why go on an all-inclusive vacation?

Wish I could see this with my own eyes

Summertime means summer vacations. I recently went on a short vacation with my cousin and two girlfriends to Cabo, a beach town on the tip of the Baja Peninsula of Mexico. I hadn’t been to the Pacific side of Mexico since my teenage days when my family would drive down to San Felipe and camp for days on the beach. I discovered that the west coast of Mexico–like the west coast of the U.S.–has much more temperate evenings and chillier ocean water than the Atlantic side and its Gulf of Mexico where the waters are much warmer and more swimmable. No matter, because the Pacific has us beat in terms of appearance. The water was a bluish-green (or so I was told by my travel companions), and best of all, there are mini mountain formations next to the surf which, I guess, makes for a fantastic postcard picture.

While I admit sightseeing and taking in beautiful views are no longer a priority since I’d lost my vision, I decided to go on this vacation because I’d always wanted to visit Cabo, and there was too good a deal to pass up at the Riu Santa Fe. It was the first all-inclusive vacation package I’d ever been on (not counting cruises), and while ideally, I’d love to explore and immerse myself in the cityscape and culture, it is just no longer feasible without vision. So I (reluctantly at first) came on this trip but soon found that all-inclusive packages relieve a great deal of stress on the vacationer. Sure, you don’t get to really venture out on the town and try street food and come in closer contact with the locals, but what you get instead is minimal headache and less stress. Your meals are already taken care of–just grab a plate in one of the many buffets or make a reservation at a sit-down restaurant and just get up and leave when you’re done without settling the bill. The mini bar in your room is already paid for; drink all the water, soda, beer, and spirits you wish. There is something going on every night at the various on-site venues. You never have to leave the resort to do anything.

Of course, it would be a different matter if I could see, but this all-inclusive thing made vacation a lot easier. Every morning, we ate, went to the pool or the resort beach, ate lunch, then sunbathed some more, then showered before going to dinner. After dinner, we’d have a drink or two while hanging out at one of the bars or in the main courtyard where onstage there’s live music or shows. Then we go to bed, next day: repeat. This may not be my ideal vacation, but all-inclusive resort packages are good when you just need to get away for a weekend to relax. You never have to deal with price haggling, exchanging money, getting ripped off, or finding your way around. And thus, it makes for the perfect sojourn for the NMO patient or sight-impaired person. Less things to deal with means less stress, and that’s always a plus during vacation. We have enough stress as it is; what good would a vacation full of worries be? There are many sites that offer all-inclusive vacation packages for reasonable prices. Try some of the following:

• Travelzoo
• Living Social Escapes
• Cayak
• Expedia
• Travelocity

featured, thanks to “masterpiece theatre” and fork for thought

Several months ago, a reader contacted me and asked to do an interview for a short piece she was writing about the cook who is visually impaired. I guess with a URL address as obvious as “theblindcook.com,” it was easy for them to stumble upon my page. The inspiration for the piece is rooted in the recent popularity of a Masterpiece Theatre show called “Downton Abbey” where the household’s cook begins losing her vision and has to deal with kitchen mishaps. I had forgotten about the article and interview until a friend recently brought my attention to it; she had found it while searching for my site. How funny is that?

• Read the short feature about the Blind Cook here.
• Learn more about the Masterpiece Theatre show, “Downton Abbey” here.

I was also fortunate to have come across a fellow foodie blogger recently and was captivated by her descriptive and honest takes on local eateries. After contacting Ms. Fork to let her know she had another fan, she was generous enough to also write an entry about me.

• Go here to read Fork For Thought’s take on me and to check out her fabulous site.

3 girls with nmo conquer the disease and, inevitably, the world

When I first met Erin and Jenna and their husbands back at the first NMO Patient Day of 2010, we instantly clicked, and over dinner at an Italian eatery, the idea was born. It had started as a joke when my husband, John (who is a tech geek), mentioned that we should start a blog called the Three NMOs, a play off the “Three Amigos.” Well, the name may not have stuck but the blog idea sure did.

And so I introduce to you our NMO Diaries blog, an online space where the three of us ambitious and [relatively] young girls show how we try to live life to the fullest in spite of the Devic’s dianosis. It’s sort of a “I am NMO woman; hear me roar!” type of attitude, and we welcome your readership. The cool thing about it is it will contain a lot of videos (read: vlog) since Erin and Jenna prefer to leave the written word to me. The other cool thing is the name behind the Blind Cook is revealed. (Yikes! Enjoy.

• Check out NMO Diaries.

caution: blind skier

John loves the snowy mountains while I love the sunny beaches, which is why for each of our respective bachelor/bachelorette trips, we headed to our desired destination: John to Breckenridge and me to Miami. Now that we’re married, we try to appreciate the other’s preference for the outdoors. This meant I had to bundle up and face my most dreaded enemy: the cold.

John fell in love with snowboarding after he went for the first time last year. Before his bachelor trip, he had never seen real snow in his life. Born and raised in Houston, the only kind of “snow” he’d seen was the southeast Texas kind: quick flurries that came about once a decade. But ever since he got a taste of the snow and mountains, he was hooked. And so this year, whether I liked it or not, he was going to plan a trip back to Colorado.

Never in my lifetime did I think I was going to attempt snow sports again. My first ski trip occurred over 15 years ago. I went for only one day with my family. After two runs down the bunny slopes, my uncle assured me I was ready for the green (intermediate) trails. What the hell was he thinking? It took me 2.5 hours to get down those greens. Meanwhile, my cousin lapped me three times on the slopes, a pro at the tender age of six. I ripped a hole in my pants with the ski pole and at one point, even skied straight into the yellow caution tape that roped off the edge of the cliff. It was a horrible experience, and I never wanted to do it again, let alone do it blind.

But that’s exactly what I attempted this time around. I decided it was something I should do not so much for my husband but for myself. I wanted to feel capable. It was something I had to prove to myself.

The Breckenridge Outdoor Educational Center (BOEC) is a neat non-profit facility whose mission is to adapt recreational activities so that all (including those with special needs) can enjoy the outdoors. The instructors from their adaptive ski school are certified to teach and guide those that are blind or paralyzed. Originally, I was going to sign up for snowboarding, but the BOEC advised that boarding was an activity better done if I had 3+ days to spend on the slopes. Because our trip contained only two full days on the slopes, the BOEC folks suggested I try skiing first, that I’d see more success with skiing in only 48 hours. And so I listened to their better judgment and opted for skiing instead despite the nightmare experience I had a decade and a half earlier.

The first half of the first day was spent feeling out what it was like to glide around with a ski on the bottom of my foot. First, I walked around on flat snow with a ski on my left foot only. Then just my right. Finally with both of them on my feet. Then I took the magic carpet/conveyor belt to the top of the bunny slope and practiced the wedge: the wider the wedge, the slower you go. Eventually, I learned to turn and make S’s in the snow. The afternoon was spent on the green trail at Breckenridge, and I actually made it down the entire green without falling! (See my skiing skills in the below video.) Granted I was going 1 mph, but still…I was so proud of myself.

I went against my teacher’s advice the next day and tried to ski Keystone instead of sticking to Breckenridge where, as John says, the greens at Key were like the blues(one level higher than greens) at Breck. The trails were steeper, and I ended up cutting my full day lessons in half to just a morning session because I was utterly exhausted. Not only is the sport already tremendously tiring–your legs are working muscles they don’t normally work–but for me who is a beginner and blind at that, skiing made my entire body tense because I was trying so hard not to fall. In addition to that, the fact that I can’t see to focus on any one spot made me get motion sickness on both the lift and at the bottom of the mountain; whenever I’d stopped, my brain and body still felt like I was moving. Needless to say, concentrating so hard on not falling and not upchucking all over my teacher were enough for me to throw in the towel by lunchtime.

I must say, though, that my instructor, Jeff, and his assisting intern, Brian, were awesome because I only fell twice in the 1.5 days I skied. They made my experience as awesome as it could be, considering I was a turtle on the slopes and had to wear a bright orange bib that said “BLIND SKIER.” At least I wasn’t tied to the end of a rope like a sled dog.

A bonus to the Colorado trip was the reunion I had with Erin and Jenna, the two wonderful young women I met at the NMO Patient Day. In the three months that we’ve known each other, we’ve grown incredibly close, communicating either by phone or email every week, sharing the goings-on in our lives, our day-to-day routines combined with our NMO struggles. It was great to see them again and know that we were all hitting the slopes to prove something to ourselves: that in spite of the obstacles, we indeed can do it!

The BOEC does more than skiing and boarding. During the summer, there are season-appropriate sports like whitewater rafting. Go here to learn more about the BOEC. And you also don’t have to go to Colorado to do adaptive skiing. There are schools all over the U.S. and Canada. Just google your destination along with “adaptive ski school,” and you should be able to find what you’re looking for. And remember, if the Blind can Do it, so can you.

dan’s story

In my previous post about Dan, I expressed my sadness whenI learned by a text message from his mother Reny that he had died. In lieu of flowers, the Tan family asked for donations to the Guthy Jackson Charitable Foundation in order to advance the research in NMO. Over $20,000 were donated (the largest donation the Foundation had ever received), and more than 400 people attended Dan’s funeral. What an amazing life story.

Before he was handicapped by NMO, Dan was a basketball athlete. On Sunday, the Ann Arbor news ran a story on the friendship between Dan and Darius, the point guard for Michigan. The story reminded me that great things can be born of tragedy, and I am grateful Dan’s memory not only lives on but has a positive impact on those who knew him and even those who didn’t.

• Read the full story about Dan Tan.
• Donate to NMO research in loving memory of Dan.