Choir Italy

Choir Tour of Italy

Summer 2007

            Planning for this international concert tour (OK, maybe that’s a bit over the top) began some 3 years ago w/ an audition tape to the Vatican.  This is the end of my 2^nd year w/ the St. Pius X choir, so some might think I just jumped on the bandwagon.  Not so.  I joined at Marjorie’s urging to help get my mind off department chair annoyances, initially didn’t plan to go on the trip  ̶  we had a wonderful fall trip thru Italy about 10 years ago and M wasn’t so interested in Italy July heat.  And after all, I’ve done a choral tour.  Yep, freshman year, U of R Men’s Glee Club, exciting venues like Detroit & Guelph.  But Italy and singing for the Pope has a bit more cachet, even for an old Presbyterian, plus the choir’s a terrific bunch who’d be fun to travel with.  Decided I shouldn’t pass up such a special experience.  Thought we might find a last minute bargain for Marjorie to join us for the weekend in Rome, but couldn’t find anything reasonable.  She participated in fundraising activities, and has been my personal travel planner for cool washable clothes & a carry-all bag (since I won’t have her purse to rely on).

            The choir’s been very busy over the past 2 years.  Fundraising included a wonderful concert by visiting Vatican organist James Goettsche, a Cafe Italiano soiree, raffles, Christmas ornaments, “greatest hits” choir CD.  Sweet white-haired Sister Mary, who’s also our flutist, proved quite a bargainer in wangling a terrific deal for buses from Albany to the airports (there’s talk that eternal damnation was mentioned in the negotiations).  Arrangements in Italy made thru Peter’s Way, specialists in such tours (Marjorie’s brother-in-law Jeff’s Kansas City choir used them for a similar trip).  The Vatican says choirs must dress uniformly  ̶  we didn’t want robes, instead selected black blouses/shirts & pants, the men’s mandarin shirt collars making us look like a gaggle of seminarians.  And extensive & challenging music.  Charles, our terrific director (just in case he reads this), has done a wonderful job bringing us along, introducing each piece in sections so we become comfortable over time.  Catchy titles like Ave Verum & Cantate Domino, many Italian & Latin lyrics to learn how to pronounce.  And over the past few months he’s peppered us with all sorts of travel reminders and tips; and I thought I was obsessive about travel details!

Friday, June 22:

            We give an Andiamo a Roma concert at church with all our Italy music.  After some rehearsal confusion about lining up and marching in, Marjorie says our procession is impressive.  Don’t know that “master” is the best word, but it seems we’re on top of the music.  I’m next to a tenor w/ a big voice but feel good that I’m able to hit my bass notes w/ confidence (mostly, anyway).  A standing ovation from the audience, Charles seems pleased.  Guess we’re ready; maybe Charles won’t make us practice on the flights and bus rides.  And my chiropractor, who I’ve seen after back problems on our early May Greece trip, says my joints are aligned and good to go.

Cross-Canada Train

Ridin’ the Rails Across Canada

September 2014

We’re bookending the summer with 2 of Marjorie’s travel favorites: spring river cruise on one end, fall train excursion on the other; oh, it’s nice to be semi-retired! And we head off on her birthday! A Google search found indications of good fall colors in the Canadian Rockies by mid-September, so our timing should be good. [♫Think I’ll go out to Alberta, weather’s good there in the Fall♫  ̶  Ian & Sylvia, “Four Strong Winds”] Tho there were reports of some snow in early Sept.! After some recent escorted package tours, I got back to my travel planning roots to arrange train and air travel, rental car, hotels, sightseeing options. Didn’t wait for possible VIA Rail fare sales, as there were indications by late May that cabins already selling out on some trains and also for some hotels of interest; but able to rebook for substantial savings when a subsequent sale popped up. This is a flashback to our 1974 train trip from Wisconsin to Seattle and back w/ M’s Mom & Aunt Marge; they shared a cabin, but we were young (and poor) and slept in our seats for a few overnights. We’ll go more comfortably this time. Our other mainly train trips have taken us thru Italy & Switzerland, but this is our 1^st w/ a cabin. Marjorie (and the house) are (mostly) recovered from her usual creative frenzy for the big Stockade Art Show last weekend.

Iceland

“Spring Break” in Iceland

March 2015

            Seriously, Spring Break in Iceland? Granted, it’s not beaches & palm trees, but to paraphrase a famous movie line: We don’t need no stinkin’ beaches! Iceland has been on our to-do-sometime list, and interest was further stimulated last spring when we flew to Europe on Icelandair thru Keflavik airport outside Reykjavik. Pretty views of the countryside, enticing tourist info in the seat pockets. My brother Doug & sister-in-law Ann had an enjoyable escorted tour circling the country during the summer. We’ve opted for a shorter 3-night visit focused on Reykjavik w/ some add-on excursions. Nearing the end of 2 academic years of “semi-retirement,” this is my last semester of teaching  ̶  we chose the March break in classes to put us into the Northern Lights season (fingers crossed). Iceland is just south of the Arctic Circle, but the Gulf Stream keeps temps “surprisingly moderate” (says one travel site), should be in the 20s and 30s (fingers crossed again). And volcanoes will hopefully be calm (are we running out of fingers to cross?). We hoped to connect w/ former colleague Thor, an Icelandic native who left UAlbany to take a very attractive offer back home, but he’s located too far north in Akureyri.

            We’ve been having a pretty rough winter. By early March we still had over 2 feet of snow on the ground. Our paper says it was “the coldest February in our lifetime” (the only colder was 1934), wind chills down to -30°! So maybe Iceland will warm us up.

Saturday, 3/14:

We have the luxury of almost a full day to finish our trip prep. Not our usual packing: we need to be ready for both cold (e.g., long underwear) and rain. I watch the UAlbany men’s basketball team win their league championship on a last-second 3-pointer by the player whose mother died during the season after the team and campus had rallied around the family; the women’s team won yesterday, so both are headed to “March Madness.” We’re finally seeing some grass over the past week here, tho plenty of snow piles still around. A rainy foggy drive to NYC, the usual exciting ride thru traffic in the Bronx & Queens, drop off the car (airparkparking.com) and shuttle to JFK. It’s good we weren’t flying last night or this AM: lots of lengthy delays and cancellations due to gale force winds up to 75 mph in Iceland; even bus tours into the countryside were being cancelled. But our Icelandair 9pm flight departs a bit early. So we’re off to the land of fire and ice, hopefully not much of either.

Bermuda

Bermuda

January 1982

[This is a precursor of what would become routine journals of our trips.  It was written as a letter addressed to “Dear Family,” mostly by Marjorie with Russ adding in some things here and there. It’s been revised into my journal “style.” This was our first travel “splurge,” in memory of, and funded by a small inheritance from, Russ’ Aunt Jessie. We pulled our then little Matthew out of school; didn’t think missing a week of kindergarten would stunt his intellectual growth too much.]

           

Yesterday we left Albany in 15º weather.  After good flights (Albany to Newark and Newark to Bermuda) we step off the plane into a 65º downpour!  By evening the rain has stopped but there are gale force winds.  Plus Matthew has a bit of a fever.  I go to dinner in the hotel (Mermaid Beach) and bring stuff back for M & M.  Our room overlooks the ocean so it’s quite a noisy night between the roaring winds and the crashing surf.  

By morning everything has calmed down and we have a lovely day: sunny & 70º! Beautiful views of the rocky shore and beach from our little balcony. One of our morning routines is feeding bread to little birds on our balcony; almost any time anyone goes out on the balcony they start lining up.  A cute little lizard also visits occasionally, even posing for pictures. Breakfast in the hotel dining room (the food is great!).  Matthew feels fine this AM but has a rash that we think might be chicken pox.  What a start that would be to our island vacation!  The hotel calls in a local doctor (very British), who says Matthew is fine, not chicken pox.  She asks what our plans are, and kindly gets us started by driving us to the Aquarium.