Once a year, Danna and I attend the Homestep auction.  Homestep makes real progress with the homelessness.  Almost as important as their work is the wonderful trips that always come up at auction time.  After sufficient wine-induced lubrication, Danna and I are always excited to see what trip is on the auction block that night.

Last year, it was a trip to a small town in Italy called Cortona. The auction included a week stay at an Italian villa in the center of town.  The villa slept eight, and after some sloshy head-nods from the rest of the table we all went for it.

Fast forward a year and it was time to make good on the trip. We partnered with our good friends Norman, Jen and Eric, and were introduced to some new friends named Shawn and Susan.  I’m sure we’d get along juuust fine.

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Danna, Cole and I spent a weekend bumbling around Manhattan.

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A year or so ago we bought an African safari at an auction.  Then we decided that a week was too short a time to take considering the flight time to get to southern Africa, so we enlisted the help of “Mama Africa” at Mills Tourism Consulting and added a couple more safaris to the list.  We started in South Africa in the KwaZulu Natal region at a private game park called Zulu Nyala.  After spending a week there we flew north to Botswana and stayed three days in the Kalahari desert at Kalahari Plains Camp.  Finally, one more plain ride brought us to the Okavango Delta for a four night stay at Duba Plains Camp. More...

Auctions rule. We buy things at auctions we would never think to spend money on normally. Like the huge basket of O Boy! Oberto snacks I bought a couple of years ago. This year among the receipts we found a week stay for eight at a villa called Villa Pantai in Bali, Indonesia. The villa sleeps eight and has a staff of six including two cooks, a masseuse, and a driver. After a quick sync up with our friends for logistics, we were on our way.

Getting There

Sampling the Yummy

Their English is better than my Chinese.