Ten years ago this summer, my two best friends and I were talking about our lives, and the future, and all kinds of good stuff like that. It was the summer of the year we all turned 20. We had just finished our second year of school, all at different schools, and were reminiscing about all the time we spent together in High School and marveling at how our lives were going in such different directions.
We concocted this plan, that in ten years we would travel to Europe together, on a Grand Tour for the three best friends! We'd all be 30 by then, or just a few months away from it. We'd be out of school, in the middle of our fabulous careers and living our fabulous lives and would be in a much better position financially then than the three college students we were, to be able to travel all over the place and explore the world! We'd have ten years to plan our trip, and figure out what we wanted to see and do, and how we would accomplish it. It would be just the three of us- no boyfriends, no husbands, no kids- if any of them existed yet! :) It would give us a chance to hang out together, explore the world together, and catch up on all the things that are missed when you live far away from each other.
Marvelous plan. Although we'd talked about it off and on for the intervening ten years, I think we all secretly wondered if we'd be able to do it, if it would really work.
Fast forward to fall of 2006. We suddenly realized that if we're going to go, now is the time to start planning! Wow! So we started talking about the logistics of the plan, first and foremost, where, specifically, do we want to go? Let's go to countries where at least one of us can speak the language. Well, since we'd each studied different languages, that ended up covering most of western Europe. Ok, what about the places where our families are from? That ended up covering as many places, if not more, and more scattered at that. OK, what about...
We then just started brainstorming a list. A lot of things had happened in the last ten years, and we'd each spent time in various places in Europe, so the list was a bit different than it would have been in 1997. Ultimately we had a list of about 10 places amongst the three of us, from which we had to whittle our decision down to two or three. We figured we could comfortably travel for about two weeks, so two places sounded about right- less travel time and more time to enjoy the places we chose!
Italy and Greece were decided upon for our two destinations. T found a magazine article about a fantastic place in Tuscany, and after some research into the Greek islands we decided to go to the Cyclades, and specifically Mykonos, I think because it has an airport so travel would be a bit faster.
Before we knew it we were ordering plane tickets and making hotel reservations- holy cow! We're actually going!!!
As for our stipulation about husbands and kids... well, I guess we were a little naive and optimistic at 20! T's husband R was AMAZINGLY supportive of her plan to travel for two weeks without him, and AM and I made our travel plans without having to consult anyone first. :)
And that's how it started! :)
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