So you feel you are getting old and stodgy and your trips tend to confirm this?
 

Then read this book and get a jump start for your latent serpendipity. Its written by an Australian man who decides to fufill his boyhood dream of touring Italy on a vespa to celebrate his 40th birthday.
It's light and fun reading and just may push all of us off the beaten paths and let the wind blow in our hair again.

"Vroom With A View" by Peter Moore. I got it at amazon.uk.

Any books you have read that have inspired you to take to the road in a different style than you usually do?

I was fairly green to travel when I first read it, but Paul Theroux's _The Kingdom By The Sea_ really enthralled me and has subsequently influenced not only how I travel but also how to examine and learn from the things around me. I like all of his writings -- this is my favorite.

Thanks for the recommend SeaUrchin. I may just go check that out.

I enjoy reading Michael Palin's books(of Monty Python fame) as well as a few video specials he's done. The last of his I read was following in the tracks of Hemingway through Africa, Cuba, Italy and Spain.

So far though, I don't feel so very stodgy! Off on an independant drive through Romania and rural Hungary in "just" 46 days. Looking forward to that wind!

Oh SeaUrchin, what I wouldn't give to be old and stodgy and 40 again! :-D

I thought you were going to say that he planned to do it when he was 40 but never did, so he decided to do it at 80. Now that would be inspiring!

Actually, we tend to have the opposite problem. We think we can do anything, and occasionally get a painful reminder that we are no longer in our 20's.

SeaUrchin - Thank you for the book suggestion. It has just jumped to the top of my Chrismas list for my son. One of the highlights of his trip to Italy last spring was when he and his brother rented scooters in Florence and scooted all over town. He kept calling it his "vroom vroom" and he had a blast. One of the best values we found on the trip so if anybody wants to rent a scooter in Florence go for it. It made for some interesting photo opportunities and some hair raising tales over the dinner table. Take Care Jackie

I'm with Marilyn.

Old and stodgy?? Pfffff!!! On the other hand, no one would ever have gotten me on a Vespa, even in my 20s.

A book I liked very much that was somewhat inspirational in this same vein was Without Reservations.

Who you callin' old and stodgy? We're thinking of renting a Vespa in Paris to avoid crowded metros and buses, without having to worry about parking problems, and we'll never see 40 again. Did I say 40? Maybe a few more...

We learned to love travel in our 20s when stationed in Germany in the Army in the 70s. We traveled all over Europe in a VW. No money, but we made it to all the major cities and sights.

Now still at it in our late 50s. Over 25 trips to Europe and still having a blast. Don't let age be a factor. You have to go to explore and see new things or you get old real fast!

Another good book by Peter Moore is Swahili for the Broken-Hearted. It is about his trip from Capetown to Cairo.

Hi Everyone!

Well, that post sucked me in....:)

I am not feeling old and stodgy and neither is my husband, who's 15 years older than I am (mainly cuz I won't LET him)! The poor guy has walked more than he ever thought he would in Europe and tried things he never thought he would (and liked 'em)! I'm convinced his family probably thinks I'm after the insurance money! :)

I'll take my inspiration from one of my clients (I'm a travel agent). A few years ago I had a gentleman at age 101 years old who travelled from California to Australia to play GOLF.....alone...."my wife doesn't want to go". I made his air arrangements for him and hotel accommodations nearby a course he wanted to play. But it wasn't THAT near the course, and I worried how he would get there, as he didn't drive. No, he assured me, he'd get a BUS schedule and figure it out..(yes, well, you can see why I was still worried).....he comes back and I call to find out how everything went....

oh, he's as happy as a clam! Well, he struck up a conversation with the owners of the hotel I put him in and they had their vegetable / handyman guy give him a lift to the links every day. Then he made friends with one of the caddys and that guy drove him back to the hotel each day!

I love these sorts of stories!

Melodie

OK, Melodie, after your story, I have to tell one of my 83 year young friend (also a Califonian) who was with a group in Rome and a pickpocket got into her purse and stole her glasses case, thinking it was her wallet. She started hitting him with her walking stick, he started yelling for "help", dropped her case and ran off. The crowd cheered her! What a heroine, huh?

I never felt that I was old and stodgy when I was 40 years old..

Like marylin said, I would not mind to be stodgy if I could be 40 again...

From perusing the posts above, it seems like we Californians are young at heart. I'm with Marilyn too, my curiosity about what's going on around the next corner (literally and figuratively) has not diminished with increasing age, and I hope it never does, because that will truly define stodgy.

((Y)) ((Y)) ((Y))

Well, good for all of you or us. Of course none of you are really stodgy, but, I think you can be stodgy at any age! (I really should look up the word stodgy before I use it anymore here).

My recent personal inspiration is the Greek woman I wrote about in my dancing nude post a while ago.

But this book is so joyous it made me want to jump on a vespa and take to the Roman Roads and have the little adventures he had where fellow tourists rarely tread, even in Italy.

Thanks for the book ideas, any more?

Ride a Vespa if you're stodgy..ride a Harley if you're RICH and stodgy????

Well, we're not from California, but I just tried to look up the word "stodgy" in my family dictionary, and couldn't find it anywhere! I think my greatgrandmother erased it altogether before she left us to explore dancing in heaven at the age of 104! We (especially the women of the clan) have always followed in her footsteps...

Vespas are great fun, and are a main form of transportation for lots of folks young and old, in Europe, do they know something we don't?

My inspiration for unusual travel though, is a fellow named Alex I found on a forum for folding bicycles (I ride a Brompton), He writes a blog while traveling around the world on his little folding bike. He's ridden through and across Europe, the Middle East, Asia, Africa. I have a great picture of him and his bicycle with the Himalayas in the background. He is a real wonder, as are his adventures and stories! I believe he lets a major amount of wind blow through his hair! I think he's in his mid forties, but I don't think age is of any importance to him, and never will be!

Peter Moore writes a good story, thanks for the suggestion!

Stodginess (is there such a word?) has nothing to do with age but with attitude and activity.

For example, when I stand on my tiptoes, I can see age 80 approaching at warp speed. My wife and I are planning a trip to India.

My good friend, of the opposite political party but otherwise of sound mind, looks at me in mock horror. But it's so far, he says. He would never consider going anywhere but Wisconsin, just as his family and ancestors have done for the past 70 years.

Go figure. Different strokes for different folks.

Topman, if I get a Harley out of the deal, I could live with a lable like rich and stodgy! Personally, I'd love to get my dad's old 47 panhead back (bought a couple years old when he was just a kid himself). That would be a roadtrip waiting to happen - but that bike (and dad) took a header off a bridge in the 50's. :( Then there was the 56 hog that made it just to the lowest limbs of a really big oak. Everyone's ok after all that and I still have the original Brando style hat with the ivory brim that came with that 56. It's a shame you have to have a pile of cash to own one these days. Harleys used to be for people with.. ba... uh, a certain willingness to break things. :)

Yes of course it is a state of mind to want to have adventure, even a mild adventure like riding a motor bike in Italy.

Continuing in my cheerleader mode: Two good books I have read with adventure tales most of us would just like to read about:

No Mercy by Redmond O'Hanlon - journey into the Heart of the Congo - very well written, on the cover it says "some slapstick, existential dread and brilliant digressions". I really like his writing.

Stranger in the Forest - solo traveler hiking through Borneo and his interactions with a tribe of nomadic hunters.
Motoring With Mohammed - solo travel in Yemen after a shipwreck. Both by Redmond O'Hanlon, great writer too.

BTW Peter Moore has a web site: www.petermoore.net which includes a slide show of his trips, I am going to read his other books now too.

People usually "feel" old and stodgy on milestone birthdays, then chose to accept it or fight it. Fodorites probably fight it as you all have noted.