St. Lucia marked my 100th country in December 2022! My love for understanding world cultures was inspired by my father’s family, who emigrated to the US from the Netherlands in 1949, and my mother, who loved traveling.
At age 14, I read about explorer John Goddard in Life magazine, who had established a “Life List” when he was 15 years old, and I decided to do the same. My #1 goal was to travel to at least 100 countries, and during the same year, my family and I made our first trip to Europe together.
A unique quest of mine is to see every team in the four major North American sports (baseball, football, hockey, and basketball) play in their home stadium/arena. To date, I’ve seen games in 106 of the 124 current venues (148 total). Club 124 has only 15 members. I try to incorporate local and professional sporting events into many of my trips.
