Travel Tattler’s tales are not torrid – but they are inspiring to those who love the romance of life’s journey.
Photo: Michael Patrick Shiels and Sarah Hughes
Selfies in front of the Eiffel Tower document your bucket list travel achievement, but the moment more likely to play on your mind is when you clinked glasses of Pouilly-Fusse with an accordion-playing Parisian in the cozy, darkened Lapin Agile historic cabaret. That’s an authentic memory of France.
Italy’s “dolce vita” can be found in its’ fountains, museums and trattorias, but treat your senses further by listening intently and looking into the eyes of a local, like I did with Venetian guide Giulia De Carolis. I asked her, as our water taxi glided up the Grand Canal, whether she found Venice to be the most romantic city in the world.
“I think if you are a romantic person, any place is romantic,” Giulia, a brown-eyed bella donna, answered.
I may meet only occasionally and in passing with an amiable Egyptian man known as “Prince Ali,” a beloved, bald bartender in Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport, but our brief, extra-cold Heineken collaborations have resulted in true enlightenment!
And the woman who, on the Day of the Dead, recounted her life-changing “coin-flip” parable over a margarita in Mazatlan, Mexico, altered my life’s philosophy forever: it is not always life or death.
If you read and absorb these types of “love stories” in my new book, “Travel Tattler – Less Than Torrid Tales,” you will be inspired to be wide-eyed on your next trip instead of staring at the screen of your mobile phone. Even more importantly, you will travel with an open heart and mind. You may find your soul excited to connect with the spirited people you encounter, even if in a brief but meaningful manner. Engage at a human level instead of just requesting a croissant or picking a pasta.
Audrey Hepburn’s advice was to “walk with poise in the knowledge you are never alone.” Even when traveling solo, you will be surprised at what a smile, in any language, can do to unlock the mysteries of a person or place. The locals are truly the stars of the show in sublime settings such as South Beach, San Diego, or Spain. By showing genuine interest and letting random people shine in your spotlight, you will be inviting yourself to the party.
“Travel Tattler – Less Than Torrid Tales” is a combination of sweet, saucy, sexy and silly anecdotes that will lead you into time-honored destination enclaves including the Beverly Hills Hotel’s Polo Lounge; the Tallahassee Women’s Prison; a dark confessional in Milan’s Duomo; the Playboy Mansion; forbidden Havana in communist Cuba; Bat Man’s cave; well-worn pubs in the wilds of Ireland; and to a prized table at Miami Beach’s Joe’s Stone Crab restaurant. In the book’s chapters, you will encounter celebrities such as Al Pacino, Jennifer Hudson, Paul Anka and more. I will not say you are going “backstage,” because, as Shakespeare wrote, “All the world’s a stage, and all of us its players.”
You, too, are on the world’s stage when you embrace the philosophy of “Travel Tattler: Less Than Torrid Tales,” a lively, storytelling guidebook of friendship and travel destination advice you can order at Amazon.com
You can even travel to places embraced by the writer Ernest Hemingway, who, after growing up near Petoskey, Michigan, frequented and drank his way through Venice, Pamplona, Key West, Havana, Africa and Paris. “Papa’s” advice is sympatico with that of “Travel Tattler:” “Live the full life of the mind, exhilarated by new ideas, intoxicated by the romance of the unusual.”
Contact Michael Patrick Shiels at MShiels@aol.com His new book: Travel Tattler – Not So Torrid Tales, may be purchased via Amazon.com
