With all the bad news recently in Australia – first, the flooding and most recently, Cyclone Yasi, I want to praise you if Australia and New Zealand are still on your travel bucket list.

Linda and I flew to Sydney, Australia, in 2002 prior to a 16-night cruise aboard Holland America Line’s Prinsendam. We flew from the East coast, stopped in San Francisco, and then flew on to Sydney – 24 hours in total – arriving in the morning. I know, I know… “It’s too far to fly to Australia.” But I am here to tell you that the long flight is worth it. Linda always jokes that she skipped her birthday that year as we flew over the International Date Line and lost the whole day.

The photo at left shows us that first afternoon – we skipped a nap because we were not tired – atop the Sydney Harbor Bridge, overlooking the Sydney Opera House. The Sydney BridgeClimb was well worth the price. What a sight!

After a day of tours and sightseeing in Sydney, we boarded the Prinsendam and sailed to our fist port of Melbourne. Much more laid back. The shopping at the Queen Victoria Market was fabulous.

The next stop was Tasmania, the island off the southeastern coast of Australia. A tour at a wildlife refuge allowed us the opportunity to see Tasmanian Devils (they really are scary and devilish), Koalas, and kangaroos.

Next up: New Zealand

Many of us have seen Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman in the 2007 film, “The Bucket List.” Of course, not all of their bucket list items were travel related, but most were. And most of us wish we could travel to far-off, exotic places. I remember daydreaming in elementary school about the Acropolis in Greece and the Great Wall of China.

I have been fortunate enough to be able to visit some of the places on my travel bucket list. I wrote a little about my wife Linda and I visiting China in the inaugural post of ATS Travels. We were, in fact, able to visit the Great Wall near Beijing as well as the Terra Cotta Soldiers in Xian.

Our China trip in 2005 remains one of the highlights of our travels to this day. I will tell you about other places from my travel bucket list that I have been able to visit, as well as places I hope to visit someday, in future posts.

In the meantime, what’s on your travel bucket list? Have you been able to visit yet? Please post about your travel highlights in the comments.

by Bill Cleveland, Vice President

Welcome to the new Antietam Travel Service blog!

We are located in Frederick, Maryland. Our staff consists of the owners, Linda and Bill Cleveland, and six travel consultants with extensive experience and expertise. We pride ourselves in the excellent personal service we provide to our clients.

The intent of this blog is to inspire you to travel. Whether with posts about past trips or my personal travel bucket list or travel tips, we hope you find this blog interesting and useful.

The banner photo above was inspired by a trip to China with my wife Linda in March 2005. The Viking River Cruises tour took us to Beijing, where we visited Red Square, the Forbidden City, and the Great Wall; Xian, where we saw the Terra Cotta soldiers; Chongxing, where the river cruise down the Yangtze River began; and finally Shanghai. We sailed for a short time on a tributary of the Yangtze, the Emerald River, where the photo was taken.

Here’s the full photo taken on the misty morning of March 31, 2005:

Unfortunately, this farm at the river’s edge is more than likely submerged as the Three Gorges Dam nears completion. When we visited, the water level of the Yangtze River was about 100 meters. When the dam is completed, the water level will rise to about 175 meters, and about 1.3 million people will have been displaced by the project.

We need to go back to China for the “after” photo…