It’s an accepted fact that travel broadens one’s outlook especially if you’re quite young. Talk about leaving your ordinary background, imbued with the idea that this is the way things are always done and arriving in old Europe where that isn’t true at all!
In the 1950s at the ages of 17 and 22, I made 2 trips to Europe: one with a chaperoned group of girls fresh out of high school; and the other with my brother on a youth hosteling trip, biking and hitchhiking. We discovered that Europeans were less straight laced than Americans. Coming from a conservative background that was a bit of a shock.
Europeans loved to discuss politics and were very interested in America. The only politics I’d been exposed to was at the dinner table where my father, who was republican, and my uncle, who was a very left leaning democrat, engaged in shouting matches! I came home aware of a much bigger world out there. Looking back over the space of 50 or more years, these episodes were “eye openers” for me and in retrospect very funny!
School Girls Trip:
Our chaperoned group of girls in 1953 spent their evenings in Paris writing postcards to their parents. That seemed like a waste to one other girl and myself so we escaped the chaperone (she had a boyfriend in Paris and was otherwise occupied) and went out to see the town. We ended up at Pigalle with 2 young G.I.s and were shocked to see the can-can dancers with “no tops on.” A real cultural difference. Nancy and I were “true babes in the woods” and we were lucky to get back to the hotel safe and sound.
In the 1950s at the ages of 17 and 22, I made 2 trips to Europe: one with a chaperoned group of girls fresh out of high school; and the other with my brother on a youth hosteling trip, biking and hitchhiking. We discovered that Europeans were less straight laced than Americans. Coming from a conservative background that was a bit of a shock.
Europeans loved to discuss politics and were very interested in America. The only politics I’d been exposed to was at the dinner table where my father, who was republican, and my uncle, who was a very left leaning democrat, engaged in shouting matches! I came home aware of a much bigger world out there. Looking back over the space of 50 or more years, these episodes were “eye openers” for me and in retrospect very funny!
School Girls Trip:
Photo credit: B@Bé / Foter / CC BY-NC-ND
There was no such thing as ‘traveling light” back then. The chaperoned group- all 5 of us were each issued a big green suitcase by the travel agency and we each filled up our big green suitcase with everything we could possibly need not realizing we would have to carry those behemoths! I’ve been a spartan packer ever since.
Photo credit: jennandjon / Foter / CC BY-NC-ND
Hiking and Biking in Europe:
My brother and I and a Dutch kid with guitar were hitchhiking in Italy and were looking for a ride into Rome. A large truck hauling quarry stone stopped for us and the 2 boys climbed up into the back with the stones and I sat in front with the driver! “More comfortable” they said. The driver was a lecher from “way back.” A true case of the “roamin’ hands” and at the first opportunity my brother and I changed places. We pulled into Rome at dawn in the rain. My first glimpse of the Eternal City was from underneath a tarp but I was safe and happy and the view was beautiful!
Restrooms in Italy in 1957 were hard to find for hitchhikers but bars could always be depended on. In most cases they were really primitive. In one there was a hole in the floor instead of an actual toilet and an indentation of two feet in front of the hole where one was supposed to stand. You could brace yourself by hanging on to the doorknob. It worked well until the doorknob came off!
In Holland
Planning our trip. Newspaper photo
Joan in London, pondering whether to trade in her bike for the Rolls Royce in the background.
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Joan
Not much can broaden one's horizons like international travel. One of the most hair-raising things I ever did was drive a moped in Naples. Italian drivers aren't exactly a sedate bunch! But somehow I lived to tell about it.
ReplyDeleteFascinating! It occurs to me that there were no credit cards "back in the day." Did you just take as much money with you as you thought you would need and hope it was enough? Did you bring back any souvenirs from those trips and do you still have them? Love the picture in the hometown newspaper!
ReplyDeleteLooking back, as I recall we took travelers checks and we came back broke! I took a 3-D camera, at my father's insistence and couldn't figure it out once we got there-so no pictures.
DeleteI do remember buying some ladies' gloves in Paris and a wool turtleneck sweater also in Paris but soon after we came home the family moved to Florida and both things were lost in transit.
Of course, traveler's checks! I forgot all about those. I don't think we've used those for about 20 years so no wonder. But back then we didn't leave home without them! No souvenirs left but you obviously still have the memories!
ReplyDelete