Valerie Jeanne King, 72, of Queen Creek, AZ, passed away on February 19, 2019.
We lived all over the world: Fiji, Labuan, East Malaysia, Singapore, Houston, El Cajon, and Queen Creek.
We vacationed to Bali twice, Hong Kong once, made a trip around the world, went to Disneyworld and Epcot in Orlando and England. We flew to Plymouth, stayed in a hostel, watched the British Air Force returning from the Falklands War in 1982, went to Greece after shipping the two trunks we had full of books and stuff we couldn’t get in Labuan. Back then baggage was unlimited, but once in Europe, two bags only. We typically traveled with no itinerary. We caught a cab to a hotel which was right under the landing/takeoff pattern. Rather noisy. We got to know the manager of the hotel. We sat in the bar and drank ouzo with him to great extent. We went to a Greek restaurant – guess what, the menu was in Greek. One of the other diners noticed we were having a little trouble – he spoke English and ordered for us. It was delicious.
In 1985 for our anniversary we booked reservations at one of the best restaurants in Singapore. We were greeted with engraved matchbooks and pens. At 8pm, drinks, hors d’oeuvres, menu choices (i.e. cuts of beef, lamb and fish) were brought to our table for our inspection. Steaks all around. We ate and drank until midnight. Thanks to the taxi driver we made it home safe.
For our 20th anniversary we went on a five-day long range sport fishing out of San Diego on the “Polaris Supreme”. We caught 75 albacore – Valerie caught 35 of them. No slouch fishing.