Love fun, will travel

by crv.staff
10.07.09
6:24 PM UTC

Filed in Costa Rica, Costa Rica Fun, Costa Rica Tours And Travel

Jean Melcher says many retirees and mature adults who have flocked to Southwest Florida are still seeking adventure and luxury travel.
“There are a lot of people that are not down here to be on a shoe-string,” she says. “They want to enjoy the finer things in life.”
Melcher says she’s one of those people.

“There are so many places in the world,” she says. “You feel like the world gets smaller when you meet new people.”
Melcher, a 65-year-old Bonita resident, tries to bring that sense of adventure to people through her travel agency, Jean Melcher Travel, and her social group the Southwest Florida Travel Club.

The travel agency organizes trips for couples and for families. But Melcher specializes in coordinating trips for groups of singles seeking to travel with peers, and uses the travel club as a way to help her clients find a social connection at home before going abroad.

“It’s all about people that want to travel in a group,” she says. “Like-minded experienced travelers.”

Melcher says she sometimes has to fight people’s notions of the concept of singles traveling: college spring break trips or sleazy matchmaking cruises.
“It’s not party hearty,” she says. “It’s more destination oriented with more sophisticated travelers.”
Most of travel club members are in their 50s, 60s and 70s. Some are divorced, some lifelong bachelors, but most are widows and widowers.
As Linda Soper, a Southwest Florida Travel Club member puts it, “It’s a great way to travel if you don’t have a Prince Charming in your life.”

The travel club and Melcher’s trips provide something to look forward to for people like 74-year-old Nancy Stenbacka.
Stenbacka says she was in a rut a few years ago after her husband died.
She was emotionally torn up by grief and unsure how to move forward, the 74-year-old Southwest Floridian says.
“I was out of it,” she says. “I knew I had to do something.” She decided to go on a trip. But, now single, she was wondering whom she would she go with.

That’s when Stenbacka found Melcher at a travel club meeting.Stenbacka signed up for a singles trip to Costa Rica.

For Stenbacka, the trip was a chance to see new places and meet new people. She even had some unique adventures — like zooming across a zip line in the Costa Rican rain forest.

“I had a lovely time. I’ve been going on trips ever since.” She’s since been to Panama, Russia, Scandinavia and the Caribbean.

In addition to going on Melcher’s group singles trips, Stenbacka now regularly attends meetings of the Southwest Florida Travel Club.The travel club is a chance for Melcher’s friends and clients to meet and socialize before and after trips. During the winter months, the travel club meets at Spanish Wells Country Club. Now in the summertime, they are meeting every other Monday at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse for happy hour.

Melcher insists that she didn’t intend to start a business after retirement. Melcher calls herself the “accidental travel agent.”

When she retired in 2001 as an educator in Long Island, New York, she said she moved to Southwest Florida hoping to travel and meet new friends. But after planning group trips as member and social director of a local singles club, she learned she had a knack for it.

One thing led to another, and Melcher became convinced to start a business to facilitate her travel coordination. She took on business partner Theresa Tyo to help.

One of the benefits of Melcher’s business is that she gets paid to travel. She not only organizes the group trips, but goes on them as an escort, as well.

“I just like to see people have fun and have a good time,” she says. It’s one thing for a business owner to say she has a connection with her clients. But talk to the members of the Southwest Florida Travel Club and they call Melcher their friend.

Connie George, a regular on Melcher’s trips and member the Southwest Florida Travel Club, says the success of the group has a lot to do with Melcher’s talent at social coordination. “Jeannie (Melcher) always brings fun to the group,” says Connie George at a Southwest Florida Travel Club meeting. “She has a happy personality. ”

Melcher says one of the reasons the travel agency and the travel club are so rewarding is that she continues to meet new people.

“All the people that travel with me,” she says. “End up becoming my friends.

Rating 4.33 out of 5