If there is one thing I absolutely hate and dread while I am on vacation, it is RAIN! If I could only foretell the times when there will be a lot of precipitation, I would most definitely work my schedule around it. However, it doesn't always work the way I want to.

I feel for the tourists in San Francisco this past week. Why? Well, the weather hasn't exactly been the best. In fact, more rain is yet to come and it has been forecasted to get even stronger.

Imagine visiting one of the most beautiful cities in the entire world. You are so excited to see the sights and then it pours so badly. It is hard to appreciate anything at all because you are soaked to the bones and the rain shows no signs of abating.

I will never ever forget my first trip to the UK and Ireland last 1997. It was the very first time I returned to Europe after a nearly four year stay in Madrid, Spain from the late eighties and early nineties. My three week vacation was marred by heavy rain not just once but almost everyday I was there. In fact, it was reported in the British press that the summer of 1997 was the wettest in a hundred years. I have traveled many more times practically everywhere since then and I can say that the possibility of rain is something I have to accept. No matter how much I pray and hope that it will be sunny every single day while I am on my much awaited vacation, I am not always spared from the experience. I don't think any traveler ever will.

My partner, Marc, and I have always designated these rainy days as our museum days every time we're on the road and in a foreign country. Still, nothing beats a warm, dry and sunny day any day.