Just Around The Bend Travel

fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.” Mark Twain

“Living life, so others may live.”

Charlene began her career in the hospitality industry working at a local restaurant, Burger Five, in Decorah, Iowa when she was 16 years old. She went on to work in the retail industry while starting a family.

Charlene is a 1976 graduate of North Winneshiek high school. She earned a Masters in Tourism Administration from George Washington University and a Bachelors of Business Administration in Travel and Tourism from the University of New Mexico Anderson School of Management, and earned an Associate Degree in Business Administration from Central New Mexico Community College.

After completing college, Charlene spent the first 20 years of her tourism career working in the New Mexico tourism industry. The last four years were spent working in the Iowa tourism industry as the Executive Director of the Winneshiek County Convention and Visitors Bureau in Decorah, Iowa. Last fall, she fulfilled a lifelong dream of owning a marketing agency. She is now the owner of Outside the Lines Destination Marketing and works with clients in Iowa, Minnesota, Texas, and New Mexico. In 2019, at the start of the pandemic, Charlene took a risk and applied for a freelance reporter’s position at a local newspaper in Spring Grove, MN. Now she is employed by the Fillmore County Journal as a reporter and manages their new office in Caledonia, MN, and does some ad sales in between articles.

Charlene has two blogs, Garden on the Rough and Just Around the Bend Travel. She loves working on them and is proud to say, “Every article I write, is based on my experience.

Thank-you, mom and dad!

Just Around the Bend Travel blog is dedicated in memory of my parents, Ernest, and Charlotte (Clink) Corson, who introduced me to the world of travel from day one. Thank you, mom, and dad, for nourishing the importance of travel in all your children.

My first trip occurred after dad served his second Tour of Duty in England. It was during this tour that I was born. After his tour was up, the family moved back to the United States. Though I do not remember the trip as I was a mere toddler, I have heard stories of our voyage across the Atlantic Ocean and keep a treasured postcard with the ship’s image in a scrapbook. One of the last stories my dad shared; I was the only member of the Corson family that did not get seasick.

We did not travel much after my dad retired from the military. We moved to the family farm north of Decorah, Iowa, where we took numerous road trips to the Air Base in Omaha, Nebraska, and Madison, Wisconsin. On Sunday afternoons in the summer, we would visit family, go fishing or swimming, and have picnics. We would take drives to see the beautiful fall colors along the Mississippi River in the fall. The Sunday drives were a highlight of my childhood.

Interspersed will be stories of trips my nuclear family took from years ago, but to me, they feel like they were just yesterday. Other stories will be recent trips and work trips taken throughout my career that created lasting memories and built my confidence. There will also be stories from weeklong trips and weekend trips. The blog’s highlight will be a series of Sunday drives that I take with my childhood friend, Tony.

Knowing I wanted to record my travel experiences and share them with others, I needed a name. I agonized over the perfect name until one day, remembering my family’s excursion down the Upper Iowa River the weekend following my dad’s funeral, the name for this blog came to me. Just Around the Bend is the perfect name for a travel blog.

Wanting to celebrate dad’s life, the family met at Hutchinson Family Campground outside of Bluffton, IA on the Upper Iowa River to pick up kayaks and canoes, from there, we headed upriver to a landing just beyond the majestic limestone Chimney Rocks for a couple of hours on the river.

It did not take long to realize that this was an ad-hoc group of inexperienced kayakers, led by the family patriarch.

Assuming got the best of me that day. I thought we were going to kayak for approximately two hours. Instead, our supposedly guided tour lasted eight hours.

We spent the day paddling, floating, splashing, laughing, and bonding intertwined with a lost sandal, glasses (thankfully Vance had another pair of glasses in his truck), upturned watercraft, and soaked and muddy clothes.

Long after passing the two-hour mark and as the sun inched closer and closer to the horizon, we began to hear “When are we going to be there?” The fearless leader boldly announced, “Just around the bend.”

My next travel adventure is just around the bend.

I want to hear from you! Your feedback is important to me as I continue to grow the “Just Around the Bend Travel” blog. I promise that I will get back to you within 24 hours. If you need to reach me immediately, send a text message to 505-331-7154.