At last the tour starts in earnest.

After two days what conclusions can I draw about Tunisia?

1) Sheraton Hotels are nice where ever you are and the one in Tunis certainly qualifies.

2) Make sure your cab driver knows where you want to go and how to get there. We had to transfer from the Sheraton to the Tunisia Palace, a 4 star hotel on a main street in Tunis. We were told the fare was 5 dinar (about $3.50). Before getting to our hotel we visited the Karthage Palace and the Olympia Palace (closed for about a year). On three separate occasions the driver asked pedestrians for directions. When we finally got to the Tunisia Palace the fare was 20 dinar. I offered 10 dinars and every curse the driver knew was thrown at me. Fortunately, he only spoke Arabic and I didn't understand any of them. Eventually he left with the 10 dinar, but he was not a happy camper.

3) When your in your 60's accepting drinks from strangers in a bar has few downsides. Karen and I were in a bar at the hotel when a business man offered us a drink. Unfortunately, he also only spoke Arabic, but the three of us spent a pleasant hour talking to each other as best we could and hope to meet again. The language barrier can be surmounted with a little effort, but there is little point when you are being cursed.

4) Today we ventured out with 13 other travelers to visit the Roman ruins at Durrga. It may be the best preserved Roman city in the world. The site is rather extensive and Roman roads are not the most level, nor are steps the most even. Handrails do not seem to have been invented by the Romans. Karen was concerned about being able to make it through the site. She need not have worried. She has more mobility than at least have of the members of the group. Karen will do just fine on this trip, but I am not sure about many others on the trip. The tour guide mentioned that Romans didn't live much beyond 50, this was attributed to lead poisoning from the use of lead lined pipes. Based on today's group I am not sure Romans would have been able to survive the rigors of city life once the got into their 60's. The cities of the ancient world were not elder friendly.

5) Our group appears to be gastronomically adventurous. Today's lunch was wild boar. Our guide was very surprised when only one person opted for the 'safer' alternative, chicken. Almost everyone on our trip has been on several Overseas Adventure Travel trips. (Some have been on as many as ten). Our guide might be surprised at the number of things OAT participants eat at least once on these trips. In my case having eaten rat (country, not city rat) wild boar seemed very tame.

Around the world

This is not a bike trip but a trip around the world seemed like a big thing so I am going to add it to my blog. Karen and I are taking 7 seven weeks to circle the globe. We are stopping in Boston, Tunisia, Jordan, India, and Bali. Boston involved a conference at MIT and lots of visits with Boston friends. Tunisia and India are Overseas Adventure Travel tours and we are doing Jordan and Bali (recovery) on our own. The other bonus is that all the plane travel is with frequent flier points.

We are currently in Tunis and have met our tour group. They seem to be a nice group, but time will tell.

But before I start to describe our foreign travels let me say something about our week in Boston. I was there for an MIT alumni leadership conference. I spend three days attending meetings and one leading a discussion group about how to select venues for meetings. I also had meetings at various times with people from the school over the net three days. Two groups that meet via conference call met face to face for the first time because I, the only member west of the Hudson River was in town.

Initially left on her own Karen became antsy, made additional arrangements to see long time friends and did much better as the week progressed. She is also a little concerned about her knees. We stayed in our time share in the Boston Custom House and on our last night entertained six of her closest friends from college. She and two other college friends had driven a barge along a canal in southern France this summer. Being with friends you have know for 40 plus years can do wonders to your spirits.

We also had time to have dinner with my best friend from college, Dave deBronkhart. During my first cross country trip he was fighting for his life after being diagnosed with stage IV meastatic renal cancer. As I rode across the country to my reunion in 2007, he was being given a new treatment that works in only 20% of patients who receive it. It worked for him and we both made the reunion. Dave has written a book about his experiences, Laugh, Sing, and Eat Like a Pig: How an Empowered Patient Beat Stage IV Cancer (and what healthcare can learn from it). Dave has has become an important advocate for patient involvement in their medical care he has his own blog e-Patient Dave and also is a major contributor to another blog e-Patients
Lastly, getting together with Dave is always difficult because he is speaking at medical conferences almost every week. We saw Dave on Sunday after he had packed for a week trip to the West Coast.

We flew to Tunis via London on Friday 9:30 PM departure but had to check out by noon. We decided to see a movie, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest, the third an final movie in the 'Girl' series. Good movie, but read the book and see the other two movies first if you don't want to be hopelessly lost. As that killed the hours between noon and 3, walked into the movie about Facebook. It was entertaining and I am sure that IT types relate to the founder more positively than do the rest of the world. My take, he is not without character flaws, and finds himself in a position he is totally unprepared for, but he is not a bad person. I'm sure that the movie bears some resemblance to reality, Hollywood's ability to tell a truthful story is only slightly better than your typical politician's ability to tell the truth.

The flight to Tunis had it's good and bad aspects. The good was that we were in first class. We had sleeper beds and were fed a fine dinner in the First class Lounge before we took off. The bad was that we landed at Heathrow and had a connecting flight from Gatwick. The overland part was a worry' but we hired a private car and it worked out fine. The first class lounge in Gatwick is not as nice as the one in Boston, but a far cry above waiting outside with everyone else. We could get used to this.

We arrived in Tunis from London. Met our guide who on his own time took us to our Sheraton hotel. We had dinner and went to sleep for the first real time in 30 hrs. Thirty hours without sleep was not a big problem when I was riding long bicyle rides in the 80's but I am older now and I can feel it. Well at least I can tonight.