Spring: The Time for Growing Travel Plans

 It’s now officially spring.  For me, that means it’s time to plant the seeds for my travel plans for the year.

It surprised me a few years ago to have someone tell me that I was someone that “went everywhere.”  When I was younger, I actually thought that I was not going to go anywhere beyond where I knew.  I didn’t seem to fit the mold of “those people” that traveled to places around the world.  It was one of the things that prompted me to read so much, to get the vicarious pleasure of going to other places I wasn’t going to visit myself.  I wanted to go to Japan “one day.”  And I wanted to attend the World Science Fiction Convention (WorldCon), which was held in a different city somewhere in the world “some day.”  But a part of me wondered if it would ever happen. 

Then in 2006, I found out that the next WorldCon would be held in Yokohama, Japan.  Having two of my “some day” goals combined into one made me realize that if I wanted to go I needed to do something about it.  So, I bought attending membership in WorldCon (after spending money to attend I’d HAVE TO go, right?).  I got my passport.  Bought the airline tickets.  Joined a tour of fellow fans traveling around the country before the convention.  I built my trip taking each step I needed to take in order to get there.

And I LOVED IT!  Once everything was set up I began to worry that, because my anticipation was so sky high, I mean it was in orbit around the planet, I would inevitably be disappointed.  But the exact opposite happened.  It exceeded my expectations by such a degree that I promised myself I would keep doing it.  I would keep going to WorldCon until something stopped me.  By adopting this attitude I went to Canada (67th WorldCon - Anticipation in Montreal), Australia (68th WorldCon - AussieCon Four), and England (72nd WorldCon - Loncon 4 in London) and all the WorldCons in American in between.   

At every WorldCon I attended I voted to have the convention return to Japan, to give me the reason to go back.  Finally, when the Japanese bid lost for the umpteenth time in a row in 2015, I decided to take the same attitude toward going back to Japan that I had to going to WorldCon.  So I did what I needed to do to go again in 2016, then again in 2017, and 2018, and 2019…

I had plans to go again in 2020, everything bought and paid for, but that’s when the word “Covid” entered our collective vocabularies.  And that’s when travel stopped.  I began to wonder if I would ever go anyplace besides work and my neighborhood again.

But travel has started to come back.  Last year were several returns.  Baseball, with fans in seats instead of cardboard cutouts, came back.  I got to spend time with my nephew in Pittsburgh and St. Louis, the first blood kin I meet face to face since Covid.  And later in the year, I got to go to visit my parents again, as well as my sister, her fiancé, her sons (my baseball loving nephew and his brother), and his son.  

And now, I’m starting to plan for my trips for this year.  

I have two types of trips I plan for, Domestic and International.

Domestic Travel

When I travel around the United States it is usually focused on three different areas of interest: Family, Baseball, and Science Fiction. And sometimes two of these will overlap on a single trip, which will often be when I’m having the most fun.  

Trips to see the family are most often done around Thanksgiving.  Sometimes Christmas, but usually only when Mom and Dad don’t want to meet around Thanksgiving.  The eldest of my two sisters died of cancer right before Thanksgiving one year.  They didn’t want to get together on Thanksgiving for a year or so after that.  

Baseball is part of my quest to see a baseball game in each stadium in Major League Baseball (MLB).  As of right now I’ve seen games in 14 different stadiums out of the 30 teams in the MLB.  My goal this year would be to reach and get past the halfway point, or see games in two stadiums I’ve not been to yet this year.  

Science Fiction refers to the conventions I go to that focus on Science Fiction, Fantasy, or Comic Book.  Before Covid I had two conventions that I went to every year.  One was the San Diego ComicCon, the largest convention in the United States related to comic books, though over the years they’ve expanded beyond comic books to encompass the “popular arts.”  Close to 200,000 people descend on San Diego in July for a week of what I sometimes refer to as a Woodstock for Nerds.  The other one has been the World Science Fiction Convention, or WorldCon.  It is a convention that is held in a different city somewhere in the world which is very tightly focused on science fiction and fantasy literature.  It’s able to move about like this due to a smaller local conventions somewhere bidding for the rights to host a WorldCon.  At each WorldCon attendees, who are members of the World Science Fiction Society for that year, will vote on the bids to select the site for the WorldCon two years hence.  

The most fun trips as those where there is some overlap.  Last year, I took advantage of the lessening of Covid restrictions and travelled to Pittsburgh and St. Louis to add the baseball parks there to my list, (respectively PNC Park and Busch Stadium).  Both times my nephews that likes baseball as much as I do joined me for the experience.  I have a friend that I met at my first WorldCon, in Yokohama, Japan, who will go with me to a baseball game if the WorldCon city we’re visiting that year has a baseball stadium, or if there is one close by.  It’s through this overlap that I’ve seen baseball games in Chicago (Wrigley Field), Kansas City (Kauffman Stadium), Oakland (Oakland Coliseum a.k.a. RingCentral Coliseum), and Yokohama Stadium (home of the DeNA Baystars, the team I support in Japan), plus the home stadium of a Single-A short season team (The Spokane Indians in Washington).

I’ve spoken with my nephew and we’re going to continue to see games together in different parks.  We’ve decided to see the Dodgers play the Brewers in Milwaukee on their one road visit to American Family Field in August.  I’m going to make the arrangements this week.  Also, my nephew lives in Tulsa, where the Dodgers have a Single A minor league affiliate (the Tulsa Drillers).  The team’s Triple A affiliate, the Oklahoma City Dodgers, are close by, so we talked about me flying out to Arkansas, visiting my folks for a few days, him coming to get me and driving us to see the Dodgers’ affiliates play.  Will need to check the schedule on that. 

I’ve not been to a WorldCon since 2018, due to work situations and Covid.  This year it’s going to be in Chicago.  I checked the schedule, and the White Sox have part of two home stands at Guaranteed Rate Field overlapping when the convention will be.  It makes it a very tempting trip to make.  With the trip to Milwaukee and then to Chicago, I should get to 16 MLB stadiums by the end of the year.  Whoya!  

Of course, I’ll be flying out to visit my folks wherever they plan on gathering the family for Thanksgiving.

International Travel

I want to go back to Japan.  I have a whole list of travel goals for Japan.  Visit there at least once each season (so far I’ve visited in the Spring and the Summer).  Visit the “major” islands, Honshu, Kyushu, Hokkaido, Shikoku, and Okinawa (I’ve not been to Okinawa yet, and I was on Shikoku only long enough to transfer to a train headed to Fukuoka).  Walk the Henro Pilgrimage in Shikoku (it takes a month, so a couple of two week vacations to complete).  AND, see a baseball game in every baseball stadium in the Nippon Professional Baseball league (NPB).  I’ve been 11 out of 12 stadiums, leaving only ZOZO stadium in Chiba, the home stadium of the Lotte Marines.  

HOWEVER, Japan is under Level 4 travel restrictions (“Do NOT Travel”) due to COVID.  I also want to go to South Korea, a burgeoning desire prompted by a interest in South Korean dramas and movies, prompting me to study the language as well, that has developed over the last few years.  But South Korea is also currently under Level 4 travel restrictions.  

I did talk to my younger brother about visiting him (he lives in Germany).  I also study Spanish and got the idea for a trip to Spain (to visit the Alhambra, which was featured in a K-Drama that I mostly liked, but thought the ending sucked, more on that in a later post, I’m sure), meeting him there, traveling by train from Spain to Paris, then to Germany to see his place and his son, whom I’ve not seen since he was a little kid (he’s now a doctor and married).  

My brother has told me he’s up for the trip, but the arrangements have seemed rather daunting, and I feel myself wondering if I can make it happen.  

But I know from experience that if I REALLY want it to happen, I just have to do it.