From Guadalajara we caught a direct flight to Chicago for the last stop of our 5 1/2-month stint in North America. Before heading to Bangkok for a new series of adventures in Asia, we spent two days in the Windy City celebrating an important milestone in the lives of old friends, Chris Sterling and Todd Vitale.

My friendship with Chris goes back to our freshman year in college nearly 32 years ago. On February 7 Chris and Todd celebrated 25 years together in the place where it all began. They met at Spiaggia, the spectacular Italian restaurant, Chicago landmark, and favorite dining spot of Barack and Michelle Obama. We were honored to join them and our friend Shawn-Laree O’Neil for an incredible dinner that night — at the restaurant where Chris, Todd, and Shawn-Laree all worked together back then as well.

On our second night we switched gears and met Chris and Todd for dinner at Girl and the Goat for a different kind of experience on the hot Chicago dining scene. This casual place serves innovative small plates and is bursting with life. Chris had to work to get seats for us, even on a Sunday night. Heck, our taxi driver even asked how on earth we managed to get into the place! But best of all we were joined by our friends Nina Fernandez and Sonia Arroyave. There is something about Nina and Sonia: When you get together with them, you cannot possibly not have fun.

Since we are barely equipped for winter weather we lucked out in Chicago, where our two days were warmer than usual for early February. But that was enough cold for us anyway, so we are headed back to warmer climes. We’re flying to Bangkok, and we intend to spend the next 5 months traveling toward, in, and around the Himalayas — through Vietnam, China, Bhutan, Nepal, and northern India.

Shortly before leaving the U.S. in May 2013 we stopped in Los Angeles for a couple days to see friends. Our overwhelming sense then – our first visit to LA together – was that it was a city that made our friends happy. Even friends who were not known for being bright, smiling, happy people. In LA, though, they were remarkably happy. So, after our week-plus in Utah & Las Vegas, we stopped again in LA for a few days.

The good news is, our friends are still happy. Something about the weather and the people and the pace of life just agrees with them. I have to say, though, I’m not sure I get it entirely. The big drawback for us was the need for cars. While there has been some improvement in public transportation, overwhelmingly to get anywhere you need a car. And that suggests all the traffic woes you can imagine.

That’s just not typical of most great cities. Obviously our old home in Boston had pretty good public transportation, and we got by our last five years without a car. You can get by just fine in New York, Paris, London, Hong Kong and lots of other cities we’ve been in without a car, certainly as a tourist. Not so in LA, though; it’s just not realistic to spend time there without spending much of it sitting in traffic.

So there you are. Great friends who love the city, but maybe I’m just not a West Coast kind of guy. I should add that the weather didn’t help matters either. It’s supposed to be pretty much always beautiful in LA, but there was quite the little heat wave while we were there, with temperatures hitting 100 degrees or close to it mid-day. Oh yeah, and a drought. I mean, who could have predicted that when you build a major metropolitan area in a desert region?

OK, enough complaining about LA. Our big cultural excursion was a tour of the Getty Villa, a museum dedicated to the arts of ancient Greece and Rome. Our favorite part was the Mummy of Herakleides, a 1900-year-old mummy that “combines the millennia-old Egyptian tradition of mummification of the dead with the Roman tradition of individualized portraiture.” And later I learned that one of the museum’s most prominent pieces, The Victorious Youth dating from about 200 BC, is part of a serious controversy with the Italian government. They have indicted the Getty’s former curator for trafficking in stolen antiquities and Greek authorities are investigating her; she claims she’s being hung out to dry for doing things everyone on the Board knew of and condoned. Sounds like fun!

We had a great time visiting with friends, and we have the pictures to prove it. I hiked up the hill behind the big HOLLYWOOD sign and even went through the Batcave, the very cave that Batman drove the Batmobile in that classic 1960s sitcom, right there in Griffith Park by the start of the hike to the sign. I might not love cars, but I made an exception to pay my respects to the Batmobile! Oh, and we drove past Cher’s house. That’s right – a Roman-Egyptian mummy, the Batcave, Cher, and great friends all in one weekend. Who says LA ain’t grand?!?