I am fortunate to work in a business that does think a title matters, and sometimes even encourages employees to choose their own. Some are as creative as the jobs themselves: “Chief Inspiration Officer”, “Prime Minister” and – my personal favorite – “Director of Fun”. Among tour guide titles I’ve seen are: “Resident Expert” and “Royal Storyteller”. Don’t you just love it?!

These monikers describe people who are in the business of creating happy memories for visitors. They may work for a local CVB, a restaurant or hotel that sees a lot of tourist traffic, or a tour operator like myself. An outgoing personality is a must of course, but an even more valuable trait is the ability to think outside the box. A unique title immediately signals to correspondents or business associates that this person is a Oner, and definitely somebody you’d like to know better.

This same creativity also applies to travel and tourism events, making them more enjoyable and – by extension – more productive. I participate annually in a travel marketplace sponsored by Travel Alliance Partners (TAP). As an entirely new business model this company strives to break ground in everything it does. That includes our trade show, which takes the traditional buy-sell relationship (which can be adversarial) and turns it on its head by creating partnerships instead. In naming our new concept it wasn’t much of a leap to pair the word TAP with another form of partnership: Dancing. Hence: TAP Dance. However, when the event was first introduced, one of our attendees actually had her registration requisition vetoed by her boss because “dance lessons were not in the approved budget!”

Unfortunately, well-meaning bean-counters do slip into positions of authority on occasion and muck things up. What a sad commentary it is on our society that if one is perceived to be having fun at his chosen profession there must be something wrong!

Our job is providing a good time for our travelers, making happy memories with unforgettable journeys. It’s second nature for us to share our happy outlook on life with those around us – customers, suppliers, and colleagues alike. What other business encourages such creativity, works so hard, and has so much fun doing it than the travel industry?

My point here is that when you have an entire industry dedicated to making YOU – the customer – happy, it’s pretty hard to keep a straight face. From the first phone call to your tour company – when you can practically hear the person on the other end of the line smiling – to the welcome reception for your tour, to the farewell dinner where tears of gratitude for an experience of a lifetime are added to the smiles, you know you have found people you want to meet over and over again. Because they make you happy.

As tour operators, we’re glad to be able to bring you such a great gift.

That feeling of adventure is exactly what you get when you explore the great American West with Shebby Lee Tours. On a Vanishing Trails Expedition you might take a horseback ride across the open prairie; thrill to the excitement of a wild west rodeo; meet a tribal elder in his own home or walk in actual wagon wheel ruts which have survived more than a century of sun, wind and weather. These experiences enhance your pursuit of America’s heritage when you follow in the tracks of intrepid pioneers, experience the romance of the fur trade, or immerse yourself in our cowboy heritage

We’re not opposed to book learnin’; I’m an avid reader myself, and we include a recommended reading list with the registration packet for each Vanishing Trails Expedition. But we do firmly believe that there are all kinds of ways to learn and we all learn better by doing. And most importantly, it’s got to be fun, or why bother?

We often use the phrase, “Explore the West Where Legends Live”. One of the ways we make this happen is with the many living history reenactments included in our programs. You might help bake bread over an open campfire with an Oregon Trail pioneer, learn how to pack a keelboat so that it won’t tip (as the men of the Corps of Discovery had to), join in the dancing at a traditional pow wow, or sing songs around the campfire at the end of the day. These activities are not only fun, but they help us appreciate what it took to settle this great country of ours – and learn how it affected those who strove to “tame” the wilderness and the original inhabitants who had lived comfortably off the land for centuries.

In the coming season we have a variety of “historic field trips” to choose from:

El Camino Real - April 19-25, 2012

Join us this spring as we follow the fabled Camino Real from El Paso to Albuquerque. Blazed over 400 years ago in the conquistador tradition, El Camino Real became the longest highway in North America and has served as a commercial artery for a longer period of time than any other road. Follow the trail blazed by Don Juan de Oñate, who risked his family fortune to colonize the interior for fame and fortune, God and Spain.

Explore the origins of New Mexico’s unique cultural heritage, as we follow the Rio Grande north on El Camino Real and learn about this fascinating chapter of American history.

Old West Trail Offers Unique Adventure – June 16-22, 2012

Explore the West where legends live on this 7-day journey to the past. Visit the site of “Custer’s Last Stand”, stroll the same storied streets of Deadwood Gulch once inhabited by Calamity Jane, Wild Bill Hickock and Poker Alice, view awe-inspiring mountain carvings, and walk in actual Oregon Trail wagon ruts which have survived more than a century of sun, wind and weather. Begins and ends in Denver.

Like all Vanishing Trails Expeditions, the Old West Trail features living history, special speakers and events, authentic meals, interpretive centers, historic sites and other activities specifically related to the theme of the tour. These programs allow participants to experience first-hand the sites where the pivotal events of the history of the West actually took place.

Lewis & Clark Trail – Aug. 3-18, 2012

Since 2001 people like yourself with a desire to explore other cultures and gain historical perspective have been following in the wake of the Corps of Discovery with Shebby Lee Tours. This timeless American program brings to life the hardships, triumphs, and many discoveries made by the Corps of Discovery along their historic and epic westward journey.

Beginning in St. Louis, the route mirrors the westward journey of the Corps of Discovery, ending in Portland, Oregon.

Don’t forget that this program includes special activities not available to the general public. From the opening night festivities in St. Louis to the gala farewell dinner in Astoria, Oregon, participants are immersed in the adventure and excitement of this epic journey. The coach even sports a 15-star flag identical to the ones Captains Lewis & Clark presented to Native chiefs along the route of their 1804-1806 exploration. In addition to the living history, special speakers and events, are authentic meals, Lewis & Clark interpretive centers, historic sites and boat rides on the Missouri River which lend insight to this truly memorable journey.

Custer State Park Buffalo Roundup – Sept. 22-27, 2012

Shebby Lee Tours has been offering a tour program featuring the popular Custer State Park Buffalo Roundup for many years. This year’s program is scheduled for September 24-29 with arrivals in and out of Rapid City, SD.

Ever since park rangers started rounding up some 1,500 head of buffalo each fall for the annual branding, sorting and vaccinating, visitors have been fascinated by this Old West tradition. You’ll enjoy a prime viewing location as these pre-historic beasts rumble by, and priority admission to the corral and vendors area.

This one-of-a-kind event also includes a chuckwagon buffalo cookout, arts festival, buffalo wallow chili cookoff, buffalo chip throwing contest, cowboy poets, musical entertainment and much more.

In addition to the Roundup, this six day hub-and-spoke itinerary offers customary Indian Summer weather, beautiful Black Hills scenery and popular attractions including Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse, Badlands National Park, Wall Drug, the 1880 train, Tatanka, and historic Deadwood.

Like all TAP Partners, Sports Travel has unique expertise in a travel industry niche. In their case, that niche is not a location, but an interest – taking you to the ballparks on your Bucket List, championship games, Hall of Fame Inductions and just about anything sports-related. But they offer much more than just game tickets. They take the hassle out of attending these high-demand events with complete packages, coordinated transportation, and a sports maven to pull it all together and give you the inside story.

I’m strictly a one-sport person myself (baseball) but because of it’s unique place in American history, it is much more than a sport to me. I even belong to a baseball historical society where I can get my annual fix of research presentations about the Negro Leagues, historic ballparks, the All American Girls Baseball League and just about any arcane baseball factoid you can think of.

But I digress.  Since baseball offers a rich and exciting history in America, the collaboration of Sports Travel & Tours and Shebby Lee Tours seems like a natural.  Our clients have a wide range of interests besides the historic and cultural heritage of the Great American West. That’s why we are TAP Partners in the first place – so we can offer you a world of travel experiences – and you’ll hopefully come back to us when you want to experience the thrill of a particular historic trail, chase buffalo or find a respite from the rat race by exploring the West where legends live. Who knows, perhaps someday we’ll combine the two interests with a Vintage Baseball Tournament program!

Our travel industry hosts, in this case Spokane, know that by creating a pleasurable experience for us, we will not only remember them fondly, but make use of all that we have learned and experienced when planning our next tour to the area.

There is no question that people in the travel business know how to have fun. Maybe it’s because that’s our business: to make sure our clients have a great experience when traveling with us. (One of my colleagues even lists his title as “Director of Fun”. I LOVE it!) I’m always looking for unique experiences, great places to dine or explore, and little-known gems which will add up to a memorable vacation.

Whether on scouting or FAM trips, tourism marketplaces, or business meetings like my trip to Spokane, I am able to experience what any given place has to offer, learn what will enhance an itinerary and equally important, what will not.

There is a down-side to all this fun, of course. I often cringe when someone at home urges me to “have a great vacation” when I am departing on a tour. I spend the majority of my time on the road making sure my guests are comfortable, happy and well-fed, in addition to experiencing new things which will ultimately enrich their lives. It’s hard work, not a vacation. But if I’m doing my job right, they won’t notice, and my obvious pleasure at sharing wonderful experiences with my passengers will be the memory they take home with them.

So I welcome the opportunity to experience Spokane, even when it comes with many hours of meetings, because I know it will make me a better tour planner and enhance the vacation experiences for my guests.

Everybody “in these parts” accepts this truism, but it is nice to encounter validation every once in awhile. I learned just recently that no less an authority than historian Stanley Vestal, called the Missouri River “the great divide, where the West begins, a social barrier between two cultures, two climates, two ways of life.”

Nowhere is this more evident than here in South Dakota, where the Missouri River divides the state in two, serving as the dividing line between Midwest and West. East of that fabled watershed is farmland and farmers, a sub-humid climate, Central Time Zone, Twins and Vikings fans, and two-thirds of the population of the state. West of that divide is cattle country and cowboys, a semi-arid climate, Mountain Time Zone, prairie instead of furrowed cropland, Rockies and Broncos fans, and lots of wide open spaces.

Still the misconception persists:

Literally NO ONE, including clients and suppliers I communicate with on a regular basis, recognize that I adhere to a work schedule based on the Mountain Time Zone. The phone starts ringing promptly at 7:00 am and enters an eery hush at 3:00 pm. Now that I think about it, I don’t get any emails after 3:00 pm either. For those of you who are not good at math, those are Eastern work hours! When my colleagues back East are headed for happy hour, I still have a good two hours of work left. The upside of this, of course, is that I get an awful lot done in the blessed silence between three and five in the afternoon!

It would be helpful if geography and politically-inspired state borders were more clear on this issue but – as the recent book and popular television series, “How the States Got Their Shapes” pointed out, there is nothing tidy about these things.

Our historical characters are unquestionably of the western stripe: Wild Bill and Calamity Jane (always spoken of in the same breath, though they were not as closely allied as Jane would have liked), Sitting Bull, George Armstrong Custer, Seth Bullock, Potato Creek Johnny, Poker Alice, Crazy Horse, Boone May, Valentine T. McGillicuddy, Sacagawea. Try interjecting those names into a conversation on crop yields and hog futures!

This is the land of the six-foot jackalope, where there are more cattle than people and men dream big enough to carve mountains. Our mottoes reflect the expansiveness of the region: Big Sky Country, Legendary North Dakota, the town too tough to die, and my personal favorite: Where the pavement ends and the West begins.

It’s been a long time since South Dakota boasted that it’s primary roads were composed of “modern gravel highways”, but once you cross the Mighty Mo you definitely know you are in the West. (Unfortunately, this great phrase originated with the Crystal Springs Rodeo which was located well east of the Missouri River, but never mind, it’s still a great slogan.)

Actually, the dividing line is somewhat fluid and can even move eastward. I was on a tour once with a lifelong Easterner who was thrilled to be in the West, which she defined as our starting point of St. Louis. We gently informed her that no, we were not yet in the West. Day after day as we proceeded toward the setting sun (following in the wake of Lewis & Clark) she asked, “Are we in the West yet?” And every day the answer was, no Cathy, not yet.

Finally we reached South Dakota, traveling north along the eastern bank of the Missouri River, which both literally and figuratively is NOT the West. But one day we crossed the river to visit a private buffalo ranch – the very one where “Dances With Wolves” had been filmed not too long before this. On that day, the answer was a final and triumphant, YES, Cathy! NOW, we are in the West! And we remained so for the rest of the trip to the Pacific.

In closing, I should point out that there is nothing exactly wrong with the Midwest, of course. In fact, the only flaw that comes to mind is that it ISN’T the West.

(With apologies to all my friends and colleagues who live, love and work in the Midwest)

Happy Trails from the Mountain Time Zone!

I moved to Indian Country from New York over 40 years ago to get married. It was the early seventies and it was a bit of a culture shock. I was teased unmercifully for wearing mini-skirts (which hadn’t quite made the scene here yet), and the omnipresent country music, western wear and cowboy boots took some getting used to.

The marriage produced a rather unorthodox family: I’m Jewish, my ex is Sioux – the kids are Siouxish! This cross-cultural, mixed racial family was something of a laboratory for life lessons not available to everyone – and we took full advantage of it. Growing up, the kids (two boys and a girl) played Cowboys & Colored People. As they grew older they thought it was hilarious to introduce me (with my pale skin and red hair) to their unsuspecting classmates just for the shock value.

Because we lived in a white neighborhood and many of our friends were white, I made sure the kids were exposed to their native heritage as well. They spent weeks at a time on the nearest reservation (where my mother conveniently worked), and participated in local Native American activities such as dance club. (For a white chick, I’ve spent a lot of time at pow wows.)

But it wasn’t all fun and games. When I first moved here there were signs in the windows of western South Dakota restaurants and shops warning, “No dogs or Indians Allowed”. The newspaper didn’t print obituaries, births or wedding announcements for Native Americans. The only Native American cops were on reservations, even though 10% of Rapid City’s population is Indian.

We’ve come a long way since then, but – like all race relations in this country – there is still work to be done.

So that brings us back to the pow wow. The Black Hills Pow Wow is now 25 years old, and an established part of the annual Pow Wow circuit which stretches the length and breadth of the continent offering substantial prize money. It is also a major economic boon for the Black Hills and its Native American contestants – a topic for another time, I’m afraid – along with pow wow etiquette, how the individual dances originated, the grand entry, and dance judging.

For the people of the Black Hills, the pow wow has provided an opportunity for the entire community to come together for what started as a family get-together on the plains. I am proud to say that non-Indians have been welcomed by Natives, and have embraced the spirit of the event as a chance to expand their understanding of a rich culture which preceded Euro-American occupancy of this area by thousands of years. We are all better for it.

It’s time to Pow Wow!!

Who’s fault is that? Mine!!

Shebby Lee Tours has become so identified with the Great American West and our Vanishing Trails Expeditions, that clients don’t automatically think of us as the source for that dream trip to Tuscany, or a romantic Caribbean Cruise, or the spectacular Bay of Fundy.

That’s a shame, when there is such an iceberg-sized array of programs available through Shebby Lee Tours’ partnership in Travel Alliance Partners. Each partner in TAP is a regional expert or specializes in a niche market, which is the reason for the wide variety of high quality travel products we are able to offer. There is no need to slog through countless look-alike websites, wondering if the company behind them is a reputable tour operator, or if the tour inclusions promised will actually be delivered.

Because the Travel Alliance is a partnership, and not a consortium or membership-based association, we all have a stake in TAP’s success or failure. And best of all, I know and work with all of the TAP partners and can personally vouch for them. So if you have traveled with Shebby Lee Tours in the past, you can expect the same level of personalized service from ANY package we offer, whether we are the operating partner or not.

So the next time you read one of our newsletters or browse our website, remember that for each tour program or destination highlighted there are hundreds more just waiting to be discovered. Our challenge is to reveal the entire iceberg, and not just the tip!

We’re working on it!

As a history major I was obliged to memorize long lists of dates, scrutinize battlefield maps and study the tactics and maneuvers of great generals from the beginning of time. It was absolutely mind-numbing. What I really wanted to know was, why were they fighting in the first place? What is their story?

For example, we are hearing a lot these days about the Sesquicentennial of the Civil War. There are anniversary battlefield re-enactments ad nauseam, but where is the dialogue about why this war happened? Was this war fought over states’ rights or was that a convenient excuse to justify the system of human bondage that was entrenched in one half of our states and banned in the other half? Or was it something else altogether?

As the 150th anniversary of the Civil War approached, I had my doubts that I could craft a tour program that would appeal to the military buffs as well as those of us interested in what brought citizens of the same country to blows.

And then I started learning about the troubles in Kansas Territory. I was hooked. This story has plenty of blood and guts, though more of the guerrilla warfare variety than actual battles. It has a charismatic martyr – John Brown – whom everybody has heard of, plus many more (mostly unknown) who brought the seething cauldron that had been knowingly created by our founding fathers, to a boil.

The politics in this case fascinate me, because they are so human. The compromises made in order to create our republic in the first place, only kicked the problem of slavery down the road. Everybody knew it; nobody knew how to resolve it. Even Southerners like Thomas Jefferson and James Madison – well, any slave-owning founding father – knew that it was an unsustainable system of labor. Never mind the moral issue of owning human property. Yet they compromised. And then the next generation compromised, and… well, you know the rest.

Bleeding Kansas: Where the Civil War Began  (October 15-21) delves into these issues and more.  Despite its pivotal role in what has been called “the gathering storm”, this episode is given short shrift in school textbooks, and of all the Civil War programs being offered during the Sesquicentennial, Shebby Lee Tours is the only one – to my knowledge – offering it. So if you want to learn more you can read all the books, or you can join others who have a similar thirst for knowledge, walk on the soil where these events took place, join in a political squabble in the first Territorial Capital, and ask your questions in the first person to one of many re-enactors and historians we will meet.

We recently received this message from a traveler who followed the Lewis & Clark Trail with us in 2007 and is signed up for the Bleeding Kansas tour this fall:

“Right now, Kansas is at the top of my thoughts. I have been reading up about the Missouri Compromise and the Kansas/Nebraska Act and John Brown and Black Jack and I just can’t wait to get out there in October to see it all for myself. It only needs to be half as good as Lewis and Clark to be great.”

See you in October, Dave!

For next year we are working on another western theater program: The Civil War on the Border (Missouri). Through today’s prism of over 100 years of Civil Rights struggles, “border” means only one thing: Mason-Dixon. (I Googled “Civil War on the Border” and came up with nothing but sites relating to that invisible line separating the North from the South.) But in the 1860′s, “the Border” was the western boundary of Missouri, just across the river from Kansas Territory.

This story too has it’s famous characters: William Quantrill, Jessie James, Cole Younger, to name just a few. Even Mark Twain served in the Confederate army – about long enough for a cup of coffee. His heart just wasn’t in it and he lit out for the territories in search of a less dangerous occupation.

Watch for further announcements as we finalize this program and set the dates. Because of the battlefield re-enactment included (yes, we include re-enactments, too) it will most likely be mid-August.

I’m fortunate enough to live in one of the most blessed spots on earth, scenically: the Black Hills of South Dakota. We have just about every kind of wild critter you could hope for and then some – we are home to one of the largest publicly owned buffalo herds in the country, and dozens of private herds. But moose? No. I’m told that moose need a swampy, marsh-like environment, and God knows we don’t have anything like that here in western South Dakota. In fact, there never were any moose here. But no matter. I travel plenty, and have had many opportunities to see them. But, no!

This has been going on for a very long time. I’ve been in the travel business for 34 years, and wasn’t exactly a stranger to the road before that. Yet, I can’t sight a moose for the love of me.

My ex-husband once sent me a picture postcard from the road, with a moose and the inscription: “This is a moose. It is a common wild mammal in the western United States. Have seen several on this trip!”

Ya gotta love him!

As far as I’m concerned the moose and the unicorn belong in the same category – both mythical.

My groups have naturally come to know this failing as we travel through the scenic west, and often try to help me out. Once when we were enjoying lunch at Jackson Lake Lodge in Grand Teton National Park, two or three breathless passengers came rushing into the dining room declaring that I HAD to come outside RIGHT NOW, because there was a moose on the grounds and I couldn’t miss it! I abandoned my repast and followed them out to where they swore there had been a moose only seconds before, but – you guessed it – there was nothing there but scenery. Foiled again.

Bus drivers often helpfully point out moose in the brush by the side of the road. Several passengers will chime in that yes, they see him. But I’m convinced they’re just pulling my leg.

Once when driving through the lush fall foliage of western Colorado someone in the back piped up that he had seen yet another moose – over yonder. We dragged out the binoculars. “Look” he said, just left of that rock jutting out. Two o’clock!”

Nope.

“Oh, he just moved! Now he’s heading downhill toward the creek. Don’t you see him??” No, of course I didn’t see him. There is no such thing as a moose.

*This post was written before my most recent tour to Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons, where – miracle of miracles – two young moose by the side of the road detained us for a full half-hour. The historian in me objects to posting this online in light of these recent developments. However, it would be a shame to pass up a good story and besides, it was all true – right up until the last paragraph!

Why can’t Mother Nature send some of this stuff to Arizona and New Mexico where they could really use it? 

We strive to make every tour experience better than the last, and use passenger evaluations and tour director’s reports as guides to continually improve our services.

Many large tour operators are obsessed with the numbers on those evaluations, and even set tour director salaries based on them. Because I am a tour director myself, however, I understand that there are many factors which affect the conduct and appreciation of a tour, and some of them are simply out of anybody’s control. Road construction, foul weather, plus a myriad of other factors can have a major affect on whether a tour is successful or not. It is how the tour staff – a partnership between the driver and tour director – deal with these factors that make the difference. For that reason, we do not judge our staff by numbers, but by words. We ask our guests to put in their own words whether their travel experience met their expectations and how.

The 2011 Old West Trail was a TAP Guaranteed Departure, which means that the departure runs whether it has one person on it or 50. Another aspect of this unique program is that several TAP Partners (now 38 of us) participate in selling each departure. This one had 5 participating Partners and the tour had barely concluded when I received my first comment from a passenger forwarded by my Partner in Indiana:

“ I just wanted you to know how wonderful that old West trip was. So old West Trail, Doris Louise Beam is a gem. Something else the 14 other people were very compatible. So it was just magnificent. We saw all these baby Buffalo [in] Custer State Park and everyday was just a joy and it was just so wonderful. So just thank you so much for being able to arrange that tour for me.”

The email concluded with a query from my Partner asking for next year’s dates so she can offer it again. (June 16-22, 2012).

Next came word from Nevada, short and sweet: “[my clients] LOVED the June 18th tour. Thanks.”

Next came the evaluations from the passengers themselves:

“Your love of the West showed through in the ways you shared your knowledge…the little unexpected extras made the many miles of our “Old West Trail” memories that will not be soon forgotten.”

“We loved our tour.”

“All presenters at the different locations were excellent”.

“My interest was in being able in my mind’s eye to picture the Wild West. Trip did that for me!”

“I’ve been on many tours and Doris was great.”

“Doris exceeded my expectations”.

“It was more than I expected. I so enjoyed myself. Thank you.”

“The tour was wonderful and Doris and Richard made it super wonderful.”

“Doris was fabulous!! She made the trip so much fun.”

“I’ve learned a lot & have a greater appreciation of everything along the Old West Trail.”

“Doris is really great & so knowledgeable about this area. Very easy to travel with & very personable & professional.”

“Our tour director, Doris Bean, and our driver, Richard were wonderful. They were so helpful, courteous and knowledgeable of history of the west. It was a great trip and I am so glad I went.”