Man Plans, God Laughs

Our friend Tamar recently shared this old Yiddish proverb with us, and it couldn't be more appropriate for the last few weeks for us Vagabonds. We've watched as each component of our 10-month travel plan has slipped away, even after multiple adjustments, as we all experience the effects of the pandemic. Just as one example, our cruise went from we'll still take it but debark in Spain instead of Italy, to we can cancel our cruise with no penalty for a voucher to be used in the future, to the cruise is totally canceled and money will (maybe) be refunded instead of  a voucher, to, ok, we'll take a cruise to Hawaii out of San Diego, to all cruises are canceled for at least the next 30 days. "God": 🤣.

While this has been disappointing after the months of planning and anticipation, we can hardly complain when we look around and see all the troubles and challenges others are facing, from friends and family on 'lockdown' in Italy to people struggling to feed, homeschool, and find care for children who suddenly aren't in school for an undetermined amount of time.

Here's where we stand on a few things:

• Despite our travel insurance not covering a pandemic, we've been able to recoup, either in refunds or vouchers, most of our pre-paid travel expenses. We won't lose more than $500. The total tally is not in because some items are still outstanding.
• Our AirBnB host in Alicante has graciously agreed to let us move our two months reservation, mostly non-refundable, to the Fall, to precede our planned transatlantic cruise returning to the States in late October. We remain optimistic that this portion of our plan may still be possible.
• Emily's conferences have all been canceled, as well as her planned trip to meet us in England in July. We're looking at the bright side, as the George Garden in Liverpool is to open in 2021, so we'll try again next year and maybe get to see that! Emily has also been instructed to work remotely for the remainder of the academic year. Unfortunately, the sitar ensemble concert was canceled, so we didn't get to attend that this year, as hoped, but Emily gave us a mini-concert.

Most importantly, we've been having a wonderful time in California and retirement is off to a good start. Here's a fun wine we discovered at our visit to ButtonWood Winery and Vineyard:

While we would love to stay in California longer, as we really have no time commitments, we realize that if we are to be in the States for a while, we need to go retrieve Marina. Otherwise, our main budget item will be rental cars! Marina is currently stored in north Florida, so our next plan (and we're hesitant to say that!) is to head back to the East Coast later this week, as originally (for the purposes of leaving on our cruise) planned. We still don't know where / how long we will spend the next couple of months - we'll tell you when we get there. 😀