Farewell To Unmet Friends

It comes to each of us that life is an adventure, a mystery--with hopes and joys, peaks and valleys that follow a constantly changing pattern. And so, after visiting for 32 years with an audience I have yet to meet, the time has come to take my leave-to surrender this space to others with fresh dreams and young ideas. Although it is my hope to appear occasionally with a story from Paris or Pago Pago--or some other beguiling dateline--these weekly visits end today. More than two years have passed since I turned over my title to The Times’ new travel editor, Leslie Ward, and so on this final Sunday of writing my Travel Tips column, I ask your indulgence while we journey together down Memory Lane.

Over the years, I have drifted by junk and sampan through the waters of Hong Kong; I have stood by the temples of Bangkok and along the banks of the Ganges. And there was the time, years ago, when I flew 200 miles off course in a small private airplane--just to buzz the Taj Mahal. I recall my first glimpses of the Tower of London and Notre Dame. So many other landmarks and episodes remain catalogued in the mind. There was the time the pilot of a single-engine airplane purposely deposited me on a peak in the French Alps--a peak without so much as a landing strip. This macho guy simply brought the plane down on a grassy slope, then turned to me, smiling, and said: “That, monsieur, takes courage as well as talent!”

Earlier, I was aboard the Concorde on an experimental flight, round trip from Boston to Paris . . . in a single afternoon. And there was the time, crossing the Atlantic in a World War II clunker, that the plane iced up and we came perilously close to going down in that unforgiving ocean.

Given the opportunity to relive precious moments, I would return to Zihuatanejo--Mexico’s Pacific Coast resort--before the streets were paved and when locals still rode burros, lying in a hammock and studying stars shining on this peaceful Mexican village . This was before developers created the neighboring resort of Ixtapa--when only the voices of crickets disturbed the stillness, along with waves spilling onto the sands of Playa de la Ropa. Each morning, a fishmonger stopped at our hotel to deliver red snapper, sole and buckets of shrimp. Across a narrow bay, on Las Gatas Beach, a fellow named Oliverio ran a ramshackle restaurant with a thatched roof and no windows . . . but the best seafood in Zihuatanejo. Oliverio was a contented soul, sipping icy Mexican beer and gossiping with his customers.

Oliverio reminded me of Bonefish Willie, an old fisherman with gnarled hands and watery eyes who, years ago, was a confidant of Papa Hemingway on the island of Bimini in the Bahamas. Willie told me: “That man (Hemingway) put this island on the map!” Like Bonefish Willie, one must enjoy fishing to enjoy Bimini, which years ago was a haven for bootleggers. It is said that Bimini was the inspiration for Hemingway’s classic novel, “The Old Man and the Sea.” Still, it is not an island for the casual visitor. Not with streets and bars crowded with the sort of characters who rage and roar through the pages of a lusty Hemingway tale, which is how I happened to be drawn to Bimini.

Those who follow these Sunday columns will recall my love affair with Switzerland. Without hesitation I would return to Kandersteg, a village that’s a lifetime removed from our tumultuous world--even though it is but a 2 1/2-hour journey from the city of Zurich. Kandersteg is timeless, with ancient farmhouses and a church that dates from the 16th Century. Cradled between Grindelwald and Gstaad, it is a canvas of blowing meadows and soaring peaks, with lakes as blue as the heavens they reflect. I recall awakening at Waldhotel Doldenhorn to the melody of cowbells as farmers herded their cattle in a pre-dawn procession from Alpine pastures to the valley. During summer, guests hike an endless network of trails. Others travel by tram and chair lift to a warming hut high in the Alps. Charles Dickens was overcome by the view: “Vast plains of snow range up the mountainsides, and tremendous waterfalls go thundering down from precipices into deep, deep chasms, the blue water tearing through the white snow with an awful beauty that is most sublime.”

One day perhaps, I shall return for a holiday to a farm in Wales called Upper Trewalkin in the hamlet of Pengenfford, where Meudwen Stephens lets rooms and prepares meals for paying guests. Old and snug, Upper Trewalkin glows with the warmth of a wood fire on a bitter night. Everything Meudwen Stephens serves is either raised at Upper Trewalkin or on farms nearby. The butter and eggs she collects from a neighbor, and the pies she bakes drip with wild elderberries and rowanberries that Mrs. Stephens collects along hedgerows leading to Upper Trewalkin.

The farm is dead-center of Beacons National Park, with its 519 miles of rolling hills, lush glens, sandstone moors and wooded gorges. Doors in this little village remain unlocked, and crime is said to be a stranger. So if you’re tempted, write to Mrs. Stephens, Upper Trewalkin Farm, Pengenfford, Near Talgarth, Brecon, Powys LD3 OHA, Wales.

It has become a cliche to say that Puerto Vallarta is spoiled. Well, I disagree. Still, if it is, blame the travel writers who arrived like an invading army after film companies discovered PV. As for the tourists who mourn the old days, few, I suspect, would enjoy hotels without screens or hot water, which was the case in the beginning. What tourists truly want is Puerto Vallarta with plumbing. I would prefer fewer cars and tour buses. Still, I’m hooked. I go back to the days when there was no TV and not a single telephone. Whenever someone tried to call home they used a radio phone. Only there was always static. It was infuriating. They’d scream into the blasted thing. Usually the person they were calling couldn’t hear. So they’d hang up and order another beer.

An opportunity to turn the calendar back? I would hurry again to Greece to visit her lovely islands. Crete was a sun-washed bargain when I arrived years ago. Just off the 25th-of-August Street, I discovered a pension where one could move in for mere pennies a day. Is it possible, I wonder, that proprietress Agnis Konstantinides still welcomes visitors?

And there is Santorini, which, while a trifle touristy, remains another favorite of mine. Several years ago, I visited the taverna of Loukas Vlavianos. His taverna clung precariously to the cliff, hundreds of feet above the Aegean, just as the village does. Indeed, the entire village seems ready to slip into the sea.

Finally, there is Paris. It would be impossible to end this tome without recalling magic moments spent strolling her wide boulevards and cobbled alleys. I shall always reflect on the flower vendor who appeared one dawn, her cart spilling over with violets as she passed Cafe Le Deux Magots, where, years earlier, Papa Hemingway spent hours, writing when the mood struck him, drinking whenever it didn’t. In the Louvre, I watched artists copying the Mona Lisa, and there was the night at the opera when Pavarotti took a standing ovation and a lovely Parisian girl reached out to him with a bouquet of roses. The memories return like cherished snapshots in a picture album: The chilly autumn afternoon I peered through frosted windows at artists setting up their easels outside my hotel . . . rain-slickened streets reflecting images of passing traffic . . . couples strolling beside the Seine . . . crowds gathered at flower stalls along Boulevard St.-Germain . . . a full moon rising over the City of Light.

Well, time to go. It has been memorable and I shall miss you.