First a little about Focus Travel Club. Our leader, Ellie Leinaweaver, is a former school teacher in Jefferson County, Colorado. I met her though a mutual friend, Bob Eckhardt. Bob was our neighbor as I was growing up. We have stayed in touch all these years. In fact, we spent about 50 Christmas Eve's at his house. Last year was the first year our family and his family didn't get together on Christmas Eve. Bob invited me to join him on a trip to Scotland. It was my first trip with Focus, my first trip across the pond, my first trip with a group, and my first trip that needed a passport. Needless to say, it was a very good experience.
Focus is a very interesting group of travelers. Ellie Leinaweaver started the group when she took High School students on summer travel trips to Europe. After she retired, she kept traveling, and found other educators who liked to travel too. Focus Adventures are always well planned, have local guides, stay in very nice hotels, and visit the major sites of the area as well as some places that are not on the tour routes. We always have free time. Ellie must have some second sense, as in all three trips I have taken with Focus, we have always had a great time. We always seem to travel well together. Focus has expanded and now the trips have friends of friends of friends. Our groups are small. Scotland was about 25, Taiwan was 20 and Egypt and Southern Africa were about 15. The trips are are usually two to three weeks. And each trip lets the travelers enjoy the trip with private vehicles and great local guides. Each adventure has a few 'regulars' and a lot of new people. You can learn more about Focus by clicking here.
In 2008 I traveled to Scotland. This trip was planned by Tumare out of Boston, MA. Bob, my neighbor, was my roommate. We traveled to Glasgow, then out to the Hebrides and finally back to Edinburgh. We traveled in the same roomy bus for the entire trip, taking the bus on several ferries to move through the islands. Our guide, Ian McDonald, and our driver, Russ, were able to provide us with lots of local culture. Ian is a retired cop from Edinburgh.
I was very lucky to be able to travel to Africa twice during the 2009 calendar year. Both trips were headed by Hamdy Nossair of HLO Tours. Both trips I had Hamdy as my roommate. He is Egyptian and came to the states about 25 years ago. He is married, has two teenagers, and runs HLO Tours. He plans trips to the Middle East and Africa. One of his great characteristics is that he wants people who visit Africa--especially Egypt--to come as a tourist and leave as a friend. He sure succeeded from my point of view. In Egypt, I saw things that the tourist doesn't usually see. In Southern Africa, I got to see many of the hotels and camps through the eyes of a tour operator. Very interesting indeed. HLO plans traveling for any size group. You can learn more about HLO by clicking here
In 2010 I traveled to Taiwan, Malaysia, and Borneo. Actually, Borneo is part of Malaysia, which I didn't really understand until I arrived. Tumare did all our travel arrangements. My roommate on this trip was Steve B, a retired Baptist Minister from South Carolina. He was a good roommate. He has done some very interesting missionary work in Costa Rica and Cuba. This was a first trip to Asia for both of us.
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