If You See Something . . .

Travel Guru, Rick Steves and Crew setting up for a "take" - Santorini, Greece
Copyright Andy Richards 2017 - All Rights Reserved

THE EARTH is huge, but the "world" is small. I grew up in Traverse City, Michigan. considering where we were (an essentially rural part of norther lower Michigan), it was a pretty modern, affluent, upper middle class city. It was well away from Detroit or Chicago, but its location on two beautiful Lake Michigan bays made it popular both as a resort and a place to aspire to live. It continues to be one of Michigan's major tourist attractions. When I was 11 or 12 years old, we had a venue popular with actors (The Cherry County Playhouse - closed in 1991) and I remember meeting Morey Amsterdam of The Dick VanDyke Show fame and getting his autograph (not really relevant, but as a young kid, it may have also been my first eye-opening disappointment as I found him very dismissive - I have learned over my lifetime that it was not an unusual thing). My first personal exposure to celebrity, though.

How close were we to being "extras" in a Rick Steves Santorini Video?

OVER THE years since then, I have had several "exposures" to celebrities, some direct and some indirect. As I note above, modern ability to travel (particularly since the jet age) and communicate (particularly since the internet became widely available) has shrunk our world. Vastly. And that has been to our personal advantage. As "serial" cruisers, we have seen so much of the world. It always struck me that my uncle from rural Vermont - just one generation removed - but for a 2 year missionary stint in Puerto Rico as a very young man, had only traveled away from his home once or twice in his entire life. Conversely, we have seen some 46 different nations of the world (and counting), and 38 of our 50 states (I can see we have some U.S. travel to accomplish 😑).

IN VIRTUALLY every instance, our celebrity "touches" have been serendipitous, and in at least one case, not even realized at the time. My post title is a silly "take" on the "if you see something, say something" saying. I saw something, but didn't even realize what it was. I didn't say anything - until now. 😈 That was definitely the case in the opening image. We were in (on?) Santorini, Greece on a cruise aboard The Celebrity Reflection with our friends, Paul and Linda. We had hired a guide to walk us around the settlement high atop the Caldera. I had done some research, knowing this would be an amazing photographic day, and it was everything I had hoped for. At one point, we were waiting for a group to thin a bit so we could walk out onto an observation point over the sea. It is not unusual for me to see something about a tourist or a group of tourists and catch a quick shot or two, as an aside from my major goal which is landscape/cityscape. I honestly don't remember making the opening image (even after a couple "curation" run-throughs). Just last week (some 8 years later) as I was re-working my "keywords" list on my entire archive, it grabbed my attention. I chuckled to myself that I probably made the photo because he looked a lot like travel celebrity extraordinaire Rick Steves. The chuckle, of course because I dismissed it thinking it was a pretty good, coincidental likeness. But then I looked again at the image. There are two guys setting up a "serious" video camera. The more I looked, the more I became convinced that I had unwittingly photographed a celebrity. 😲 How close were we to being "extras" in a Rick Steves Santorini Video?

I am holding Rory McIlroy's PGA trophy here, in his trophy room at Holywood Golf Course, Holywood (Belfast) Northern Ireland - 2019

THIS DISCOVERY got me thinking about cruising and other times we at least had a touch with "celebrity." The next one that comes to mind was an uplanned, short but fun visit to PGA golfing pro and celebrity, Rory McIlroy's home golf course in Holywood (Belfast) Northern Ireland. Once again on The Celebrity Reflection; this time in the British Isles in 2019, we didn't get to see or meet Rory that day (just missed him 😉), as he was competing in the U.S. at the time. But we did get to see his trophy room and meet the club pro. And we got something else kind of special - at least to a golfer - as you can see in the photograph. It turns out that our driver/guide for the day was a sometime personal driver for Rory.

THE TOUCHES get more tenuous, but there is at least one more fun, cruise-based story. On that same 2017 Celebrity Reflection cruise, we hired a driver from Rome In Limo (we have used them a few time and highly recommend them) to drive us up the famed "Amalfi Coast." Our driver was a great guy, obviously knew his way around, and gave us a great day, culminated in a wonderful late lunch in a restaurant overlooking the bay at Positano, owned by a friend of his. That wasn't the celebrity touch, though. Toward the end of our drive, as he was returning us to our port in Naples, he told us a story. He has driven for the company for many years - enough to become a "favored" driver by the company when something needs to get done. One day he received a phone call from the boss assigning him to one person for an entire week. She would be staying in Positano, and he would be at her "beck and call." Each day he would take her wherever she might wish (shopping, beach, restaurant, etc.). He was told she was a very private person and he was given a name (I cannot remember, but let's just say Gloria) for her. Several times, she asked him to serreptitiously get into a back room at restaurants, which he dutifully did. He addressed her as Gloria every day. At the end of the week she took him aside and thanked him for pretending not to know who she was and treating her like a "normal" person. He was a little bit perplexed. He really had no idea who she was. He doesn't watch television (especially American television) or keep up with anything "celebrity." He showed us his proof: photos on his phone of him with Oprah Winfrey (and Stedman)! Small world.