Disclosure: I covered the 2014 Travel and Adventure Show at the Santa Clara Convention Center. All opinions are my own.
I truly believe that “travel and adventure” are a lifestyle choice. Some people are born to cook. Some people are born to play sports. Some people are born to have a successful career, and some are born for travel and adventure. I like to believe I am the latter.
My days of travel started at a young age, around age 7 when I was taken to Walt Disney World for the very first time. My eyes opened wide at the possibilities of travel. They continued to expand at 17 when I flew to Australia and New Zealand for 3 weeks of discovery and experiencing an entirely new culture. And just a few years ago, an entirely new world opened up when I got brave enough to move across the country.
Needless to say, travel and adventure come hand and hand, and this is exactly why I believe it’s a lifestyle choice. Last weekend, I drove myself down to the Santa Clara Convention Center to take part in the Bay Area Travel and Adventure Show. Since new to the Bay Area I thought it’d be a great time to teach myself about Northern California and the surrounding regions along with put a bit of a travel bug into my ear.
I started my morning off by focusing on the different California Region booths surrounding the show. I am continuing to teach myself about the California area and soon made a list of places I want to visit in my near future: Mt. Diablo, Sacramento, Gold Country, Paso Robles, Pismo Beach, Half Moon Bay, Mendocino County and many more places.
I stopped to chat with the Fresno Zoo. He’s there holding a Red Tail Boa Constrictor. This picture was as close as I could get. They also had other reptiles they were showing throughout the day.
And then I decided to get adventurous and try a few things:
I’d always wanted to try climbing a rock wall. And since the opportunity was there I thought I’d try it. Yes, I am barefoot. I was doing good until about halfway up when I looked down and the heights started to get to me. It definitely gets tougher the higher you get up. Some of the rocks become farther apart then to get down, you grab above you and the rope will carry you down. An interesting experience, and now I can say I’ve done it.
Another thing I’d always wanted to try were also the Segways. Lucky for me, they had set up a course along the show for people to try it out thanks to Santa Cruz Segway Tours. What did I learn? That for me, I wasn’t very good at operating one. I couldn’t tilt my body forward all that well so needless to say, Segway was not for me, but I watched how easily so many others picked it up.
Then I was off to learn a bit:
First from Lee Foster, the author of many popular books about Northern California. This presentation’s focus was on Northern California, and he took us on a photographic journey of places to see and visit in Northern California. Needless to say, he gave me inspiration to get out and begin exploring and made my Northern California list a bit longer.
I also sat in on a presentation with Joe Dias from Afar Magazine as he talked about his passion for travel and how his business began. And if you haven’t heard of Afar Experiences, you should really look into it. They make traveling even better through close encounter experiences. Samantha Brown and Rick Steves were also present at the show offering their wisdom to the crowd and signing books afterwards.
And soon, I found my traveling bug, and began to travel after the show and landed in some place new:
The Santa Cruz Boardwalk
Until next year Adventure Expo. They will be in the Los Angeles area February 8th and 9th, be sure to check to it out. A good place to learn about regional destinations or to book a trip to somewhere far and make that dream vacation a reality along with tons of chances to win a getaway yourself.
