The Drama of Travel, Made Into Television
MY very first international trip was on TWA back in 1990. I went to Madrid and went backpacking with my college roommate for about five weeks. I went with $1,000, and we lived on wine, cheese, bread and chocolate. That trip changed my life.
I met my husband, Bertram van Munster, about five years later, and we both loved travel. I remember talking about how travel always has a lot of drama and how you can build relationships. I still keep in touch with people I met on my first trip abroad. So long story short, “The Amazing Race†was born somewhat from our own real love of going places.
I do talk to seatmates on occasion during my trips for the show, but I don’t really tell them exactly what I do. All I will say is that I work in television and I’m traveling for business. Even that takes a while for me to admit. First, I’m very private and where we travel for the show is a secret until it airs. Even my parents have to sign a nondisclosure agreement.
Traveling for the show is a lot of fun. It’s also a lot of work since the logistics are crazy.
But I’m privileged in that my business trips are really out of the norm. My husband and I have a lot of maps of the world in the office, and we try to pick places to film that may not be travel destinations for most Americans.
I’ve had some amazing experiences.
I remember flying from Adelaide to Coober Pedy, Australia, which is the opal capital of the world. I was on this tiny Cessna with four other passengers and one pilot. I decided to take flying lessons when I got home because I couldn’t help thinking what would happen if this one pilot passed out. Fortunately, he didn’t and we wound up filming for one week in underground homes called dugouts, which really are a lot nicer than the name implies.
I was in Botswana in a plane called a Caravan. We were flying over the Okavango Delta while herds of elephants ran throughout the bush. It was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. Flying into Reykjavik, Iceland, was like landing on the moon. Even though it’s only five hours from J.F.K., it’s like no other place on earth.
We took off at night and arrived in the morning to the most beautiful sunrise I’ve ever seen. I’ve also flown apparently to the end of the world when I flew to Punta Arenas, Chile and then onto Ushuaia, Argentina, where I had my passport stamped “The End of the World†on Isla Redonda Tierra del Fuego. That was very cool.
Aside from finding places that are not usual destinations for many Americans, we try to keep things local or culturally significant regarding the challenges that our contestant teams have to perform.
People really seem to enjoy sky diving and bungee-jumping. I went bungee-jumping for the first time in New Zealand during season two. It’s called the Nevis Bungee Jump and you drop about 440 feet. I must have stood on the ledge over the gorge for about five minutes. I knew if I didn’t do it I would regret it. So I did it. I couldn’t even catch my breath to scream. I was out of my mind, but I would do it again.
Sky diving is another story. I told myself I would do it once, and now it’s off my to do list, but more power to our teams and every other person out there who thinks that it’s fun. Jumping out of a perfectly good plane makes absolutely no sense to me.
By Elise Doganieri, as told to Joan Raymond. E-mail: joan.raymond@nytimes.com.
