Young Chang Like teenagers with nothing stopping...

Young Chang

Like teenagers with nothing stopping them from jetting off last

minute to a faraway place, Lorian Petry, Ann Folks and Lynne George

of Newport Beach flew away last month when their friend Wendy Bowie

called and said her home in Jackson Hole, Wyo., was finally ready for

a visit.

The three travelers knew that Bowie, whose primary home is in

Laguna Beach, had her 50th birthday coming up. But as she’s the

famously understated one among her friends, Petry and pals decided

not to assume the birthday was the occasion for Bowie’s sudden

invite.

“It was very spur of the moment,” said the 51-year-old Petry. “She

said, what are you doing next week? ... We all got on the phone and

called the airlines.”

For some, it was a chance to learn the many deal-finding ways of

the Internet and a chance to click away without really being sure

everyone else was going.

“You have 30 minutes to say yes or no to the ticket,” said Petry,

a financial planner. “You start to sweat. All of us clicked yes.”

In the small, cowboy town of Jackson Hole, the four friends spent

time without husbands and kids and work duties for a week. They hiked

-- everyone else in hiking boots and the self-proclaimed unfit Petry

in slip-on tennies. They rafted down the Snake River at night and

didn’t bother feeling things like fear for what was unseen in the

water. They took the liberty of celebrating Bowie’s birthday at many

a meal.

“Basically we treated her to dinners at various places around the

Jackson Hole area,” Petry said. “We were slyly celebrating her

birthday without making her feel like it was a major birthday event.”

Bowie said her favorite moment during the week together was

attending a Sept. 11 memorial together in the town square and

praying.

“Just because of our long friendship and just [being] united

together in prayer and remembering those that have lost loved ones,”

Bowie said. “It was really a very special bonding experience.”

The four college friends -- everyone met at the University of

Southern California -- kept it an all-girl affair, save for Bowie’s

dog Josh, until Bowie’s husband arrived the night the Newport Beach

women left Wyoming.

“It made me feel like we were, instead of being 50, 18,” Petry

said.

* Have you, or someone you know, gone on an interesting vacation

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330 W. Bay St., Costa Mesa, CA 92627; e-mail [email protected];

or fax to (949) 646-4170.