“I’m going to go ahead and break the ice on this one,” I said to my fellow Trafalgar travelers, all of which are at least 40 years my senior (not counting my parents), “because when we walked in, everyone must have thought, ‘Are they lost?!'”
The crowd, thankfully, laughed as I introduced my family, mentioned my recent graduation, and explained that I work in the travel business. “That’s why I’m the only 22-year old who even knows about Trafalgar.”
Ten minutes prior to that introduction, my whole family had exchanged the What the heck have we gotten ourselves into look. When we walked into the lounge to meet the other Trafalgar travelers, we were as wary of them as they were of us. The whole room had their eyes glued to us as we grabbed a booth in the back. Then, without missing a beat, one of the men reached out his hand and introduced himself to my dad.
“Dave, meet Dave,” he said, reaching out a hand to my dad and pointing to their name tags. “How’d you drag her along on this trip?” he asked, gesturing toward me.
Dad was quick to correct that I dragged them along on this trip. Our new friend informed me of how lucky I am to have parents willing to take me on such an elaborate graduation trip. I definitely agree.
Russell, our tour guide, said his hellos and went over our itinerary for the upcoming days. Then, he set us free to individually stand and introduce ourselves, which is when I addressed the aforementioned elephant in the room. After our meet and greet, a friendly woman approached me. Out of the thirty people in that room, there was a fellow University of Georgia graduate. If it’s not a small enough world already, she had previously taught in Columbus at the high school my father attended. What. Are. The. Odds?!
On our way back to the room, we rode the elevator with a man who eagerly looked at his watch and said, in a British accent, “It’s 2 AM where I’m from! Not bad for a 104 year old man!”
I have a feeling there are going to be some characters on this trip – in a good way – full of an excitement for life, a passion for travel, and eager to tell their own stories…and you know how much I love stories.
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