After family illness and breast cancer, at 82 this Shreveport woman took her dream vacation

Angelina DeFatta Rice took seventeen years to plan her trip to London and France.

Every detail of the eight-day trip was planned for her and her three retired teacher friends. Everything but the unexpected illness of Rice’s grandchild, which would ultimately prevent her from going.

During the next seventeen years, life kept getting in the way of Rice being able to take the trip. Cancer took three of Rice’s brothers, she became a caregiver to her aging father and later her husband as he battled Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.

“Five months after he died in March 2021, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. After a lumpectomy, radiation, and then two ‘normal’ mammograms, I decided it was time to take the long-awaited trip to London and Paris,” wrote Rice.

So, at the age of 82, Rice and her sister-in-law, Sherrie DeFatta, finally set off to see two European cities that they have only dreamed of seeing. Their children thought it would not be safe for them to do the trip on their own, so they signed up with Globus Tour Group, but added three pre-days in London before the tour started and three post-days in Paris after the tour ended to explore the cities on their own.

This led to one of the most magical moments of the trip, “On our first full day in London, we had tickets for Windsor Castle. When we asked the concierge about the best way to get to Windsor Castle, he said, ‘You don't want to go to Windsor Castle today.’ We were surprised at this answer and asked, ‘Why?!’ He said, ‘You want to go to the Trooping the Color Parade because all the royal family will be there, and this only happens once a year.’ He pulled out a map and marked the route we should take, and we took off walking!!”

The yearly event, also known as the Sovereign's Birthday Parade, is a public celebration of King Charles' birthday and gave Rice the opportunity to catch a glimpse of the royal family as they passed on horse-drawn carriages. In a photo Rice captured, Princess Kate is wearing a bright green hat that matches her suit and Queen Camilla has a black hat with a bright red suit.

The highlights in Paris included a cruise on the River Seine, Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, Montmarte, Sacre Couer, the Louvre, Versailles and a day trip to Giverny to see Monet’s Home and Gardens.

“Seventeen years was a long time to wait for this once-in-a-lifetime trip, but the people and sights in London and Paris did not disappoint. The wait was well worth it, and we enjoyed every minute of it,” said Rice.

This article originally appeared on Shreveport Times: Shreveport cancer survivor visits Europe in dream vacation