Travels with mother: In search of the world

Anne D'Innocenzio has traveled with her mother since she was a little girl. But at 80-something, her mother, ever fearless, is beginning to slow and told her that her traveling days are coming to an end.?

By Anne D'Innocenzio,?Associated Press / May 12, 2013

This 1965 photo provided by Anne D?Innocenzio shows her in the arms of her father, with her mother, sister and brother on a ship heading home from a family sojourn in Italy.

AP

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When I was young, I learned a lot about travel from my mother. She taught me how and what to pack. She taught me to keep a travel diary to record my memories. And most importantly, she taught me how to power-sightsee.

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"You never know when you'll be back," my mother used to say as she and my dad pushed my sister, brother, and me to yet another art museum, Gothic church, or 18th-century cemetery.

Decades later, my mother and I still travel together, but now that she's in her mid-80s, our roles have changed. She's hearing-impaired, and often uses a cane for balance, while I bring a notepad and pen to write down tour highlights for her. I also handle hotel accommodations, hail the cabs and make sure a wheelchair is waiting at the airport to take her to the gate.

Some might think of traveling with an elderly parent as a burden, but my mom is invaluable to me. She's still vibrant and fiercely holds onto her love of travel. She's a globe-trotter and a wealth of knowledge ? my personal version of a Frommer's app. I'm a journalist, perpetually time-strapped as I race to meet the next deadline, so I also depend on her to help me with the research for our trips. She often highlights hot spots weeks in advance.

Back when I was in college, I would have never dreamed my mother would become my travel companion decades later. I might have even shuddered at the possibility. You see, growing up in our family, vacations were rarely about splashing in hotel pools or relaxing on beaches. Vacationing was a form of boot camp. Try touring Washington DC in July where scorching temperatures wilt hair bows and drench summer shorts. Even a trip to Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla., as a child was not as much fun as one might think. My mother made sure it was squeezed between educational sightseeing trips to Cape Canaveral, home of the Kennedy Space Center, and St. Augustine, where my sister, brother, and I learned about 16th century history and explorer Ponce de Leon.

But as the decades have gone by, my mom's and my life's circumstances have made the mother-daughter travel combo a natural, practical, and enjoyable experience.

To be sure, I have taken plenty of trips with friends to a variety of places ? Puerto Rico, Miami's South Beach, San Francisco. And over the years, my mom has traveled with her own circle of friends, and most often with my father, crisscrossing the globe to faraway places like Australia and Indonesia. My father was a catalyst for travel ? he worked for a major oil conglomerate that took him on overseas assignments. But mom lost her most dependable travel buddy when my dad died in 2002, and her aging friends are too frail to travel now.

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