About 7 or 8 years ago my husband, my college-age son and I were traveling through Turkey for a week before my son had to fly to Toulouse for a semester of intensive French study. We had arranged our stays in Turkey through the Internet beforehand and thought we had everything under control. Not. . .

We were supposed to arrive in Kusadasi in the morning, after taking a Greek ferry from Athens to Samos and then onward. Unfortunately nobody remembered to tell us that a wedding party had booked the entire ferry from Samos to Kusadasi, so we were stranded on the island for an entire day. Normally this would not have been a problem except that we were being met at Kusadasi by the owner of the bed and breakfast where we were scheduled to stay (in Selchuk), and we had no way of letting them know that we were going to be late. Fortunately, they checked the ferry schedule on their end, so we weren't stranded - just stressed.

After arriving safely in Selchuk we were delighted by the hostel and the the owners, checked in with no problem and then discovered that they could not take credit cards and that all of the ATMs in town were out of order indefinitely. Since we had not been able to exchange money for Turkish currency in Greece, that meant that we were completely stranded without cash and no way to pay our hotel bill. Fortunately again the owners were both understanding and reassuring and they assured us that this was no problem - the ATMs were bound to be working before we left - and they were right. But it wasn't until our last day there that they did work so we spent the entire time wondering again.

Our plan had been to take a train from Selchuk to Ankara and then catch a local flight from Ankara to Istanbul. Again the best laid plans and all that. . . At the time there were two airlines that provided service between Ankara and Istanbul and one of them went bankrupt and out of business while we were in Selchuk. Needless to say we could not get a flight because the remaining airline was already overbooked. And we had hotel reservations in Istanbul.

So, we followed the plan and took the train from Selchuk to Ankara and discovered that there is a wonderful ferry that goes from there to Istanbul and we were lucky enough to be able to book two cabins for the overnight trip. This is really a great way to travel, BTW - far better than flying and the arrival in the port of Istanbul is not to be missed. However, it meant that we arrived a day later than expected in Istanbul and we did not know if the hotel would hold our rooms.

So, as soon as we arrived in Istanbul, we grabbed a cab and threw all of our stuff in the trunk. (Remember, my son was relocating to Toulouse for five months, so this was not inconsiderable.) When we arrived at the hotel I dashed inside to make sure that we still had reservations, leaving the boys to pay the cab driver and get the luggage. When I returned they were looking frazzled and had just discovered that the driver had taken off with one of my son's bags. Not just any bag - it had his CD collection, his books, and all of his airline tickets to Toulouse and home. Of course nobody had any idea of how to identify the cab.

So after checking into the hotel (they did hold our rooms) we spent the next couple days dividing our time between the police station, travel agencies and the airlines. The police could do nothing but write a report and tell us to check back; the airlines could not help because - they said - my son's tickets had to be reissued by the travel agent that had originally issued them. As that travel agent was in Salt Lake City and there was a nine hour time difference, every time we called the travel agency they were closed. The calls, of course, were placed using our AT&T card, and after a few calls AT&T cancelled the card because we were not home to verify that anyone was authorized to use it in Istanbul.

Our fallback plan was to simply purchase a new ticket for my son to fly from Istanbul to Toulouse - and then deal with the issue of the stolen ticket later. That didn't work either - the travel agents and airline reps in town (and we checked every one of them) - assured us that every flight out of Istanbul - going anywhere - was fully booked for at least the next three weeks. We even looked into flights to Cairo, Tripoli and Kiev - nothing.

The story did end happily. On our last full day in Istanbul we were finally able to contact the travel agent in Salt Lake City and she reissued the ticket and faxed it to the Delta office at the Istanbul airport. As soon as she told us it was faxed, we dashed to the airport on another wild taxi run, and arrived fifteen minutes before the office was scheduled to close for a Turkish holiday. It was close but the ticket was finally reissued and we all got out on schedule.

This did not put me down on Turkey, but next time around I really would like to see something in Istanbul other than taxis, telephone booths and travel agencies.

Why, my honeymoon, of course.

August 1990: Wedding Day

Where: Alice's Restaurant, Skylonda Corners, Woodside

When: Middle of hottest August in state's history

The bride wore: Full motorcycle leathers (so did groom and most of guests)

Nods to nuptial convention: Cake (well, it started out as a cake - by noon it was more like Lake Cake), rings (bride's hands so swollen with heat ring had to be placed on pinkie), tacky plastic 'Just Married' pennant some yahoo tied to tail section of bride's Ducati. Honeymoon getaway to friend's summer cabin on Yuba River. (Ah, bliss we figured... hot sun, flat rocks, clean cold water, roadhouse beers, no alarm clocks, and plenty of... well, it was our honeymoon. Expect you can finish the sentence.)

Brief chronology of honeymoon:

Day one: Ducati, known from that day forward as La Prima Donna stops breathing and can't go on. Long round of miserable, cranky, profanity-rich roadside repairs in triple-digit heat.

Day one, continued: Finally arrive at summer cabin to discover key won't open door. Break into storage cellar and locate mildewed pup tent, known from that day forward as 'The Honeymoon Suite.'

Night one: Mosquitoes-on-steroids, unfamiliar, distinctly non-urban sound effects ("... do you think that hissing noise is a snake?), small non-urban crawling things, allegedly inflatable rubber mats lie flaccid and contemptuous on very hard non-urban ground. Sex? You've got to be kidding.

Day two: Break into cabin. Enjoy lively discussion with local law enforcement officials. Shower, sleep. Sex? What're you... nuts?

Night two: Field trip on foot to local roadhouse. Beers as appetizers, many shots of brown liquor as main course. Stumble back to cabin. Pass out. Don't even ask.

Day three: Two words - Poison. Oak.

Days four - six: Master the art of constructive marital combat.

Nights four - six: He's on the grimy plaid Herculon sofa, I get the bed. There are no connubial visits.

Day seven: Limp home, 'Just Married' pennant in grease-streaked tatters, apt metaphor for honeymoon.

Please tell me the marriage survived...any marriage that survived that honeymoon should be able to stand anything else...};->

My own most recent story is not nearly so amusing/horrifing. It involves camping in the rocky mountains this past Sept. We were taking a road trip to Oregon. Thought we would spent the night in the Rockies (me, my daughter and my granddaughter). We had sleeping bags (supposed to keep you warm down to 40 degrees) and a tent. I live in Mississippi, they live in Kansas. What we packed as "cool weather garb" was woefully inadequate--I don't even HAVE a real coat anymore! The camp ground we intended to stay at was closed for the 'season'. So was the next one. And the next. (never thought to check on that...it was only Sept. 12th) We wandered higher and higher into the mts. We stayed at Willow Creek. I don't know the exact elevation, but ICE formed on the top of the tent during the night. We were very late setting up camp in the "primitive" campground. It was cold. Looking for wood by flashlight was not very productive. The lantern needed a charge on its battery. It was cold. We ate almost warm beans from a can. The only other campers appeared to have been living there for some time, possibly auditioning for a role in the remake of "Deliverance". Did I mention it was cold? No one was speaking to anyone else by the time we broke camp the next morning, after scraping as much of the frost and ice as we could from the tent (and the car windshield).

The rest of the trip was good, we even camped in Yellowstone without freezing, lol. };->