Carolyn Boyle:
CLASS OF 1968
Warren Easton High SchoolClass of 1968
New orleans, LA
Mississippi State UniversityClass of 1992
Starkville, MS
University of North Carolina - Public HealthClass of 1978
Chapel hill, NC
University of New OrleansClass of 1972
New orleans, LA
St. Joseph AcademyClass of 1968
Bay st. louis, MS
Carolyn's Story
Holiday Season 2023
This has been another great year of travel for John and Carolyn. Over the Christmas/New Year break, we took the whole family on a cruise to Hawaii round-trip from Los Angeles on the Crown Princess. That used up most of the vouchers from our aborted (due to COVID) Alaska cruise last summer. The islands are as gorgeous as ever, but the rental car situation there is horrendous. Nevertheless, we got to see most of the sights that we had planned and had a great time.
Next up for us was a hiking trip to Las Vegas. Although we stayed right on the strip in a villa at Marriott’s Grand Chateau, we did not partake in the gambling scene. We did enter one casino to see the free mermaid show—the best part was the wide-eyed children who were totally convinced that those were real mermaids. Otherwise, we enjoyed hiking at Death Valley National Park, Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, and Valley of Fire State Park. We also took a 15-hour group tour to Antelope Canyon X in Arizona and were happy to leave the driving to someone else. In addition, we did a wine and chocolate pairing at the Ethel M chocolate factory and took a guided tour of Hoover Dam.
That was followed by a low-key spring break family cruise to the Caribbean on the Regal Princess. John and Carolyn did a refresher two-tank dive in Grand Turk and a DIY walking tour in San Juan. Two of the port calls were beach days at Princess Cays and Amber Cove, where we tried zip-lining for the first time.
In April, we cruised on a food- and wine-centric itinerary aboard the Ponant L’Austral from Lisbon to Bordeaux. We had great food and wine tours in Lisbon before the cruise and wine/port/cider tastings in various ports in Portugal, Spain, and France. In Bilbao, we visited the Guggenheim, as famous for its Frank Gehry design as it is for the artworks inside. After the cruise, we flew to Madrid for the Prado, more winery tours and visits to Ávila and Córdoba.
We flew to Amsterdam in June and spent three days there museum-hopping, doing a food tour that included a canal cruise on a vintage wooden saloon boat, and making a day trip to Haarlem. Our college friends, Robert and Mary, joined us on the food tour and a “Rhine Getaway” cruise on the Viking Gersemi. That cruise featured ports in the Netherlands, Germany, France, and Switzerland plus scenic cruising on the Middle Rhine. Highlights included a fantastic food tour in Strasbourg and a tasting and dinner at the Schloss Johannisberg winery outside Rüdesheim. We also had a chance to work off a few calories by climbing the cathedral towers in Cologne and Strasbourg and by hiking in the Black Forest.
After the cruise ended in Basel, the four of us took the train to Zurich for a DIY excursion to the Rhine Falls, one of Europe’s largest waterfalls. After viewing the falls from both sides of the river and taking a boat ride to see them up close and personal, we headed back to Zürich for a relaxing and scenic boat ride on the Limmat River and into the Zürichsee. We ended the day with a delicious meal of Zürich-style Swiss food in a touristy, but atmospheric, beer hall. The walls there are covered by weapons, including an armbrust (crossbow) allegedly belonging to William Tell. The next morning Robert and Mary headed back home to Virginia, while John and Carolyn flew off to Iceland.
We have visited Iceland on several cruises over the years and taken private tours in a number of ports, including driving the “Golden Circle” from Reykjavik. This time we took advantage of Iceland Air's free layover program to drive the “Ring Road” and hike around the country. We needed a 4x4 to traverse the “F roads” (rough, unpaved gravel roads) and other unpaved roads of Iceland, where lots of the good stuff is located! After seven days of driving to isolated waterfalls, rugged canyons, lava fields, and thermal areas, the once-white car was now a brown and white two-tone. Iceland is a special place and we are looking forward to visiting it again next sum...Expand for more
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There was still time left in the year for another cruise, this one in November aboard the Viking Osiris. The trip started in Cairo, where we toured several sights we had seen on a previous visit to Egypt. Then we were flown to Luxor to cruise up the Nile River to Aswan and back. Among the many sights were the Karnak Temple complex, the Luxor Temple, tombs and temples of the pharaohs and their queens, and some of the 22 temples that were saved from the rising waters of Lake Nasser. We even viewed the Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the Queens from a large hot-air balloon! However, the primary reason to take this trip was the optional excursion to the spectacular temples at Abu Simbel, which memorialized Ramsesses II and his wife Nefertari as living deities. Ramesses wanted to impress his people and enemies and he sure impressed us with the monumental figures on the front. The interior is also impressive with the scale of the carvings and the colors they have retained. This was a definite highlight of our trip.
Viking’s post-cruise extension to Jordan included a number of other interesting sights, but we mainly wanted to explore the archaeological site at Petra, the Nabataean necropolis filled with tombs, shrines, and temples carved into the rock walls. Entry to the site is through the Siq, a wonderful 0.75 mile long canyon, with colored rocks and lots of twists and turns. The Siq ends at the Treasury, Petra's most famous monument, which is actually a temple dedicated to Isis. From here we continued along the main trail, passing numerous tombs hewn into the rock walls. Those of the common folk are cave-like, but those of the wealthy and nobles have intricate façades with columns, pediments, arches, urns, and other decorations. At the end of the guided tour, the two of us continued uphill to the Monastery, another huge monument that was used for religious purposes. We ended up spending 6.5 hours at the archaeological site and hiking 8.5 miles. This is another incredible sight that exceeded our expectations.
In December, John and Carolyn will head to Marriott’s OceanWatch in Myrtle Beach for some beach combing, hiking, and plenty of fresh seafood. We visited the Michigan Boyles in August and will return there again for Christmas.
As usual, we spent the time between trips planning travel, volunteering with Fearrington Cares, keeping up the walking program, going to wine tasting and wine pairing events, and generally enjoying our retirement and good health.
BIOGRAPHY
After graduating from Warren Easton, I attended the University of New Orleans and later married John, another UNO alumnus. We lived for several years in North Carolina while attending graduate school at UNC (me) and Duke (John). We lived a short time in New Haven, CT, while John did post-doctoral research at Yale and I worked as a research analyst for The Hartford Insurance Group.
Escaping from the frozen north, John accepted a faculty position at Mississippi State University, where he was Professor and Head of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. I was an Associate Professor in the College of Veterinary Medicine, where my major professional activities were collaborative research and statistical consulting. After 27 years at MSU, we retired to central North Carolina in 2007.
John and I have one child and two pre-teen grandchildren.
My personal interests are reading science fiction and mysteries, good food and wine, needlecrafts (knitting, counted cross stitch), outdoor activities (hiking, snorkeling, SCUBA diving), travel (particularly cruises).
John and I travel extensively and have now set foot on all seven continents.. Looking ahead to the end of the pandemic, we are hoping to step up our travel agenda, possibly rescheduling some of the trips that were canceled in 2020/2021. So many places still to see!
If you really want to find me, I'm on FaceBook! If you are interested, in any of my cruise reviews, they are posted on Cruise Critic under my screen name, cboyle.
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