Bucket Lists and Country Counting -- Revisited

I've been scrolling back through my blog, doing some clean-up. I'm rediscovering the fact that I like to write (when I overcome inertia and do it), and although I'm not a rock star, I'm a reasonably competent writer. Which means I need to get back at it after a pretty long hiatus (again).

In my journey through my archives, I discovered an entry from 2016 about my bucket list. Back then, I had a few specific things on my list and a general goal of seeing the world. Today, faced with the reality of COVID-19 and the possibility that future travel will be significantly curtailed, I feel very fortunate that we've been able to really fill our buckets to overflowing in the last four years.

My list from 2013 and how I've done:

• Machu Picchu -- fall of 2016
• Panama Canal -- January 2020
• Great Barrier Reef -- Spring 2017
• Easter Island -- this fall (we hope)

In the past four years, I've been to 28 new countries plus revisiting a few old favorites. (Jim added 1 more -- Poland -- which I had already visited on business years ago.) That brings the total to 85 for me and 79 for Jim.  And that makes us incredibly lucky people!

Friends sometimes ask if we have any place else on our list or if we've seen everyplace worth seeing? We've ticked off most of the major sites people want to visit, but we haven't begun to exhaust the list of possibilities. So assuming it becomes possible to travel again and that we're still physically and financially able to do it, here's my current bucket list (in no particular order):

• Easter Island
• Rwanda and the gorillas
• Uganda
• Caucasus (Georgian, Armenia, Azerbaijan) 
• Japan (I've been there, but only on business)
• South Pacific islands
• Nova Scotia
• Turkey (beyond Istanbul and Ephesus)
• Ethiopia
• Israel
• Ireland (people can't believe we've never been there!)
• Indonesia and Bali
• Southern Spain
• Tuscany and the Italian coast
• Greenland and the northwest passage
• The parts of the Persian Gulf / Arabian peninsula that it is possible to visit
• And of course, I'd like to reach 100 countries

Definitely an aspirational list that continues to grow. As we get older, we need to prioritize the more difficult trips ahead of the easier ones. We need to trek to see the gorillas in Rwanda sooner rather than later. Perhaps relaxing on a ship in the South Pacific should wait a few years. We've also discovered the tremendous pleasure of traveling with friends so that factors into our choices. 

At this point, the future in general and the future of international travel in particular, is very uncertain. But in times of uncertainty, it is still good to have dreams.