I have previously alluded to my extraordinary luck whenever I venture abroad, most recently in my ATM experience and the fact that I survived numerous taxi and bus rides in Mexico.

Alas, luck does not extend to my daily affairs, where horrible things occur with regularity, but in foreign travel, they don’t call me Lucky Jim for nothing.
To be truthful, “they” don’t call me that. I wish they would. It would bolster my flagging ego.

Despite the absence of honor in my own household, it is impossible to argue with my record in foreign travel. Nothing has ever gone wrong or even gone inconveniently. I’ve only once booked accommodations in advance, yet tasteful, affordable rooms have always been available. There was one close call long ago when we happened to arrive late in the afternoon in Cordoba, Spain, on a festival weekend and nothing was available at any price. We were on the point of bedding down in the car for the night.
My wife, the Driver, had already pulled a coat over her head when our companion, David, found someone at one in the morning who directed us to a joint on the outskirts of Cordoba so dumpy it was comical. Under the circumstances, it was luxury. Never mind the dogs and flies. That’s how lucky I am.

Though it pains me to mention it, I did fail once in the arena of accommodations. (We journalists take a vow of full disclosure). I spent a cold, miserable, hungry night on an Aegean ferry boat because of a language problem that hinged on the term “12 o’clock.”
It could have meant midnight or 12:00 noon the next day. In the event, it meant noon the next day. Hence the night on a pirate’s tub docked below the cliffs of Santorini. At least I was chivalrous enough to give my jacket to my wife-to-be, the Driver-to-be, who used it as a blanket and slept on a hard bench while I strode the deck, flapping my arms to stay warm and brooding over my mistake. Donkeys, I said to myself. Everyone else got off the boat and rode donkeys to the top of the hill, where there was food, retsina and warm beds. Was that a clue or what, stupid? But that was a one-off in an otherwise uninterrupted 35 year record of luck with lodging.

If you want to wander on the cheap without reservations, stick with me. Flights will never be cancelled, and if they are, like one leg of our recent return from Guanajuato, you won’t be stranded in Dallas like thousands of other American Airlines passengers.
No, when you stride up to the ticket counter prepared to be outraged, without so much as a “now see here” you’ll promptly be placed on a flight that gets you to Denver an hour ahead of the cancelled flight.

With me your rental car will never break down, and if it does, like ours did in a remote section of Greece 27 years ago, an amiable local mechanic with no English will diagnose the problem after much pointing and gesturing, zoom off on his motorcycle and promptly return with the correct fuel pump. Total installed cost: $10. With a big smile, he will hand you a bunch of apricots when you leave. Don’t tell me I’m not lucky.

With me, significant world-class sites will never be closed, and if they are, they probably weren’t worth it. Who needs to see Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling, anyway? (Actually, I do. All photographs suggest an arched ceiling, but it is flat. How did he do that?)

You’ll never miss a train with me, and if you do, your brother will be on the train with your suitcases, and your wife (not the current one) will consequently suffer only a brief hysterical moment. Then, after spending most of the night sitting in a scabby little train depot, you catch the next train to Madrid, where your brother and suitcases are waiting for you. What’s luckier than that?

Nor, if you stick close by my side, will you ever mistakenly eat a can of Spanish dog food under the mistaken impression that it is a cheap can of lunchmeat, as my brother did when he imprudently ventured out on a day trip alone. He’d gobbled about half the can when he noticed the word “Perro” on the label. It was a lunch break to remember.
In tropical climes, with me at your side you’ll never be bothered by mosquitoes unless you are like my first wife (the one who missed the train) who was literally blanketed with bites on a trip to the Yucatan. She resembled a giant strawberry when the bugs finished with her. I, arm in arm with her, was bitten only once or twice. To mosquitoes, I smell bad — and don’t say it. Twenty five years later, I was in the same location at the same time of year, and my current wife was bitten no more than I. This may be because ours is a marriage made in heaven rather than hell, and my luck works better with her. Or it may be that she also smells bad. To mosquitoes, that is.

I could go on, but the conclusion is obvious. For trouble-free foreign travel, I’m your man. Just call me Lucky Jim — no one else does. I should mention that with me, you may expect rain and uncommonly cold weather anywhere I go. I can’t do everything.
But my innate luck in all else associated with foreign travel overrides the weather thing, unless you have a problem with being rained on at the beach.

Where were we? Oh yes, Guanajuato. There, my luck light shined as brightly as ever.