The Traveling Widower

Author: Richb

  • More Blog Changes – Something Different

    A travel guide titled 'The Traveling Widower' displayed on a wooden surface, featuring a blue cover with a coat of arms and a man in the background near water.
    Just kidding….not real

    13 October, 2026

    As I was reorganizing the Traveling Widower blog the past few days, I started browsing through the posts from the trips I’ve written about the past two years, just for the fun of it….Wow, I’ve been to a lot of really incredible places, and have overloaded my brain with memories. I’m glad I’ve been recording what I’ve seen on the blog since I’ve probably exceeded my internal storage limits. I need one of those storage implants that Keeanu Reeves had in Johnny Mnemonic (one of my favorite films…I want room service!).

    A man in a suit is wearing a futuristic visor and gloves, preparing to engage with a digital interface.

    I need more than the 80 GB he had attached to his head. Much like the SSD card I used the last day in Katmai National Park, I think a large portion of my brain is corrupted.

    Wait! This is not what I wanted to write about. Not enough coffee this morning. Let’s start over.

    One thing I noticed while reading my stuff is that while I do write a lot about each location in excruciating detail sometimes, I do not really spend too much time describing what a lot of people are looking for in travel related sites. While my intent has never been to turn the blog into a Rick Steves or Travel Advisor type of site,  some viewers might want to know more details about where I stay – hotels, restaurants, interesting places to visit. Or the company I travel with. My recent Iceland trip is a good example – we visited many of the major tourist sites, and also visited quite a few places off the beaten track. Along the way, we stayed at seven different hotels, ate at a lot of restaurants, and hiked or stopped at many locations that most of the larger travel companies ignore. If I were planning a road trip in Iceland on my own, I might be interested in some of the places I stayed at.

    So, what can I do differently without going through yet another time consuming redesign? Using my Iceland trip as an example, with the new format for the blog, maybe I’ll create a post summary for each trip, something like a “Best of My Iceland Trip”, which lists each place I stayed at, what I liked about it, focused more on what I liked about that village and/or hotel along with some pictures. For Iceland, this might include (as an example):

    Reykjavik

    Places to Stay – I only stayed at one hotel – The Hilton Canopy City Center, and it was one of the best hotels I’ve stayed at…anywhere. The hotel is something of a maze, but other than that, the rooms are large and modern, there are a number of great sitting areas to relax in, a great bar, excellent restaurant, and very helpful staff. It is also located on the main street with gobs of restaurants, bars and shopping just around the corner. Excellent location for getting around the city as well. And the gelato shop is just a block away.

    Food – Reykjavik is a foodie city…really. It’s not just weird fish dishes. You can find just about anything there, including the famous hot dog stand (never got to try it…too crowded. I do recommend the Baka Baka bakery – great food, pastries and breads.

    Akureyri

    Food – We had our final group dinner at a seafood/sushi restaurant, Rub23) across from out hotel. Very upscale, with a nice wine list. The dinner was pre-ordered by our guide – all sushi, and some of the best I’ve ever had. There are lots of restaurants, bars and coffee shops along the main shopping area – most looked pretty good, but we only at the hotel (meh) and Rub23.

    I can then create a new group on the home page – My Favorite Places or something like that. Or maybe “Max and Aperture’s  Favorite Places”:

    A man sitting on a deck with a golden retriever dog beside him, holding a book. The setting features a wooden railing and large windows with sheer curtains.

    This new category group will then have composite blog entries for each of my trips. And maybe some generic travel tips as well, on things like gear that I bought for some of the trips.  I will have to start taking more photos of the towns instead of animals, but I’m taking classes on street photography.

    I’m liking this idea. As Captain Picard would say, “Make it so!” Version 2.1 of the site will soon have this new category on the home page, with an entry for Kodiak. I’ll back fill some of the places over time – Iceland for sure since I still have all the maps and itineraries from there. And I’ll take more photos in Puerto Natales and Ushuaia on my upcoming trip,

    And in case you are wondering, I am not writing a travel guide book. That was just more AI humor.

    Peace

  • The New and Improved Traveling Widower

    An elderly man reading a book while seated at a desk, with his feet propped up. Two computers are visible on the desk, and a golden retriever is lying on the floor nearby.
    Max and Aperture hard at work

    11th October, 2026

    No, I’m not referring to my cardiac ablation procedure, although I have been feeling pretty good the last few days. I just released a completely reorganized version of the Traveling Widower blog. Woo hoo! I had two really good reasons for doing this:

    1 – I never had much of a design for the blog when I started it in 2024. I’ve been tweaking it every now and then, adding a few new features and cleaning up the post navigation, but it has grown organically, and there are now 160 posts, hundreds of photos, with a mess of pages, categories and tags, There are links that mysteriously broke, confusing methods for subscribing and submitting remarks, It’s time for some serious maintenance.

    2 -I’m bored and have a lot of free time before my next trip. I really needed something to focus on for a few days.

    3 – I would like to increase subscribers, and the current version is not exactly user friendly

    I know, that’s three reasons. 

    I decided I needed some assistance with the redesign – Web related applications have never been my strength … I was a database geek. So, I asked my new friend, ChatGPT for help. Seriously. I figure the AI (or is it SI..no) has access to more design information that I can find, so I had it review the current site on WordPress, and come up with changes to improve usability and increase clicks and subscribers. The first response back was a recommendation to hire someone who knew what they were doing. Just kidding. Much like my experience with photo editing, the chatbot responded with some really good ideas for a new design, most of which were time consuming, but technically simple. The most significant change was to simplify the home page, and organize all the posts into interest groups – travel stories, photography related techniques related to my trips, travel tips, and more personal posts about my loss and changed life. I used some of my AI generated images of Max for the link covers.

    A collage of blog categories featuring photography tips, travel stories, photo galleries, and travel tips. The images depict a diverse range of travel and photography experiences.

    When you click on the Travel Stories link, you get a page with links for each of the major locations I’ve visited in the past two years. Each of these then presents the blog entries for that trip. Pretty cool. The other group links are similar in functionality. Every page also has links in the header to move around in the blog. One nice feature for this new organization is that all I have to do now when I create a new post, is to add an appropriate tag – it will automatically be included in the appropriate group.

    A scenic view of Yosemite National Park featuring granite cliffs and pine trees.

    There are still a few bugs I need to work out, and one major issue which requires more research and possibly some  detailed technical work. Oh boy. Something else to work on this week. I do have to start packing pretty soon for Patagonia, so I’ll try to finish this up ASAP.

    So, if you have nothing better to do, I’d appreciate some feedback on the changes – either respond using the comments section, or via Facebook (or if you have my e-mail or phone number….that works too).

    Thanks in advance.

    Peace