About Us

How it all started...

 

     It was August 1990, Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait to gain more control over the oil supply in the Middle East.  I was immediately deployed as a Marine helicopter pilot out of California as part of the U.S. led 39 country Desert Shield/Desert Storm coalition to support Kuwait’s sovereignty and independence and to build a greater cooperation amongst the Persian Gulf countries.

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 As we sat in the desert for months and prepared for an imminent conflict, one of my tent mates noticed that I was receiving little to no mail from home, he quickly gave his hometown family and friends from Buffalo NY my name.  I was soon overwhelmed with so much mail from my new friends.  One particular letter came from a young woman (Sherri) and her girlfriend (Michele) that really caught my attention, she appeared younger than me and very outgoing.  She asked all kinds of questions about the deployment and she told me all about her life in Buffalo.

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 As the conflict intensified, we moved several times throughout the desert and then the air and ground war began and as you know ended quickly with the defeat and retreat of Iraq from Kuwait.

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Shortly after the war ended we were deployed back to our home base.  I received orders to a new squadron and moved into a new apartment and the first day I received mail I found a letter from my pen pal Sherri.  It had traveled around Saudi Arabia and found its way to my new address in California.  I tried to contact her by phone in Buffalo but her girlfriend Michele told me she had moved to California and gave me her number.  I quickly called Sherri and thanked her for her letters.

 I also received a lot of mail and packages from a Buffalo company based in California near the base, one day I dressed up in uniform and went to their office with flowers and candy to thank them all for the generous support to me during the war.  As I went around the office thanking people, and to my surprise, I met Sherri, she had taken a temporary job transfer to California and was working for this company.

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  We kept talking, dated and soon fell in love.  I told her she had to marry me because it was fate that brought us together with just a simple letter.  We had a military style wedding, had kids and began our life of travel around the world.  We have now been happily married over 31 years and have visited many countries, explored nearly all of the island and countless states, cities, and adventures across the United States.

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  This website highlights our love for each other, travel and adventure and will hopefully give you information on how to enjoy all this as we have.  

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-Allan Collier