EDITOR’S NOTE
The editor’s memories of fishing for snapper in New Zealand’s Bay of Islands had him pondering when he would be able to enjoy another such international outdoor adventure. COVID-19 has shut down nearly all travel outside the U.S at press time. (CHRIS COCOLES)
O
ne of my closest friends – and a longtime travel companion – has been a world trekker since long before I made my first trip outside of North America 11 years ago this month. I remember once he showed me his passport and I was in awe of all the stamps clogging the document, imprints from countries on every continent. I’m doing my best to begin catching up to his impressive list and don’t know if I’ll ever come close. But it’s been fun trying. These days, traveling outside the United States is impossible, and rightfully so, given our country’s lack of proper response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Our Paul Atkins, who wrote about some of his memorable hunting safaris in Africa (page 68), had to put another adventure on that continent on hold. “I was supposed to go in 2021, but with the virus I had to move it to 2022,” Atkins told me, “if I even go now.” I could understand his trepidation about assuming everything will be OK, even a year or more from now. I’ve already canceled plans to go to Greece in September and further trips scheduled for later this year and/or early in 2021 (nobody with an American passport seems destined to leave the country for leisure travel anytime soon). Like Atkins, I have great outdoors memories from some of my adventures afar: A hike along a rocky beach on an island in Estonia; piloting my own reindeer sled in Finland; catching enough snapper on a New Zealand charter boat to grill up the fillets back at the hotel; river rafting some of the fiercest rapids I’ve ever experienced further south on that same island nation; fishing from the shore of spectacular Lake Bled in Slovenia. These moments have me dreaming of my next vacation far away from the harsh, uncertain and somewhat bleak reality I find myself in right now. Maybe someday my world will be normal and I’ll be able to explore the rest of the world again. -Chris Cocoles aksportingjournal.com | AUGUST 2020
ALASKA SPORTING JOURNAL
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