TRAVERSE CITY -- Doug French tries hard to stay in one place, but the road always beckons him back for one more adventure.
When French, 50, of Traverse City, learned he needed extensive dental work, he decided that was reason enough to rev up his Kawasaki 750 motorcycle and ride the 2,500 miles to Costa Rica to have the work done there. He departed Traverse City Friday bound for San Jose, the country's capital.
He has a two-fold purpose for making the trip. While he's there, French, a non-traditional student at Northwestern Michigan College, plans to spend the month of November immersed in four-hour-a-day Spanish classes that he hopes will equate to a semester of college Spanish.
"It's actually cheaper to have a home stay with a local family that includes two meals a day and at the same time immerse myself in the Spanish language then it would be to rent a hotel room," French said.
French says the trip is just one of many such adventures he's taken to broaden his horizons.
In the past three years French has traveled by motorcycle to Martha's Vineyard, Boston and New York, all part of the wanderlust that hits him from time to time.
While he says he enjoys the security the steady work at a Northport nursing home offers, as well as his NMC business classes, when the road calls he listens.
He heeded the call a few weeks ago when he found a little free time to travel to Wisconsin to work in a cranberry bog during the fall harvest season.
French has sought out similar jobs since high school that pay the way for his travel opportunities. If he likes the job, he might stay on.
He traveled to Morocco and Europe when he was just out of high school and worked on a fishing boat in Alaska when he was 18.
French later returned to Alaska and stayed for 10 years working as a fisherman and in a grocery store chain. He spent time in Montana working at a ski resort and did a little mining work for a few weeks while the Eisenhower Tunnel was under construction in Colorado. "If I wanted to do something, I'd just jump in and learn to swim after I got in," he said.
He has a knack for writing and thinks it's time to combine it with his unique travel experiences. "People often have told me to write a book, so maybe it's time to start doing some things I really like," he said.
His new blog, www.freedomthrumovement.blogspot.com, will chronicle his Costa Rican experience.
During a motorcycle rally in Duluth French met some riders who had traveled by motorcycle all over the world. He said some had written books and poetry inspired by their travel.
"I talked to a guy who rode his motorcycle as close to the Arctic Circle as he could get. He rode through the tundra as far as a dirt road can take you in this world."
French hopes his blog inspires readers to look beyond their own borders and beyond their own inner boundaries.
"There are a lot of armchair travelers out there who experience life through other people and other mediums. Hopefully you can make a positive impact on their lives just through your own writing," French said.
"The thing I like about traveling and writing is that you have to slow down enough to account for where you’ve been. I think you get more out of life when you write about it."
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