The List

The. List. As I like to call it. You know what it is. Everyone has one. Also known as a “kick the bucket list”, “bucket list” or “reaper list”. Long before the Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson movie, Bucket List, people had their own “list”, even if it wasn’t written and stored in a capsule or better yet, posted on a blog. It is sometimes a place and sometimes an activity. No two people’s list is the same, but one thing remains the same, it never needs an explanation. So without further adieu, I present to you my list; which I expect to add to and then mark off as I do them. I put on this list not things that I’ve done already, but only things that I want to do. Please comment about items on your list and even things on this list that you’ve already done.

1. Take a ride in a submarine
2. Start a non-profit
3. Be a published author
4. Write a best-selling book on travel
5. Hang Glide at Kitty Hawk
6. Take a cruise (Yes, I’m a travel writer and have never taken a cruise)
7. Compete in the U.S. National Toboggan Championships
8. Dog sled
9. Trek Machu Picchu
10. Climb Mt. Kenya
11. Cave Dive at the Cave of Swallows in Mexico
12. Drive the length of the Baja Peninsula
13. Go diving for treasure
14. Take a hot air balloon ride
15. Take a hot balloon ride…at sunset…while making out with a significant other..in Africa.
16. Yacht through the Caribbean
17. Snowmobile in Antarctica
18. Live in an oceanfront cottage
19. Track Gorillas
20. Go tornado chasing
21. Drive a gondola, but not wear the scarf and hats like they do at the Venetian in Vegas.
22. Raft down the Colorado River
23. Be on The Colbert Report
24. Live as an expat
25. Play a round of golf at St. Andrews
26. RV across North America
27. Drive on the Autobahn
28. Go to the FIFA World Cup Championship
29. Go to the Super Bowl
30. Catch a fish or shark that is taller than me (above 6’3″)
31. Throw the opening pitch at a Major League Baseball Game
32. Swim with penguins in the Galapagos Islands
33. Attend the final round of the PGA Masters at Augusta National
34. Dive the Titanic
35. Sled down a volcano
36. Go spelunking
37. Live for a season in the U.K.; where I go to the pub everyday, eat fish and chips and Bangers and Mash, drink Guinness and sing and dance
38. Get published in one of the big fish (National Geographic, CN Traveler, Budget Travel Magazine)
39. Be on a Travel Channel TV show
40. See a concert at Red Rocks
41. Get off my plane and see someone holding a white sign with “Spellman” on it
42. Go waterfall rappelling
43. Build a beach cottage
44. Start my own business
45. Black water raft through the caves of New Zealand
46. Start a magazine
47. Operate a bed and breakfast
48. Develop an iPhone app
49. Learn to surf
50. Go base jumping down the Cave of Swallows
51. Sled down a volcano in Hawaii
52. Eat from every food truck in San Francisco
53. Compete in the U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship
54. Road trip the Pacific Coast Highway.
55. Hike a 14er.