The Travel Experience, (TE), was started in 1989 by two teachers from Massapequa High School on Long Island, Richard Westley & Al Midura. Wes and Al began planning and escorting one student trip to Europe annually. Within a year many teachers and educational support staff in the district were asking them to do a trip for adults. Eventually they did one adult and one student trip per year. The number of tours for adults was expanded when Al retired in 1996. The student trips ended when Wes retired but the number of adult trips was increased to about 8 to 10 per year. Since the TE does not advertise, all its growth has been through word of mouth. TE travelers enjoy the varied content of the tours at very reasonable prices, designed to give more bang for the traveler’s buck. The TE includes in its prices all taxes at time of publication. Furthermore, either one or both of us escort each tour to give it the personal touch. Today the TE newsletter is mailed to approximately 1,200 addresses alerting everyone to our trip selection. The TE has conducted trips to all of Western Europe, most of Eastern Europe, China, Thailand, the Caribbean, Central and South America, Alaska and Hawaii. A trip to South Africa in the fall is one of our new offerings. We are also planning another trip to Costa Rica, a return visit to China, and a trip to Spain and Portugal, There will also be new trips to Italy and other countries in Europe. Our new web pages have been designed to keep you informed about upcoming trips and to provide helpful information for our club members. If you are in interested in any of our trips or have and questons fill in the attached forms or email us. We love to have new travelers join us. GOT – A – GROUP? Contact the Travel Experience if you have a family group or a group of friends of 10 or more and would like us to design a specialized trip for that group. It might be that your family, after talking about it for years at family events, would like to return to the country of their ancestors. Perhaps a group of your neighbors, friends, or your dining, theater or religious group has been trying to plan a trip together. Get in touch with Wes or Al and let us help you customize your trip and realize your dream vacation. Within the last year and a half the TE has had the pleasure of planning and escorting a church group to Ireland and a family group to Switzerland. While both groups chose to visit some of the standard sights, they also, due to the nature of their trip, asked us to include some sights or places, which we would not ordinarily visit, that had some special significance to their respective groups. Some of their choices helped us to enjoy areas we never would have seen.