By Linda Ballou, NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate Note: This is a first in a series of three articles detailing the Ultimate Safari experience with Overseas Adventure Travel, aka OATS, in the countries of Botswana, Zimbabwe, and Zambia. There is simply too much ground to cover in one article. It’s late May in Chobe National Park, Africa’s third largest wildlife preserve, and creatures great and small are fat and sassy. Tall golden grasses are plentiful. They are the favorite of the many herds of massive elephants and a host of antelope along with Cape buffalo, zebra, and more. The... Read More

By Linda Ballou, NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate I am thrilled to be taking the “Ultimate 17-day Safari” with Overseas Adventure Travel. It promises total immersion into the African culture and a close up and personal look at creatures large and small. We will travel  to conservation-minded Botswana; less-traveled Zimbabwe where I will partake of an elephant-back safari near Victoria Falls, the largest curtain of water in the world; and to Zambia for  incredible game viewing while canoeing the mighty Zambezi River. I have wanted to experience the Okavango Delta in Botswana since... Read More

By Linda Ballou, NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate A single white sail drifts by where I lay on warm sand beneath a fringe of palm trees. Hotel guests on paddle boards and a family of locals floating like a raft of ducklings in translucent water share the unspoiled beach. St. Croix, the gentle virgin, as Cruzans call their sleepy isle, is off the grid for most tourists. Sitting on the horizon nearly 38 nautical miles way, bustling St. Thomas is bombarded with cruise ships three times a day, while St. Croix gets a visit about once a week! Sharon North Pohl, avid horsewoman and founder of... Read More

By Linda Ballou, NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate John Muir explored the fiords of Glacier Bay in 1879 in a sixty-foot, spruce canoe with a Tlingit Indian guide. I’m glad to be aboard The Spirit of Adventure, a 150- passenger catamaran with two glass-enclosed decks to roam, and an open deck on top for viewing. Our Captain, a jaunty young woman with a ponytail down to her waist, is wearing a crisp naval white and blue uniform. The introduction to the cruise, given by the ship’s naturalist, a national park ranger, is interrupted by the sighting of a sow with two cubs. While I scan the... Read More

By Linda Ballou NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate Cruise up Highway 101 overlooking sweeps of white sand beach framing brilliant blue on a sun-filled California day to Santa Barbara. Take Mission Canyon Road inland to the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden. Stroll miles of garden paths that meander through meadows of wildflowers, other worldly succulents, and deep into a shady redwood glade. Share a picnic lunch with butterflies and bluebirds flitting among the aromatic sage. Want to take a piece of the garden home with you; stop at the Garden Store where indigenous plants and more are for sale. On... Read More

By Linda Ballou NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate Today I’d like you to meet Annie Coburn, a vivacious, energetic woman who can’t stop traveling. (That’s her looking cool beside her motorcycle over to the left.) An accomplished videographer, she adds sparkle to her content in her newsletter Fab Senior Travel with videos providing insider tidbits for visitors to a specific region. Annie is the author of detailed guidebooks for walking tours in major cities designed to take the stress out of travel. Even though I have been to London many times and thought I knew my way around,... Read More

By Linda Ballou NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate Yachats (pronounced Yah-hots) is a Chinook name that means dark water. Nestled at the foot of spruce-sheathed mountains overlooking the wide mouth of a bay where the Yachats River meets the Pacific, it was the site of a thriving village. Today, squealing toddlers play in soft purling waves while parents throw Frisbees to happy dogs on a vast expanse of hard-packed sand. I couldn’t resist wading in the clear water and watching the kaleidoscopic bubble lines kiss the sand as white puffs of clouds overhead morphed into streamers across a brilliant... Read More

Solutions for Solo Travelers by Linda Ballou NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate   Boomer women make up the largest segment of the travel population. Freed from the ties of family responsibilities, and with a little extra money in their jeans, they want to explore. Often they have husbands who are not interested in travel, or they can’t round up a friend who shares their wanderlust. Yet, this segment of the population often feels intimated by the idea of traveling alone. Women worry about their safety for good reasons. What is more, society penalizes the solo traveler with the dreaded... Read More

Plug into Nature’s Bounty at Sacha Lodge in Ecuador’s Amazon Basin by Linda Ballou NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate   Like Jack on the beanstalk, we climbed up a giant wooden stairwell wrapping the kapok tree. A drenching rain set in before we reached a viewing platform above the protective canopy. We stood atop what must be the 9th wonder of the world with our heads tucked into the hoods of our ponchos waiting for the weather to change. Soon, blue skies opened over the platinum Napo River.   Pink flamingo hues softened gray layers of clouds. Shafts of light streamed down upon the... Read More

Saddle Up in Ecuador by Linda Ballou NABBW’s Adventure Travel Associate   What prompts a young Brit ensconced in the Parisian perfume industry to flee the continent in quest of creating the ultimate South American riding experience? That was the first of several burning questions I had for Sally Vergette, owner of RIDE ANDES, before joining her in Ecuador this September. I’m looking forward to romps through pastures in the shadow of snow-crowned volcanoes with other experienced riders on Sally’s fit and well-mannered mounts. Each day’s ride ends at a wonderful colonial estate like... Read More