Breakfast papaya tastes like travel

This morning Neil and I shared a big papaya with lime juice for breakfast. That papaya tasted like travel. From the very first bite, it tasted like adventure. It tasted like sunshine and vitality and juicy orange vigor.

Today, more than any other point in our first 19 days on the road, I finally feel like I’m on vacation. The papaya did it.

I can’t account for why or how the papaya worked its magic: maybe because the taste reminded me of previous trips to Hawaii (good) and Costa Rica (bizarre) where I ate papaya every day; maybe because Neil and I haven’t eaten a lot of papaya at home while we lived in Richmond; maybe the luscious ripe perfection of this papaya just shocked me into a Zen moment of lucid recognition of the reality around me like a two-by-four to the head in a Buddhist meditation hall.

Wow! We’re on vacation! This is really cool!

Note to self: start all future trips with papaya for breakfast.

[I should have taken a photo of our papaya, but by the time my brain cottoned on to the papaya's enchantments, we had eaten the whole thing. The gorgeous papaya picture above is a Creative Commons licensed photo by Flikr user L*u*z*a.]

Are there any foods that work this travel magic for you? What tastes remind you of your favourite vacations? Do any foods jump start your “vacation feeling?”

And if you try our magic papaya breakfast trick on your next trip, let us know what happens. (Your milage may vary.)