The Mid-Valley Travel Club is an informal group of people living in the Mid-Willamette Valley of Oregon, who are interested in travel. We get together once a month from September through June at Salem Public Library to share travel information and listen to presentations by Club members and invited guests on travel to interesting destinations. We are not travel agents, so we do not organize group or individual travel. Our mission is purely educational.
Please contact the Program Chairman (see "Contact the Program Chairman" below).
Guidelines for Presenters
Suggestions for a successful Travel Club presentation
Please click on this link and read the suggestions before making a presentation to the Club. It will help ensure a smooth, gratifying experience for presenter and audience alike.
Meeting Details
Location, times, dues
Click here for details of meeting location, dates, times and dues.
Need advice on a travel destination?
Going to Bhutan, Mongolia, Morocco, Australia, or some other exotic locale? Or perhaps somewhere a little less exotic such as the U.K., France or Switzerland? You don't have to reinvent the wheel. Click here for a list of club members with intimate knowledge of your destination, who are willing to advise you.
Travel Sites on the Web
Want to surf the web for travel bargains and travel information?
There are a million web sites offering information useful for travellers, from cheap fares, to health data, to U.S. Consulate addresses around the world and U.S. State Department warnings. Click here for a selection.
Members' Travel Announcements
On Purchasing a Timeshare
Member John Avery gives some information about purchasing a vacation timeshare, and offers his own for purchase.
Travel Advisories
Club members' warnings and recommendations
Click on this link for a new page on the Club's web site, on which Club members can pass on warnings about travel difficulties they have encountered or make recommendations of places where they have had favorable travel experiences. If you have such tips you would like to pass on to Club members, please email the Club President (see "Contact the Club President" below) and your material will be added to the "Travel Tips" page.
Tim Murphy's Letters from Mexico
Tim's dispatches about life south of the border
Travel Club member, Tim Murphy, is now living in N.W. Mexico. Click on this link for a series of articles by Tim on this region of Mexico. Tim writes that he welcomes feedback from Club members. You can reach him at tm_soilscientist@yahoo.com
What do we do with your email address?
There are about 150 members on the Club's mailing list. Contacting them all using the United States Mail is expensive. By using your email address we can regularly send announcements of schedule changes and reminders about meetings, as well as seek your input on proposed changes to Club policies and procedures. We do not distribute your email address to any outside parties. Click on this link to see our privacy statement.
Travel Club Meeting Thursday, May 8, 2008
(Fourteenth Season) Loucks Lecture Hall Salem Public Library 7:00–9:00 pm
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Southern Mexico:
Yucatán & Chiapas, ¡Olé!
by
Janet Neuberg & Charles Hannigan
This presentation is a compilation of 2 trips to Yucatán and a trip-and-a-half to Chiapas.
Yucatán can refer either to the state of Yucatán or to the entire peninsula in southern Mexico in which the state is located. Our travels were to the state. Our first destination was Merida, the capital of Yucatán. It is a clean, noisy, colonial city, now quite large. Most accommodations and points of interest are within walking distance of the zocalo, the central plaza. Every night there are free outdoor performances of regional music and dance. Merida's restaurants offer regional dishes and beverages. So do street-corner vendors and stalls in the public market. Everywhere you see beautiful regional dress; the women in their embroidered huipils and the men in their short-sleeved pleated shirts.
From Merida it is easy to get to major Yucatán archeologic sites by bus. Chich'en Itzá is the largest. A short tax-ride away is Balankache, an underground site used for hundreds of years, that was discovered only recently.
Uxmal is another archeologic site accessible from Merida.
There are several interesting colonial towns east of Merida. In one, pedicabs are used instead of taxis. In another, Izamal, horses and carriages are the first choice. Vallalodid has a beautiful cenote (sinkhole) which you can walk down into and even swim in. Many of these towns have beautiful colonial churches which are being used today.
West of Merida, on the coast, is Celestún, famous for its ecologic site. There you see flocks of flamingoes in their habitat.
Our primary destinations in Chiapas were San Cristóbal de las Casas, the old colonial capital, and the ruins at Palanque. San Cristóbal is in the highlands, and at over 6,000 feet, is very cold in winter, and cold even in March. The city has lots of topography, and is a great place for long walks. There is a huge central open-air market. Along the major tourist routes, there are vendors of regional clothing. The people wear a huge variety of regional dress styles, each of which is associated with an individual village.
Chiapa de Corzo, near the current capital of Tuxtla, is in the lowlands on the Grijalva River. There you can go on boat trips, or relax in one of the outdoor cafes along the banks of the river. A multi-generational family has a wonderful tour of their factory, where they make marimbas, the official musical instrument of the state of Chiapas. You can see how the instrument is made, learn about its history, and finish by hearing family members performing in a marimba orchestra.
Not knowing of our eventual trip to Chiapas, we traveled to Palenque as a (very long) side trip from Merida. The site is in the jungle, and is a long way from anywhere. It is a huge site, so one should plan on 2-3 days. There are some wonderful places to stay in the jungle adjacent to the archeologic zone.
TRAVEL SKILLS TOPIC: “Volunteer Construction: Habitat for Humanity” 3rd in a continuing series on Volunteer Vacations. Discussion will be introduced by Bill Hayden.
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Meetings of the MVTC are free and open to the public. _______________________________________
Summaries of Previous Presentations
Summaries of past meeting topics since October, 2004 can be found in the Archive section (see link near bottom of left column). Click on the link for the desired year.
Summaries of past "Travel Skills" topics since December, 2004 are also at bottom left. Click on the desired topic.
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Tim Murphy's "Letters from Mexico"
Travel Club member Tim Murphy's letters comprise a series of colorful, short articles on northwest Mexico. Tim's letters can be seen by clicking on the link under "Tim Murphy's Letters from Mexico" at left.
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Pritam Rohila'sTravel Blog
Travel Club member Pritam Rohila has provided a link to his travel blog: http://pritam-rohila-travels.blogspot.com. It is very well presented, with excellent photos. Pritam writes:
"Right now I am working on my recent travels in Romania, Turkey, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro, Croatia, Slovenia and Austria. I have already posted parts of my travels there. Other parts will be posted in the near future. The site also has blogs about my previous travels in Israel, Egypt, Jordan, and India."
