When the eyes of others shine ...

27.01.23 Ouzoud: Why are you doing this? Irmi and Ricci look at each other briefly. Why are we doing this? Today I want to introduce the tour guide of our Morocco trip and his wife, who is often his right hand as a co-driver and even more often his calm anchor. Such a person is very important. For two reasons: Ricci is a hot-blooded person, whose fuses occasionally get hot. And secondly, it is not always easy for the nerves to travel with 18 motorhome friends in ten vehicles over 50 days in a foreign continent.

Why are you doing this? "I have already been to Morocco for the second time. The first time was like a fairy tale from 1001 Nights. I just love going far away", Irmi tries to answer. She knows that was not the question ... "I just like being in a group, the entertainment, there is always someone with an idea and it is relatively safe."

Now we are getting closer to the point. Ricci takes the floor. "When I see the sparkle in the eyes of my participants at the end of a trip, then I am happy. Then I know why I do this."

It must be a great happiness that the soon-to-be 80-year-old Upper Bavarian is talking about, because the demands, the pressure is immense. As a tourism manager of the Association of European Motorhome Friends and leader of our Morocco adventure, he is responsible for the well-being and fortune of a total of 18 people, some of whom are older than Ricci. And some of them sometimes have a different opinion about the planned tour. It's good - to put it cautiously - to have a certain assertiveness.

Ricci has more than enough of that. "I was already the headman at school", he says with a smile. Leader of the Red Cross Youth, 1st chairman of the TSV Peißenberg ice hockey club, league director at the German Ice Hockey Association and so on. The list is long. "Somehow I like it, the friction, the thrill of bringing others onto their path of happiness." However, he qualifies and raises his index finger: he also likes to be convinced if someone has better arguments. But finding better arguments is not easy ...

But the Motorhome Friends Europe, who form a close-knit group, know that. For them, Ricci is the man who has been planning and conducting trips for twelve years. Just as an aside: This position had to be created first and the club management had to be remodeled for it. It's not hard to guess who the driving force behind it was. "The former club leadership didn't fit. They only wanted to reap the laurels for the work that others had done", Ricci says. What he doesn't say: By "others" he means himself.

Maybe not only ... Because there is Irmi, for example, who has braided his rather thin threads of patience into braids in the past 20 years. "Yes, he's already listening to me better now", she says, winking at her Ricci. They met 20 years ago, following an ad that Irmi had placed and that Ricci found in the Munich Merkur newspaper. "I was in my late 40s and divorced", says Irmi, who worked as a teacher and in the care of people with disabilities. And she had three children aged 14, 16 and 18. It was not easy to find a new partner. Not even for Ricci, who is divorced twice and admits that he never wanted to get married again. That was before he met Irmi. He responded to the ad, putting all his writing talent into it, and after the third second meeting, he was convinced that Irmi was the right one. After he had also convinced Irmi that he was the right one for her, the deal was sealed, and because Ricci doesn't do things by halves, the two have been married for four years. "Yes", says Ricci, "Irmi is an absolute stroke of luck for me."

Also because she shares his passion for traveling with the motorhome. The two really come alive on the trips with their motorhome friends, complement each other and do an excellent job. Although Ricci has been thinking a lot about saying goodbye lately. "Yes, at some point it will be time to pass the baton", he says. "I am looking for a successor." Irmi has to suppress a smile. As long as Ricci can still hold a steering wheel, he will go on trips, she knows that. And her Ricci knows that too. A true chief only puts down his tomahawk when called to the eternal hunting grounds ...