“Somewhere on your journey don’t forget to turn around and enjoy the view”

 The weather’s gorgeous and you wish there was someone special in your life to take to those BBQ’s. Well, until that Mr. or Ms. Right comes along, remember why being single can really be fantastic, too — maybe even preferable with so many enviable freedoms!

The New Seven Wonders of the Worldis a project that attempts to revive the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World concept with a list of modern wonders. A popularity poll was organized by the private New7Wonders Foundation, with winners announced just last year in Lisbon, Portugal.

 Reason #6: Travel bolsters mental health
A study published in the Canadian Journal of Mental Health of almost 20,000 Canadians showed that leisure travel has been found to directly contribute to higher levels of physical and mental health, especially during times of stress. Vacations are best bet for throwing off work-related stress by providing you with not only a physical and mental diversion, but a lifestyle diversion. Taking time to “get away from it all” means you can redirect your thought process from corporate decision making to deciding on fun things that you want to do in the time frame that you want to do it. This change of pace can allow you to decompress, reflect, relax and slow down…providing a sense of balance to every day stresses and responsibilities.

Reason #7: Vacations make you more effective at work
According to the U.S. Travel Association’s compilation of research studies, overwork costs employers about $150 billion a year in stress-related absences, and workers get no more done when they work 50-hour work weeks than when they work 40-hour work weeks. The association notes that European workers, who are granted much more vacation time than American workers, had higher productivity growth than the United States in most years between 1981 and 2000.

Some good reading: This “amazing” article was published this week in our hometown Jewish Chronicle. Check it out: http://www.thejewishchronicle.net/pages/full_story/push?article-Jews+in+Antarctica-+Amazing+Journeys+-%20&id=3054814&instance=home_news_right

We continue the series on reasons why taking a vacation is not only good for your health, it’s good for your productivity, creativity and overall well being. One should not under-estimate the importance of recharging one’s physical and mental health:

Our annual Amazing Journey to Alaska is always filled with excitement, adventure, unpredictability and lasting memories. This year’s 10th journey to “Mother Nature’s Showcase” however, having just ended a couple days ago, took the word “amazing” to a whole new level. I could spend a few minutes typing a generalized testamonial compiled by the many positive comments that are beginning to filter into our office, but I’ll just let the following text as received via email from one of our passengers do the talking.

Eagles and Whales and Bears..Oh my!

Whale watching, hiking, wilderness adventures, glacier tours, sea kayaking and white water rafting are just a few of the adventures that await our group. We’ll even sail on our cruise ship to the face of a massive glacier, in a body of water that was created by this glacier over hundreds of years. Our group of 74 are about to embark on a vacation that will be etched in their minds forever as they experience a world that most people only dream of.

Over the past decade, Amazing Journeys has taken nearly 1000 passengers to Alaska (some of them even twice!) and we are proud to be a leader with the Jewish single population in showing off what’s known as Mother Nature’s Showcase.

We’re also proud to announce our most recent “success story” as a result of a recent Alaska cruise; Martin Katz and Nicki Berlyn, who both met on our Alaska cruise in 2007 will be married later this summer.

So, for those of you who are working to live…..there are so many reasons to plan an Amazing Journey. Missed Alaska and want to join us next year? No worries; stay tuned to our website for details on our 11th annual Alaska Cruise & Tour in August, 2010.

To be continued….(see the next blog for more reasons why taking vacations should be a priority in life)

The sun on your face, the sand between your toes…it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that being on vacation makes you feel better. But in case you need some proof —for the boss or for yourself—that a vacation is not only good for your health, it’s good for your productivity and creativity, the next few blogs will be dedicated to showing you a compiled list of reasons (as if you really need an excuse) to better your life with vacations.

We continue a look at some of the unique people who make up the Jewish population in Alaska:

Chaim Cohen is a tall, burly man wearing a neon-orange safety vest and a cap with a construction company logo. He walked into Beth Sholom one day last July and asked to buy a tzedaka box. Cohen, 40, who claims to be the only Jewish pile driver in Alaska, had just bought a house near the synagogue and needed the box so his children could keep the congregation’s tradition of weekly donations at home. Cohen had come to Alaska from Los Angeles the year before in search of a job. An Orthodox Jew, he refuses to work on the Sabbath, but his unusual background more than makes up for what employers might have considered a limitation: He had lived in Israel and had served in the Israel Defense Forces for nine years, running fuel and supplies throughout South Lebanon

Bob Loeffler, 53, a consultant in land-use planning and natural resources, was in the synagogue the day Cohen came in, having arrived by bicycle from his home eight miles away. Loeffler grew up in California and came to Alaska as a college graduate looking for adventure, especially outdoor sports. Thirty years later, his enthusiasm has not waned.In his job with the Department of Natural Resources, which manages Alaska’s 100-million acres of state land, he created the first land-use plan for Prince William Sound, home to spectacular glaciers and a stunning array of wildlife.

Joel Zipkin and his wife, Barbara, knew nothing of Alaska before arriving from San Francisco in 1974. Fresh out of law school and frustrated by the dearth of jobs in his hometown, Zipkin accepted an offer from an Anchorage law firm, thinking he would try Alaska for a year. Today, he is a senior partner at the same firm. Among the things that kept him in Anchorage were the close friendships he made through Beth Sholom. “We are so distant and in some ways still so isolated and forgotten that living here binds us”, said Zipkin, who has twice served as congregation president. “Friends became as close as immediate family”, he added.

The Lubavitch Jewish Center which houses Shomrei Ohr and its educational facilities, a Chabad House and Judaica shop—also offers a sense of family to an eclectic group; some 40 of whom dine with the rabbi and his family on Friday nights. One regular is Jerry Green, 74, son of legendary Anchorage furrier David Green. Jerry Green and his brother, Perry, are among the few Jews in the community who grew up in Alaska. Together they run the family business; their factory and fur shops line 4th Avenue downtown and attract both tourists and locals. A fourth generation of Greens is already growing up in the city. But Jerry Green never wanted to be a furrier, and in 1965 he left. Green wanted to become a doctor, but did not have the grades. He returned and channeled his passion for learning into collecting books, which line the walls of his study at the factory, and into his devotion to Greenberg;

Alaska has been good for the Jews; with a presence since at least since 1867, when they were active in the fur trade. Jewish merchants in San Francisco who imported furs from Alaska influenced the United States purchase of the territory that year. More Jews came later in the century with waves of prospectors responding to the lure of gold, and especially during the great Klondike Gold Rush of 1898. In 1908, Congregation Bikkur Cholim was formed in Fairbanks, but the Jews and their congregations tended to come and go. The town of Anchorage started out in 1915 as the site of the headquarters of the Alaska Railroad. Leopold David, a Jew, was its first elected mayor when it was incorporated in 1920.

One of the congregation’s three Torahs is a treasure from Alaska’s gold rush, brought from Lithuania to Nome in 1900.