In a post early in the month, someone asked about traveling alone. While most of our discussion focused on safety, I also suggested some ways to start dipping your toes into the solo waters and ease into traveling by yourself. One of my suggestions was to take a tour. You're alone, but you're not.

To expand on that a bit, I wanted to mention that there are numerous tour companies out there that specialize in women's travel. Trips near and far, familiar and exotic, by, with and for women. Such a tour could be just the ticket.

The TIME article about baby boomer women that we talked about earlier mentioned one company, Gutsy Women Travel( www.gutsywomentravel.com ). Gail Golden, the owner, says that half the women who sign up for her tours are married, but their husbands aren't interested in travel. So, she goes, he stays home, and everybody's happy.

You might also want to check out Evelyn Hannon's Journeywoman.com ( www.journeywoman.com ). You can sign up for the free Journeywoman newsletter that lists dozens of wonderful trips just for women. Hannon's site and newsletter are good places to connect with other women travelers and find information about travel possibilities you never knew existed. You'll want to update your passport by the time you log off.

Lori, what recommendations do you have for someone who has never been to California, but only has one week to visit?

I have never been. I'm dying to get there. Thank so much.

Dotsie, for a first-time visitor to California with one week to spend, I'd say San Francisco should absolutely be your target.

It's a physically gorgeous city with history, architecture, ethnic neighborhoods, views and restaurants galore. It's vibrant, colorful, brilliant. Beaches, bridges, hills, painted ladies (Victorian and otherwise), boat trips, cable cars, surfing, shopping. I could go on and on.

And, just outside the city, there's an array of day trips to choose from. Take the ferry across the bay to Sausalito. (I've walked back to San Francisco from Sausalito -- around the headlands and over the Golden Gate Bridge. A long, windy walk, but it was great fun.) You can travel south on Route 1 to Monterey, taking in incredible coastal scenery and towns enroute. Or, head north over the Golden Gate to the Marin County headlands and redwoods. Keep going north, and you come to Point Reyes and Bodega Bay, hauntingly beautiful and remote-feeling (passing glorious Stinson Beach that I mentioned in an earlier post). And, of course, there's wine country, if vineyard-visiting is something that interests you.

One week for a California first-timer? San Francisco, hands down. You could spend a month and still miss half.

She's never been to California? I think we have a communist on our hands!

Dianne,
That's exactly what I've been telling her. Dotsie has never been to the desert either and I'm not sure she's ever even been west of the Rockies. That should be illegal!

I think since she's never been to CA before, she should go to southern California where it's really "California" with a capital C.

San Fran may be far too sophisticated. I mean the scenery is fabulous, but shucks, it's almost like Baltimore or some classy place like that (Well except for a few places that is). I think Dots should tour Hollywood with all it's sleaze. She needs to go to Venice Beach and do all the really low down California stuff. She could go see Jay Leno and take the Universal Studio tour and go to the amusement park then amble down to San Diego and over into Tiajuana and Rosarita!! She could stay those beautiful hotels with rooms that open directly onto the ocean.

And she could shop all along the strips where you can buy drugs without a prescription and everyone comes out to try to entice you in and the men all flirt with you and it's kind of dirty and all the overpasses are painted in themes of fish and umbrellas and beach balls with bright Mexican colors.

WHOOEE! That would put her in culture shock for sure. Gee, I want to go too.
smile

[ May 23, 2005, 06:26 PM: Message edited by: smilinize ]

P.S. And she could go to the bullfight in Tiajuana! Boy what a trip that would be. We gotta' get this woman indoctrinated to the "colorful" side of life.

Haaaa! LOL. You guys know Dotsie better than I do. Maybe southern Cal is the best place for her to spend her very first California week. Baptism by sleaze, beachballs and bullfights.

Yup, on second thought, Dotsie, save San Francisco for your second trip. Head to L.A., San Diego and Tijuana. And take Smile along as your tour guide. She seems to know all the hot spots!

Oh Lori,
I'm so glad you agree. Dotsie really NEEDS to go on the sleaze tour. And Venice Beach will be a wake up call for sure. She would love the chain saw jugglers and the world's oldest wino and the nearly naked joggers.

The Tiajuana bullfight is best with a few--no a bunch -- of very cold Coronas. The music is spectacular, very operatic with dozens of horns and all the musicians dressed in bejeweled purple outfits with jeweled purple sombreros. Surrounding the arena is a carnival type thing with color everywhere.

And driving down the Baha coast to Rosarita and Mexicali is a an absolute feast for the eyes and the spirit. The ocean laps the road in places and the hotels are practically in the water.

Everything is a handmade work of art from ornate mirrors to mud dolls. There are Mexican wedding dresses, hand tooled leather purses. gun belts and saddles. Evrything is paited in the bright colors of Mexico. But if you stop to shop, hire the kids who will come up to ask to watch your car, or else the wheels may leave while you're gone. Love it.

Oh yes and don't drink the water. Tequilla is recommended for breakfast, lunch and dinner. WHOOOEE!!

Oh Dots, I should turn around and go with you. I like Mexico and So. Cal. even more than D.C.
smile

Notice how quickly we moved from San Francisco to Mexico? It's all connected. Life is one big road trip.

I've never been to a bullfight. I think I'd need a boatload of Coronas just to get through it. Do they kill the bulls in Mexico?

My brother-in-law lives in Phoenix and owns an RV, and every spring he piles his family in the camper and they head down the Mexican coast on the other side of the Gulf of California from the Baja Peninsula. They camp right on the beach in a little town whose name escapes me. It's not all that far south of Nogales, and lots of Americans head down there to camp. I'll have to send him an email and dig up the name of the town.

Have you been to Cabo, Smile? You've got me wanting to drive down the Baja coast to Rosarita. Sounds fabulous.

Why don't you see D.C. real quick, swing up to Baltimore and kidnap Dotsie, and then whisk her west to school her in the ways of chainsaw jugglers and tequila breakfasts.

I love San Fran too. Drove along highway 101? up the coast all the way to Oregon. What beautiful scenery. Have you seen the sea lion caves? I loved that. Of couse up the east coast is beautiful too.

But there's nothing quite like southern California and Mexico.

Been to canbo. Beautiful. Xtapa even more beautiful and and peurto vallarta a little touristy but luxurious and cancun, nice, Guatalahara, rich and poor, Mexico city rich and poor too.

I wonder if your friends in Phoenix go to Peruto Penasco a.k.a. Rocky Point. Oh what an adventure I had there. Beautiful too. And the food was wonderful. Huge fresh caught, fresh grilled shrimp like I've never tasted before or since.

BTW, I have written an unsubmitted, unpublished, novel about a middle aged divorcee traveling to all those places with a much younger lover. Long story... (250 pages). It was lots of fun researching and writing.

Go west young Dotsie, Go WEST!!
smile
P.S. Yes they do kill the bulls if the bulls don't kill them first. Very dangerous sport. Blood everywhere. We rode on a bus to the fight. A guhy on there was in a body cast and lucky to be alive. He couldn't wait to get the cast off so he could fight again. Of course they do butcher and eat the bulls so I guess it's not all in vain. It was an experience.

[ May 24, 2005, 01:32 AM: Message edited by: smilinize ]