September 2, 2010
Pictures from Yoyogi Park in Harujuku, Tokyo
One of the first things we saw in Tokyo was this scene in Yoyogi Park on our way to the Sunday flea market. There were way more hula hoops than people and I couldn't tell if these women wanted attention or not. Unlike some other Yoyogi park performers, they were pretty far removed from the path (we had to zoom way in for this pic).
Right next to the flea market we saw some bboys practicing and they were obviously happy for the attention. Interestingly, they never passed around a hat for money like I think most street performers do in America. They were there for fun.
August 30, 2010
Tokyo day 7: shopping in Shibuya and figuring out the damage
We checked out of the hotel, asked them to look after our luggage, and walked a few minutes to the Shibuya shopping area. We started at Shibuya 109, the place we ended at last night, because my wife had to exchange something that was a bit damaged. Luckily we had no problem but many places in Tokyo have signs that say no refunds or exchanges which I find very weird. Anyway, you want to check your things carefully before leaving the store.
After that we went to Shibuya 109 2 (for men) which is actually mostly for women. The top 3 floors have some interesting men's fashion but most of it is kind of expensive. I had decided the night before that I should get a cool little man bag because my fanny pack was just not cool enough for Tokyo and looked extremely touristy. Plus it was designed for hiking.
I did find a little half-backpack thing for about 3,000 yen but my wife made me wait to see if we found something better.
We did find something better in the next place, some department store that had a couple of Takeo Kikuchi shops among other things. Better but also about 8,000 yen. I guess that's the price I pay to look a little bit cooler. I also got a Takeo Kikuchi shirt, another 8,000 yen or so making it by far the most I've ever paid for a shirt.
The last thing we did in Tokyo was get lunch in some food building with a different restaurant on each floor. My wife had sashimi but I was getting a bit tired of raw fish and went for the steak. We both enjoyed our meals. I had briefly thought about getting some Kobe beef or something while in Japan but when I went online to find a good recommendation the prices (someone said $100 for 100 grams) changed my mind.
Well the real last thing we did was go to Grom near Scrumble for some excellent gelatto. I personally loved the milk and mint flavor - some of the best ice cream I've ever had.
And that was it. A bus from the hotel to the airport and a short flight later we were back in Seoul heading to the vet to pick up our dogs (one of whom had, according to a text message we got from the vet, started to get a little depressed while in the kennel. Everyone is fine now though!
All in all, it was a good vacation and a pretty good experience of one of the world's most famous cities. It wasn't cheap but it wasn't any more expensive than traveling around Europe if you ask me. We used miles for the flights but estimate that the hotel was about $1,500 while food was about $400-500 (figure about $10-15 each for lunch and dinner, $5 each for a cold noodle breakfast at 7-11, and lots of snacks). Public transportation was under $50 as we walked a lot and never took a taxi. Plus flying into Haneda instead of Narita helped as Haneda is much closer to Tokyo. The bike tour was about $250 (125 each). Taxis to and from Gimpo airport in Seoul were $20 each way and the kennel was about $35 a night.
August 29, 2010
Tokyo Day 6: Shinjuku Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building & Friday night fashion in Harujuku and Shibuya 109
We first went to Shinjuku. It was another late start so we wanted lunch right away. We headed to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building where they have a cafeteria on the 32nd floor (mentioned years ago on this site). You buy your ticket from a machine and then hand it to the right people to get your lunch in about 2 minutes. If you're looking for a food bargain in Tokyo, this may be it. It's not gourmet or anything but you can get very full for 700 yen or so.
In the same building they have 2 observation towers. You take a different elevator to each and from the 45th floor you do get a nice view of Tokyo. It's free so that's a nice bonus.
We then walked to Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden but we arrived after 4:00 and since they close at 4:30 no one else was allowed in. We then walked to Harujuku but I wouldn't do this again - it was a very boring walk on Meji Dori to get there.
Harujuku itself early Friday night was pretty busy and there were some Harujuku girls walking down the main street in front of the station. We tried a crepe - a must according to my wife's guidebook. We got chocolate ice cream, banana, whip cream, and chocolate syrup. How can you go wrong? My wife mentioned that it was better than the crepe we had in Paris but that was some kind of blueberry jelly or something so of course this Tokyo ice cream dessert crepe.
Anyway, I got bored of trying to pick out the people making fashion statements from the people dressed normally so we headed back to Shibuya for sushi, the same place we went on day 2.
Then we went to Shibuya 109, a shopping mall for women's fashion. If you want to see some exciting fashion, this place may be better than Harujuku. You won't have the cosplay costumes but on Friday night lots of young women dress their best and come to Shibuya 109 to find more clothes. The women working in the Shibuya 109 shops often dress in the wildest outfits possible from the clothes in their store. The customers are pretty dressed up too. My wife ended up buying some Tokyo punk stuff on the 5th floor from Tutuya. If you don't want to dress like a punk it's still worth checking out the workers' fashion.
Then it was back to the hotel, picking up breakfast at 7-11 along the way. When we got back to the room we started packing for the next day would be our last in Tokyo.
Reflecting on the vacation we didn't really feel we needed to do anything on the last day. We certainly didn't do everything in Tokyo but we did everything on the short lists of things to do we had made and felt we had a pretty comprehensive Tokyo experience. I don't want to say I know Tokyo but I feel like I have a pretty good idea of what the city is like.
August 27, 2010
Tokyo Day 5: Sensoji Temple in Asakusa and Castle Street in Daikanyama
Another late start so we got to Asakusa around 12:30 and headed toward Sensoji Temple. We stopped to buy some kimonos. I got two modern-style kimonos (not the traditional wedding kimonos that use 50 yards of fabric that you roll up around the waist) and my wife got two kimono-style shirts. All the stuff we bought was used which we think saved us a ton of money. Kimonos were between 1,000 and 5,000 yen and the shirts were similar I think. We spent about 5,000 total - say $60. I feel like I got a bargain.
There's a very touristy street leading to the temple which we took later but the place we went to was on a normal street and the other customers we saw were Japanese. They also had kimonos on this street but I'll recommend my place - it just seems more authentic (though of course I know nothing about kimonos so I can't tell which ones are actually better). The name is Tansu-ya Asakusa Ten.
Sensoji Temple was interesting though it didn't give me a feeling of tranquility (usually one of my favorite things about visiting a temple). No one who wasn't a member of the temple was allowed in to pray because of some special ceremony but we spent a good hour there looking at the main temple and then walking around the grounds.
After that we walked along the touristy street (we really appreciated that it was covered as the sun is hot in Tokyo). There were more kimono stores and my wife got some shoes to go with her stuff.
My wife hadn't had tempura in Tokyo up to this point so we stopped for some and split a lunch box for about 2100 yen that included some tempura, some rice, a piece of cold chicken omlette, 2 big pieces of marinated radish (we think), a cup of salty miso soup, and some big green beans that tasted much better than any green bean I've ever had. It was very good.
We left Asakusa on the subway and went to Ebisu Station. From there we walked to Daikanyama, specifically looking Castle Street. We eventually found it, a cute little shopping street with some interesting shops. We were amazed at how empty it was.
From there we walked back to Shibuya. It was fairly uneventful but at one mall we did find a store selling little doggy wedding dresses and tuxedoes. We didn't see prices on these but I'm guessing they were more than the regular doggy outfits that cost hundreds of dollars each.
In Shibuya we went to a franchise called CocoCurry which some people on our bike tour had recommended. It was pretty good. We got 3/10 in terms of spiciness and it was plenty spicy. We had originally asked for 5 thinking that middle meant mild but the waiter warned us (luckily!).
That was about it for day 5 in Tokyo.
August 26, 2010
Tokyo Day 4: Ueno Park, Tokyo National Museum, Ueno Ameyoko Market
We got off to another late start. It's vacation and we have time so no need to rush - we didn't even set an alarm clock. We left the hotel around noon and got back around 11:00 PM. We spent all day in the Ueno area.
First we walked through the park,\ to reach Tokyo National Museum. It's interesting traveling with a Korean guide book because Korea and Japan have something of a contentious history. So in the park there's a statue of some guy (maybe Saigo Takomori) with his dog but our book says to skip that statue because this guy was behind an invasion of Korea in 1592. In Japan he's a hero but in Korea he's a villain.
Anyway we made it to the museum and spent about 4 hours there, skipping the special exhibit. This is probably the only museum we'll be doing in Tokyo but it's a good one and I recommend it. You get to see 3 different buildings full of stuff (though the second floor of one is for special exhibits). You want to spend most of your time in the first building, 2 floors of Japanese art. They have comfy chairs all over so take your time, especially if it's too hot to be wandering around outside.
Back outside around 4:30 or so we saw Ueno Park's shrine and temple thought the temple was closed so we barely saw anything there. There's also the Great Buddha of Ueno.
Outside Ueno Park we went to Ameyoko Market. This is a shopping area with a different feel from the trendy stores in Shibuya - more like discount stores I guess. Some second hand stuff but also some new expensive stuff.
After dinner at Yoshinoya (a franchise where you get some meat to put on top of your rice), we got massages. They didn't speak much English but they did say we weren't getting Shiatsu massages exactly. Whatever it was, it was 3,250 yean for 60 minutes while the hotel is 7,200 so I still haven't gotten a shiatsu massage in Japan but this one was OK. Well every massage is good but this one was softer than I'm used to.
After that we got some Japanese ramen - they really know how to make a meal out of it. I've gone out for Ramen in Korea but it's thought of more as a cheap fill-me-up there. In Japan they can really make it a nice meal.
And that's about it for day 4.
Tokyo Day 3: bike tour, Ginza bakeries, Shinjuku yakitori
Today we did the Tokyo Great Cycling Tour, the #1 rated thing to do in Tokyo on Tripadvisor. It seems everyone gives it 5/5 but if I get around to doing it I think I'll do 4/5 (good, not great) while my wife was thinking 2 or 3 would be about right.
We did see some cool stuff including the fish market, Tokyo Bay and beach, a temple, a shrine, and the emperor's property. That took from 9:30 AM to 3:00 PM and the guide guessed we covered 25 kilometers on the bikes. Some of the riding was a bit stressful (I've never ridden in a city before) because you find yourself on streets with cars that might hit you or on sidewalks with pedestrians you might hit.
I may get around to doing a fuller review in the future. After that we went to Ginza where we checked out a couple of bakeries. We got some leaf cookies that are supposed to be 240 layers or something. My wife loved them. We also tried some roll things with various stuff inside them including red bean in one, white bean in another, and mango / custard in another. Very good stuff. Plus there were some shops.
Then we came back to the room for showers and out to Shinjuku for dinner. We found a yakitori street and felt ripped off for the first time when our check came out to 600 yen too much. Apparently they give each person a little bowl of peas (still in the pods) when you sit down and charge 300 each. I guess it's a kind of cover charge but I'm not sure how it works (like if natives refuse the peas and save money).
The yakitori was an experience though. We got this chicken sampler thing but only one stick tasted like chicken. One was chicken skin. One was probably liver but I generally avoid liver so I'm not really sure. The other 2? Not sure I want to know. We also tried this fried fermented soy bean on a stick stuff. Interesting but not delicious.
And that was day 3. That night I slept for 9 hours and my wife for 10.
August 24, 2010
Tokyo Day 2: Shibuya from Mos Burger to Starbucks above Scrumple Intersection to sushi
We woke up at 5:30 AM on our second day in Tokyo because the hotel gym costs over $20 after 6:30. So we worked out and then ate breakfast which we had bought the night before at 7-11 (the hotel breakfast is $40/person or so). For me that meant yogurt, and cold noodles - it was good enough.
Then what was supposed to be a short nap ended with us waking up at 11:00 or 11:30 and leaving the hotel around noon. The only problem with that is that from noon to 4 or so Tokyo is very hot and sunny.
For lunch we went to Mos Burger, a Japanese fast food place. It was interesting to see a different style of fast food and the taste was OK.
After that we went to some shops. The second hand shops and Tower Records I found pretty interesting. The department stores my wife wanted to go to were sometimes filled with interesting Japanese stores but other times just the normal designer brands you see everywhere. There were some Vertu cell phones that had diamonds and stuff but I wasn't going to lay out $10,000 for a new phone.
Wealso stopped for a bit at what I guess is the busiest intersection in the world, Scrumble Intersection by Shibuya Station. There's a Starbucks overlooking the place but you have to wait for a seat by the window. We did and enjoyed watching the people for a while, including a few of the young women wearing crazy outfits that Japan is famous for.
Dinner was sushi again but a different place. This one was less crowded and didn't rush you (no 7 plates in 30 minutes rule). The types of sushi they had were a bit different too but I'd say about as good as the one from the previous night. Each plate was 120 yen although they said they had more expensive ones (I didn't see any).
Eventually we'll have to go to a museum or a temple or something but for now just walking around Shibuya is pretty interesting. Actually tomorrow is a cycling tour that includes a couple of shrines, a temple, a fish market, Tokyo Bay, and the emperor's house.
August 23, 2010
Tokyo Day 1: Harujuku & Shibuya
So far Tokyo has been great.
It's very interesting to just walk around and people watch. Our first day we checked into the hotel and then went to Yoyogi Park in Harujuku for the flea market. That was mostly done by the time we arrived but I managed to buy a Japanese style shirt and pants set.
We also saw some young Elvis impersonators dancing, some Hoolahoop girls, some bboys, and a live concert that had attracted a decent and fairly energetic (especially considering the sun and heat) crowd.
We also saw a few "Harujuku girls" but it was pretty hot so most of them probably stayed home or opted for normal shorts and T-shirt ensembles.
Then we slowly walked back to Shibuya station, 1 stop away, where our hotel is. That took hours as we stopped at a few shops and made a few wrong turns. Back in the Shibuya area we got some sushi from a place recommended in my wife's Korean guidebook "Enjoy Tokyo" - it took us an hour to find the place so I'm not offering directions. Each person had to eat 7 plates in 30 minutes or less and each plate was 120 yen. I'm no expert but I do eat sushi occasionally and this seemed like good quality and certainly not as expensive as I expected Tokyo sushi to be. Shikijihonten might be the English spelling.
Then next to Shibuya Station we went to the statue of Hachiko (spelling may be off) which was a Japanese movie remade by Hollywood starring Richard Gere. The movie is based on a true story of an amazingly loyal dog who has his own statue now. He used to come to Shibuya every day to meet his master. When his master didn't come home one day (he died) the dog kept waiting for his owner. Eventually his family moved with the dog but he escaped and moved into Shibuya Station permanently as I understand the story. I haven't seen either movie...
After that it was more walking around Shibuya and doing a little shopping.
July 17, 2010
Anyone here recommend Groupon?
So I just signed up for Groupon.com after my sister recommended it. What they do is get group discounts by ordering in bulk. So they have a special deal like a Ferrari driving experience in Boston (my sister got this one as a gift for Father's Day) for $89 and you decide if you want to buy. Typically they get hundreds of buyers so the merchants offer nice discounts.
Anyway, I was thinking it might be good for travelers. Say you're planning a trip to New York City. You might want to sign up for Groupon to see if any good restaurant deals show up - they often have things like $20 for $40 worth of food. They also seem to have discount massage and spa services - another nice vacation item.
I was thinking it might be a nice addition but apparently one traveler is having quite an experience living off of Groupons. If he makes it for a year living off of Groupons he gets $100,000. I like traveling and I would like 100 grand but I still don't think I would sign up for what this guy did. I just can't imagine traveling without spending money. Not seeing friends and family is tough too. I'd like to see a map of his travels but I didn't find one. Apparently, though, he has been all over America.
July 12, 2010
Maisan & Busan
As we near the end of my sister's visit to Korea, I realize that I've been lagging behind in my reports.
Our second day in Jinju we spent on Maisan (Mai Mountain or Horse-Ear Mountain). Here, there is a very cool temple called Tapsa (pictures coming in a few days). While there we had some lunch - scallion pancake for my sister and her husband while I had sanche bibimbap (rice and mountain veggies) and my wife had barbecue ribs. After driving back to Jinju we had dinner with the family plus an ice cream cake since it was my father-in-law's birthday.
The next day, Saturday, we went to Busan. Younggung Temple was the first stop. This is a nice temple on the water but the water was pretty dirty thanks to litter and whatnot. Then we went to Songjeong Beach which wasn't too crowded for a Saturday. My brother-in-law said it looked like people just wore their normal clothes into the water (which was pretty cold for mid-July). Sure there were a few guys in bathing suits with no shirt and one or two girls in bikini tops but there were tons of people in shorts and t shirts, a kid in blue jeans, etc. The next stop was Shinsegae department store which seems more like a mall than a department store.
But someone calls it a department store and Guinness World Records has certified it as the largest store in the world. We did some shopping and visited the food court a few times. Interestingly for the world's largest department store (but not surprising for people familiar with Korea) they weren't really equipped to deal with vegetarians. It's not that there were no vegetarian options, just that staff wasn't equipped to deal with questions about vegetarian food, even in Korean.
I have to hand it to the staff though - we did meet one extremely friendly guy on our way out. It was raining and we had no umbrellas. My wife asked if anyone would walk us to our car (there were a few security guys at the exit since the store was closing). One guy said he would be happy to, grabbed 2 umbrellas, and walked the 4 of us to our car. We had a nice little chat with him on the way - just a real nice guy. My sister was laughing at the absurdity of the situation since it's hard to imagine something similar in America.
That was a rough day because Busan traffic is pretty bad. We spent 6 hours in the car (3 in each direction) not counting the short drives between each of the three places. They at least were all close together. Had we gotten an earlier start we could have seen Haeundae Beach as well since we drove right past it. Supposedly this beach is more crowded and less conservative (more bathing suits and bikinis I guess).
July 8, 2010
A day in Jinju
We spent the day in Jinju, which in Korea is considered a small city with a repuation for being pretty conservative.
We started off with a great breakfast prepared mostly by my mother-in-law that consisted of rice and a bunch of side dishes. We then went to Home Plus which is kind of like a Super WalMart. There's a floor for food, another for clothes, antoher for electronics, toys, sports, acquariums, glasses, etc.
Then we went to Jinjuseong - a fort that includes a few buildings including a temple and a shrine dedicated to Non Gae, a Korean woman who killed a Japanese general after the Japanese had captured Jinju. In addition to the shrine you can see the rock where she jumped into the Nam River with the general trapped in her arms. The jade rings she wore on every finger made her grip unbreakable.
After that we went to a traditional Korean tea house and then walked around Jinju's "downtown". This included a stroll through the open market, through an underground market, through a building full of clothing stores with the highlight being the hanbok places (a hanbok is a traditional Korean outfit).
Now we're trying to decide where to eat dinner. It's not always easy feeding a vegetarian in Korea.
July 7, 2010
Staying flexible regarding my sister's Korean travel experience
So we wended up shuffling things around a lot more than we had planned. Monday morning we really did walk around my university and the neighboring one. We then stopped for some "Korean pancakes" (pajun) near Hoegi subway station.
It was pretty hot so we went back to my apartment, showered, rested, etc. Then we went to Sinsa which is basically a shopping street. We ate there. Dinner was at a franchise place called Buon Jook / Buon bibimbap. Some places have only the jook (porridge) or the bibimbap (rice mixed with veggies) but this one had both so there were some good choices for everyone. And since it was after 8:00 and the 10 Corso Como department store next on our list cloese at 8:00 we then headed back.
Tuesday we headed to Changdukgung or Changduk Palace for the 11:30 AM "secret garden" tour. It was OK, but basically just a shaded 1 hour walk through some green. There were a few buildings you saw on the way but nothing really special. After that, you can see the main buildings on your own like the King's office and stuff. That is probably enough unless the flowers are blooming or the leaves are changing color - then the secret garden tour would be worth it.
It was then a short walk to insadong where we ate lunch at Samchon, a restaurant that serves a nice Korean-monk inspired lunch for 22,000 KRW - just under $20. We saw some interesting shops and things in Insadong, and got some potbingsu (shaved ice, ice cream, red bean, etc.). It's a very popular dessert snack with Koreans but I don't appreciate it much. Why dilute your ice cream with actual ice?
Back to the apartment for a bit of a rest and then out to dinner at Hongdae. We're friendly with the owner of Yeti which serves some good Indian food and then we went out drinking Korean style (Makkoli, dongdongju, and beer - no soju). I invited a few Koreans out to make it more authentic.
Today my sister and her husband did a DMZ tour but they say it was pretty rushed / crappy which is too bad because when i did it 4 or 5 years ago it was very interesting. I hope to have a full review on the DMZ tour later after I debrief them. My wife is guessing that because of the tension between the two Koreas these days things have been cut short. My sister heard that maybe there were some North Korean tourists around somewhere and the two groups weren't supposed to get too close. I'll investigate...
July 4, 2010
Playing tour guide and getting dogs used to company
So for the next 10 days or so there may be some odd travel news but mostly I will be describing my efforts to play tour guide since my sister and her husband arrive in Korea today.
We've already had some changes to the beginning of the travel plan since we couldn't go to the DMZ Tuesday like we planned. Now the DMZ tour is Wednesday so we might not stay out too late Tuesday night when we go party in Hongdae. Earlier Tuesday instead of the DMZ we'll check out the crazily priced department store Corso Como and the Cheongdam area.
Of course, it is rainy season so there may be more changes...
One thing I'm wondering is if anyone has any tips an getting dogs used to guests. Our dogs go a bit nuts when strangers come over and one starts biting toes (he's small). We're bring the more sociable dog to the airport so she can meet my sister and her husband and get used to them some in the car.
Hopefully that leaves us with only the 13-year-old Yorkshire terrier to worry about (the toe-biter). We can't bring him to the airport (he barks at everyone he sees and it gets very annoying real fast) so he'll be getting used to them in our home. He has actually met my sister but we don't think he'll remember...
This also means no fireworks for me or my sister but I wish all Americans an excellent Independence Day.
May 2, 2010
Anne Frank's tree is dying
A visit to the Anne Frank House is pretty much a must when traveling to Amsterdam. It's part of this old travel plan, and even though our first attempt ended in disappointment, we did get there eventually during our January vacation.
So I'm sure some of you reading this, anyone who has been to Amsterdam I guess, has seen the Anne Frank tree. That tree is dying but great efforts are being made to make sure that its memory lives on.
The memory already lives on in Anne Frank's words:
"From my favorite spot on the floor I look up at the blue sky and the bare chestnut tree, on whose branches little raindrops shine, appearing like silver, and at the seagulls and other birds as they glide on the wind," she wrote on February 23, 1944. "As long as this exists, and it certainly always will, I know that then there will always be comfort for every sorrow, whatever the circumstances may be."This article describes our current efforts:
The tree has been sick for 10 years; a fungus has left two-thirds of it hollow, said Anne Frank House spokeswoman Annemarie Bekker.
A battle began in late 2007 between city officials who wanted to chop it down and activists who insisted it stay. But a court injunction, a second-opinion analysis and a committee mobilization later, it still stands, barely alive and supported by steel.
About five years ago, the museum began collecting chestnuts from the tree to grow seedlings, so that pieces of the original tree could take root and flourish elsewhere.
April 8, 2010
Where to start? Latei cafe and In De Waag restaurant / cafe in Amsterdam
So I'm all moved in to my new apartment. Of course all moved in doesn't mean totally organized and I found a bunch of travel things I've been saving to blog about some day...
Today I'll briefly mention Latei a cafe and shop (not a coffee shop) in Amsterdam. Zeedijk 143, 1012 AW Amsterdam for the cafe (which has a bunch of stuff for sale but is not the shop apparently). It's very central, close to Nieumarkt. You have to be in that area anyway for In De Waag (pictured here).
We were here on December 31st, 2009 - it's the "cute, little cafe" I mention in this old blog entry about my trip to Amsterdam.
The cappucino was good but my wife liked the "coziness" most of all. I liked that the servers were pretty friendly explaining the different pastries and stuff. There weren't a ton but we did try a New Year's traditional Dutch pastry. I can't remember the name and it wasn't great, but it was alright and I'm glad I tried it.
Now, moving on. I also found a receipt from In De Waag where we ended up eating twice. The service wasn't great the first time but it's cool inside and the food is good. Our first time we had dinner. I ordered the 3 course meal for 34 euros and my wife had a salad for 11. That was enough food because I shared my stuff and my wife was trying not to eat much. After water and tax the bill was about 50 euros and I'm sure we tipped something but the server was pretty forgetful so maybe not that much!
I ended up with carrot / tomato soup, roast duck on potatoes and mushrooms, and some kind of dessert I don't remember. I had wanted some kind of pumpkin entree but they didn't have it that night. My wife's salad was good - it featured some kind of fried goat cheese.
The second time we ate there it was for lunch. My hamburger and fries was pretty good. My wife had a soup plus sandwich combo and we shared. That meal was much cheaper - probably less than 30 euros although I haven't turned up that receipt yet.
They also have a cafe in In De Waag. I think we had cappuccinos there at the bar while waiting for a table that first night. The price was about average 2.50 euros and they were good.
Well there we go - two recommended places in Amsterdam. I can now get rid of 2 tiny pieces of paper. My new apartment will be organized in no time!
March 19, 2010
My wife in Hawaii
My wife just spent 2 days in Honolulu and is now in Kauai. I think I mentioned that my friend Doug hooked us up with a condotel room in Hanalei Bay Resort. My wife's first impression of the room and the resort was very positive. It's bigger than she expected and very nice.
We also made our rental reservation though Doug's site and after choosing the "price so low we can't tell you the company's name" ended up with Thrifty. I booked her a convertible, Sebring or similar for $50/day I think. She got the Mustang which makes me even more jealous. But what can I do? JAL was having a huge sale and my semester was starting.
If anyone has any restaurant recommendations or whatever for Kauai please make them now!
March 13, 2010
Paris (the 5th day) and Luxembourg (the 1st night)
If you're looking for continuity, you won't find it here but I do have a link to my 4th day in Paris which may help you put this blog entry into context. That one links to days 1-3. Here are some pictures of Paris.
Anyway, onto our final morning in Paris. In the morning we checked out of the hotel (which was a problem because of some extra charges and no manager willing to speak with us). We left our luggage and went to Hotel Deville on the metro and then walked to a shop we had noticed on Tuesday (it was closed when we walked by). BMV la Niche was pricey but for 100 euros total each of my dogs gets a nice winter coat (European fashion!) and a new toy. We later learned that the dog coats are made in the USA which I thought was kind of funny. And of course the dogs totally ignore their expensive new toys...
We then walked back t the hotel where we had some sandwiches for lunch. We were hoping to speak with the manager of the hotel but maybe you remember that story - Best Western Malte Opera sucks!
Then we headed to Gare d'EST train station. The trip to Luxembourg was comfortable (we were in second class). When we arrived we bought tickets to Amsterdam for the 10th (5.5 hours with 30 minutes and a change in Brussels - no direct trains) and then walked to the hotel. After getting settled we walked around Luxembourg City in the snow. It was really really nice - peaceful because there were only a few people out and beautiful as the snow gave the old streets and buildings a romantic feel.
The food was very good and quite reasonable compared to Paris. We asked some of the few locals we saw and they recommended a "traditional" restaurant. Bosso had some very interesting entrees and desserts. It probably deserves its own blog entry one of these days but for now let me just say it was a great experience and we ended up going back a day a couple days later.
People were very friendly, in a small town kind of way that I just don't see happening in Paris even if Parisians surprised me with their friendliness. A reader named Pieternel had left me a comment offering to show me around Luxembourg and I was able to call her husband first from the restaurant phone and then from the waiter's cell (when the restaurant phone disconnected me). Maybe he was angling for a tip but I think it was just being friendly.
I spoke to George Georges; unfortunately Pieternel wasn't feeling well but George and I arranged to meet the following day. I've already posted something about that.
March 12, 2010
Spain experience: what went well and what could have been skipped
This traveler had an overall positive experience in Spain but still took the time to write down some of the things he didn't like so much. If anyone here is planning a trip to Spain I would say this vacation experience is a must read:
First some overall impressions/comments on Spain:
Spain has been conquered so many times that it is a little bit confused as to what it's actual heritage is - there is evidence that each of the conquering cultures has influenced the core of Spanish Culture - and this gets glossed over in the telling of Spanish history as the Spanish see it.
Spain is not extremely user friendly - and especially so if you do not speak Spanish.
- The printed and online roadmaps of Spain bear very little resemblance to each other and none of them accurately portray the roads of Spain
- Spain is closed from Sunday at 2pm to Tuesday at 9am
- The Spanish don't eat a real breakfast - they eat tostatos (toast and tomato) and café con leche
- Nothing is really open in Spain before 9am
- Very few people work in Spain from 3pm to 6pm - the whole country is on Siesta - in some areas Siesta starts a 2pm or earlier
- There are very few stop signs in Spain - mostly you come to turnarounds, which means you have to get on a traffic circle and chose an exit. If you are blind like I am, you may have to come back to the
same turnaround more than once, or twice, or three times - the signage all round Spain is confusing and you never get the full story about anything
- the airports in Spain are also very confusing - try not to take a connector flight in Spain if you can help it
The Good News:
- there is great café in Spain! Everywhere you go, café con leche, brewed in fancy machines is available even in the most lowly of places
- tapas is everywhere, and if you find the right places, tapas is free. You generally are in a tourist trap when you have to pay for tapas. The origin of tapas is that it was an order of the King that pubs served their patrons food with their drink to try to limit drunkenness. Pub owners [after the king made this edict] served small upside down tops on the beer mug filled with food tidbits [the filled top was the tapas]. Tapas can be simple like wedges of cheese, or slices of cured ham, or a cooked dish of many different varieties: fish, beef, pork, shrimps, mushrooms, eggs. There are almost an unlimited variety. They are eaten at the pub, at the main comida (meal) during mid day and at night (late at night), and even at home. Btw, It is not uncommon that the last meal of the day is after 9pm
- the Spanish don't like tipping. Don't ask me why, but they generally complain when you give an American size tip (15% or more). A lot of time they will round off your change to the next full Euro. The only exception to this appears to be taxi cabs where a tip is more acceptable
- Iberian Pork - oh my! - there are many grades of Iberian Pork, but the best pork is the "Bellota" which is a black pig historically raised in Spain and fed on acorns. It's pricey but you must try it, both cured and not cured it is truly divine.
I gained fifteen pounds at least in Spain - we ate a lot a lot.
Here is a list of the highlights/places we visited and my brief impressions:
Port of Mazarron - seaport town on the Southeast coast - cute seaside area with great views of the Mediterranean - we found a great bistro there inside one of the new boat dock developments they have - but for the most part there are a lot of Chinese and Pizza restaurants there and not a lot of Spanish eateries - the beaches are not very pretty with dark sand and a lot of rocks.
Port of Cartagena - another seaport town just east of Mazarron - considered a very strategic port - conquered and rebuilt at least five times - with impressive views on the waterfront combined with historic forts and buildings - includes the ruins of a Roman theater, a medieval palace at the highest point with opportunities to view the entire layout of the city - several museums (pass up the tour bus that goes around the city - it's terrible with prerecorded tour that is not very informative - and also pass up the archeology museum inside the city and away from the port) - there is are great plazas for strolling and eating all around - a salvage/diving museum - definitely a good place to bring kids - do not go there on Sunday or Monday - especially Monday - everything closes.
Condita D'Alhambra and Campa del Sol - the best feature of these two places is the Jack Nicholas Golf Course they have just completed - its proximity to Murcia, Cartagena and Mazarron - we played there and it's a great course - the rest of it - yuck! - it's basically a series of condo developments largely catering to a British population - filled with British style pubs and Chinese and Indian restaurants - there is a good Italian style Spanish restaurant and grocery in the Condita D'Alhambra - and the condos are inexpensive to stay in and while ugly - they are clean - but it overall seems to be a non sequitor to the country.
Grenada - go to Grenada to see the Alhambra - it is awesome - plan on spending a whole day there - you must book in advance though and I recommend getting there early - it is just an enormous museum and there are many places to stroll and eat - if you arrive there after five pm the gates close on most of it.
Archena - site of the Roman baths and Termal Spa - another great place to spend the day. There are newly built public baths there on top of and integrated into the old roman ruins - get there early - bring your bathing suit (they don't have a great selection there if you want to buy one) bring a robe, and bring flip flops. They rent towels for a nominal charge and lockers too. They have giant thermal baths, whirlpools, saunas, steam room, heated stones, lemon baths, spray baths, igloos, cold baths, massage baths and treatment rooms. It is linked to several hotels where you can stay and I recommend staying there - if you want to arrange a private massage - facial or treatments you have to book those two days in advance - but they are well worth it - and those are conducted inside the Roman bath ruins - really amazing stuff. The only place to eat there is in one of the hotels - but the hotel restaurant is really quite good.
Cuidad Real (pronounced Thu-da or Su-da Ree-al) - the birth place of Cervantes - charming town with a bunch of monuments and a clock that plays on the hour and gives a Cervantes show - many tributes to Don Quixote and his side kick - surrounded by many quaint farm villages you can drive to and eat for a very authentic Spanish Experience - we were lucky enough to be invited to the farm home of a Spanish family there and treated to an amazing home cooked meal in a charming home. We also toured and ate in an old monastery village outside of Cuidad Real - the monastery has been converted into a hotel called Paradores with a fabulous restaurant in it - pricey but well worth it - the food there is heavenly - the hotel is very comfortable - we didn't stay there - but it is a place I would stay in if I go back - apparently it is a favorite spot of the royals. There is also a charming 16th Century open air theater there in the village square along with shops that sell local cheeses (fabulous local cheeses for tapas) and local specialties.
Toledo (pronounced To-Lay-Doe) - another great place to spend the day - Toledo is a landmark of the EU and is the largest intact Medieval city in all of Europe. You can walk its streets and savor churches, historic sites, views of the countryside, many, many restaurant and shops and it is just charming. We were lucky enough to have a couple that reside in the city guide us around. One of them has lived there all her life the other works for a friend of the King of Spain (Sr Ventura) who has been restoring and converting old buildings in Toledo into restaurants serving traditional fare - we ate in one in the cellars several levels below the street - it was charming and we had royal venison among other treats
Madrid - we were only there for a day - but visited the Prada Museum with an outstanding collection of Goyas - ate at the Westin Palace (oh my!) - and ended our day at the Corral De La Moreria - which is the foremost classical Flamenco parlor in all of Spain. We saw the farewell performance of Blanca del Rey - the reining Ballerina of Spain at the foot of the stage - after her performance she gave an impassioned talk about her love of Flamenco and she acknowledged her husband and a few others in the audience to see her last dance - and then she danced a final loving and passionate duet with Juan Andres Maya who is the male lead dancer there. We had taken the fast train from Cuidad to Madrid and back again - and it was definitely worth the convenience and experience of the train - Madrid has subways that take you all over. We also walked through the Gran Plaza which is like Madrid's Fifth Avenue and that was okay - but of no appeal to this New Yorker.
We were lucky enough to have great weather throughout - and we truly enjoyed it. Ole!
March 2, 2010
Pictures from Paris part 3
We went to Sacré Coeur Basilica (Basilique du Sacré Coeur de Montmartre) on our fourth day in Paris. It didn't have as big an impact on me as Notre Dam but it was still amazing.
I mentioned Lafayette Department Store a few times. My wife was obsessed with this place because 10 years ago she wanted everything she saw here but had no money. This time we could buy a little something (once the sales began on Jan 6th).
This is a thumbnail so click on the picture above for a larger version. We took it when we went to the Eiffel Tower. My wife loved our new camera's panorama function but almost none of the shots we took came out. This one is pretty good though.
February 22, 2010
Pictures from Paris part 2: Angelina Tea House and a bar to be named later
This is a picture of me in a Parisian bar with a Cafe Viennois. It was our third full day in Paris. We were walking from Notre Dame to our hotel and my wife wanted a cappuccino somewhere near Hotel de Ville.
This is my wife at Angelina's on our first full day in Paris with some pastry in front of her. It was all good, but I still prefer eclairs from Italian pastry shops in New York. Plus they were 6-7 euros each...
At least they were better than my salmon club sandwich (I was expecting turkey or ham)!
February 19, 2010
Paris: the 4th full day (Wed. Jan. 6, 2010)
It's been a while since I've blogged about my time in Europe this winter so let me get back to that now. I found our first day, the second day, and the third day in Paris in case you're wondering what led up to this experience:
Apparently sales in Paris go from Jan. 6 to Jan. 9. Since we like to shop during sales we got fairly lucky that we happened to be in Paris for one of these three days.
We started off in Rue d'alessia (alesia subway station). This area is supposed to have discounts on last season's fashion lines. We found it fairly boring - the stores were small and plain mostly. My wife was looking at fur coats and there were plenty around but even with the sales they were pretty expensive. Also, I don't really like fur coats in general so I wasn't too enthusiastic.
We stopped for lunch at an Italian place that was good. We then went to the smaller Galleries Lafayette where we each got a pair of boots.
We had a little cultural conflict on the subway which was getting quite crowded. We were sitting on these folding seats and some guy asked me to "wake up." I didn't know what he was talking about until he changed that to "stand up." Apparently the folding seats are not supposed to be used when it's crowded. This guy was much less friendly than most Parisians.
I remember him asking if I spoke French in kind of an elitist I speak English but you don't speak French kind of way. I thought about talking to him in Korean and English - not that my Korean is impressive but it has to better than this guy's English. Of course speaking more than one language doesn't make you a good person so I decided not to bother.
There was also a more friendly woman telling us that it was OK to remain seated but I had to prove a point so I stood up with all my shopping bags and suddenly there was less room than before for the guy who wanted us to stand (and the nice woman). My wife was a bit smarter and remained seated. As my bags were bumping into the guy I asked him if this was better. He said yes.
Then the subway lurched and I stepped on the nice woman's foot. I'm an idiot.
We went to Sacre Cour next. I wasn't nearly as impressed as I was with Notre Dame - it just didn't have the same kind of feel for me. It was still quite beautiful of course and I'm glad I saw it. On the way out I gave the sneakers I thought I no longer needed (thanks to the new boots) to a beggar getting kicked off the steps of Sacre Cour. The boots would later start hurting my feet - I got blisters on each big toe, but at least I can't think that I need the sneakers more than their new owner.
Next to (and behind) Sacre Cour is a very pretty area full of restaurants (many quite reasonable), souvenir stores, stone streets, a fancy art gallery with Dalis, Chagalls, and Picassos, etc. We walked around there for a bit and then we passed a crepeteria and realized that we had yet to have a crepe in France - an oversight we corrected that night. The dinner crepe was fine but the desert one I did not like at all. Anyway, the place had a nice feel - good music including a song "Hallelujah" that my wife loves (Tom White played it on our NCL cruise to Bermuda). If you go, you might want to bring a picture to stick on the ceiling along with the cash and notes and pics already up there.
We ended the night, as usual, with a walk around the Louvre.
There are some pictures here and I plan to post some more pics of Paris in the next day or two.
February 8, 2010
Pictures from Paris
This one is from Amsterdam but all 4 below are from Paris. I want to say this was a wedding store but my memory is failing...
Our pictures of the Louvre Museum at night don't show why we were so awed by it.
Of the 5 nights we walked around the Louvre, we only saw the blue pyramid once.
This is me sitting on the weirdest bench I've ever sat on.
Pretty much everyone followed the arrows to the Mona Lisa, fought for a good spot, and tried to take a picture. We were no different but the pictures of Mona Lisa aren't that great (an exit sign reflects of the glass in front of the painting) and I thought this one was more interesting.
Pictures from earlier this vacation:
January 27, 2010
Jan. 2 - our last morning in Amsterdam and train ride to Paris
We had tried to get a train leaving at 11:00 AM or noon but everything between 8:00 AM and 2:00 PM was sold out. We left at 2:16 rather than early in the morning which left us with some time in the morning. We had a few options but we ended up waking up, working out, and walking to the @7 cafe where we had eaten our first brunch in Amsterdam. We brought our Macbook to take advantage of the wifi but we didn't get another map of Amsterdam from the front desk (the map comes with a coupon for a free cup of coffee).
The food there was OK. The scrambled eggs were a bit runny but still good and the croissant was overpriced. The yogurt with fruit I really enjoyed. Like the first time we were there, it seemed to be popular with locals and we liked that. They didn't even have an English menu but each time our waitress was able to translate for us.
Then we got the tram back (we bought one hour tickets so it covered the ride back and then the ride to Central Station) to Holiday Inn where we just grabbed our luggage and got back on the tram.
Originally my wife had wanted to eat at the hotel restaurant but I didn't want to "waste" a day in Amsterdam by not really leaving the hotel until it was time to head to the station. We never did eat breakfast (other than protein bars for me) at Holiday Inn but you see something when you go out for breakfast so that's OK.
The Thalys train from Amsterdam to Paris was alright. We knew which track it was supposed to leave from but they didn't have it on the screen at the track until 6 minutes before the train departed so we were unsure for a bit if we had it right. They pointed us to where we wait for car 16 (at the number 16 on the track which is right after number 25) but when the train pulled up the bar car was right in front of us. We walked to the next one to the right but that was a first class train. We walked to the next one to the left and hopped on. There was no number outside but inside we found it was car 15. So we walked through that one to car 16 and by then we had to spread our luggage out to fit it in the overhead racks. My wife wants to take first class from now on but that would have cost us 390 euros instead of 260 - a pretty substantial difference. 13 euros worth of Wifi would have been free as well though.
The seats are comfy enough although we are facing backwards. We feel the rude ticket seller should have given us a choice of seats because we'd rather be facing forward. My wife just paid 2.40 euros for a tiny 40 gram thing of Pringles.
We would end up on a first class Thalys train eventually from Brussels to Amsterdam. I'll be posting that experience soon.
More pics from Amsterdam winter 2009-2010
This gift shop in Amsterdam had some big shoes my wife wanted to pose in.
We actually ate in a place on the left called Burger Bar. When I finally finish posting my Amsterdam stories, I'll write about how we had to go to McDonald's (and pay) to use a bathroom because this burger place didn't have one.
On New Year's Day we were impressed by this big pile of fireworks garbage. The streets were covered in red firework skins.
There are a lot of pretty scenes in Amsterdam. This was one of our favorites.
January 13, 2010
Paris: the third full day (Tuesday Jan 5, 2009)
We got off to a late start because my wife had to make some calls for work. I think we reached the Eiffel Tower around 11:00. The line was discouragingly long so we asked a security guy how long it might be. He guessed 1 or 2 hours but recommended the stairs. There was a much shorter line there so we walked. It was cheaper as well (4.50 a person). Plus now I can say I climbed the Eiffel Tower. You're only allowed to take the stairs to the first or second floor. I'm not sure if the elevators went to the highest floor (the 3rd) but we were happy with the view from the first two. If you were at the very top, everything might look too small (or who knows - maybe we missed the best view in Paris). I remember at the top of Taipei 101 there wasn't really much to see because everything was so far down.
We ate a packed lunch up there in the cold on a picnic table and then went to the cafe inside for some soup , coffee, and hot chocolate to warm up. And we took lots of pictures.
Then we went on a Seine River cruise. 11 euros each for the 1 hour cruise. It was quite nice but I was wishing I had sat on the left by the end especially for the best views of Notre Dame. But we had some OK views on the right too. Then we walked to Rue Cler, the street Rick Steves recommended. It was a bit hard to find but we managed. We ate at the Asian place he suggested - 8 euros for some tasty fast Asian food seemed like a very good deal. The restaurant, Traiteur Asiatique at 26 Rue Cler, sold already prepared food to take away, but they had a few tables in the back and a microwave so eating their was no problem. They even have a free bathroom (Paris was good compared to Amsterdam in that regard).
We then found a metro station and went to Notre Dame. This place had a very special feeling for me. There was a mass (French of course) going on and the whole thing felt very spirtual - holy in a way that I just didn't feel going to mass on the Seoul US army base on Christmas Eve for example. That mass on the army base was fine and the people there were great and they had a choir and everything but Notre Dame is just different. The organ, the solo soprano, the priest speaking in French - sure you saw the tourists milling around and heard people saying "No" to the would-be photographers but still the holiness of the place struck a chord with me. My wife felt something too. I was raised Catholic but rarely go to church. My wife is a Buddhist. I think a lot of different people could walk into Notre Dame and feel something special.
That night we ended up walking around in circles on our way back to the hotel from Notre Dame. We passed a pet supply store, which we would visit later. We also passed lots of other beautiful places, stopped at every real estate place to get a feel for prices since we love Paris so much, got directions from friendly strangers, and got cold.
We ended the night with a walk around the Louvre. It was still special and this time the pyramids were lit up kind of blue giving the place a slightly different look. We went to bed happy.
January 12, 2010
Jan. 10 - second to last train trip in Europe (Luxembourg City to Brussels MIDI)
I know I'm skipping around and possibly making my trip to Europe hard to follow but I'm not at my most organized while on vacation... This one happens several days after my previous entry - we're missing a few days in Paris and two in Luxembourg which I'll be putting up eventually.
We bought 2nd class tickets for Amsterdam as soon as we arrived in Luxembourg. I think they were about 70 euros each. We were surprised to learn there was nothing direct. We had to take a slow interciTy train to Brussels and then get on the Thalys high speed train to Amsterdam. 5.5 hours in all with 23 minutes to change trains in Brussels. My wife started having second thoughts - we should fly directly instead of changing trains. I didn't want to bother researching flights but luckily a nice receptionist at the front desk of Novotel Centre checked for us. 1200 euros for a last minute flight from Luxembourg to Amsterdam. Ouch! What about the bus? No direct buses either.
We were stuck with the train so we upgraded to first class which cost us 94 euros combined. No reserved seats on the way to Brussels but we hoped there would be plenty of seats (and there were it turned out). We figured that would remove the stress of finding room for our luggage - my wife's main concern. Of course the train to Brussels was 10 minutes late giving us only 13 minutes to find our Thalys train in Brussels, presumably a big station and one with which we are totally unfamiliar. I asked the ticket person what we could do if we missed the train and she told us about a train leaving a bit later we could get on using the same tickets we already had. I was happy enough with this but my wife sent me back there 2 more times with different questions. She was trying to send me back a fourth time (and I was telling her she would have to come with me this time) when the train finally pulled up.
We couldn't find a conductor to ask where the first class car was (no numbers on the tracks or on our tickets to help). None of the passengers my wife asked knew so we just got on a car and started walking (with our luggage this was a bit slow going). Eventually we did see a conductor. First he said he didn't speak English. Then when a nearby passenger translated first class into premier class he said he didn't know. I thought my wife was going to explode. He eventually figured it out and led us to the first class car. Unlike Thalys, there's no WiFi here so I type now and will have to post later. By then I guess I'll know if we made it onto the Thalys train at Brussels or not.
If we don't my wife is going to be pretty mad because the replacement train is a slower intercity one with no WiFi, like the one we're on now. Presumably it's cheaper than the Thalys 1st class we paid for and having "lost" that money will be tough for her to accept. I'll just complain about it on my blog and then let it go. Interestingly the first class seats aren't much bigger than 2nd class. The aisle is certainly wider and it's much less crowded though - very easy to find luggage space with 10% occupancy or so.
My wife says she's never taking a European train again. They're just too inferior compared to Korean trains. There has been some talk of renting a car the next time we're in Europe, the idea being to visit some smaller towns instead of major cities for a change. But we were also talking about a month in Prague with train trips to Vienna, Budapest, Bratislava, and other places. Maybe that's out?
January 5, 2010
Paris - the first full day
Yesterday, Sunday, my wife decided we should walk everywhere (no public transportation). It was the first Sunday of the month so we started off at the Louvre. We got online at 8:30 for the free admission starting at 9:00 AM. We were'nt first on line but I'd say we were inside by 9:15.
Then we walked from the Louvre to the Arc de Triomphe (down Avenue des Champs Elysees). I thought I was int rouble when my wife started taking pictures of the Louis Vuitton store as we waited to cross the street. I escaped without any damage at all though I did have a scare when the colorful bag my wife liked had an 8,000 euro price tag.
Then we walked to Lafayette, the famous department store. My wife was here 10 years ago, too poor to buy anything. She has been dreaming of coming back with a little money ever soince. On the way we passed a train station and picked up tickets to Luxembourg. When we finally got to Lafayette (it was a long walk) we found out it was closed.
We walked back to our hotel and took a little break before going to Angelina Tea House for dinner. We got on line around 4:30 and we were seated about 45 minutes later. I got a Scandanavian club sandwich that turned out to be salmon - a big surprise for me! We also loaded up on pastry...
We then walked down to Paris version of the London Eye. It was perhaps the biggest rip ever (10 euros for 7 minutes of mediocre views) and I wasn't even expecting much since there aren't many great attractions nearby.
We then walked to the Seine river. And walked along that for a bit, crossing a couple of bridges in the process. Then back to Louvre though I was too cold and tired to really enjoy it like I did the first night in Paris.
Lastly we headed back to the hotel.
Today was my second full day in Paris. I'll fill you in on that in a bit as I'm just about out of internet time...
I do apologize for the Typos my wife keeps pointing out to me. My Macbook doesn't do spellcheck...
December 30, 2009
Amsterdam: the story begins
So our flight got in to Amsterdam on time, around 4:00 PM. We hadn't flown JAL in a while and they are having some money problems so we have to hope they stay in business a few more weeks so we cna get home OK.
We arrived at Incheon Airport early and were the third people to check in that morning but we couldn't get emergency exit seats for the Tokyo-Amsterdam trip. I was bracing for the worst but it ended up great. The flight wasn't full and I ended up with a row of 3 to myself and my wife got the same.
By that way, Incheon really needs to do some proofreading as we saw bad English at the information desk (a big "Happy Holiday" sign), at the Paris Baguette (Seemed like 20% of the menu was wrong - red been is the only one I can recall at the moment), and somewhere else I think.
Anyway, we got to the airport, got some cash from teh ATM, got a train ticket to RAI, walked to Holiday Inn, checked in, showered and changed, and went to Nieumarket (excuse me if I butcher some spelling - I want to cram as much in as quickly as possible). We ate dinner at In de Waag which the guidebooks had suggested. Food was good but service was mediocre (she was friendly but forgetful).
Then we just walked aimlessly and ended up in the red light district by the canals and then past that on some busy streets with coffee shops and bars. We stopped in a few souvenir stores but didn't try any of the sinful things. It was snowing which bothered my wife (but I kind of liked) but not as cold as Seoul.
This morning we woke up at 8:00 AM after 8 hours of sleep so we seem to be doing well against jet lag. We each took one Nocturnabol on the Tokyo-Amsterdam flight and another one before bed last night. We also stayed up the entire night before we left. It has worked out fine so far as we slept relatively well on the plane and very well last night.
I have taken a bit fo criticism for the location of the hotel (otherwise the hotel is quite nice) but there are some nice areas pretty close to the hotel. We went there for brunch (left the hotel at 11:30 because we worked out and my wife made me do my own laundry while she got ready to go out - I used to be too cheap to pay for laundry service and now I'm married to someone who is too cheap...).
Anhow, brunch at cafe @7 was good. My wife got the mozzerella and tomato sandwich while I got the pastrami. We were the only ones there speaking English so it had an authentic feeling we liked.
Now we're on our way to Central Station to buy tickets to Paris for Jan.2, 2010. We stopped at an internet cafe because hotel internet service was 9 euros an hour. Here it's 1.20. Plus as we got off the tram (no idea where we are - just got off when we saw the internet cafe) we saw an open market so we'll check that out before going to the station.
Then after we get our tickets it's on tp the Anne Frank House and then the Jordaan area. That's all we have planned for today so hopefully we can explore the Jordaan area for a while tonight.
I plan to blog tomorrow on New Year's Eve but in case things don't work out that way let me just wish everyone reading this a very happy New Year!
December 23, 2009
Snow ruining vacations in Europe (or is it just money?)
Here are a couple of travelers explaining how the snow in Europe has left their vacation plans (and budgets) in shambles. It seems to be a money issue in both cases. A couple on their honeymoon was stuck in Paris (couldn't get to London where they had prepaid for a hotel). First, getting stuck in Paris doesn't sound too terrible. Second, they could have gotten traveler's insurance (though losing a few nights hotel shouldn't be a life-changing financial setback unless it was one of the world's most expensive). Third, they ended up at the woman's mother's house in Sweden. That sounds alright too.
So while I feel bad for a couple that has their honeymoon messed up, this particular case does not sound so extreme.
The second story is someone stuck in Milan who only has enough money for food. No hotel money means sleeping in the airport. Now it does not say where Rebecca Brown is from, but if you're in a foreign country with barely enough money for food you'd better be a pretty resilient traveler. I guess I sympathize because this traveler was going to Spain to see family and sometimes seeing your family might be worth spending every cent you have so you end up in a foreign country with basically no money.
And it might be me losing money next. I fly into Amsterdam Dec. 29th and then head to Paris Jan. 2, 2010. Then onto Luxembourg and we've paid for hotels in all those cities so if we couldn't reach one of them we could be out some money. But say we get stuck in Amsterdam or Paris - we just have to try to make the most of it and not worry too much about losing money on hotels (we don't have travel insurance though now my wife wants to start shopping for some...)
I guess it's time to start watching BBC weather...
December 21, 2009
Rocky Coach Tour experience & review
This is another extra credit assignment from one of my students at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, Seo, Seol Hwa:
Fall in love with Magnificent and Picturesque Nature: Rocky Coach Tour
If you are a hungry student studying in Canada and desiring to travel somewhere, here's a cheap but well-filled tour package I purchased.
[Prologue]
Staying in Vancouver, I decided to travel Canadian Rocky Mountains. And I hurried up before the summer was over. Because I'd heard that I would see only snow if I traveled Rockies during other seasons.
There's Rocky Coach Tour for students. They -studying abroad agencies- sell this package to adults too. The average cost is from $250 to $300(CAD) for 3 nights 4 days.
After I reserved, I bought some clothes to warm me. Because it's cold in Rockies even in summer. I also packed extra films to take beautiful pictures as many as possible. And I looked forward to the departing day.
[Day 1]
You will spend half of a day on a coach. But, you will notice the scenery is changing around the highway as time goes by. Whenever I come back to my hometown, I enjoy rural landscapes through the window. And the scenery I saw was really exotic compared to Korea's.
When I started to feel bored, the coach stopped at Bridal Falls. They say it looks like a bride wearing a veil. But I didn't see a bride actually. However, I could breath clean air and enjoy listening to the waterfalls.
After taking some pictures, we got on the coach again. The coach ran through Marritt, one of the big 3 cities for copper mine, and Kamloops, the city of lumber. And we arrived at Valemount, the gateway to Rocky Mountains. We stayed at Canoe Mt.Lodge and prepared ourselves for the following day.
[Day 2]
Finally, we entered Rocky Mountains. The road was a bit steep which means we were climbing Rockies. The first destination was Emerald Lake. It was my first time to see such a beautiful lake. The water was really clean but, at the same time, emerald green. I felt like I was in a drawing. It was not real world for me. I eagerly took pictures of the lake. But, I never knew the bigger one was waiting for me.
I took a gondola going up to the top of Mt. Robson(3,954m) which is the highest mountain in Rocky Mountains. It was great to be on high mountain. Everything looked so small and I felt like I was standing on the world.
Next destination was Lake Louise. Moving toward, my tour guide played a music. 'Lake Louise' by Yuhki Kuramoto. According to my tour guide, Yuhki Koramoto loves Lake Louise so much that he made 'Lake Louise.'
After arriving at Lake Louise, I fully understood his love for the lake. It was absolutely amazing! Splendorous! Spectacular! It was emerald green and sapphire blue. And sometimes silver. I'd never seen such a marvelous nature. Walking along the lake, I could feel the beauty of nature. I'll never forget that moment.
Our coach moved to Banff in Calgary. We had Bulgogi for dinner at Korean restaurant. There are Koreans in every city in Canada. So, I had no problem about meal during the journey. We had some time to go shopping as well. I bought a digital camera because the Alberta provincial tax is the cheapest in Canada. So I waited until I get to Calgary. We stayed at Sheraton Four Point Hotel that night.
[Day 3]
It was the last day in Rockies. After having breakfast, we hurried to move to the next destination. Bow Lake!
It was the first shiny day during the journey. So, Bow Lake was twinkling. The atmosphere of the lake was warm and shiny compared to Lake Louise which has a calm and stillness beauty. And I could enjoy the sunlight and taking lovely pictures.
I think it's really nice place to sunbathe. But I had to leave the place to move on to the next destination. I promised myself I would come back and sunbathe with some in love someday.
We arrived at Columbia Icefield. It is about 325 km² in area, 100 to 365 meters (328' to 1,197') in depth and receives up to seven meters (23 ft) of snowfall per year. The icefield includes 8 glaciers and Athabasca glacier I visited was one of them. We took a snowcoach which has four large wheels. I was excited just as I was when I got on a plane for the first time.
When I stood on the glacier, I was a bit nervous. Because my guide said there were some craters. So I didn't wander too far. But I had a lot of fun taking pictures. Jumping shot, lying shot, and so on.
Because of global warming, the icefield is getting smaller. It's too sad to lose such a wonderful nature. So, I bought some post cards with glacier pictures on them.
After coming down the glacier, we moved to Athabasca Falls. The waterfalls come from the Athabasca glacier. So, once again, I was impressed by a natural wonder. Athabasca Falls was not that high but the force of the falling water was great. Lots of water falling made a very loud sound like cannon. So I felt fear when I approached to the falls. Serpentine Athabasca river that starts below the falls was also interesting.
I fell into a deep sleep in Canmore, a small town, that night.
[Day 4]
We had breakfast at a Korean restaurant and we started to come back to Vancouver. It was another spending-half-of-a-day-on-a-coach day. For us, tour guide played a movie. But most of us were so tired and slept.
We had lunch somewhere but I can't remember exactly. I was in between sleep and wake. After running such a long way, finally, our coach arrived at Vancouver. Taking off the coach, my Rocky Mountains tour was over.
[Epilogue]
It was a really nice travel at little cost. I was pretty satisfied but it was a bit short to visit many places. Since there are many, many places to go, I will rent a car and take enough time to enjoy Rockies next time.
December 17, 2009
Live abroad for a couple of years and change your life
Here's a great life-changing travel experience from one of my students.
Written by Yoori
From April 2006 to February 2008, I stayed in England. At first, I planned to study in a private language school for 1 year, but I decided to stay more working in a hotel. During that period I visited a lot of European countries and Egypt. I will tell you about my precious memories.
When I first decided to study in England, I did not have a concrete plan where I should go, or what kind of course I will take, etc. At that time my father's friend who had worked in England for several years recommended the language school, Harrow House International College, located in Southern part of England to me and I went there. He recommended it because of its dorm system. I shared the room with a foreign student from around the world and it was actually good. Lessons were not so bad but what I really enjoyed was playing with foreign friends. Some of them were from South America, and others were from Asia and Europe. We were born in different places but we were in the same place and shared our feeling.
In the dorm, there was a gym, tennis court, squash court, and pool tables. I enjoyed these facilities and some programs like quiz game, karaoke, and disco with friends. What I learned during the class was academic English like grammar and writing skills, and what I learned interacting with friends was daily conversational speech and different culture. I told them about my country and I heard about many countries where I had never been to from them. Everyday was just like a dream. I was in typical of English country, Swanage, and I was happy just staying there, but I was also with friends. I was top of the world everyday and I can dare say that days were on of the happiest time of my life so far.
During the summer vacation, I had a chance to visit continental Europe. I had eight weeks away from England, so I flew to Spain, the first destination of my travelling. From Spain, I used railways to go sightseeing many cities and cross borders. The funny thing was - it is funny now but it was very serious - my money was stolen the first day in Valencia, Spain. I was so depressed and did not want to stay there any longer. However, I could not stop broadening my experience, so I carried on.
The first step was just horrible, but I became bolder and more brave thanks to that accident and could enjoy the travelling. Starting from Spain, I visited Italy, Austria, Hungary, Czech Republic, Switzerland, Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Holland, Luxemburg, Belgium, and finally France. For 2 months, I had visited a lot of cities and seen lots of beautiful landscape, wonderful buildings and castles, and fantastic works of art. Everyday, I woke up at 7 and walked all day until 10 at night during that time but I had never felt bushed. I was just happy.
I finished long journey at France and went back to England to study continuously. I spent Christmas and New Years day in there. I was invited to my English friend's house and I could experience typical English Christmas and New Years day. Time was flying in no time and the time to go back home was coming. I wanted to stay there but I did not want to take same course studying in class. So I decided to take an internship course supervised by British Council and I could work in a hotel located in the same city. I could move to another city but I did not want to say goodbye with many friends, so I stayed there. It was Purbeck House Hotel where I worked for about a year. I worked as a waitress and receptionist.
It was not so easy at first but other colleagues helped me a lot. I also could meet a sincere friend there. My friend and I were always together and shared precious time. Not only could I have working experience like how to control the temper, service mind, and how to deal with complains, and also I could maintain friendship with a lot of friends. I had to come back to my country to finish my study but I am willing to go there again. That 2 years made who I am today and gave me a vision of my life. I will remember that time forever.
This story reminds me of a few old blog entries like learning on vacation, what does it mean to be well traveled?, slow travel, and my own plan to study Italian in Italy.
November 16, 2009
In the mood for a long travel story (bucket trip in Australia)?
This link will take you to a 77 day Australian travel experience. Basically a family with a 13-year-old took a pick-up track and a camper trailer all around Australia but that's about all the summary I care to give since the full 77 day summary would take me forever... A good vacation experience though - enjoy reading it.
October 20, 2009
My student's Nepal meaningful travel experience: 3 days of volunteer work
So one of my students recently went to Nepal to do some volunteer work. I think this experience and what she got out of it is a perfect example of what meaningful travel should be. I don't know that I could have gotten as much from the experience as my student did - maybe it will come across in her story but just in case it does not, I will tell you that she is a remarkable young woman. For example, I know that she volunteered a couple of years ago to visit a rural town in Korea and help out the old farmers. This involved working on the farm, giving the old people back rubs, outhouses for bathrooms, 5 minutes shower time per day, etc. I respect people who do that kind of volunteer work because I never have.
Here's her meaningful travel in Nepal experience (first a summary from me and then her own words):
She was looking for something out of the ordinary and to learn something outside of school. She went to some website where Korean college students go to learn about activities for university students and saw an opportunity to go to Nepal doing volunteer work. All expenses would be paid by a corporate sponsor.
Seeing this as her only opportunity to go abroad (she's a poor college student after all) she applied. I understand that they took 20 people, 1 out of every 80 who applied. She got in and after some hesitation decided to go even though she'd be missing the first 2 weeks of the semester.
The trip to Nepal was 3 days - I believe the rest of the time was training for the mission. They stayed in Kathmandu and worked at a school for the deaf named Bahira Barak. In Korean culture it's not uncommon to play with, touch, hug other people's children in public and my student played with the younger kids at the school (ages ranged from 8-20). She was warned no to touch their heads with her left hand.
Her team's job was to clean and paint four classrooms and paint a corridor. I'll have to ask her if she knows why they needed Korean volunteers for that. Surely they have untrained painters in Nepal...
Anyway, the condition of the classrooms was heartbreaking: spider webs, broken chairs, dust, etc. After 10 of them spent 5 hours cleaning the painting started. The smell made them nauseous so they started working in shifts.
During one of her breaks my student met a girl named Sushma. She spoke Nepali sign language while my student speaks English and Korean. They communicated through drawing and isolated English words. My student learned how to sign "Sushma," her new friend's name.
Three days later they showed the results of their work and everyone loved it. They performed a flag dance, a traditional Korean dance, and some tae kwon do. And then they left. Now my summary ends and I leave you with my student's own words:
We promised not to cry in front of our Nepali friends. I avoided eye contact with my Nepali friends so that I could control my feelings. But when I saw my friend Sushma I could not stop crying. We hugged each other. I got in the bus and saw Sushma standing outside. She had tears in her eyes but she tried to smile at me.We only had three days to get to know our Nepali friends. These three days gave me so many things that I might not have known if I had stayed in Korea. How could our Nepali friends be so open to us and give us unconditional love without getting anything in return? After I visited Bahira Barak School, I learned that sign language is the most powerful and beautiful language; it can move people's hearts. My friend changed her facial expression with every sign. You could see what she was saying by looking in her eyes. The love I learned from my friends will become a seed that will help me grow and mature. The smiles my Nepali friends gave me will be treasures that will cheer me up when I am having a hard time.
October 13, 2009
Scary News for Halloween
A new guest entry from Mancunian:
Well, it's almost Halloween again and of course, there are plenty of scary festivals and events taking place. The Voodoo Experience alternative music festival takes place in New Orleans from October 30th to November 1st and among the 150 or so music acts scheduled to take place are Widespread Panic, Jane's Addiction and Jello Biafra (I can only assume these people are well known and popular).
There are plenty of Halloween parties and events all over the place, but apparently one of the best is at the Louisville, KY zoo, which describes itself as the world's largest Halloween party. It takes place throughout the month of October.
Talking of scary things, I was in York, UK with my family a few weeks ago and we all plucked up the courage to go on the Original Ghost Walk. I have been on ghost walks in various other places, such as Charleston, SC and New Orleans, but this one was the best. It also claims to be the oldest ghost walk in the world. The walk leaves from a pub, so you can always have a couple of drinks to relax you before you leave. (Although there is a shortage of toilets along the route!)
York is supposedly the most haunted place in the world, with over 500 reported ghost sightings. Unfortunately, I didn't see any of them, but the guide managed to entertain and even make us jump a couple of times.
Here's a scary thought: being stuck in a middle seat on the plane, surrounded by a crying baby, a fellow passenger who won't stop talking and somebody with poor hygiene. Around 44% of airline passengers polled by Travelocity stated that poor hygiene among fellow passengers was their biggest complaint, followed by passengers with a cold. Kicking the back of airplane seats was also pretty high up on the list of annoying things that passengers did.
I think my biggest complaint is passengers who try to carry on bags that are clearly too big, although with all these checked bag fees, you can hardly blame them. United Airlines, by the way, has introduced a scheme where you can pay a flat rate of $249 a year, which covers all your checked bag fees during that time. If you fly a lot, it's a good deal - I'm sure all the other airlines will follow suit.
October 4, 2009
Megu Midtown: review
When I wrote about a one day itinerary for New York City that included lunch at Megu, the UN, some shopping, and dinner at Michael Jordan's steakhouse, Rhonda commented that $60 was a lot for lunch.
That's certainly true, but lunch at Megu is a pretty neat experience. There are 2 in New York City and I've only been to the one on 47th street by the UN. My wife had a Megu sampler (sushi, sashimi, and a few other things like fried asparagus) and I had a Kobe beef burger. Both meals were on the $24 lunch menu so they came with salad and desert. The salads were interesting, the meals were excellent, and desert was pretty creative: 24 layers of thin cake and green tea filling.
We liked it so much that we decided to get my parents a gift certificate. They just went and although they didn't see Kobe beef burgers on the lunch menu, they did see Kobe steaks on the $35 lunch menu. These were small (2-3 ounces) but unlike on the cruise, my father wasn't complaining about these portions because the food was so good and the experience was so good.
Since I can't remember everything I wanted to say in my review (except that I was amazed by how good the french fries were - my wife was talking about them for days and this is a sushi place...), let me share my parent's thoughts.
Impeccable service, uniquely elegant décor, and artistic presentation of food, especially the kobe steak served flambé on a bed of hot rocks
Appetizers, main courses, and deserts were all outstanding. Each dish had something out of the ordinary, like yuzu dressing on the caesar salad.
Green tea was poured for us right away. Three of us ordered from the fixed price menu. There were a number of choices for $24, but we picked a $35 option. We had the ceasar salad, the small (2-3 oz) kobe steak which came with rice and miso soup, and for dessert we got to try several things since ladies got 2 desserts! What a great idea. So we had tiramisu, creme brulee, chocolate cake and homemade ice cream. The fourth person in our group ordered from the House Special Rolls section of the menu.
It was a little pricy but what do you expect across from the UN? The 2-3 oz kobe steak (sampler), salad, soup, desert that we had for $35.00 on fixed price lunch menu was much higher on the dinner menu. Regular Coffee was $5.00.
So Megu is expensive, but it's a great experience and everyone in my family thinks it's well worth the money.
September 9, 2009
NCL Spirit August 14-21, 2009 Boston to Bermuda cruise: comprehensive review
This was my second NCL cruise and the less satisfying of the 2. I can only recommend this cruise to people in the Boston area who want to leave on a cruise from Boston for convenience. I understand that NCL is also the only cruise line that has 7 day cruises to Bermuda with 3 days there. So if 2 days in Bermuda isn't enough, I could certainly see cruising there and staying for three days - that might be more relaxing than flying to Bermuda and then finding a hotel.
For experienced cruisers, however, the Spirit is unlikely to compare favorably to your other cruises. The ship is relatively small - the pool is tiny and there aren't a lot of extras that make you say "wow, how'd they get that on a ship?" It seemed similar to the NCL Pearl I took to Alaska, but the Spirit had no bowling lanes and no shabu shabu. They did have a few things the Pearl did not have, however; the Indian night ($15 cover) sounded interesting but they had often had an Indian dish on the main dinging room menu (free).
Despite the relatively small size of the ship, it didn't really have an intimate feel. For example, if you go eat breakfast at the buffet around 9:00 AM it will be way too crowded. I know that stressed my sister out a bit. My wife and I chose to wake up early every day and go to the main dining room where the breakfast food was very good but the service was slow.
We noticed slow service in the restaurants was pretty typical on this cruise. We were on vacation to relax so it wasn't too bad but being from New York and living in Seoul - I just appreciate speedy service so that I can decide how long the meal takes.
Speaking of food, there were several times when we were really surprised at how salty some of the dishes were. My family tends to like salty food but there were quite a few times when something would just have way too much salt. It may sound funny to complain about free food because you can get something else instead. However, wasting food and waiting is not really comfortable. Interestingly, we only had this problem in the main dining room. The specialty restaurants were always very good.
While we're talking about specialty restaurants, we joked on the last night as we ate in the Italian one that we'd have eaten there every night if we had just tried it earlier. The cover is a little less ($10) and the food was very good (with the exception of the canoli that must have been pre-filled so it was nasty and soggy). The Asian restaurant (where you can get regular Asian dishes or sushi) was very good. We went twice. We didn't try Teppenyaki since it was pretty bad on the NCL Pearl. We didn't try Cagney's steakhouse because it was $25. For $35 you can have dinner in a famous steakhouse during restaurant week ($25 for lunch) and I guess because of the economy, restaurant week lasted for all of August at some places.
The rooms seemed quite small. I have no problem with small rooms but some people were a bit disappointed. I had a cheap inside room but even the balcony rooms seemed quite small. They certainly didn't seem as nice as the balcony I was in on the Norwegian Pearl.
Overall it was a great vacation but I think there are certainly better cruises out there. If you're limited to ones leaving from Boston, then I'm not so sure but this may be the best you can do. It's good, just not great.
Other NCL Spirit cruise related posts:
2 pictures
2 more pictures
The bad start
Days 1 & 2
Shore excursion talk
Confusion over edocs
Do you expect good entertainment on cruises?
September 8, 2009
2 more pictures from the Bermuda cruise: Catamaran sunset cruise shore excursion
This was the view we got when heading out for the sunset cruise catamaran shore excursion.
When we arrived in Bermuda, we had a note that one of our shore excursions had been canceled and moved to another day. No big deal except the new time was 9:15 AM or something and the old time had been 2:30 in the afternoon or so. I went to the shore excursion desk and they explained that we had been bumped because another ship was coming in.
Anyway, our second day in Bermuda we see Explorer of the Seas (Royal Caribbean). We talked to a few people from the Explorer and got the impression that is was a lot bigger than the NCL Spirit. Later we did a sunset cruise shore excursion (this is not the one that got rescheduled) and we saw that the Explorer of the Seas is tied for 3rd largest passenger ship in the world. It can handle about 3100 passengers as opposed to 2000 for the Spirit.
This was the view from our sunset cruise shore excursion.
The sunset cruise was $49 I think. They had one that seemed the same except it was all-you-can-drink rum swizzles and $89. Interestingly, the cheap one we went on also turned out to be free rum swizzles all night so we think we got a bargain.
The next morning, we were doing a glass bottom boat / snorkel shore excursion where the first rum swizzle was free but after that they were $3 each. We mentioned that last night we got free refills all night and the guys running this excursion seemed a little upset. They said that the guy last night wasn't supposed to do that but because he isn't doing well he's desperate.
It seemed kind of funny because the weak rum swizzles in a big cooler probably cost next to nothing so I don't see what the big deal is. The guy from the sunset cruise just seemed like a nice guy. Anyway, we were still happy to have saved the $40 and still get the free rum swizzles.
September 7, 2009
Norwegian Spirit cruise - the first two pictures
My blog is giving me some trouble so I'll do these 2 at a time (and show you 4 pictures of the cruise total).
Leaving Boston we grabbed a spot on the top deck at the back of the ship. The Boston skyline was OK but the highlights were the planes close overhead coming into the airport.
Here you see my wife and I posing on our Segways on a hill overlooking the Norwegian Spirit. Now my wife wants to buy a Segway but I hear they are $5,000 so I'm not so happy about the idea...
September 6, 2009
Wrapping up my mini-vacation
When I wrote about my little unexpected vacation, Sharon asked about the DMZ.
In Seoul, you can take a DMZ tour that brings you to a tunnel dug by North Koreans, an observation point, and the JSA (Joint Security Area). The tour is done by your local guide and by US army soldiers. It's pretty interesting. I actually wrote about it just over 3 years ago.
The part of the DMZ I visited the other day is in Gosung. Here there is much less to do - no tunnel and no JSA. The observation part is nice because it's on the coast and very beautiful. You can see a few mountains in North Korea but I found myself looking at the beach. No people but with binoculars you can see a plain military outpost.
They have gift shops with much of the same stuff I saw at the DMZ closer to Seoul: North Korean soju and other liquor, mostly. I did make one excellent find - a tshirt that says "Unification Observ". They forgot the "atory" so it's pretty funny. And it was only about $3.50 (4,000 KRW).
There were a few military vehicles like a Mustang fighter and a tank. There was a museum but it was nothing compared to the Korean War Museum in Seoul. There was a passenger train turned restaurant that amused me.
I believe that Gosung is the meeting point for tours of Keumgang Mountain. My wife wants to go but I have no interest at all - plenty of mountains in South Korea and elsewhere to visit.
Gosung happens to be right near Hwa Jin Po where they have a "castle" that used to be Kim Il Sung's summer home. It seemed like a nice house with the ocean on one side and a lake on another side. Great scenery.
After getting back to the pension and taking care of the dogs we spent some time with our friend Nasra and the Japanese backpacker (I think I mentioned them in the other entry on this trip) in Gangneung. I can't think of any reason to go there unless you know someone so I won't bother saying much about it.
The next day went to Jung Dong Jin - the easternmost beach in South Korea. It's popular for sunrises but we got there around noon. It's basically just a walk on the beach. I managed to get into a shouting match with some drunk woman who was mad that one of our dogs was barking.
Then we headed home. Today we realized that I had thrown out my wife's new fancy shoes because she had packed them in a black plastic bag and asked me to take out the garbage as we were leaving the pension. Luckily they had the shoes so we're getting them back. I'm in trouble anyway, of course.
September 4, 2009
In Sokcho and Connected again
I should have a proper blog entry for you soon. I missed a couple of days because the "pension" (a kind of fancy motel in Korea) we're staying at, Dog Hill or Dog in Hill depending on which sign you read, didn't have WiFi in our first room.
Now we're moving in to another room and here the WiFi works.
It's been an interesting two days so far. Part of that is because of Dog Hill Pension but most of that comes from visiting our friend Nasra who lives in the area.
Our first night in the area we went out for Sashimi. You pick out the fish, they smack it with a baseball bat, and then they slice it up and serve it to you. My wife picked a Sea Bream. It was caught in the ocean (not farm-raised) so it was expensive for a small fish. My wife talked them down from 80,000 KRW to 70,000. I'm guessing that's around $60.
You eat in a small restaurant that looks very cheap: dispoasable wood chopsticks, disposable plastic table cloth covers, toilet paper instead of napkins (the norm in Korea actually in less expensive restaurants), etc. But they give you the fish you picked out, some blue fish sashimi, some seafood soup, and some lettuce.
The Sea Bream, or Porgie (my wife only knew the Korean word so the dictionary gave us these two translations) was a bit chewy but didn't taste fishy at all. Actually a lot of fish tastes much less fishy raw.
That night we tried to watch dexter season 2 on DVD but the DVD in our pension room wasn't working. We called the owners but they said they had no idea how to work it so we were stuck. That would be unacceptable in America but not so much in Korea. Kind of like the military helicopters flying overhead throughout the day. In America I don't see anyone putting up with that but in Korea it's just the way it is.
Anyway, we went to bed before 9:00 PM and slept almost 11 hours. Must be the country air. The next day we met up with Nasra (after taking one of our dogs to the vet). She showed us a great resort where we would love to stay one day called Sol Beach. We checked out their cafe and walked around a bit. We even got our feet wet on the beach and after rinsing them off we dried them with air pressure guns like they have at ski resorts.
We went to a tofu / seafood soup restaurant for lunch where we met up with one of Nasra's friends. Then we went to Seoraksan, one of the more famous mountains in Korea for a cable car ride, some hiking, and a little picnic.
On the mountain we met a Japanese woman backpacking around Korea alone so we invited her to spend some time with us and had dinner plus went to a singing room (we do our karaoke in private little rooms in Korea).
Now it's day 3. We plan on driving to the DMZ after we finish moving into our new room (the old one was really weird so remind me to tell you about it sometime) and then meeting up with Nasra in the evening.
August 30, 2009
Still woke up at 3:00 AM
So the sleep supplement worked beautifully when I arrived in New York a month ago. But back in Seoul it failed me and I woke up at 3:00 AM. I tried to go back to bed around 5:00 AM but just didn't fall asleep.
So now I have to fight jet lag the old fashioned way - by staying awake a stupid number of hours so I end up going to bed at a normal time even though I woke up early. So far I'm doing OK. I watched a few episodes of Dexter, ate a few meals, went outside for a workout, and went out for a late lunch.
Now I visit the in-laws, get dinner, come home, do some yoga, and hopefully stay awake until 10:00 PM. I'd settle for 9:00 actually...
Speaking fo exercise outside and yoga later and all that, I want to reinforce what I said about exercise making me a better traveler. The other day I was walking around New York City all day. In the old days my back would have been killing me. Not anymore. I thought I had a bad back - turns out it was just a weak back.
To further complicate things there's an Ebay auction I hope to win ending in about 17 hours - if I get back on schedule I'll be up by then anyway.
August 28, 2009
One day in NYC = Megu MIdtown and Michael Jordan's Steakhouse
I didn't remember this post about restaurants in NYC until just now, but yesterday my wife and I spend the day in NYC and squeezed our activities between two very good meals.
I'll start with an outline of the day's schedule:
Megu MIdtown - I think we arrived around 2:00 for lunch. This was a really nice experience for $60 (2 lunch sets, 1 cappucino, tax) and I'll write a review soon.
We then spent some time in the UN building right across from Megu Midtown. They had a photo gallery called "Women and Water" and another gallery on atomic / nuclear weapons. We didn't do a tour but we did hit the gift shops where a UN charm (or pendant) for my wife's charm bracelet set us back $60. Ouch.
Next we headed to Century 21 Department Store near the World Trade Center Site. I got a Ralph Lauren sport jacket made in Italy for $70 and some Boss sneakers that look kind of like shoes (no laces) for $65. I'm really excited about the sneakers because I like wearing comfortable shoes when I teach.
Next we went to Times Square. The new pedestrian-friendly section is very nice although my father tells me that David Letterman doesn't like it. My wife found NYC charms for $5 each in a gift shop here. Luckily they didn't have a UN charm or I'd have cried.
Then we went back to Grand Central and had dinner in Michael Jordan's steakhouse. I think it was around 10:00 by now. Michael Jordan's Steakhouse cost us about $70 (2 8 oz. fillet mignons for $29 each and a side of asparagus for $9 or something). Not quite as good as Ruth's Chris in our opinion but still very good. And the location is not only convenient when you're taking the train but also great for people watching if you get the right table (which we did).
All in all, we had a wonderful day in NYC. Now we're packing to fly back to Seoul. Our flight (Asiana) leaves at midnight tonight so it'll be a couple days before I blog again.
August 26, 2009
Six Flags Hurricane Harbor water park in New Jersey
Yesterday my wife and I drove down to Hurricane Harbor in NJ with a few friends. I hadn't been to an amusement in America in a long time and though I had been to a water park in Korea in recent memory I was expecting a totally different experience in America.
Tickets are normally $35 each but my friend got them for $11 through his job (he's a news producer). We also split about $40 in gas, $15 for parking, $21 on a locker, $25 for the worst Papa John's pizza ever. Plus we spent $8 on a decent salad and $3.20 on a horrible cup of coffee. Plus we had snacks on the way there and on the way back.
So it's not cheap and the discounted tickets really helped. But we did have a full day of fun, we were in the park from around 11:00 AM to 6:00 PM and the park is open until 7:00 PM. So I'd have to say I got my money's worth.
My friend was also there last Tuesday and said the lines were so bad that they spent all day going around the "Take it EEE ZZZ" (maybe that's the name) river. Yesterday, Monday the 24th lines were not bad. I'd guess 15-30 minutes depending on the ride.
The rides are mostly water slides. There were about 10 that you went down on either single or double person tubes. There were 3 that you went down tubeless. One of those is, we're guessing, about 8 stories high and what looks like a close to vertical drop. Climbing the last few flights of stairs made us a bit nervous but after that none of the other slides worried us.
Anyway the slides were fun - I think we tried about 6 of them. They also had a wave pool and the lazy river thing I mentioned. We enjoyed both of those too. The wave pool was infested with kids who bump and kick a lot but what can you do? I'd love to go back to Bermuda and the almost empty Horseshoe Bay but that's not really an option.
All in all, Hurricane Harbor makes for a very nice day trip, especially if you can find discounted tickets somewhere.
August 23, 2009
NCL cruise got off to a bad start - confusion over specialty restaurant vouchers
I'm not quite ready for the entire review just yet, but I want to tell this story. We got on the cruise ship and we were ready for the wait to get into our rooms. We had bathing suits in our carry-on bags and we found a table in the shade outside in the back of the boat.
The plan was to eat and swim while waiting for the rooms to be ready. First I decided to go to restaurant reservations to confirm two reservations that my travel agent had already made. She had booked us as a group (there were 6 of us) and gotten us free reservations at Shogun, the Asian restaurant, and Trattoria, the Italian restaurant. These were normally $15 for Asian and $10 for Italian (per person of course).
So I go to confirm the times and they say I have no reservations for us. I say there's a problem - not only should I have reservations but they should be free. The lady looks at me funny, talks a bit more, and finally goes to get the manager.
The manager turns out to be a maitre d' and basically says he can make reservations but that's it. He's not very polite when I ask him what we can do to fix the problem. He doesn't want to do anything - he keeps repeating that I have to pay for the restaurants no matter what. I get the feeling that he thinks I'm some sort of scam-artist. I ask him to call my travel agent and sort out the mess for me. He says no. I say, "So basically you're saying I'm completely on my own and you won't do anything to help me?" The answer is yes.
The maitre d's name is Armed in case anyone from NCL is reading and wants to yell at this guy. Anyway, I call my travel agent and explain the situation. They can't talk to Armed so they say they will call NCL and get back to me.
A bit later they do get back to me. NCL group bookings confirmed that the 2 specialty restaurants should be free for all 6 of us and told the travel agent that they would email email the Norwegian Spirit (Armed I guess) and let him know.
I go back to the restaurant people and tell them they have an email coming explaining that the reservations should, in fact, be free. They say that for now they have to charge me normally but that once they get the email they can drop the charges. I make reservations for Shogun.
Soon we get into the rooms and I find a card that says something about Shogun. My sister also has this card. My parents do not. I also have a card for Trattoria. This one my parents also have but my sister does not.
We're not really sure what these cards mean and we really have no idea why I have both while my parents have one and my sister has the other. We forget about our troubles and have some fun on the ship and then go to Shogun that night. The food is excellent.
At the end I give the waitress my card. She's confused but I guess someone somewhere told her that the dinner was free. I sign the card and that's it. We left a cash tip because she didn't give us a receipt to sign like they usually do at specialty restaurants. She kept the card which turned out to be a credit voucher thing.
It would have been nice if Armed had said that if we were getting a free meal that there should be a voucher card in our rooms. That would have made him appear to be helpful (instead of being an ass) and saved us a lot of confusion wondering what those cards were for. Of course, we still wouldn't have known why I had 2 vouchers while the rest of us had 1 each for different restaurants...
The next day my parents got their card for a free meal at Shogun. My sister got the card for Trattoria.
A few days later 4 of us went back to Shogun because it was so good. They asked us to sign receipts from the first day of the cruise. We thought that was funny but it was no problem.
The last day of the cruise we all handed in our vouchers for Trattoria but they said we had to give them to reception. Kind of funny since before we had to give them to the restaurant but no big deal.
Anyway, that's my story. It seemed like a lot of people didn't know what they were doing. I was certainly one of them but then again it wasn't really my job to know what was going on there. It also seemed like the restaurant reservations people and the maitre d' were not real anxious to help me. Like I said before I felt like I was being treated like a scammer instead of a customer who needed help.
July 30, 2009
6 reasons to visit Costa Rica
Here are a few tips/ comments / experiences from a friend who knows a few things about Costa Rica (he's been there several times):
1. If you haven't driven around in Costa Rica yet - I would recommend that you learn the lay of the land first - once you see how the main roads work and the driving style of the country - which is very agressive - you will probably feel more comfortable driving.
2. Here's the two best guide books imho - Costa Rica for Dummies and the Lonely Planet Guide to Costa Rica.
3. Nicoya Peninsula is great - We've stayed at Playa Samara and Montezuma now and enjoyed both for different reasons - However I will tell you - we are strange and don't like to go where the crowds are - hence we stay away from some of the more popular locations
We rented a car and drove out to Montezuma (and Mal Pais, St. Teresa, & Cobano) I thought Montezuma felt a bit more touristy/college town than Tambor or Mal Pais, but I liked them all.
We did the Cloud Forest on the 26th before heading (by ferry) to the Nicoya Penninsula. Monkeys, iguanas, geckos, every kind of bird imaginable, coati, and some so-so scuba diving. A great trip. Costa Rica was beautiful, and the people were quite nice.
If you ever go to the Southern Nicoya, in Tambor there is a little Italian place (the sign just says pizza and italian kitchen or something) that is really great.
3. We drove through the area where Jurassic Park was filmed two years ago - It's on the Central Carribbean side of Costa Rica - it was awesome - miles and miles of Tropical rainforest wilderness.
4. Montezuma is a real kids hang out - but where we were it was about a km East of the village - on the beach - that's where the wildlife preserve begins and runs all the way to Tambor - we rode horses through it - a real treat.
5. The best spot we were at was the Tabacon Resort under the Arenal Volcano (which is still erupting) we hung out in the lava-heated hot springs there - in the middle of a spectacular rainforest with volcanic views and massages and great food. Avocado salad made right at the table and the ceviche (raw fish marinated in lime juice) just amazing - that's a great meal.
6. But it is a trek from San Jose to Arenal because you have to go over and around the mountain chain in the area - the Poa Volcano is more of a straight run up hill - and if you go to Poa and have a chance you can visit the Doka Coffee Plantation there - despite what the other coffe tours say - that's where the best coffee can be had - their Organic Roast is amazing - we are set on trying to work out a deal to distribute their organic coffee.
July 6, 2009
Eyewitness to the Disney monorail accident
Here's an eyewitness account of the Disney monorail accident:
I'm actually at Disney now with the kids and can see the monorails out my hotel terrace at the Contemporary. So strange to see it - there and no other monorails running. Horrible for the driver and sucks that my kids loved to watch the monorails driving thru the hotel. That of course is an afterthought though. They're saying the kid was 21 and was part of a college program, due to graduate Stetson College next may.
Transportation from the Contemporary is chaos without the monorail. They have some buses which they contracted to help but it's like a triage so no one really has a plan. Monorail yellow is just sitting in the Contemporary.
July 4, 2009
Football coaches in Iraq: travel experience
Here's a travel experience reserved for celebrities visiting troops in Iraq. It includes flying into Baghdad on a plane with no lights, getting escorted into war zones, staying in Saddam Hussein's former palaces, and heat:
"It's unbelievable," he said. "We were in a chopper that had its windows open. We got in the helicopter where the hot air poured in on you and it felt like it was 140 degrees. It was hot. Because of the sandstorms we've had some sand cover, so the sun is not always beating right down on us."
June 29, 2009
What travel experiences have chnaged your life?
Nice story here about a life changing travel experience. An English actress saw The Reasmey Angkor Bassac Theatre Troupe in Cambodia. This troop was so poor that they traveled around Cambodia on foot.
Since meeting them, the traveler has been inspired to raise money for them. I'm sure it didn't take too much to change their lives.
I can't say that I've had an experience like that. Nothing that really changed the way I lived after I returned home.
May 29, 2009
Very interesting travel anecdotes from an American who visited North Korea
This fellow is a photographer by the way so you can check out some photos on his website. Anyway here are some interesting anecdotes:
There are British travel agencies that arrange for tours, including the major one that was affected by the CNN thing and Nat Geo documentaries. Here is part 1 of the national Geographic documentary that got people in trouble. They don't really start showing North Korea until several minutes in:
In and out from Beijing nonstop on Koryo Air, the lowest rated airline in the world. But, if you get to Beijing, you can find your way to PY for a fraction of the cost of a group tour. I met a pair of guys from Australia who paid about $450 for a week, all expenses paid tour of NK via a Beijing travel agency.
You can go via the South, but Beijing is the best way. Three times a week nonstop. Flew in with the North Korean Olympic team - sat next to Hong Un Jong on the flight, who won a Gold medal for women's vault. She let me try on the medal. The athletes were met by the media on the tarmac and children presented them with flowers and what not while the supporting officials were off-loading shwag they brought back from Beijing. TVs, laptops, laptops, dvd players, laptops, pirated movies, laptops, etc. Must have been 50 boxes of Lenovo laptops.
I had a minder with me while I was there who happened to be the son of a diplomat, about 25 years old, and was very easy to get along with. He liked James Bond movies that he would get from one of the two free trade zones where black market items comes into the country. He drives a BMW X5 and goes to China frequently. The minders/tour guides are usually middle class and terrified of a number of things, chiefly what their charge may do. A foreigner will seldom get in trouble - it is their minder who will get in trouble. But, having the son of a major diplomat as my personal minder led to a more liberal trip.
The people, for the most part, do not like us. The nicest people I met, actually, were the late-teenage members of the army. They were fascinated with me. Kids are the worst - they are just programmed to hate Americans. The elderly still have family outside of the country, for the most part, and were trying to get me to get messages out for them, which I did.
The North Koreans put on a show EVERY DAY that makes the opening of the Beijing Olympics look like an after school recital. Seriously impressive. I tried to sneak some video off one of my point and shoots, but it wasn't meant to be. That's a major no-no. Still shots are less of a problem. Video is just shy of impossible.
Instead of traffic lights, the most beautiful girls in the country are selected to be 'traffic girls.' They wear these white blouse style uniform tops with blue skirts and are like the guys on the tarmac at JFK, but more rigid.
Tourists are lavished with 6 course meals. But those meals are really just plain weird. They will start you off with one or two Korean courses, and then out of nowhere you will get Mac and Cheese or Spaghetti with Meatballs. Another Korean course or two and then another 'Western Choice.' It doesn't matter if you eat it or not, you're going to be served the entire meal. I wasn't allowed to sit with my minder during meals, so I tacked on to a tour group - EVERY tourist ends up at the same place at the same time. The gov't basically clears a place out of locals as much as they can (except the subways), and that's where you're taken.
North Koreans don't understand exchange rates. Most things are based on the euro. You can use Euro, USD, or Yuan while over there. However, the Yuan (China) is converted against the dollar, and they trade the dollar at a 1:1 rate with the Euro. You can't use CCs over there, so you have to come in with a stack of cash. I brought in Chinese RMB and at the hotel I converted everything I had to Euros via the dollar and made a killing. Arbitrage at its finest.
There are only a few hotels where a foreigner may stay while in Pyongyang (three, I think), and the most lux one (which would be about 2.5 stars in the US, is on its own island in the river where the only access is by a large bridge. During the night, the bridge is lifted so you can't sneak away. The hotel does try to keep you occupied though. There is a 9-hole par-3 course with driving range, three restaurants (including a revolving restaurant - if you want it to spin, they have to turn it on for you. This is a theme throughout NK - revolving restaurants, they love 'em - or more specifically, the Chinese seem to). There's a bowling alley iirc, and a Casino/brothel in the basement run by an outside Chinese country.
I was always running into the same groups of people, no matter where I went. There's no freedom of movement. Your minder and driver take you where they want you to go. Places are cleared out in advance, little actors or whatever come and go, etc. It's all coordinated in an effort to put some good word of mouth out there. When you're going to visit their version of Arlington Cemetery you're 'encouraged' to bring flowers to the graves and there just happens to be a van in the parking lot of the hotel that just happens to have flowers for sale.
I went to a place called Mt. Myohyang. You pass some villages (where I was allowed to stop - very unusual) and poverty is obviously rampant. But, I've seen worse in more accessible countries across Asia and Africa. Then again, for the most part what I was allowed access to was sanitized before hand. So, starving people are really not on the itinerary. There is NO begging in PY, which would really be the only place you could see it up close and personal under normal circumstances. I wouldn't feel comfortable saying undernourishment is rampant. For the most part, the people I saw and met were fairly healthy looking individuals.
May 19, 2009
Interesting travel experience but is Hong Kong going overboard trying to stop the spread of swine flu?
A very unique travel experience described here - some people were forced into a flu jail in Hong Kong. The hero in this story was in the same hotel as someone with swine flu. One of the people they met had been in Mexico three weeks earlier. The doctors said they were not sick and would not get sick but they had no power to do anything...
May 1, 2009
Breaking new ground and more concerns about swine flu
I'll start off with a little personal travel note. Today in Jinju I went to an athletics day at my niece's elementary school. We heard from one teacher that I'm the only foreigner who has ever visited the school so I guess it's not too surprising that some of the kids were pretty curious about me. There were a few times when I was surrounded by kids with several asking / souting questions in both English and Korean. It wasn't a great experience but it was new. And I think my niece is a bit more popular now for whatever that's worth.
I'd rather be dreaming travel dreams, but I'm stuck with swine flu on my mind as I consider postponing booking my summer vacation plans.
The CDC says don't go to Mexico. That's fairly obvious and wasn't part of my plans anyway. I'm sure plenty of areas in Mexico are free of swine flu so far but I don't want to research which ones or predict if that will change. Plus you could get stuck there if they decide to close the border.
Here one travel agent says that people are more worried about cancelled flights than getting swine flu in Mexico.
The Biden controversy has me a bit suspicious. Is it dangerous to be in a confined space or not? I presume that if one of the people you're sharing the space with has swine flu then the answer is yes.
Travel insurance might offer some protection if you decide to cancel but it can be hard to find a company you trust. The article says to ask questions, but we've all heard stories of agents who lie or make mistakes. Seems like what you'd really need is a lawyer to read the insurance contract for you...
I'll probably take a wait and see approach. If it looks like things are getting under control in a week I'll start buying plane tickets to New York and Costa Rica. If it turns out we have a pandemic I'll become a shut in and hope for the best.
April 19, 2009
The Palazzo Hotel in Las Vegas: experience & review
Here's another report from my parents about their trip to Las Vegas.
We went to Las Vegas in early April and stayed at the Palazzo Hotel. We'd seen pictures on the internet before we booked the Palazzo, but we were still impressed by the luxury of it all. The lobby was grand with its fountains and sculpture, and there were plenty of friendly and helpful staff on hand for check-in.
It didn't take long to get to the casino since you pass through it on the way to the elevators for the guest floors. We were happily surprised to see plenty of penny slot machines which we visited often during our stay.
The rooms in the Palazzo are actually suites, and ours was larger than any we'd ever stayed in. The sunken living room had a big comfortable sofa and a nice big flat screen TV. There was also a dining table & chairs plus a desk. The living room was open to the bedroom which had its own big flat screen TV and the bathroom had a flat screen TV as well. The elegant marble bathroom also had both a tub and a separate shower.
But for us, the best feature of the room was the view. We could see the Strip and watch some of the outdoor attractions at the hotels across the street. And when you want to sleep, the remote control roman shades & curtains are a very practical luxury.
We were fortunate to get a tour of the hotel by one of the very knowledgeable staff. We went to the Lamborghini showroom which is right in the Palazzo. There were lots of Lamborghinis and several other exotic cars, including a Bugatti Veyron and a couple of Ferraris. It was great to see them up close and very interesting to find out that events can be held there. Now if only we can think up an event.
While touring the pool areas we found out that the Palazzo is Silver LEED certified (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) and is the largest LEED-certified building in the world. One of the Palazzo's many energy efficiencies is that the swimming pools are heated with solar power.
The Palazzo is connected to the Venetian Hotel which has beautiful painted ceilings. We took a quick look at the 134,000 square foot Canyon Ranch Spa Club which is accessible from both the Palazzo and the Venetian. Canyon Ranch Spa has an extensive menu of services, including massages, wraps, scrubs, skin & nail care, some of which sound quite exotic.
Both the Palazzo and the Venetian have several celebrity chef restaurants and there are plenty of other places to eat as well. We especially liked the Palazzo's Dal Toro Ristorante because the food was excellent and it looked right into the Lamborghini showroom! Both hotels have their own concierge suites with separate check-ins, lounges, and other amenities. Both have shows with well known entertainers. Both have many wonderful designer shops and there is even a rare book store (Bauman's).
The Venetian has its own unique features besides the painted ceilings. There are canals and there is both an indoor and an outdoor gondola ride. We went on the indoor gondola and our Italian gondolier's singing was very good! We've been told that the gondola ride is pretty authentic and hope one day to check that out for ourselves.
The Venetian also has a town square with restaurants and entertainment. Although it's inside, the décor makes you feel that you are outdoors.
We were glad we stayed in the Palazzo. We enjoyed the luxury and services and although there are over 3000 suites and it was booked to capacity, it felt pleasantly busy but never crowded. We just wish our stay had been longer.
April 18, 2009
Capriotti's Sandwich Shop in Las Vegas: review
Not too long ago I was writing about eating in Vegas and soon after that I got an email inviting me to review a Capriotti's Sandwich Shop. My parent's were actually headed to Vegas, so the timing was pretty good and they went. Here's their review.
We recently made our first trip to Las Vegas. We went for a friend's wedding and stayed five days, so we had a short 'must do' list, just enough to get a taste of Vegas. Besides a trip to Red Rock Canyon, the penny slots & the Lamborghini showroom at the Palazzo where we stayed, one 'must do' was lunch at a Capriotti's Sandwich Shop.
There are about 20 Capriotti's locations in the Las Vegas Valley to choose from, and we went to the one on Eastern at Anthem. Capriotti's has a nice selection of hot and cold subs and sandwiches, including some called "Cap's Specials". There are even several vegetarian 'meat' sandwiches.
The "Bobbie" Special had been recommended to us - turkey, cranberry sauce, stuffing & mayo - yum. It was a hard choice, but being New Yorkers, we also decided on a "Capastrami" Special - hot pastrami, cole slaw, swiss cheese & Russian dressing. We both had half of each and they were delicious. The small (9") size was quite enough. At $6.50 for the "Bobbie" and $7.50 for the "Capastrami" the prices are very reasonable for what you get.
The staff was friendly and helpful, and since it was a beautiful day, we were able to eat at one of the outside tables.
We definitely want to try the other sandwiches, and there are Capriotti's in several other states including Pennsylvania & New Jersey, so we may be able to do that soon. When you get a chance, we recommend you try a Capriotti's sandwich as well.
April 5, 2009
Back from MT
Well my day in the country was pretty good. We drove about an hour to Gapyun and stayed in a pension. I've written about these before if you're not familiar with the idea.
This one was basically 3 little cabin-type things. The one we were in had a bedroom, kitchen / living room area / bathroom. There was also an upstairs area that you had to climb a ladder to get to that was pretty useless.
They did have a nice yard and our dogs had some fun with the new smells. I wasn't too thrilled when we arrived at 1:40 and hat to wait 1.5 hours to get in the room. Check in was supposed to be at 2:00...
But we spent that time walking the dogs and stuff so it wasn't too bad. When the construction workers started walking around and one of our dogs went nuts barking for way too long we certainly wished we could get in the room (he's fine as long as he doesn't see any humans).
But my wife wants to go back anyway. I guess she can forgive them since the owners really do seem to care about dogs and it's so easy for dogs to have fun there. Plus the room / cabin thing was cheerful enough.
April 3, 2009
Going on a little trip today: MT
Today is the College of English MT or membership training. This is kind of like a retreat where the people in a club or other organization get out of the city, rent a big place in the country, barbecue a dinner, play silly games, and drink all night.
It's a kind of bonding thing pretty common in Korean culture and the university actually encourages its students to go do these MT things.
They also encourage the professors to come along so we can chat with a few students, judge the drag queen competition (I did mention silly games, right?), and then go to bed while the students drink all night.
Last year I ended up going to bed around 3:00 0r 4:00 AM (I guess the drag queens took a while to get their curtains on and looking like dresses) in a room with about 5-10 other male professors.
This year I'm renting my own room nearby and driving up with my wife and dogs so I can chat with the students and then go back to my own room with my family around 10:00 (and skip out on judging the contest).
And when I'm not busy at the MT we'll take the dogs for walks in the country and watch some Sopranos DVDs (season 6, part 2). It's a one-day Friday night only getaway, but we're looking forward to it. Plus it's better than the alternative...
January 23, 2009
Back home after a long travel experience: American, United, taxi, subway, bus, & car
I wrote about how I changed my flight from leaving New York on the 15th to leaving on the 20th when my grandfather got sick. Now I'm back in Seoul. Briefly, I woke up at 5:30 and got to JFK around 8:00 AM. At 11:30 or so we flew 12 hours on American Airlines from JFK to Narita. We had a 4 hour stopover and then flew 2 hours on United to Incheon. So the trip took a while - tack on the fact that Seoul is 14 hours ahead of New York an we arrived at 10:00 PM on the 21st.
We then took a taxi to our home in Seoul where we unpacked and cleaned. We slept for 2 hours and then woke up at 4:30 AM on the 22nd, took a 1 hour subway ride to the bus station, and took a 4 hour bus ride to Jinju. There we finally saw our dogs after being away from them for nearly a month. Our car was parked in Jinju so after spending one night there we drove back up to Seoul with our dogs. It's 3:00 PM on Jan. 23rd here in Seoul.
That's why I haven't posted in a while.
It was a long trip. I'm going back to America this summer but I keep saying that next winter I'm going somewhere warm. At first I was saying I'd go to New Zealand and that would be awesome but it's a long flight. Maybe I'd rather go somewhere kind of close to Seoul - my wife says Okinawa would be nice and warm in December or January. I'll check that out but would probably rather see Angkor Watt and then maybe a Cambodian beach or Vietnam or something.
But for a long trip, this one wasn't so bad. When checking in for the American flight, we kept asking about upgrades. The guy who checked our documents at the self check-in said to ask the lady at the baggage check. She said to ask in the first class check-in area. The very hostile woman there said there were no upgrade specials on American Air but I could pay $6,500 per person to buy business class tickets.
I didn't want to do that. Later I asked at the gate if they had any upgrade specials. This woman was very pleasant. She said I could pay the difference between my fare and the business class fare. That's already better than the other lady who said I had to buy totally new tickets. Plus this woman said the fare was $5,900. So at the gate upgrading would have cost $4,800 each instead of $6,500 each. Still a bit much for me.
She did say the flight was only half full and that she could seat my wife and I on either end of a row of 5. So we had the two aisle seats and the three seats in between us were empty. That's what we did and it wasn't as comfy as Virgin Atlantic's upper class, but then neither was American's business class judging from the looks of things. At least we were able to lay down and stretch our legs and stuff. And we didn't have to spend an extra 10 or 12 grand.
In Tokyo, United was trying to sell upgrades to economy plus for 4100 yen - I think $45. Unlike Virgin's premium economy, United's economy plus looked exactly like economy. Supposedly they had 5 inches extra leg room. It was empty so I guess you could have had empty seats around you. We stuck with regular economy emergency exit row seats - a 2 hour flight is nothing after a 12 hour one and a 4 hour stopover anyway.
January 5, 2009
Last day in London: Sunday markets (Columbia Road Flower Market & Greenwich Sunday Market)
From 9:00 - noon on Sundays, the Columbia Road Flower Market is a place where you'll see more locals than tourists. You probably won't be in the market for flowers but you can look and there are also lots of cute shops on the street that are only open Sundays. I would say an hour is plenty of time although if you start trying clothes on and stuff you could take longer.
Take the northern line to Old Street, exit #2, bus #55 to the first Columbia Road stop, when you get off the bus cross the street to your right and walk a few minutes.
After that we took the bus to somewhere near Oxford Circus for lunch. I had a Cornish Pasty, which was pretty good. My wife had Chinese food which was OK. The pasty (no idea why they don't say pastry) is basically a meat pastry although vegetarian options are available. They seem pretty popular in London but I had never seen them anywhere else so I wanted to make sure I tried one before leaving.
Then we took the bus to Green Park Station and walked to Buckingham Palace. It takes a few minutes to walk there and it was cold. The palace itself is not too exciting either and the guards marching funnily are only entertaining for a few minutes.
Then we took the bus to Westminster Station, walked to the pier, and got on the Red Rover River Thames Boat. I think I forgot to mention that yesterday's tour of Kent included the Thames cruise tickets which turned out to be worth 11.50 GBP each. That one went to Tower Bridge / The Tower of London but we stayed on and went to Greenwich.
In Greenwich we went to the Royal Maritime Museum which was free. They had some interesting stuff on cruise ships. I think we stayed about an hour. I could have stayed longer but my wife was falling asleep on a bench there so I figured I'd better move on. Then we went to the Greewich Market - only on Sundays. There was some pretty interesting stuff like Japanese anime style cell phone attachments, fleece hats, 20 or so booths with international food, colorful slimy-feeling things that you put in your vase to decorate the water, animal fur, and so on.
That's about it. At night we did go to a Cafe Nero for coffee and a little mart to buy some Twinings tea bags. We packed most of our stuff and are pretty much ready to go back to New York Tomorrow. We're hoping that Virgin has another Premium Economy upgrade special.
January 4, 2009
Evan Evans Kent tour review: Leeds Castle, Canterbury, Dover
I had a good day today. It started with a few surprises. Apparently it's common for tour companies to pick you up and then drop you at Victoria Coach Station where you then have about 30 minutes to wait for your actual tour bus. We had our first British pay toilet experience in the bus station. It was only 20 pence and for that I'm told women get a nice restroom. Men get one with no urinals, just a long latrine against a wall that you can't get close to without stepping on piss. And that's at 8:40 AM.
Anyway, things got exciting when the tour guide found some people on our bus that were supposed to be with National Express. We watched them get off our Evan Evans bus, talk to the National Express lady, and then start chasing after one of the National Express buses. She must have kindly told them which bus they would need to run down and somehow stop to go on their tour.
I guess I can't recommend National Express. Our tour guide said that at least one company knew what it was doing and I had to agree - National Express looked bad.
The Evan Evans tour went pretty smoothly and I had a great day. But, as those of you who know me probably could have guessed, I do have a few complaints.
First we went to Leeds Castle and one reason we took a tour instead of going ourselves was that the guide said that we'd get to enter the castle before the general public. When we booked, the agent confirmed that the castle opens early for Evan Evans. That didn't seem to be the case when we arrived at 10:25 and had to wait 5 minutes for the castle to open. After talking to some castle staff I learned that they open for everyone at 10:30.
Now I never would have gotten there so early without the tour. And our tour did seem to be the only people in the castle which was amazing for taking pictures - most of our castle pictures have no other people in the background. We saw everything no problem. So we were extremely happy with the Leeds castle part of the tour. I just don't like Evan Evans lying about getting in especially early.
Anyway, Leeds castle was great. In warmer weather I might have wanted to spend more time there enjoying the grounds but for the cold weather a couple of hours was just about right. We saw the castle, had a staff member show us to the center of the hedge maze, and went to the dog collar museum - the largest collection fo dog collars in the world will only take 5 minutes to see but it's pretty interesting. In warmer weather and if we hadn't been on a tour schedule we'd have explored the maze on our own and spent more time on the grounds. Maybe we'd have checked out the hot air balloon but who knows?
Appreantly we'd arrived so early at Leeds Castle that the information people we were told would be in each room were not set up yet (we saw only 2). So the tour guide didn't come in and the castle people weren't working yet - we were pretty much on our own. That was fine for me but a true history buff would probably have wanted more information than we ended up getting.
After that we went to Canterbury, famous for the cathedral where Thomas Beckett was murdered. Like Leeds Castle, the guide showed us the cathedral but didn't enter with us. We were on our own in the cathedral and I couldn't find anyone to ask where Thomas beckett was actually killed. I saw the candle where the tomb of St. Thomas had been before one of the kings robbed it. Maybe that's where he died? I wanted to know because I remember teaching about the murder in a British history based English language course back in 2001.
I might have stayed there longer trying to figure it out but my wife was getting bored and with the tour schedule we only had 2.5 hours in Canterbury I think. So we left the cathedral and had lunch at a nice-looking cafe. I had turkey quiche while my wife had a traditional ploughman's lunch (ham, cheddar, some kind of black pickle mix, apple, and baguette). everything was pretty good and I'd even recommned the place again: Cafe Cultura on 43 Burgate.
We did have a choice of eating where the tour guide recommended. Chicken and chips or fish and chips for 10 GBP a person. The lunch choices sounded crappy and overpriced. My wife knows from being a tour guide herself that there's some commission built into that price. I'm definitely glad we saw the traditional ploughman's lunch instead. Plus we spent 12 GBP for both of us instead of 20 plus a service charge or drinks or whatever.
After that we alked along Caterbury's busy shopping streets where we admired the architecture and took lots of pictures. My wife said she could live there. I said I was bored and ready to move on.
Last was Dover Castle. We had about 25 minutes to look up at the cliff and the castle on top. The most interesting part was on the way there when the guide pointed out the veranda from which Winston Churchill oversaw the evacuation of over 300,000 troops after the fall of France. Where the bus stopped we had no view of that veranda though.
And that's about it. On the way back, the guide asked everyone where they wanted to get dropped off and tried to get everyone pretty close to where they wanted to be.
In between stops the guide talked pretty much nonstop in both English and Japanese. I found the English explanations interesting. My wife said they put her to sleep. If I had a choice I might have picked an English only tour. Listening to long stretches of Japanese wasn't too bad but didn't seem like a useful way to spend my time either.
Overall I was happy with the tour which, by the way, was 69 GBP/person. That included admission which I think is 15 or so for Leeds Castle and 7 for Caterbury Cathedral. Plus who knows how much transportation would have cost. I can't say it was a great value but it seemed fair enough. The itinerary was fine - the pamphlet was untrue.
January 3, 2009
Days 5 and 6 in London: Costa Coffee, Westminster Abbey, Rules, Covent Garden, London Eye, Oxford Circus
Day 5 was Jan 1, 2009. We got off to a late start, still worn out from battling crowds the night before. We found a little Costa Coffee on Vauxhall Bridge Road near Victoria Station. It seems to be the kind of place where a lot of locals know the owner (a nice, old Italian guy) and come in regularly. Costa Coffee seems to be a franchise - I'm sure their not all as good as this one is. The friendly Italian owner lets us practice our Italian and seems to really know his coffee.
My wife had a very good cappucino and I tried mince pie which was OK but I'm glad to have had a pretty British experience. Then we went to Westminster Abby, arriving around 3:00. They say the last admissions happen at 3:30 but our friends got there at 3:20 and could not get in.
There were two lines. One very long line for cash and one very short line for credit (the one on the right). We took the credit line. Other times we passed Westminster Abby and the lines seemed about the same. Even the shorter line took a while though and Westminster Abby was pretty crowded but not too jammed that you couldn't enjoy it.
Just after 4:00 I got online for evensong and my wife went looking for a bathroom. The ones in Westminster Abbey close at 4:00. The ones outside the abby were also closed. She ended up buying a coffee across the street and waiting on line for their restroom. She had to talk the guards into letting her back in since evensong had already filled up. I guess when she told them her husband was in there waiting for her (and I had managed to save her a seat) they let her in. My friends got in too. They weren't allowed to see much of Westminster Abby but they were able to enter the regular part of the church for evensong which is a mass and free.
Evensong was interesting but not the awesome experience I was expecting after reading a few other people talk about it online. They did Benjamin Britten's New Year Carol since it was Jan. 1. The mass tok about 45 minutes maybe half of which was singing. At the end there was a hymm that was so easy to sing even I was in tune though I'd never heard it before. Hearing myself singing the right notes is a rare treat so I was pretty happy about that.
The four of us then took a but to Covent Garden and hung out for a couple of hours. We saw some guy in a pink speedo juggle a chainsaw and a couple other things. It looked so dangerous my wife didn't actually watch. They also have this little capsule where they put people's wishes on the wall. It was kind of fun to hang out in there and wait for the funny ones like "I wish my wish would get on the wall" or "I wish I had bigger boobs and my boyfriend had a bigger %^@*$."
Then we went to Rules, the oldest retaurant in London. Everybody really liked their food. My wife and I ended up spending about 60 GBP on 1 salad, 2 mains, and 1 dessert. We all thought it was reasonable but it's certainly not cheap.
Day 6
Another late start today (we like to relax on vacation after all). We started with the London Eye around noon. It involved some waiting (we had bought tickets in advance - the line for redeeming vouchers is shorter than the one for buying tickets so it worked out well) and it was 15.50 GBP each but we enjoyed the "flight" or whatecer you want to call it. Like my friend said, you should do it once but you probably won't want to do it again.
Then we went to Leicester Square / Covent Garden again. We had lunch at Wabamama, a Japanese themed franchise very popular with the locals. We enjoyed the food and were reminded that London is expensive because even this relatively inexpensive lunch cost us close to 20 GBP. A little more than 20 with the tip actually.
We planned to walk around Covent Garden some more because the shops had been closed the night before but we got bored fast and went to Oxford Circus. Like Covent Garden, this is a very crowded shopping area. We felt the first few rain drops of our trip but luckily nothing serious. Again we got bored pretty fast and took the bus back to Victoria (where we're staying).
Now it's time for a Korean dinner from the illegal B&B next to our illegal B&B. Then probably a little exercise and a lot of sleep. Tomorrow is an Evan Evans bust tour going to Leeds Castle and a few other places. I'll let you know...
January 1, 2009
New Year's Eve London
My wife and I both thought Zurich last year was better (kind of funny since last year I said London would have been better than Zurich). We saw the fireworks from the northern part of Blackfriar's Bridge where the angle was so so and where it was pretty crowded but not too bad considering we got there at 11:30.
Of course we had been at Doggett's Coat and Badge (1 Black Friar's Bridge Road) since 3:00 in the afternoon. We had thought we would see fireworks from there but that was not the case (the bar is on the south side of Black Friar's Bridge). I recommend their meat pies though.
Anyway, the fireworks were OK but we didn't have the best angle and getting back to the hotel was a mess. Lots of people walking, behaving badly, etc. It was far more crowded than Zurich and since the city is so much bigger it took us much longer to get back. We ended up walking, taking the bus, walking some more, and taking the subway.
My wife and I have both agreed that fireworks are not worth the trouble. Before midnight she said you ought to watch them live or not at all. Afterward's she said she'd rather watch them on TV...
December 31, 2008
Day 3 in London
We started off at Harrod's, a famously expensive department store in London where royalty supposedly shops. Kings and queens probably don't care about the once a year sale but normal people do and the place was pretty crowded.
I was expecting something a bit more exciting when a student of mine, a guy who spent so many years in London he said it was terribly boring, insisted that of all the places in London I go to Harrod's. I didn't think it was that great but my wife did buy a pair of boots (on sale). The pet kingdom place was kind of interesting though.
Then we walked to Sloan Square where my wife used to work. She bought a 20 GBP shirt. A few minutes ago she realized they charged her 40 GBP so we're going back tomorrow. We seem to get overcharged once a day here in London - cahier training must be weak.
We also went to some fancy supermarket where quiches were 1.95 GBP. We sat down and the price went up to 4.50. When we got the bill they charged us 5.75. After correcting that error they redid the bill and it was still 20 pence too expensive. I don't know what it is about London, but the cashiers are driving us nuts.
After that we went to Trafalgar Square (we saw the tree but it wasn't very exciting) and the National Gallery. The Monet room was quite nice and there were a few other interesting paintings. Then we walked to the Hyde Park cavalry barracks where we annoyed some guards with flash photography and walked around a bit.
And that's about all we did. We had dinner at the Korean B&B next door to the one where we stay. They are both run by the same person but the one next door has much better food so we talked to the owner and arranged to eat breakfast and dinner at the other place.
I don't think I'll be posting tomorrow. After we go looking to fix the overcharge I mentioned earlier, we're going to a bar where we can see fireworks and staying there until past my bedtime.
Happy New Year everyone!
December 30, 2008
2nd day in London
Our first day consisted of napping and walking around Piccadily, Chinatown, and Soho. We had some Chinese food, did some window shopping, and looked for another hotel (we've decided to stay where we are - there are nice things and not-so-nice things which I'll write about later).
Today we woke up early for breakfast. More accurately my wife woke up early and I have no idea how since the place we're staying has no alarms or wake-up calls. After breakfast we went to the Burberry factory store about 45 minutes by bus from Victoria Station.
We got there just as they were opening, a few minutes before 10:00 AM. By 12:00 the place was pretty crowded so shopping earlier is definitely better. There were some nice deals though - boots for 29 GBP that used to be 290 or something. Ties for 30 GBP - around $45. That may seem like a lot for a tie but it's by far the cheapest Burberry tie I've ever seen and the collection of ties was pretty big. There were bags and shirts, and jackets, and baby clothes, and everything - biggest Burberry collection I've seen actually.
We didn't get back until 3:00 because we noticed they overcharged us and we had to go back. Plus we stopped for lunch and coffee. Then we took a little nap, had a snack, and are getting ready to go see Big Ben at night.
I'll check in tomorrow!
December 21, 2008
Comparing Christmas traditions in the US and the UK
This is an interesting article - an American woman who travels to England for Christmas talking about similarities and differences between the holiday celebrations in each country. Some comments on Amercian culture were new to me: "We, too, fill Christmas stockings with candy, small toys and an orange in the toe."
That orange in the toe thing might be a New England custom (I'm from New York) or just a family thing but I've never heard of oranges in the stocking. Anyway, if you're interested in what it might be like to travel to England and spend time over the holidays with a British family this could be an interesting read.
October 7, 2008
Ferragamo's Tuscany property, cheap honeymoons, San Diego experience
Since this blog is about travel plans, both realistic ones and the dream ones, this article seemed appropriate.
Turning off a dust track on the route from Buonconvento to Montalcino in Italy's Val D'Orcia, there is a small 10th-century Longobard church once used on the old pilgrim's trail, the Via Francigena, for those making the journey from Canterbury to Rome. It is owned by Massimo Ferragamo, son of the late Salvatore Ferragamo...There's also something about a travel agent who charges $10,000 to get his number. Guess we won't be interviewing him on this blog...
On the opposite end of the spectrum, here we have some ideas for cheap honeymoons. Backpack. Ask friends to lend you a vacation house. House sit or find a cheap houseboat. Etc.
I actually looked into the house sitting thing once. The option was to house sit in Manhattan I think and mind someone's cat and pay them $100/night. I bet they ended up paying $15 a visit for someone to come to the house twice a day and feed the cat...
Finally, this article talks about a San Diego vacation experience. San Diego is on my list of places to go and maybe someone there needs a house sitter for a bit. I love animals but I'm not going to pay for the privilege of walking your dog or feeding your cat...
September 18, 2008
Hiking in Korea, Canadian credit cards, a possible new law
I'll start off with an article on traveling in Korea, particularly Mt. Seorak. I'm looking forward to going on a few hikes this fall to enjoy the foliage - not sure if Mt. Seorak will be one of them but it is one of the most famous mountains in Korea. Certainly not a bad choice for tourists with a little time. Those on tight schedules can easily find good hikes in or around Seoul.
By the way, I'll eventually start telling stories about my wife's experiences as a tour guide in Korea.
Here is a Canadian article on some credit cards with travel rewards. We have an old discussion on American cards here.
I hesitate to get even remotely political so close to an election, but I feel like living dangerously with this article. Basically one politician introduced a bill that, if passed, will eventually make it harder for Customs & Border Protection to keep your confiscated laptop forever or mess up its information. Sounds OK to me.
August 30, 2008
Modern and antique vacation experiences
This article talks about a multi-sports Yellowstone family vacation that includes off-road biking, hiking, horseback riding, rock climbing, and white water rafting. Sounds pretty cool to me.
These destinations also sound cool although one of them has been buried in volcanic ash for over 1900 years. And I thought talking about grandparents' travel habits was going back in time...
And it turns out that Staycations were not as popular as many people thought they would be this summer. I suppose I paid too much attention to the hype as well.
That article does argue that the travel industry is hurting a bit - but that does not mean everyone is staying home...
Finally, I'm thinking of starting a new thing where with each blog entry I point out an old one. Today I happen to be wondering what happened to Bobby Fischer who I wrote about back in February, 2005. Did he get out of jail? Did he get his new passport from Finland (apparently the 3 year old link on that old blog entry is no longer good)?
August 13, 2008
Duksan Spa Castle water park: the good, the bad, and the so disgusting I'm almost too ashamed to write about it
Well we ended up having fun yesterday. That thick blanket I heard about never materialized so I slept on a very hard bed. What’s worse was that my “blanket” was actually some sort of bed decoration or something, about 6 feet long and 1 foot wide…
So I didn’t sleep that well. Around 8:00 AM or so we went to Dol Flower pension to meet the ladies so that they could cook for us. Don’t get too mad at me – I’m just going with the flow on this family vacation and it’s not uncommon for a Korean man to be totally helpless when it comes to preparing food. I know wives who won’t leave the house until they’ve prepared a sandwich or some meal for their husband. Sometimes even that’s not enough because the man won’t heat up a meal or anything. He either needs his wife to cook for him or he has to go eat in a restaurant. My father in law is like that.
So anyway, I eat breakfast and then nap until 11:00 or so. Even though Dol Flower has a bed I nap on the floor because one of our dogs recently had leg surgery and if I’m on the bed she’ll probably hurt her leg trying to join me.
Then we go for lunch in Duksan Spa Castle. I liked my beef stew but a lot of people weren’t happy with lunch there. We met up with my brother in law (he started this whole thing), his wife, and my nephew.
Then we went to the Duksan Spa Castle water park. The discounted price was about $40 each so it’s not cheap. They had a short water slide, a tube slide, and a “raft” ride. The raft ride was another $2 each. It was fun, but after paying $80 to get in I didn’t understand why there was only one decent ride and we had to pay another $4 to take it.
They had a wave pool/lagoon thing, where occasional strong waves would eventually blast you around in a circle through this lagoon. Tubes were mandatory, which was good since it was pretty packed and it’s better to have tubes smacking into each other than people…
The rides and wave area was all outside and there were tons of kids. Inside they had some adult only areas including a water massage thing that was very strong. I’m sure that if I had stayed there more than a few minutes the jets of water blasting my back around my kidneys would have done permanent damage. But there were plenty of people hanging out there for long stretches…
There were a couple of hurdles before I could even let myself have fun. This first one is absolutely disgusting so skip this paragraph if you’re not in the mood to read some nastiness. There were no shoes allowed in the water area, and you had to take them off and put them in lockers before you even got to the locker room to change and stuff. At first I thought this was just a bit nasty because of all the dirty feet I’d be sharing the ground with so was disappointed I wouldn’t be allowed to wear my sandals. What was really really nasty and disgusting though was that in order to use the bathroom in the locker room you had to step barefoot in puddles of piss. My wife said it was the same in the ladies’ room. It was the most disgusting thing I can remember doing my entire life.
The other hurdle, minor in comparison, was that you couldn’t enter the water without a shower cap. You could buy them for $3 each, but seriously everyone is walking into the pool to get the piss off their feet and they’re worried about shower caps?
But eventually I was able to forget about that stuff and the cost and just have a few hours of fun on the rides and in the wave pool. Then it was dinner (not so great), another night on the hard floor, and then we drove home the next day (today). After not sleeping real well the past couple of nights I am really looking forward to posting this thing and going to bed. It's nice to be home!
August 11, 2008
Ducksan, South Korea: Ducksan Spa Castle and Dol Flower Pension
Not much from me tonight because I'm on vacation!
Don't get jealous though, so far it has been amusing at best. It's kind of a long story, but we're in Ducksan Spa Castle (find a little blurb with a picture in the middle of this page). We also have a room in what Koreans call a pension. I've had conversations about how to translate the Korean pension into English. It's kind of like a cross between a motel and a condo. They're not usually fancy, but they do have kitchens. They seem to have 10-30 rooms on average but that's a rough guess.
Anyway, it's called the Dol Flower Pension in English and the website is Korean but you can see a picture. We got that room because they allow dogs while Ducksan Spa Castle does not. The original plan was for my wife, the dogs, and I to stay in the pension while everyone else stayed in the spa.
Everyone else would be my parents in law, my sister in law, her husband, and my niece. Apparently most people didn't want to come but my brother in law (who's coming for the day tomorrow if the weather is nice but who might not show up at all) said he could get the condo free through his work because they own it or something. Somehow he persuaded everyone to come even though everyone claims they were against the idea.
Then we find out (yesterday) that the free condo is actually $75/night (would be $180 without the company owning it), and it only sleeps 2, having one double bed. For an extra person in the room add $10. To rent blankets for the extra person (a thick one for the floor which you sleep on and another one to go on top) add another $10.
So naturally the 5 people who were supposed to stay for free in Ducksan Spa Castle are a bit upset they now have to pay $75 + $60 per night. My wife and I were already spending money on our dog friendly pension so we didn't want to hear it.
But we heard it, and heard it some more. We heard it enough to upgrade our room at the pension to the biggest one they had (not a suite, just a big motel room with a kitchen and private concrete patio). It would easily sleep 5 or even 10 (no idea if they actually allow 10 people in the room but it's pretty big) and no charge for extra blankets.
So we spent the day at the pension letting our dogs run aorund the concrete patio betwen breaks in the rain and watching the olympics. It was OK but nothing special. We discovered that there was no hot water so we figured we's all go to the spa for showers. But the pension also has no keys so with no way to lock our door my mother in law decided to stay in the room while me, my wife, my father in law, and my sister in law + husband and kid went to the spa.
So we're all here now (well not my mother in law). I'm writing while my wife showers. Then my wife and sister in law go back to Dol Flower Pension to stay up all night chatting with my mother in law. I guess my niece will go too and fall asleep while the ladies talk.
That will leave me, my father in law, and my sister in law's husband at the spa. I'll be sleeping on the floor without the benefit of a thick blanket because we're (not me!) too cheap to let them know there are 3 of us. So we escape paying the $10 plus the fee for renting blankets. I'll live because I don't mind hard beds although this one will be slightly harder than I like... My sister in law's husband is in the same boat. My father in law will get the bed. Not sure if he'll have any balnkets left...
Tomorrow, I'm willing to pay for spa treatments but I'm also willing to stay in the pension and mind the dogs. There's a pool here with a water slide but it's supposed to rain so we'll see...
I probably sound like I'm complaining but that's just a bad habit I have. I'm actually glad to be here experiencing something new. I consider this a very authentic Korean style vacation because I haven't seen another white person since I left Seoul.
And apparently my sister in law packed some blankets so I'll have a few layers between me and floor which should be exactly how I like it - I really prefer a firm bed. When I was on the cruise, the soft mattress was driving me nuts.
Tomorrow I'll try to check out the free area (the pool) and the spa a little bit to write a proper review of this Ducksan Spa Palace place. Since it has a computer in the room (that's how I'm able to blog) I guess I'll give it a few points now. We'll see about the rest tomorrow.
I can't figure out how to spell check on this thing so never mind the typos...
July 29, 2008
LARP = unique weekend travel experience
So I'm back from my live action roleplaying weekend and I want to tell you something about it in case anyone here is looking for a weekend trip. There are a number of games - I went to an Alliance LARP in Pennsylvania but they have them all over.
So getting to the campsite was fun. I borrowed my parents' van and 5 guys got in, piled it full of crap, and drove 4 hours. It's been a long time since I got to go on a road trip with a bunch of guys and just talk.
Then we got to the game. Basically people wore medieval / fantasy costumes and then played their character. My character was an elf so I had prosthetic ears. One of my friends was a dwarf with a big fake beard. Another guy was an orc with green makeup all over.
There was a tournament and the ball. Someone put some pictures of the ball here so you can get an idea of the costuming. No pictures of me in there though.
The ball was basically a party with people mingling, dancing, singing, reciting poetry, etc. Of course it was all medieval themed. I actually wrote a poem for maybe the first time in 15 years (since high school) about a battle between some dwarves and some trolls and read it at the ball. Afterwards everyone cheered and one of the dwarf characters came over and hugged me. It was very cool to feel so appreciated and to have everyone clapping and cheering for me.
Then there was the tournament. 6 teams competed in events such as 3 person combat, single person combat, race, hunt, archery etc.
Combat is done with foam weapons and shields, so you are really trying to hit someone with your sword or avoid the other person's weapon. When you do get hit the foam doesn't hurt though. I'm not very good at this part of the game but I really enjoy it. You get to fight for fun and you don't get hurt. I tried to find a good video on youtube for you, but most LARP combat videos seem far more violent than the Alliance game. You're never allowed to touch another player during combat (except with the foam weapon of course).
The hunt is a real interesting one where you have to solve puzzles in order to earn points. So one morning my friend and I sat down over breakfast with "Have Ivan Drake gather her toys" which we eventually figured out was an anagram for "Give Trevor a hearty handshake." When we walked up to the character named Trevor and shook his hand we got the points. Trevor said "Very impressive. That's been on the hunt list for 2 years and no one has been able to figure it out." So again, I felt cool because my friend and I figured something out and no one else was able to. That was one out of maybe 20 hunt items so we kept busy and still didn't finish them all.
All this was fun for me, especially when my friends and I took first place in the tournament because we won the hunt, the race, the 3 person combat, and finished 2nd or 3rd in many of the other events. In the end we had 28 points while the second place team had 23 (you got 5 points for a 1st place, 4 for a second place, etc.).
As far as costs go, the game itself was $60, gas was $75 or so (New York to Pennsylvania and back) but we divided that by 5 so it was $15 each, breakfast Saturday and Sunday morning was $5/day, dinner Saturday was $5, and the snacks and water and stuff I brought was probably another $15-$20. So it's not as cheap as staying home and watching TV, but it's not unreasonable for an entire weekend.
Some people prefer to stay in a hotel instead of on the campsite so that would raise the price and extra $60/night or more (but if you share a room with someone you can split that cost of course). Some people go out to dinner Saturday night and most people do on Sunday after the event so that can add to the cost as well.
The campsite has a shower room with private stalls, and places to sleep indoors or set up a tent. Most people stay at the campsite but some people prefer the hotel. The campsite has portapotties - with 3 of them for 75 people Friday night to Sunday afternoon they never got too bad. One thing that was irritating was that during the day flies liked to buzz around our cabin so I couldn't sleep as late as I wanted to.
So if dressing up in costume sounds cool or if foam weapon fights sound cool, you might consider trying out live action roleplaying.
July 13, 2008
Drama on the Norwegian Pearl (last night at sea)
Yesterday I talked a bit about getting removed from a cruise ship. An hour or so ago I got an idea of just how hard it is to get thrown in the brig or removed from the ship.
We were eating dinner (waiting for our food actually) in the only restaurant that was open. One of the 4 or 5 women at the table next to us starts screaming. "Maggot! Maggot! There's a maggot in my food! Do something! Maggot! There's a maggot in my food!" She walks around a little bit yelling about the maggot to everyone in the restaurant. She says that this was the worst cruise she's ever been on and that the food has been horrible all week. She wants a manager who can do something about the maggot in the food she feeds her baby, etc.
Now she really did have a baby but the baby was drinking from a bottle not eating mom's salad. So the whole thing seemed overly dramatic and kind of untrue. My first thought was that all they wanted was a free cruise and that maybe they made up the maggot.
My wife saw her ask the woman sitting at the next table if she saw the maggot and that woman nodded. Did she really see it or was the little old lady scared of the big violent crazed lady? Or did they plant the maggot to try to get a free cruise? Or was I being too harsh in my snap judgement and was there really a maggot? I still don't know. They also had the definition of maggot nice and ready: "A maggot! Do you know what that is? A bug lar
But I do know the drama that happened next. The women were all screaming and moving around and bothering everyone and demanding to see a manager. "Call a manager!" I said, "Call the captain to kick her off the ship."
Anyway, soon one of the women throws a plate into the waiter area. Then she throws another plate. My wife says it looked like she was aiming (poorly) at a waitress who was walking by. Luckily no one was hurt. "Mom, stop!" She stopped but my wife and I couldn't believe how crazy these people were.
I asked one waiter to call security. When security came they broke out the camcorder, but there was no fighting or anything so the camcorder went away. Eventually they talked to the food and beverage manager, probably for about 20 minutes. Then they left peacefully, taking pictures and getting names of the waitstaff.
I'm told that the public health officers checked all the lettuce after the complaint and it was fine. They say the lettuce is never kept more than 3 days and the temperature is regulated and everything. They don't understand how it could have happened and since the women chucked the plate with the maggot the staff couldn't check it out.
Next thing I know they're telling me that the waiter's job may be in danger so I'm handing out business cards and explaing that the waiter did the best possible thing - he called security.
Well it's late. I was going to try to stay up a couple of hours to use up the internet time I paid for but I'm tired and I have to wake up at 5:30 tomorrow to talk to the accountant about a $90 bottle of wine chraged to my room when my wife and I don't even drink, not even the free wine when we had dinner with the captain... I don't really need to wake up at 5:30 but I'm guess that the line for the accountant will be very long, slow moving, and unpleasant so I aim to get there early. Plus the breakfast buffet will also be crowded and uncomfortable if I'm not early enough.
I guess I just have to accept that I'll have wasted some money by purchasing too much internet time.
Too tired to spellcheck...
July 11, 2008
NCL Alaska cruise experience continued
I think this is day 5 of the cruise. It's Thursday and I haven't blogged since Monday so let's see what I can remember and what I have time to tell you.
Last time I blogged I was under time pressure because I had a 'VIP' drinks with the captain party. That turned out to be a very interesting conversation with the chief engineer. It takes 4 years of study (marine engineering) and 15 years of experience to get your license, but it seems like a pretty good job - 10 weeks on and then 10 weeks off. That's some serious vacation time.
Anyway today there is some time pressure because we were invited to have dinner with the captain. My wife thinks I should shave first and since I'll probably be underdressed I guess I will.
I'm writing this in my room, but annoyingly I'll have to carry my laptop somewhere else to connect to the internet and publish this on my blog. No wifi in my room and the room certainly wasn't cheap...
So let's test my memory:
Monday night:
After drinks with he captain and staff, we went to Lotus Garden, an Asian restaurant. This was one of the cover charge ones so it cost us $15 each plus tip. No one seems to tip in the free restaurants but in the others they swipe your card and ask you to sign the bill where there's a place for you to write down the tip. Lotus Garden was good.
Tuesday:
We went to breakfast around 9:00 AM. It was crazy crowded and it took us a long time time to find a table. When we finally sat down my eggs were real cold and though I hate wasting food I didn't eat them. Of course I could just go get more but still.
Lunch was at Indigo. The food there was good but mostly I remember the chilled blueberry soup. I went back to Indigo today hoping to find more but it was closed.
Dinner was at Teppenyaki, another restaurant with a cover. Here you pay $25 each but I would say you're better off in the buffet for free. They cook the food in front of you and put on a little show. It was loud and fun but not as good as you would get in a fancy restaurant ashore. Plus my filet mignon was the worst I've ever had. I don't think the problem was preperation - just meat that wasn't real tender. I actually canceled my reservations at the steak restaurant because I have no desire to eat more steak here.
In between meals we did a shore excursion in Juneau - the Mendenhall river glacier float. It started off with nice views of the Mendenhall glacier but then it took us downriver, away from the glacier. So for the first 30 minutes it was nice. The other 90 minutes was uncomfortable and while the scenery was peaceful it wasn't what we came to Alaska for - houses on the river, rusted cars on the bank that the government decided would help stop land erosion a few decades ago, a beaver dam.
It was mostly calm but there was one spot where they had class 2 and 3 rapids. So we got wet.
We talked to some people over dinner who did a helicopter tour and hike. They were much happier with their choice than we were with our choice. My wife was actually pretty mad at me until Wednesday's shore excursion which was much better.
Wednesday:
We woke up at 5:00 AM or something today. Breakfast wasn't crowded but in the early morning all they have is fruit and bread and stuff. Officially the real breakfast begins at 7:30 but we got our eggs and stuff before 7:00.
Then we met outside at 7:40 for our Skagway excursion, White Pass Railroad and gold dredge. This was great, particularly the railroad.
More on that later...
Thursday:
You can see I'm rushing now - today was Glacier Bay and it was awesome. We got some great views of Marjorie Glacier and even saw and heard a big chunk of it crash into the water. We didn't see as much wildlife as we hoped but we did spot a few whales.
And now I need to work out, shave, drop off papers for this bag service (we pay $20 each and they take our bags and check them in at the airport for us - that's good since we arrive in Seattle in the morning but our flight leaves at 9:45 PM).
July 8, 2008
NCL Alaska cruise experience day 2
Well here I am on day 2 of the NCL cruise to Alaska. First let me explain what I said at the end of my blog entry yesterday about the internet being annoying. While we were waiting to get into our rooms after boarding the Norwegian Pearl yesterday we had very little to do after we ate lunch. So we found a couple of lounge chairs, and I tried to get online to blog a bit.
Fist they say $4 activation fee. OK. Then they say pick a plan. The cheapest one is 40 cents/minute with a $100 minimum (no refund for unused minutes). OK. I'm thinking that having a travel blog is a little expensive at this point (I also pay a bunch for hosting) but it did get me VIP treatment on this cruise. That basically meant a bottle of wine (we don't drink though), a special concierge number (at least I assume it's special), and an invitation to have drinks with the captain (which I'll be doing in an hour or so).
Anyway, I pay my $104, get online, and start blogging. I write a bunch, click save, and then find out I had been disconnected. Of course that means yesterday's blog entry should have been much longer but I lost almost everything. I log back on, write a few more words and then when it's time to go to the rooms I click publish. The poor internet connection times out. Anyway, on the third try I finally published my abridged blog entry.
So basically I'm saying the wifi here wasn't all that good on day 1 but I did learn a lesson. I am writing this blog entry offline. I'll log on when I'm ready to publish it.
So what have I experienced so far on the cruise? The food has been great. We tried one of the specialty restaurants, or at least my wife did. She liked the sushi and sashimi but she ate alone because there was a $15 cover charge. I don't eat sushi and the place was empty but they still wanted $15 to let me sit next to her. Not a huge deal. I found a seat not too far away and read my book while she ate.
I ate at Mambo's, a TexMex kind of place. I really liked it. A more complete review with pictures should follow one day. We also ate at the big buffet place a couple of times (lunch yesterday, snack yesterday, breakfast today) where almost everything has been good. The French toast was pretty sad this morning though as they barely used any egg. Today it was lunch in the Blue Lagoon comfort food restaurant. We plan to go back for the tomato soup. The chicken sandwich and the salad was also good but the french fries (which I didn't order but whatever) were pretty bad.
Not that we did nothing but eat. I've been to the gym 4 times so far. Yesterday at around 5:00 and 9:00 it was pretty empty. Today at 9:00 AM and 4:00 PM it was packed. I love having a gym open 24 hours and the new equipment, but as you know I do like to criticize whenever possible (even though I really am having a good time!) so let me just say that they need more in the gym. They have lots of dumbbells but no barbells. And too few strength training machines. And the area by the dumbbells is just too small with only three benches and not much space in between. I couldn't even put my dumbbells back where I got them if someone was using the bench on front of the rack there. It's also hard to get a key for the lockers (and impossible after 10:00) so I just head to the gym and back to the room in my workout clothes. Yesterday I ended up carrying my clothes around the weights...
And of course there was some expensive shopping. Columbian Emeralds had some stuff off 50% today only until 1:00 or something. Now my wife has a new necklace and ring and we have 90 days to pay.
Well anyway, everything has been fun so far. Naturally I'll have more to say soon!
July 6, 2008
Hello from Seattle and happy July 4th!
Well I have been busy (as usual when I'm on vacation). We flew JetBlue from JFK to Seattle and were pretty impressed. For a discount carrier I think they have more free stuff than most traditional airlines flying domestically in the US. Dunkin Donuts coffee, animal crackers, blue terra chips, etc.
One strange thing was that because of a nut allergy on board they asked everyone not to eat nuts. A woman in our row said she couldn't eat her sandwich because the bread had nuts in it. I'm no doctor, but how can me eating a nut kill someone else? My only guess is that nut particles in the air could bother the other person or something.
Anyway, the flight was fine. Seattle has been pretty good and last night we saw fireworks from the space needle observation deck which was neat. We've also found a good restaurant (Wild Ginger) and done an underground tour (strongly recommended and fairly interesting but not that great).
Now I'm off to the Pike Street market. It's quite a trek from the Chambered Nautilus B&B to downtown Seattle - maybe 20 minutes walk to the bus and then 20 minutes ride to downtown. My wife got pretty mad that I didn't book something more central but the people are nice and the food is fine so she's feeling better now.
Tomorrow I'll try to blog from the cruise ship.
July 2, 2008
Boston Duck Tour experience
So today I did the Boston Duck Tour. We bought our tickets at around 3:00 Tuesday afternoon and they were selling for the 5:30 tour. I think this was one of the last ones.
The tickets were $29 a piece so this can be kind of an expensive family trip (we had 5). It was pretty good though. The 80 minute trip shows you some cool stuff in Boston and is fairly entertaining.
The cool sights included a piece of the Berlin wall, a Dunkin Donuts that also sells sushi, another Dunkin Donuts that had an empty spot on the second floor where there used to be a gym, the hotel where Boston cream pie was invented, and a hotel that has a black lab guests can walk - some things I never knew about Boston though I'd been there a few times before.
The entertainment was the guide / driver. Each one invents a different persona and our guide was a pirate captain (he was dressed the part), Jack Black or Jet Black or something. My father said the guide was funny without being corny. I thought some of it was corny but still OK.
5 or so kids had a chance to drive the vehicle while it was in the water but this apparently depends on the driver and should not be expected on a duck tour.
So while it's not the cheapest way to spend 80 minutes in Boston, if it works with your budget the tour is worthwhile, at least in my opinion.
By the way, I'm in Boston visiting my sister. In 2 days it's on to Seattle and then the cruise to Alaska.
June 27, 2008
Going away for the weekend
I should have a fairly unique experience to share on Sunday night, as I'm going on a special kind of camping trip: Live-action roleplaying at Faire Play campground.
Since my experience has not been made yet, let me leave you with this one for now. Island Spirits Rice Lake promises relaxation or adventure on an island with no lawnmowers (sheep take care of grass). I'm guessing this island is 'missing' a lot of our modern things as well and it sounds good to me.
May 25, 2008
Mother's day travel experience
This article talks about a weekend in San Diego. Most of it sounds like fun although the writer did almost miss her plane. Of course I really did miss a plane once so I understand... I don't understand how the writer's friend set off an emergency exit alarm in a museum though.
Anyway, we hear about the Gaslamp quarter and the Coronado ferry. For some more specific stuff from this blog, you could try eating in San Diego and the San Diego travel plan.
March 6, 2008
Seeing and hearing whales in Iceland and why we travel articles
This article is mostly about hydrogen power in Iceland, but since the story focuses (in part) on a whale watching ship I thought it was worth mentioning here. Especially because the hydrogen power allows the ship to shut down its engines when whales are spotted. This means that tourists get to hear the whales swim and blow water.
I don't know what whales sound like, but if you're going to see them it seems to me that you might as well hear them as well.
Iceland is the first of 17 slides in this article. I really like this article which has pictures and positive travel experiences from real people. Of course one slide is a passage from Robert Byron's (1933) from “First Russia, Then Tibet” but mostly these are ordinary people sharing happy travel moments. Besides Iceland and Moscow we have Tokyo, Mexico, Sweden (where we get a genealogical travel experience - cousins showing a traveler the actual house where her grandmother was born), Montenegro, Kyushu, Peru, China, India, Turkey (Cappadocia - a place I really want to visit), Macedonia, Colorado, New Mexico, and Rome (one of my all-time favorites).
Anyway, this article put me in a great mood and certainly left me looking forward to some more travel experiences. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
February 18, 2008
Mother & daughter vacation in Fiji
Here's an interesting story from a woman who took her 16-year-old daughter to Fiji. I don't know that most of us can afford to imitate her experience though:
Navutu Stars Resort and Spa, an exclusive and stunningly beautiful property on an uninhabited island. Six smiling staff members greeted us from the beach with songs, fresh fruit cocktails and leis of pink hibiscus.The author talks about another resort, diving and snorkeling, how friendly Fijians are, and more.
January 17, 2008
Tax free shopping in Europe and getting out with the refund
Remember how we didn't have tome to get our tax refund in Zurich? We figured we'd get to Barajas Airport Madrid early since we had over 200 euros coming to us with all our tax refunds from shopping in Spain. Pluse we were going to try to get the Zurich receipts stmaped and submitted as well though we figured that would be more complicated.
By the way, if you don't like long stories the short version is that we didn't get the refund on our first two tries, missed our flight from paris to Seoul, and then had plenty of time waiting for our next flight to try again...
I'll start the story in Barajas. We arrive nice and early, check in at terminal 2, walk to terminal 1, get our recepts stamped, smile at how easy everything is, and then try to figure out where to get the actual refund.
Information tells us we have a problem. Our flight from madrid to paris leaves from terminal 2 but the refunds are issued in terminal 1. We're told there is no way to get from terminal 1 to terminal 2. Once you enter terminal 1 there is no way out except on a plane. We can not possibly pass through security into terminal 1, get the refund, and then catch our flight from madrid to Paris. The only way is to do the refunds in Paris.
My wife explained that we had a short connection in Paris. Too bad. Not quite believing what she was hearing from the information guy, my wife asked several passport control officers if we could go in and then come back out. They all said we'd never be allowed to leave. Reminds me of the song Hotel California actually.
Now hopefully passport control would check your ticket before letting you in terminal 1. If we hadn't talked to information and had just gone into the terminal to get the refund, it sounds like we would have been stuck in terminal 1 forever, kind of like Tom Hanks in that movie.
So we go back to terminal 2, through passport control, and see signs for the terminal 1 gates A, B, C, and D. The refund place is near B, so we start following the signs. Eventually we get to another passport control area. They don't care about our problem and tell us that if we go in to get the refund we will not be allowed out.
We turn around and trek back to terminal 2, find our gate, wait, board the plane, and wait some more. We leave over 30 minutes late, obviously giving us very little time in paris to handle the refunds.
What happened next was pretty confusing and my wife and I were running around like crazy pretty much the entire time. At the security line for connecting passengers we ask the Air France or security person (not sure who she worked for) where the tax refund office is. She tells us it is outside security. That makes no sense since in madrid it is inside security so we think she means the place you get stamps. We explain we already have stamps. She doesn't speak much English. We show her our stamped receipts. She confers with her colleagues and tells us to go inside.
We knew it was inside but were looking for directions as to where it is inside. Our tax free information pamhlet says it's in the gates A,B,C area but that's pretty big so where is it? Obviously this lady can't give us decent directions so we go through security and start looking for information.
We are running because our flight should be boarding now. We don't find any information but ask every shopkeeper we see (plus a few other people) and the ones that speak English tell us we have to leave and go outside. We keep telling them we have stamps but they say we have to go outside to get the refund even if we already have stamps. We start to believe them.
I say it's time to give up and go to the gate, which we do. They haven't started boarding yet but the flight should leave in less than 30 minutes. My wife says I can wait at the gate but she is getting the refund.
I follow her. She might need my help and I don't want to leave her alone in case she gets stuck outside security or something. Unlike in Madrid, the passport control people here are happy to let us leave the secure area to go get the refund. We leave, go through and empty baggage claim area, through customs (there were no customes people there), and start asking for directions.
The directions we get are mixed, conflicting. Eventually my wife agrees to give up so all we have to do is get back to our gate. We get directions, but there's a soldier blocking the escalator up to where we need to be. We ask how to get to our flight? "You don't." Our flight is leaving in a few minutes - can't we pass? "No." How do we get up there to our flight? "You don't".
We run to information - we need help badly at this point. We hear a gun shot or explosion or something. Then the information lady tells us to go up that escalator. We explain about the man with the gun but she says we can go up now because the explosion is over, some kind of security check or construction thing we figure. We run back to the escalator but they guy with the gun still won't let us up.
Close to tears, my wife asks if anyone can help us get up to the departure area. A construction worker actually knows where the stairs are so we run up, go through security. When they see our ticket they rush us to the front of the passport control line where wwe get the slowest immigration lady ever. She is talking on the phone, talking to the person on her right, and talking to the person on her left. My wife tries to rush her but this seems to slow her down even more.
We get through and run to our gate, arriving 8 minutes late. It's totally empty. I run down a few more gates and find someone to ask - they tell us that boarding is closed. I explain that we need to get on that plane. "No, boarding is closed. All you can do is go to the transfer desk."
My wife starts running but I tell her not to bother. We missed the flight.
Now I know it's our fault for being 8 minutes late. We shouldn't have gone looking for the tax refund especially since it meant leaving the security area. I accept the blame for that.
But still, a few things really bother / amaze me.
1. Getting the tax refund is too damn hard. I have some brains and some travel experience. My wife is a tour guide in Seoul who has lived in Rome and London. If we can't get our refund something is wrong with the system. Even a novice traveler should be able to take advatage of tax free shopping if European countries and stores are going to advertise it / offer it.
2. How can an airport block the path to departures without telling people the detour. I mean this just blows my mind. What genius thought to put a guy with a gun in our way and no information about an alternate route up to departures?
3. I'm surprised the plane left without us. We were 8 minutes late but how many times have I sat on a plane for 20-30 minutes only to see someone get on so we can depart? And I don't think I've ever been to an airport without hearing announcements pagigf passenger so and so, final boarding call for flight x, passenger so and so please report to gate whatever. They often page the same person over and over again. Serioulsy, I'm 8 minutes late for the one flight they don't do that? They knew we were checked in, and knew our connecting flight had arrived (late I might add) 45 minutes ago or so. Maybe waiting for the late people isn't as common as it seems.
So a lot went wrong in Charles de Gaul. We got sent the wrong direction, we couldn't find directions, we couldn't get back to our gate because of some soldier, we got more bad information, and we even got the slowest immigration officer ever. Not to mention our flight from Madrid had been delayed.
Anyway, the transfer desk people were kind and didn't charge us. They said they should have made us pay because they knew we were here and had left to go get the tax refund (they were some of the many people my wife had asked for directions since there was no airport information booth around).
So we thanked them and sat down to wait 8 hours or so for the next flight to Seoul. After a few minutes my wife left to go get the elusive tax refund and I started writing this. I'm just copying it from my notebook now since I was traveling without my laptop. I've already taken that later flight and gotten back to my dogs.
It took about an hour for my wife to find the tax refund office and half an hour to get back to our gate. She got lots more bad directions on the way but eventually found a directory (seriously Charles de Gaul - if everyone who works in your airport is an idiot how about a few more directories?) that showed her where the office really was.
She showed the guy the receipts but he said he wouldn't give the refund because the shopping was done in Spain. Spain had to issue the refund. So my wife had to put the envelopes in the box there.
And another thing. If all you need to do is put the envelopes in a box, how about putting a few more boxes around? One inside the departure area would be nice!
So we think we're getting a refund but it could take a while.
By the way, as I was waiting for the later flight I saw 3 people get on a flight to London 5 minutes after boarding had closed. Why did Air France wait for them on that short flight but not for us on our 10 hour flight?
And one last complaint. As I listened to the announcements (not that they made one for us), I noticed that the Charles de Gual PA system is about as clear as the old New York City subways. I can only make out an occasional word even when listening closely.
Anyway, vacation is over after a very weird ending. Back to normal life. And I wonder - has anyone else here missed a flight? If so, what happened?
This will eb one of the last times I ask you to ignore my typos. Soon I'll be back to my computer that has spell check...
January 14, 2008
Wrapping up my vacation
After nearly a month of living in hotels and eating 2 meals a day in restaurants (the other in the hotel), my wife and I are ready to go back home. We miss our regular social lives (we´ve talked to a few people in Europe but it´s not the same as talking with friends), our pets, even our real-life have to make some money work. Tomorrow we will do some things like packing and laundry. The day after we leave for the airport at 7:00 AM.
Today we went to Museo del Prado, a huge art museum. It was Sunday and we showed up around 1:00 but we were still surprised to see a long line of people waiting to get in. The live moved pretty well and half an hour later we paid 8 euros each for our tickets.
I´m not an art affcicionado, so for me visiting an art museum means bypassing many works for the few that catch my eye. I found some, and it was certainly nice to take a break from walking around and shopping, but I actually preferred the one other museum I saw on this trip, the Neue Pinakothek in Munich.
Looking back over the past 3 or more weeks, there are definitely a few things I would have changed. I suppose I should have visited more than 2 museums on the trip, but with basically no advance planning I arrived in each city with no idea of which museums would be more interesting for me and my wife. And since we came to Munich for the Christmas market, I don´t care about missing the museums there. Then by the time we got to Madrid my wife was obsessed with finding an affordable (meaning on sale) Burberry coat so we had to spend a good amount of time shopping. We bought heres yesterday by the way.
I would have changed the itinerary to include more than 3 cities. Certainly 12 days in Madrid seems like a bit much. There´s plenty to we haven´t done yet, but staying in the same hotel for 12 days and all that just isn´t ideal. A longer stay where we could kind of settle down and make friends would be one thing. Otherwise a shorter stay is best. I think in the future it will be fewer than 7 days or more than 30 days in each city.
I guess that´s all I have to say for now. I´ll probably be back in Korea next time I blog but I think there is a guest entry from Mancunian on the way.
January 11, 2008
Self made tour of Toledo
So yesterday was our first day trip from Madrid. I wanted to take a tour of Toledo which would have run about 50 euros each. My wife wanted to travel on our own and spend the money we saved on clothes. My wife won.
I didn´t mind losing this time because we got to choose our own train and leave at 10:30 in the morning instead of 8:30... We ended up spending about 30 euros each instead of 50 though we spent about three times our savings on clothes.
We didn´t go into any of the museums, but we did see the Cathedral. It was beautiful outside and caverous inside. At 7 euros to get in it is fairly expensive and inside was impressive but not breathtaking to my untrained eye. I don´t think the tour actually went in there but it´s hard to be sure from the brief description in the pamphlet.
The ticket said no flash, but inside a guard told us no pictures at all. He couldn´t guard the whole place and was alone so we ended up with lots of pictures. If the ticket says no flash I´m pretty sure I can take pictures (without a flash of course).
Anyway, I don´t mean to sound like I´m complaining about the price. I may never be in Toledo again and I´m glad I saw the inside of the Cathedral. I was looking for a better, more descriptive name but everything - even my map of Toledo - just says "Cathedral".
We also went in Iglesia de los Jesuitas where you can pay 1.90 euro to climb to the top of the tower and get some good views of Toledo.
We spent hours walking around the city, much of that time trying to figure out where we were. Obviously if we had a guide that wouldn´t have been a problem but exploring on our own was good too. We saw most or all of historic Toledo I´m sure.
We only spent an hour or so shoppping. Basically after we had seen enough of the city we turned our attention to the shops. We didn´t buy any swords, chess sets, or black and gold jewelry despite one high pressure store where we were told to buy soon becase they were closing in 10 minutes at 5:00. They were still open at 5:30...
Interesting most salespeople in Spain are the opposite, very polite and they really don´t bother you until you ask for help. Today in the supermarket the lady at the olive bar didn´t even want to bother with us after we asked for help but that too was unusual...
I guess that´s about it for Toledo. I´ll be on again soon to tell you about the Royal Palace in Madrid.
As usual, please excuse any typos while I´m on vacation.
January 5, 2008
Hello from Madrid
I've done so much and had so much happen to me in the last few days I´m not even sure where to begin.
I guess I'll start with our last night in Zurich - we shopped until the stores closed and managed to spend all our Swiss francs. The next morning we woke up early, checked out of Goldenes Schwertz and waited for the airport shuttle to arrive (we had booked through the hotel and already paid so we didn't need any cash).
The shuttle didn't come. I suppose I'll save the details for my review of the Goldenes Schwertz hotel, but for now let me just say that the front desk did nothing to help us solve the problem. We had only planned on arriving in the airport an hour in advance (this was actually based on advice from the hotel front desk as well though I did know better and should have insisted on an earlier shuttle). So after 20 minutes of waiting for the shuttle we were pretty stressed out about possibly missing the flight.
The shuttle service itself was another experience as the driver backed the luggage trailer into a building, droppped us off at the wrong building, and sent us in the wrong direction.
When we did eventually find the SpanAir checkin (it was actually Swiss Air) we didn't have much time. My wife got on line while I tried my luck with the machines. I wasn't making much progress and then they all crashed. Every check in machine went down.
So we waited on line - they sent us to a special line which we later learned was the wrong one. Then we found that Span Air hadn't sent us an eticket number - I thought that my reservation number was all I needed since that was the only number in the only email I got from them.
So check in took a while and then the guy said he couldn't give us the tickets and told us to run to a Lufthansa counter at the other end of the building to get the actual borading pass. So we're flying SpanAir, checking in at SwissAir, and getting our tickets from Lufthansa. We get there and there is another line. At this point we have a little less than 30 minutes until the flight departs.
As we were waiting they called out our names and gave us the boarding passes. We ran to passport control, got through and then faced a problem. My wife really wanted her tax refund from all the shopping we did but we didn't have much time. We still had to go through security. We found a refund counter but they said you have to go to customs first to get some stamp or something.
My wife was getting directions to wherever the office was upstairs while I tried to convince her it wasn't worth the stress. We must have looked pretty funny with my wife running to the escalator and me chasing her begging her to come through security with me and forget about the tax refund.
Eventually I convinced my wife (or maybe she was just tired of running) and we went through security. We got to the gate just as they were boarding. Then we waited on the plane for half an hour thinking we should have just spent that time getting our tax refund...
But we did get to Madrid. Today was our second day here. I won't go into details yet, but let me say that our hotel Francisco I, will probably get a pretty bad review and certainly no recommendation. It is by far the noisiest hotel I've ever experienced.
We also haven't had great luck with Spanish food, although we did get some excellent Italian tonight.
We continue to shop and spend money at an alarming rate but we think we're buying clothes that we want and that we would have to pay much more for in Korea or America.
Well let me save Madrid for another blog entry. I'm fairly tired and probably will be the rest of the trip considering how much noise we have to endure at the hotel...
January 2, 2008
Happy New Year & New Year's Eve in Zurich
Happy New Year
New Year's Eve in Zurich started the same as many other days in Zurich - shopping. After some MaxMara for my wife and Hugo Boss for me (I think we've spent our clothing budget for the next two years or so) the shops closed at 4:00, including the supermarkets. We did stock up on yogurt and pasta before they closed.
Interestingly, the crowded Zurich supermarket reminded me a lot of Korea, although it was one old lady in particular who really is responsible for this digression. She kept pushing her cart into my back in an effort to get me to move the crowds faster. After turning around and voicing my displeasure for the second time I managed to let her pass me and then followed her through the crowd as she cleared a path by banging her cart into everyone nearby including a very frail looking old lady with a cane.
Anyway, after dropping off our new clothes and food in the hotel we went out for dinner at around 4:30 since we had skipped lunch. The Swiss restaurant I've been meaning to try was reservation only so we went to an Italian place. I'll have a review of the 2 Italian places I've tried so far in Zurich one of these days but the food was quite good at this one.
Then we went back to the hotel and got in a quick nap so that we'd have enough energy to stay up for the fireworks. Now Zurich already has miles of pedestrian shopping streets, but they banned cars from some more streets so that New Year's Eve revelers could watch the fireworks safely.
We left the hotel around 10:00 and were very surprised that crowds were not bad. There were also lots of tents set up, mostly small ones selling food (we had some bratwurst and some beef on a stick - both quite good). A couple of larger tents served as night clubs.
At 11:00 we went to the bridge nearest Zurich's lake to find a spot where we could see some fireworks. It still wasn't all that crowded and we got a spot right on the railing with no one in front of us. By 11:30 it had gotten a bit crowded so if you really wanted a good spot it would have been best to find it by 11:00 or shortly after.
At midnight a few loud fireworks went off and everyone said "Happy New Year". Then we waited as it got colder and we wondered if the fireworks display was coming or if the few loud ones and the small ones coming from various spots on the river bank were all there was to New Year's Eve in Zurich.
At 12:25 or so we talked about going back to the hotel room to warm up our toes but then the fireworks started. It was a very nice fireworks display but I won't actually recommend it.
The reason I am not recommending fireworks in Zurich is because when I pictured fireworks in Europe I pictured old buildings and things beneath them. In Zurich you face the lake, which means you face away from the historic part of Zurich. So yous see the fireworks, but not the city. At least not the historic part of the city.
I saw pictures of fireworks in Berlin, London, and Moscow - in all 3 cities it seemd that fireworks happened right above major historical landmarks, which to me would be the point of seeing fireworks in Europe.
Now I'm not asking anyone to feel sorry for me. My wife and I both think this was our best New Year's.
Tomorrow will be our last day of shoppping in Zurich, which is good since we spend too much money here. Then we have nearly 2 weeks in Madrid - I'm trying not to worry about the money but as this vacation gets more and more expensive it does creep into my mind every time my wife picks up another pair of shoes or a bag or wahetever. At least half the time she's looking to get me something but I don't know if I can afford to upgrade my wardrobe right now...
As usual, when I'm traveling I need you to overlook any typos as I haven't figured out spell check or got time to do my usual proofreading.
December 31, 2007
Sunday in Zurich
I'm guessing that some of the people who said Zurich was boring visited on a Sunday. Cafes and restaurants are open but everything else seems to be closed. That's fine with me - I'm perfectly happy not shopping and not spending money. However, my wife isn't content just walking around taking in the sights again (we've already walked through most of the pedstrian areas). I'm starting to think that 7 days in Zurich is a bit much, especially since shops will also be closed Jan. 1, 2008 and at least some are also closed Jan. 2. Tomorrow (shops are open from 10-4 on Dec. 31st) might be our last day of shopping in Zurich...
I hope that the New Year's Eve fireworks are impressive enough to keep my wife happy for a few days. We're in Zurich until Jan. 3rd when we fly to Madrid.
December 29, 2007
Shopping in Zurich
I will not write much today because I want to save my internet time (10 francs an hour is the cheapest I have found so far) for when I have more to report.
But I do want to talk a little bit about what we did in Zurich today. We shopped. My wife called Zurich a shopper's heaven (wow just found the apostrophe on the keyboards here). There are lots of pedestrian zones with shops all over. As travelfan noted in his comment on my previous entry, some of the window displays are really excellent and some of the shops are really neat.
However, as you might have guessed, there aren't too many bargains here in Zurich. You need to have money or enjoy window shopping to really appreciate Zurich's shoppping. Burberry and Louis Vitton are more expensive here in Zurich than they were in Munich or Salzburg according to my wife who keeps track of these things. We did find some big sales at Ferragamo. It helps to think that you're saving money as you push your credit card closer to its limit...
Of course you have to be careful in Zurich because you could look at a cappucino that costs 6 francs and say it's a bargain since it is cheaper than other places like Starbucks. But anywhere else in the world that is an expensive cappucino. I caught my wife doing this with shoes or boots a few times. 200 francs might seem like a bargain in Zurich after seeing all the way more expensive boots but it's not a bargain where I come from...
Anyway, I still say that visiting Zurich was a good choice. My wife is happy walking around shopping and I'm happy walking around this gorgeous city. Ciao.
December 28, 2007
From a Zurich restaurant to a Zurich spupermarket
So we left Munich today and are now in Zurich. The castles we saw yesterday were amazing and when I get back from vacation I have pictures to show and some general commentary on tours, the people who take them, and the guides.
But for now I want to talk about Zurich. The Goldenes Schwert hotel is excellent so far. Unless they happen to know this blog they do not know I am anyone but a regular traveler so I was pretty surprised when they told me I would be in the junior suite for my 7 night stay. It is a great room obviously.
By the way, I will not be using contractions in this blog entry until I find the apostrophe on this craazy Swiss keyboard...
So our room has a living room, bedroom, 2 bathrooms, and a kitchenette. The kithchenette turned out to be absolutely huge and that brings me to the title of my blog entry: From a Zurich restaurant to a Zurch supermarket.
We had dinner tonight in a very mediocre Italian restaurant. We had a soup, a salad, and 2 main dishes (not to mention the water you always pay for in Europe). It cost us 90+ Swiss Francs. Obviously doing this 2 times a day for 7 days would get way too expensive - that is why I say the kitchenette was huge for us.
After our expensive but below average meal we went straight to a supermarket we had noticed on the way from Zurich main station to our hotel. We spent 30 Swiss Francs and probably got 5-10 meals worth of ham sandwiches, gnocchi, tortellini, arrabiata sauce, basilico sauce, yogurt, and water (we accidentally bought the kind with bubbles).
We do plan to try a couple os Swiss restaurants that the guy in the hotel recommended, and we might try another Italian place or get some Chinese food (my wife and I make sure to try Chinese food in every country we visit because it is usually different). However, for at least half our meals, probably more, we will be cooking for ourselves.
A few people asked why we chose Zurich - it seems that most people are not real impressed with the city. My wife and I think it is gorgeous and so far I have to say it is worth a visit. I suppose there are plenty of other beautiful cities in Europe and I do not yet know why Zurich would be better than any of them since I have only been here a few hours but we chose it for the New Year (no apostrophe) fireworks.
If you do visit Zurich for more than a few days, I strongly recoomend a kitchenette. Eating out here seems to be very expensive.
December 26, 2007
Confusion in Munich on Christmas day
Merry Christmas again!
We spent Christmas day in Munich and a few useums had reopened. Unfortunately, the BMW museums wasn't one of them even though the tourist information place outside the Munich train station told us they would be open. So after a short subway ride to Olympic Park and a long walk around in cold during which we got directions from several locals and spole to several other cold, confused tourists (lots os people expected the museum to be open and no one could find the actual entrance) we found out that it was closed. We never did find the entrance - I was pretty surprised there were no signs except for one that said 'BMW museum' in front of an empty parking lot.
Confused and cold, we got back on the subway and headed toward Marienplatz. There we found the toy museum which was a waste of 10 minutes for us. 3 euros each seemed like a fortune considering to the size of this place. I suppose if you really liked teddy bears or toys you could spend 20-30 minutes in there...
Then we went to Stadt Museum which was quite good. Surprisingly for a large museum almost none of the signs had English translations but we enjoyed looking at the musical intstruments and puppets anyway. This museum was free on Christmas day so that made up for the 6 euros we wasted on the toy museum.
In between museums we had more Bavarian food and Munich beer in a beer hall. We're not sure what we'll end up doing for dinner. Last night we had kebab since nearly evervthing was closed. We noticed many places closing at 3:00 today so we may be in for some more kebab or something...
Tomorrow I probably won't get to blog as we'll be at the castle all day...
December 24, 2007
Salzburg day trip and a bit more from Munich
This entry may not be too detailed since I seem to be in the worst pc room ever. I can't find the relatively nice one I was in 2 nights ago and this one has people speaking loudly with the employees and someone singing into a mic to someone almost as unfortunate as me...
Salzburg is beautiful. Apparently it is popular for movie tourism thanks to The Sound of Music (we saw the 'do re mi' steps and the cemetery that inspired the Hollywood set in the movie) and Motzart. We didn't go into either of the 2 Motzart museums or buy any Motzart chocolate.
We did eat in the oldest restaurant in Europe while we were there, Stiftskeller St. Peter. Apparently they started serving food in 803 so they have had enough time to get it right. The food was excellent and at about 15 euros a meal not unreasonable. The dessert wasn't as good and seemed overpriced but then again, the desert we really wanted, Salzburger Nockerln, took 25 minutes to prepare and we hadn't ordered in advance...
We also saw the the inside of St Peter's plus the Salzburg Christmas market and my wife almost spent way too much on a Louis Vitton handbag.
As for Munich, I did visit Nuremberg Palace and Neue Pinakothek today. The palace is pretty neat inside with some fancy clocks and chandeliers. The Neue Pinakothek gave us a nice surprise when we found that admission is only 1 euro on Sundays instead of the usual 5.50. We enjoyed our hour there looking at paintings from the 1800's. I'm no art afficionado but the museum is fairly small so an hour might be what it takes a normal person to walk through. Of course I saved time by walking by every portrait in the place - I really don't like portraits. There were a few Van Gogh's and some excellent works by people I've never heard of.
And I finally tried Ghluwein in the Munich Christmas market. But if this entry seemed poorly organized it probbaly had more to do with this PC room than the alcohol. Ghluwein comes in .2 liter mugs which is enough to warm you up but not get you drunk.
As usual, please excuse any typos - German spellcheck isn't helping much...
December 22, 2007
Hello from Munich (Air France, Germania, beer halls)
Well I knew I'd be cold in Munich and I am. It's probably similar or only a little colder than New York or Seoul but since I was outside pretty much all day I really feel it. I almost spent 100 euros on boots with hopefully fake fur lining inside (on sale from 200) but I don't think I'll get to use them much and don't really want to carry them around...
By the way, typing on a German keyboard is an entirely different experience - several keys are different but the biggest difference is the y key down in the bottom left. It's a QWERTZ keyboard instead of QWERTY... Anyway, please excuse any typos... And I can't seem to link for some reason but I'll do my best with these unfamiliar resources.
So far I can tell you a few interesting things:
Air France is fine. I'd put the service somewhere between the Asian airlines like Korean Air, Asiana, JAL, etc. and the American ones like Northwest and Spirit. This means that while the flight attendants were never rude or mean as American ones sometimes are, they were't nearly as attentive as Asian flight attendants. It was pretty clear that they were as interested in talking to each other as they were in serving the passengers. Still much better than I've seen on many Northwest or American Airlines flights though.
I did hear one interesting story from the interpreter on board (since the flight had lots of Koreans on board but none of the French flight attendants spoke Korean they had a Korean - French translator who happened to be seated right next to us). She said that lots of Korean passengers complained about the service and the food. The service complaint will probably remain until they get a taste of American service; as long as they are execting Korean Air service they will be disappointed with any western airline. However Air France did solve the food complaints by serving kimchi with every meal.
Hotel Germania in Munich is fine. I can't remember what I had to pay so I won't talk about value but the hotel is in a great location - we haven't used any public transportation yet because everything is within walking distance. The rooms are small and old but it's not bad. The beds are too soft but most people complain about the hard beds I prefer. The room wasn't warm enough for my wife (I thought it was good enough) but they gave us some extra blankets and we're OK now. The taxi fare from Munich airport to the hotel is about 60 euros.
Munich has some beatiful architecture. It#s not spread out all over the city like in Rome but the New City Hall in Marienplatz was almost worth the trip all by itself. We've also seen some great churches, a former royal residence (I'm not sure why they don#t call it a palace) and other neat old buildings scattered around.
Munich's Christmas market is great. It's not real big but there are some stalls selling different kinds of food (we had some bread covered in salty cheese topped with bacon) and ghluwine. I haven't tried it yet because it smells kind of sweet and I haven't been in the mood for a warm, sweet, alcoholic beverage in the past couple of days. We also had some bratwurst from one of these vendors with Heinz mustard and ketchup. Others sell fruit, nuts, Santa things (I'm told that in southern Germany no one cares about the Santa myth so this is strictly for tourists from the north and from other countries), nativity sets, and other little craft-type things.
Munich beerhouses are great for dinner. They serve Bavarian food. It comes fast, portions are large, and prices are reasonable. The two I've tried so far had English menus available upon request. I also tried some local beer (apparently lots of breweries are or used to be run by monks). I don't like beer but this seemed like good beer to me. I kind of liked it.
Well that's about it for now. Tomorrow we take a day trip to Salzburg - I'll let you know how it goes as soon as I get a chance.
December 4, 2007
Who can you trust regarding the Explorer in Antarctica?
The other day I linked to an article about a British woman who said evacuating the sinking Explorer was pretty easy, no hassle, no panic, etc.
Apparently this woman found the experience a little more frightening:
"I literally was shaking from the inside out," she recalled. "There is no word in the English language to describe the terror. You're just thinking only about your family. I was sending e-mails out to everyone, a good-bye letter. It never occurred to me I'd make it out of this."Of course since she took videos of the event and now has a publicist and an agent it is pretty clear she wants to make some money out of her story so you have to wonder if she isn't embellishing it some...
But I didn't entirely believe the British passenger either:
Ms Plant said the passengers had been "nervous" but that none gave any sign of fear.Now in the BBC article they say that everyone had protective suits to help keep them warm. But this American woman with the agent and publicist tells it differently:"There was no panic at all."
"When I was actually being rescued, my boots had fallen off in the ocean. I had nothing," she recalled. "You have your camera and the clothes on your back."Now obviously I don't have all the information so right now I'm not believeing anyone but something doesn't make sense here. Maybe they got the orange suits after being rescued, maybe only some passengers got the suits, maybe the real story is somewhere in between the two I've linked to so far...
December 3, 2007
Bulgarian ski vacation experience + ski travel deals
Matt Gross has many complaints about Bansko in Bulgaria but ends up calling them petty thanks to one good day of snowboarding. The two main complaints, while conflicting, didn't seem petty to me though.
First was what the author called "anarchy" and second was that many lifts remain closed for no good reason. I say they are somewhat conflicting since someone decided not to run the lifts to the better snow so someone was in charge. However, that didn't seem to help much on the ground where the best way to get on the lift was to outmuscle the rest of the skiers.
The author decided to forgive Bansko when the lifts were all opened at the end of his vacation. Besides that one day of good snow and trails, he notes that skiing in Bansko is affordable - $60 to $100 a day should be easy according to the author (including lift tickets, steak, and beer).
Speaking of cheap skiing, here's an article that starts off with some "overlooked values" but also goes for some more expensive heli-skiing. This one focuses on US destinations (the heli-skiing is in Canada).
December 2, 2007
Sinking ships and vacation proposal
A few days ago I wrote about The Explorer in Antarctica. Well, here's an article about the vacation experience from one of the passengers. Certainly not your typical vacation experience, but it seems to have been a happy one for this passenger.
And for all you romantics out there "there was some unexpected good news as a Danish couple got engaged while in the lifeboat." I guess that will be a good story when people ask about the proposal. Who wouldn't be impressed to hear about a proposal in a lifeboat in Antarctica?
Does anyone here have a vacation proposal story to share?
November 22, 2007
Lanzarote: not ruined by tourists yet
I hope this doesn't offend anyone but ZI thought it was kind of funny that this author uses the analogy of God spilling his cat's litter to describe the beauty of Lanzarote.
The author praises the island for not letting tourists ruin traditional towns and notes that most tourists are content to stay in the resorts so lots of places are still very authentic. Apparently you can even find a secret surf spot that the locals will want to protect from foreigners. Not that conflict with the locals sounds like fun.
Anyway, the article is a pretty good description of the author's experience in Lanzarote, including the "weirdest bar in the world".
I found a Youtube video which has photos from a Lanzarote vacation. It's not ideal - they keep showing pictures of the same lady over and over again but I watched a few videos and this one had the best landscape shots, mostly in the last 30 seconds. If you skip the first 3 minutes or so you won't miss too much but there are a few interesting pictures mixed in with all the lame "I'm modeling at the resort" pictures.
Have you ever been to Lanzarote and was the nature really spectacular?
October 23, 2007
Pyeong Chang Korea travel experience
So I just got back from Pyeong Chang. This was a good experience for me because it’s a real Korean vacation spot, meaning that Koreans go there to visit. I didn’t see any other white people so I’m thinking that foreign tourists don’t usually make it there.
Of course, the only reason for a foreign tourist to go would be to see an actual Korean vacation spot. The activities themselves are nothing too exciting.
The first place was a school turned art gallery. My wife really liked it. I thought it was OK - certainly different, but there were only afew artists represented despite the fact that Mooee Art Gallery could have packed a lot more art into the school. One artists had about 50 paintings of Memil flowers. Most of the rest were crazy modern sculptures - never really did learn to appreciate modern sculpture.
Then there was the home of a famous Korean author – Lee Hyo Suk - the sign said he was born there and lived there until he was 13. It also said that another family lives there now so you can’t actually go inside. We spend less than 5 minutes there.
Then there was a memorial to Lee Hyo Suk. The information signs there said that his birth house had been destroyed – weird since we thought we had just come from the house where he was born. They also had his former gravesite. Apparently he’s no longer buried there. We walked around for about 30 minutes because the place was pretty big but we didn’t actually see much. Korean tourists like to pose for pictures by the sculpture of Lee Hyo Suk sitting at his desk writing. There’s also a museum – it looked pretty boring and we wanted to go to the next big attraction.
Herb Nara (Herb nation) is basically an herb garden. We had fun walking around and sniffing all the different herbs which are labeled in English and Korean. There are some nice picture spots in the gardens there and you can buy plants, herb bread, herb cookies, herb candy, etc.
Then we went to try some of the local beef; Haeng Sung (next to Pyeong Chang) and Bong Pyung (part of Pyeong Chang) are famous for beef. Now Koreans think that Korean beef is superior and are willing to pay for it. At the butcher, 600 grams cost us 42,000 won, probably $45 or so. We also stopped in another store and got some cooked rice, some side dishes, some sauce, etc. and went back to our hotel for a feast.
Now the hotel was Memil Flower Valley Pension. The area is famous for Memil as you can tell from the pension's name and the paintings in Moose Art Gallery I already mentioned. Plus one of Lee Hyo Suk’s novels was titled (this is a rough translation) When the Memil Blooms. Anyway, the place was dog friendly so we went there.
A pension, by the way, is just a hotel where the rooms have little kitchen areas.
Our room was spacious and we were, I’m fairly certain, the only customers last night. Pretty bad for a pension that I estimated had about 50 rooms but my wife guesses had 10 at most. Anyway, we were the only ones there and it would have been very quiet and peaceful if not for the construction next door where they seem to be building another hotel. Still, they stopped around 7:00 PM so it was quiet at night. Of course they started before 7:00 AM so the morning wasn’t so peaceful... The room was about $130/night.
Anyway, we cooked our local delicacy but the beef was tough. Anyway, we had fun walking the dogs and watching Animal Planet (the only channel with English programs we could find). And we did spend some time looking at the moon and stars. We couldn’t see many stars because of some clouds but those clouds did look pretty when they passed in front of the moon.
All in all it was nice to get out of the city and experience a place I had never been before.
October 21, 2007
Birthday getaway
I won't be writing much today, but hopefully will have something to share in a couple of days. We're going away for the weekend to celebrate my birthday. I'll give you details after I experience it, but the plan is to get out of the city, go somewhere quiet, ruin the quiet with our two dogs, enjoy the fresh air (dogs can't ruin that), and look at the stars at night.
It's been a long time since I saw and took the time to enjoy a really beautiful starry sky. Since the summer really in Vermont and before that in Cebu in April.
August 8, 2007
Last full day in Punta Cana's Sirenis resort
This day was much like the previous ones in that it was very relaxing. The only thing out of the ordinary today was when we gave away $30 worth of toy cars we had brought for children (we never took a tour or saw a rural village or school so it was either give them to Sirenis employees or bring them back home).
Otherwise it was pretty normal. Wake up and go to the beach to find a good spot (got the best spot yet today), eat breakfast, make dinner reservations, exercise, shower, go to the beach...
Actually that reminds me of what I did differently. At first I went to take a free scuba lesson. They do this daily but I kept putting it off. The guy asked me when i was flying and I told him tomorrow.
He said scuba would be dangerous because of the nitrogen if I was flying within 48 hours. I had read 24 hours somewhere, but I'm not about to take risks to go scuba diving in the hotel pool (though it would be nice to learn one day). So I didn't scuba dive.
I did go snorkeling, however. Actually this made me quite nervous as I read somewhere that you can cut yourself pretty seriously on coral. I felt that I was very close to the coral and the water was slightly rough so sometimes I'd kind of be pushed too close for comfort.
Maybe I felt more exposed because this was my first time snorkeling without a life vest but I figured the risk of bumping an arm or a leg would be much greater. Anyway, before I saw anything cool I gave up. Nex time I'll wear a wet suit or something to protect myself from an accidental scrape. Yes, I know this makes me a wimp.
So I asked the guys in charge I asked what I should have seen. Apparently there's not much to see unless you take the tour. I missed that opportunity.
But other than snorkeling it was a normal day. We went to the spa after the beach. Then we had dinner in the buffet - it was really excellent tonight. There was a great creole chicken, good ribs, roast beef at the carving station, etc.
Our main dinner tonight was at the Italian place. Things were looking good when we saw the menu. They had some interesting pizzas, several types of pasta and several types of sauce that you could mix and match, and veal.
So my wife had tortellini arrabiata and I had the veal. Her meal was good, though the sauce was made more with tobasco than the peppers favored in italy. My veal was not so great. It was deep fried and tasted it (greasy) and was a little tough to chew.
The other new thing we did today was go to show. They have one every night but this was the first one I saw. It was better than I expected, a dance variety show. Some skits were better than others, but it was neat to see so many people we recognized among the performers. Most of them actually work at the resort by day and perform at night it seems.
Those are my notes for the day. To prevent the confusion I caused with other daily Sirenis blogs, let me warn everyone that this is not conclusive at all. I'm just writing down everything I remember now and want to remember later...
August 7, 2007
Day 4 in Sirenis Punta Cana
Well we managed to stay up late enough to visist the disco last night. It was pretty different from any nightclub I've ever seen. The dance floor was a circle with a wall around it. People would hang out by the wall and watch the dancers.
The dancers were very skilled - I think they were dancing merengue to the Spanish langugae dance songs being played. I tried tog et my wife to try it out, but she knows how bad a dancer I am and the people out there really seemed to have had a lot of practice. No doubt she saved me from looking like a dancing fool (any Frank Zappa fans catch the reference there?).
We also went to the beach last night to reserve some good lounge chairs in the sahde. I wanted to wake up early to do this - going at night felt like cheating somehow. But we did it at night and it worked; we had a nice spot today.
So today was much like other days. Breakfast, Spanish lesson (painful for a professional educator), exercise (the trainer in the gym is very friendly and he really knows his stuff), lunch, beach, lunch, pool, beach, spa, snack, dinner. I think I got the order right there.
Dinner was in the crepe restaurant, which was an interesting experience for me. I had seen my grandmother get crepes in IHOP when I was in college, but never really experienced them for myself. As always, dinner was good. I had the soup with tortillas - the best soup I've had here at Sirenis by far. Then a chicken crepe and a crepe suzet for desert. My wife liked her Sirenis crepe and her desert, a crepe with caramel and ice cream.
I'm really impressed with the food here at Sirenis. The buffet is pretty luxurious (for our snack before dinner tonight we had prosciutto). Then there are the restaurants including Chinese, seafood, vegetarian, steak, crepe, Italian, Mexican, and one other that I plan on checking out tomorrow). You really can't get bored with the food here.
We also tried a new drink, blended cherry brandy (cherry brandy, freshly squeezed lime juice, ice, mix it all in a blender). It's great tasting, cool, tropical-looking, and just perfect for us here in Punta Cana on the beach.
Speaking of drinks, my wife has been struggling with the coffee and cappuccino our whole stay. The coffee is very very strong so she always asks for half coffee and then just extra hot water. Even then it can be too strong for her. That's tough for someone who relies heavily on coffee. The cappuccino on the other hand is too sweet.
That's about all I have to tell you about today. Except to note that we still haven't gone for our night swim. We could, but my wife hasn't felt like it and I don't enjoy it much alone. It's just funny that I tried so hard to find a resort that permits night swimming, ended up in one accidentally, and now haven't done it...
Tomorrow I might be a bit more active as I try to do some activities I've been skipping in order to write a more complete review.
August 6, 2007
Day 3: trying to decide on taking an excursion
Sirenis continues to impress and my wife and I are trying to decide if we should do one of the excursions. We don't see the need really because we're having a very good vacation just sticking around the resort.
Today we woke up at 8:30 because our wake up call never came. We easily found a spot with shade, actually the same one I got an hour earlier yesterday morning. This was surprising because starting Friday night the resort seemed to start getting more crowded.
After breakfast we took a 30 minute Spanish lesson. I won't bore you with the details but speaking as a linguist I wasn't impressed with the teaching. Nevertheless I'm returning tomorrow.
Then my wife hit the beach and I hit the gym. We didn't meet up again until 12:30 or so. We spent a little time together on the beach and then got lunch. As always the food was fine though my ham steaks were a bit salty. I ate a bunch of them anyway since I'm on a high protein diet.
After lunch we went swimming in the pool. There are always kids splashing abput in the parts of the pool with shade. If you're willing to hang out in the sun it's easier to avoid them.
I don't like sun so I endured. There's a swim-up bar in the shade. My wife and I generally don't drink but I've probably tried 5 or 6 different cocktails since I've arrived here. They've all been good. When I get a black russion here it's bigger than you get for $6 in a regular bar. They may use no name liquor but I don't taste any difference...
Then we went to the beach for a while longer and then to the spa. I had to pick my seat in the sauna carefully because there was a topless woman in there and I didn't want to look.
American parents might consider this before bringing children here. There are certainly some cultural differences evident. Today my wife and I were surprised to see a topless mommy putting sunscreen on her kid. How many American males see their mom's breasts after they are (I'm not sure) 3? This kid was at least school age I'd guess...
Anyway, cultural differences are part of traveling.
We definitley like the big jacuzzi style bath here. After the spa we went the steakhouse for dinner at 6:30. It was good. My wife had the sirloin and I had chimichurri or something like that (beef tenderloin apparently). Those were the only steaks on the menu. They also had ribs, BBQ chicken, hamburger, and a few other choices.
I'm not sure it's so much better than the other restaurants but there's no denying it's the most popular and the hardest to reserve. When I think about how well we eat here, Sirenis is an excellent value. My all-inclusive in Cancun wasn't serving food half this good and it wasn't any cheaper...
After dinner we hung around on the beach for a while and then in our room. Then we went to the buffet around 9:00 so I could get some more protein. I ate a lot of turkey while my wife found some big shrimp or something and some passion fruit (we think).
Well we have to go relax in order to stay up late enough to visit the disco tonight. I'll tell you if we made it when I blog tomorrow.
It looks like we won't be doing any excursions but I'll let you know about that if we decide for sure.
Is there anything anyone wants to know before I leve Sirenis?
August 5, 2007
2nd full day at Sirenis Punta Cana experience
Just so you know, I will be taking these various experiences and creating one big huge definitive review of Sirenis Punta Cana. But I don't want to do that while on vacation so I'm just going to keep posting my daily thoughts, kind of like notes for my future big review.
Anyway, our second full day at Sirenis is coming to a close. We left off last night with me about to go to the Chinese restaurant. This was fine, a nice change from the buffets and as far as I know the only place to get duck (roast Pekin duck) at Sirenis. My wife got shrimp with something. The main dishes and deserts were good. The starters were pretty weak as was the rice that came with the main dishes.
I had some noodles cooked in soy sauce (very salty) and my wife had sweet and sour soup (ridiculously salty). The rice was also cooked in soy sauce I think.
But overall the meal was good.
This morning I woke up at 7:00 instead of 7:30 and went straight to the beach. The shade spots closest to the ocean were taken but I easily found some shade. People reserve their spots by putting the hotel beach towels on the lounge chairs they want. I guess these never go missing which is good since the hotel charges 20 ucks if you lose your towel.
I listend to the ocean for a while and then went to the lobby to make reservations. At 7:55 I was the second person on line. 10 minutes later, there were more like 25 people on line...
The steakhouse was already booked up. Clearly you have to book in advance (you can book 3 days in advance) to eat at the steakhouse. This means you'll have no choice but the buffet at least once during your trip. That's beacause you can only make one reservation each day. So for example, if it's Monday and I make reservations at the steakhouse for Tuesday, I can't make any reservations for Monday night because I've used my reservation for the day.
Now the hotel management knows I'm doing this review, so they are letting me bend the rules a bit so that I can review as many restaurants as possible for my readers. But eating at the buffet is fine - I always enjoy it.
Anyway, tomorrow I'll tell you if the steakhouse is worth the trouble. When I found out it was booked for today, I chose the seafood restaurant instead. We had a good meal there tonight. I don't actually like seafood so I tried the only non-seafood choices: beef carpaccio and stuffed chicken breast. Both were good. My wife had Spanish style octopus which she said tasted more like scallops. She liked it though.
Before and after the seafood restaurant we were in the buffet as my wife is on a mission to eat all the mango in the Dominican Republic.
Tonight we might try out the resort's entertainment (a theatrical performance of dirty dancing) and or go night swimming. I don't know if it's officially allowed but we did see one couple swimming at night and there doesn't seem to be anyone there to stop you.
Interestingly, there never is anyone there - no lifeguards at all at the pools or the ocean. Lots of seemingly unupervised children too.
Another note about the pools / ocean is that since the resort is so popular with Europeans you see several women (not most but a few) going topless.
Anyway, I'm nearly out of batteries on my laptop so I'll have to continue tomorrow.
August 4, 2007
1st full day at Sirenis Punta Cana experience
Sirenis is definitely growing on me. Last night I was talking about the key for the room's safe. Well they gave me the wrong one originally, sent me back with the wrong one when I complained, then the third time they admitted that the keys were all messed up and I couldn't get the right one until tomorrow morning.
So now I have the right one, but I paid for 6 nights of safe key and I'm only getting 5. I don't think I'll waste valuable vacation time complaining, but the fact that they didn't offer me a refund speaks volumes.
But like I said, Sirenis is growing on me. When we arrived last night we had to kill 5 or 6 mosquitoes in our room, but we haven't gotten any bites so that's a positive.
Our day started with a wake up call and a trip down to the beach to get a spot in the shade. At 8:00 AM the best spots were taken, but we did find a nice spot with shade. It was fairly far back on the beach so we couldn't see the meeting the sand, but I pretty much slept and read all day anyway.
After securing the spot on the beach, I sorted out the safety deposit box stuff I mentioned. Then we got on line to make reservations at one of the restaurants.
We figured that getting a reservation would be easy since last night none of them looked really crowded. But at 8:40 AM the steak house was all booked so we ended up in the Chinese place. I'm going there in a few minutes at 9:30.
Then we ate breakfast. The buffet was fine and they had custom made eggs. My wife went to the beach while I went to the gym. The gym is OK, but the equipment isn't impressive (it works and everything - it's just not as nice as a modern gym with new equipment) and there's not that much of it.
After the workout, I showered and hit the beach. We also did some swimming in the ocean and the pool. The pool gets crowded in places but it is huge and has 2 swim up bars.
We had lunch in a restaurant by the pool - this was a small buffet. Then we went back to the pool and the beach. We also tried out the spa (the water in the whirlpool type things wasn't too hot which is great for me. We hung out there until it was snack time at 4:00. Then we did some more swimming, laying out on the beach, jogging on the beach, etc.
At 7:30 we had another snack at the buffet. And now we're just killing time (well I'm blogging) until our reservations at the Chinese restaurant at 9:30.
I've left out plenty of details but I do have to go eat soon. Anyway, I like the food. It's not the best I've ever had but there are lots of good choices. And I like that I can eat any time. I believe there's at least one place to eat open 24 hours a day.
I also like swimming in the pool and relaxing on the beach. I still haven't decided if I'll recommend Sireins or not. I mean you should be able to enjoy the pool and beach pretty much anywhere.
And I just remembered that I left a note for housekeeping to leave extra bottled water in our fridge. The note is gone and I only got 4 little bottles of water - not nearly enough. I'm thinking I might not leave a tip since I now have to go track down more bottled water from somewhere...
After I go try the Chinese food. More tomorrow!
July 10, 2007
Buying travel insurance, La Costa Resort, 7 wonders of the world voting finished
A few people commented on travel insurance on a recent post about travel agents. Apparently the issue is more confusing than I thought according to this article:
Don't buy travel insurance, says Consumer Reports. Do buy travel insurance, say consumer advocates Clark Howard and Ed Perkins. Don't buy travel insurance, says the Consumer Federation of America. Do buy it, says your travel agent.What's crystal clear though is that you can't afford to get really sick on vacation without insurance. Fore example, medical evacuation costs a fortune. If you remember that lawyer flying around the world with TB, an air ambulance between Denver and Atlanta cost $12,000. Make it an international flight and you're talking about a lot more.
This writer talks about La Costa in Carlsbad and while it doesn't sound like my kind of thing (especially at $400/night) the author says it succeeds as a family vacation spot. Even though the author enjoyed, any praise is lukewarm:
Sure, it's a big resort that demands planning, but it's navigable if you work the system.So that La Costa place isn't on my to do list, but I suppose the new 7 wonders of the world ought to be:Still, great hotels shouldn't force you to attend to matters on your own. Just ask my aunties.
Chichén Itzá, Mexico
Christ the Redeemer, Brazil
The Great Wall, China
Machu Picchu, Peru
Petra, Jordan
The Roman Colloseum, Italy
The Taj Mahal, India
So far the only one I've seen is the Colloseum in Rome. I'll actually be seeing one of the losers this summer (Statue of Liberty) and another this winter (Eiffel Tower). And Angkor Watt in Cambodia is another loser pretty high on my list.
Which of the new 7 wonders have you seen?
July 8, 2007
Pagudpod, the Philippines: A Hidden Paradise in The North
Imagine traveling by land from 11 in the evening to 2 in the afternoon the following day, during the Holy Week at that, just to go to a beach that friends and family swear to be as marvelous as Boracay; one of the most popular beaches and tourist destinations in the Philippines. Well, if traveling for hours on end will get me again to Pagudpod, Ilocos Norte so be it. Pagudpod's powdery, white sand and crystal clear blue waters can rival any beach in the world. Plus, it isn't that commercialized yet, so the beaches are very clean and even if the resorts are all booked, you wouldn't notice it.
As it was the Holy Week and we didn't have a reservation, we ended up staying at a house which we rented from a local near the beaches so we didn't have the view of the beach. We had to pay an entrance fee of 30 Philippine Pesos (about $0.80) to get into Saud beach resort. The beach was nothing short of dazzling. There was an assortment of locals and tourists swimming and soaking up all the heat the sun could offer. Thankfully, it wasn't like Boracay where you have to fight for sunbathing space since Boracy's sand is literally littered with sunbathers.
There were several beaches there that offered only sand space where you can bring your camping gear and set it up right on the beach; though that option is only perfect for those who don't have kids as it gets very hot during the nights and the bathrooms were relatively far from the camp site. If you do decide to bring kids, make sure to bring mosquito nets and mosquito repellents.
Our second day called for fresh water, so after a few hours on the beach, we headed to Kabigan falls, a 15 to 20 minute drive from where we were staying. An affordable fee of 15 Philippine Pesos (about $0.40) per head will get you in. We had to trek for 30 minutes through not-so-steep steps and some streams on the way to the falls which made it even more exciting. The falls itself was nothing short of majestic as it falls 120 feet into a natural basin where you can swim or just relax on the surrounding boulders.
On our third day, we decided to visit the famous Blue Lagoon or Maira-Ira beach where surfers hangout. Oddly enough, we didn't see any surfers and we didn't see anyone who rented out surf boards - maybe it's not surfing season. Nevertheless, we rented an open cottage where we ate our food. There are no hotels surrounding this area so renting cottages is your only option.
The waves there were higher and more aggressive than the ones in Saud so we spent the whole day body surfing until our bodies ached. What sucks about this place though is that there are no bathrooms, so we asked to use a local's bathroom near the area and gave them a generous tip.
Sadly, all things must end at some point and we had to go home the following day. On the way home, we decided to stopover the neighboring town of Bangui, where you can see for yourself the magnificent wind mills that provides sufficient amount of the electricity in Ilocos Norte.
For those who haven't been to Pagudpod, I strongly suggest that you book reservations at least 2 months in advance, especially when you plan to go there during the Holy Week as there are only a few resorts. You can also opt to travel by air by catching a plane from Manila to Laoag and then catching a 75 km bus ride to Pagudpod.
Guest entry submitted by a Filipino reader who wanted to share his vacation experience.
July 4, 2007
Antique Nash Automobiles Visit Boston Area
The Nash Car Club of America’s 2007 ‘Grand Nashoinal’ event was held in Andover, Massachusetts the end of June. Many car enthusiasts are in clubs that promote enjoyment of their antique, special interest and collectible automobiles and although there is no Nash car company today, there are still many people who love Nashes.
We drove our 1955 Nash Ambassador from New York. The weather was beautiful and the car ran great. It was about 225 miles but we weren’t even close to getting a long distance award!
People come from all over for an event like this. One member flew from Australia for the show! Some folks have known each other for years through the car club, so there’s something of a reunion feeling in the air. The good fellowship is extended to new members and everyone who comes to appreciate the cars, so it’s a really pleasant experience.
The event was held at the Wyndham Andover Hotel. There was plenty of parking so the old cars could stay together. The rooms and amenities were quite nice and everyone at the Wyndham was very helpful.
The car club members who organized the event did a wonderful job. They put together a terrific itinerary. There were pre-show events to tour Concord and Salem, Massachusetts, Canobie Lake (amusement) Park in New Hampshire, a bus trip to Boston, Massachusetts to see the USS Constitution, Old North Church, Paul Revere’s House & Bunker Hill (part of the Freedom Trail), and a bus trip to Maine & New Hampshire to see Wells Auto Museum and Stonewall Kitchens among other attractions.
Of course, the main attraction was the cars themselves. The Hudson, American Motors and Rambler clubs were also invited. There were cars from the 1920s through the 1970s. Besides the cars, there were vendors with hard-to-find parts and special items. Of course, no car club event would be complete without the commemorative T-shirts and this year's was
one of the best.
On Saturday, the cars were arranged by ‘class’, based on the year and model of the car. You can see pictures of cars at the 2007 ‘Grand Nashional’ (and lots of other antique & collectible cars) at the Nash nut.com photo blog. These are 1957 Rambler Rebels.
Everyone was given a ‘goodie’ bag when we signed in, and this contained a ballot to vote for your favorite car in each class. The ‘goodie’ bag also had a program with restaurant & gas station info, some maps and car stickers, as well as some local products – Cape Cod Chips, Table Talk mini pies, Stonewall Kitchens jam, plus candy from NECCO, Yummies, and Sleepy Mountain Maple. Sweet.
Saturday night the Grand Nashional concluded with a Banquet at the hotel. Some donated memorabilia was auctioned off to raise funds for next year’s meet in Indiana, and the awards were presented. The awards were unique. They were hand made by one of the club officers and truly represented the spirit of the Northeast. We went home happy because the weather stayed fine and our car got a 2nd place award in its class!
This article was written by my parents. You can see their other work by reading the Liberty of the Seas reviews: day 1 and day 2.
June 30, 2007
6 Marvelous Beer-drinking Days in Bavaria and Munich, Germany
Day 1: We started off at Nuremberg and did a quick trip to see the Nuremberg Toy Museum which boasts of 200 years of toy making; seeing all those unique and beautiful dolls, trains and wooden soldiers will make you feel like a kid again. We then headed to Swiss Franconia; the world's number 1 beer brewing district where you can find about 300+ breweries still operating to this day. Make sure to stop by several breweries where the locals will be glad to guide you. And taste their mouth watering beers. We had more time to spare so we decided to look around the quaint village of Buttenheim, Levi Strauss' hometown, and later checked in to Hotel Strauss.
Day 2: Day 2 called for a tour of the majestic and popular walled city; Rothenburg, considered the popular and majestic walled city of Germany. We then went to Wurzburg where some of the most famous churches and the grand palace of The Residenz await. If you are a lover of crown jewels and Egyptian art, you've got to see the Residenz.
Day 3: The most sought after tourist route The Romantic Road, called to us. Towns rich in history gorgeously surrounding the landscape of the magnificent Alps are just something you wouldn't want to pass up. Next stop is Oberammergau, famous for its unique houses and its paintings of the brothers Grimm Fairytale paintings on its many walls; think the really old book editions of Snow White and you'll get the picture.
Day 4: Hail Mad King Ludwig! Neuschwanstein and Linderhof will literally take your breath away! Walt Disney Castle anyone? We were told that Ludwig's castles were the inspiration behind Walt's. If you can actually take yourself out of Ludwig's castle, you can try visiting nearby Garmisch were the Nazi Olympics in 1936 took place and Wies famous for its splendid Rococo church.
Day 5: Munich! Museums, Munich Olympic Park, beer gardens, Hofbrauhaus, the chilling Dachau concentration camps which housed over 200,000+ people during Hitler's reign - he killed 36,000 of them. A tip for those who want to go the Olympic Park, an adventure tour is offered daily at 2pm and you wouldn't want to miss that. Plus, do what we did and climb the actual Olympic Tower to get a full view of the entire park and the stadium and get a reduced price of 2.50 instead of the usual 4. We then visited Dachau before immersing ourselves in the beer gardens (via bike tour I might add), because we knew it would be a bittersweet affair. The best thing to do after visiting Dachau is go directly to a beer garden to brighten up your mood. And what do you know; we ended up tasting at least a dozen kinds of beers by nightfall.
Day 6: Museums, museums, museums! Pinakotheks and some more Pinakotheks! If art is your thing, you really shouldn't miss these museums. The Alte Pinakothek houses over 800 masterpieces of medieval to modern paintings including Goya, Da Vinci, Boticelli, Raphael, Rembrandt, El Greco, Durer and Rubens. While the Neue Pinakothek houses an extensive collection of French Impressionists by Pissaro, Degas, Renoir, Van Gogh Cezanne, Gauguin, Monet and Manet among others. The Pinakothek der Moderne on the other hand showcases modern art and the Lenbachhuas features Bahaus, Blue Rider artists and expressionist art such as Kandinsky. Immerse yourself and pray to heaven that you will remember all the details of the masterpieces. To cap the last day of our glorious tour, we headed to... guess where? The Beer gardens of course.
Road signs in the city are somewhat confusing so be sure to be a really good map interpreter if you plan to rent a car. Your best bet to get around the city is to take advantage of walking tours, bike tours, trains and buses as most people would gladly help you out if you get lost; though getting lost is somewhat of an adventure in itself since you will get to see tons of off-road attractions not normally set in the itinerary. Within Bavaria, you can take advantage of the Bavaria Ticket used to get around the entire city state by train. The ticket will give you an all day travel within Bavaria.
Reader submitted vacation experience published anonymously on request. Send your expereinces to jtrotta@gmail.com if you'd like to see them published. Or comment below.
June 27, 2007
Hard to have fun in the state of Las Vegas when you have no cash
Here's a scary story that's mostly about a horrible experience with a bank that blocked access to the "State of Las Vegas" so that a honeymooning couple had no access to cash. Strangely they were traveling with one credit card that had a limit of $300. I didn't know it was possible to get such a low limit, but anyway, the lesson for travelers here (besides avoiding Farmer's and Mechanics Savings Bank NJ) is to have a little credit (2 cards or more with high enough limits to get you out of a jam).
The best bet would be credit cards that get you free travel rewards when you go to Las Vegas.
June 25, 2007
Santa Fe Trail, Red Rock Fantasy, Moose Jaw
I'll try to be brief today as I have tons of papers to mark and final grades to calculate...
This experience is an interesting one, horseback riding on the Santa Fe Trail. Having no idea how to ride a horse, it doesn't seem like much of a vacation to me, but the camping part sounds pretty good.
We've also got a story on the Red Rock Fantasy in Sedona, Arizona. This goes from November 16, 2007 to Jan. 1, 2008.
Up in Saskatchewan, Canada, you have Moose Jaw. This city is featured in Chatelaine, a Canadian women's magazine. Apparently Moose Jaw is the best place to vacation in Saskatchewan. The July issue of Chatelaine has more information. If you're not a subscriber, try the official city website.
I wouldn't mind going to the Saskatchewan Burrowing Owl Interpretive Centre to see some of these endangered owls, but something has me confused:
SBOIC is a non-government, non-profit, charitable organization. Our work is funded entirely through donations and grants. Donations are tax deductible. Donations from conservation organizations, corporate sponsors, local business, and the public enable the Centre to continue providing educational opportunities to concerned citizens. Donations should be made payable to the City of Moose Jaw...Now if this is a non-government thing, why are people making their checks out to the city government?
Of course, there's lots more to do in Moose Jaw so don't worry if you're not excited about the owls.
June 11, 2007
Amtrak to Glacier Park experience
Here's a letter to the editor arguing for more trains and more government support for trains. To support his argument he talks a little (not many details unfortunately) about the Amtrak ride to and from Glacier Park.
June 4, 2007
Punta Cana Sunscape Dominican Republic vacation experience
This is one reader's experience in the Punta Cana Sunscape all-inclusive resort (where I might stay):
We paid $2000 for airfare, transportation, room & board and booked on expedia.com. We probably spent another $300 in tips/incidentals primarily because we wanted to. Get one of those calling cards or make sure you cellphone will work there, but you'll need one of those power converters if you bring your charger.
We ate at all the restuarants. I had no stomach or intestinal issues. Men must wear long pants at 3 of the 5 places. If you go, look up one of the restuarant manager's named Duarte (about 55 years old build like a fire hydrant. His English is the best. The guy really took us under wing.
The beer does suck, as does any drink requiring Tequilla--they have nothing but Rum and Vodka for the most part and no Mexican Tequilla or American Beer whatsoever. If you're a Bloody Mary fan, make sure you bring some Worchestire, Old Bay and Horseradish with you. They didn't have Bailey's either, but we bought a bottle at Duty Free so Espresso Martini's worked fine. Stay away from their Casino...not worth the $50 in free chips whatsoever. The shows were great and the Disco was o.k. too, although the one night of Karreokee almost required my putting some women out of their misery--problem was I couldn't find the gaff. Heinecken was available but not part of the all-inclusive which featured El Presidente, that's about the extent of dark beer--no pun intended. Unfortunately, the beer in the mini-fridge was moose-piss. Pay the maid a $20 and she'll buy you Heinecken and bring it to work the next day.
I tipped the maid from day one $20 and she changed all the sheets daily for us, as opposed to just making the bed. The room was spotless and we had nothing stolen. Safe is available, but after the 3rd day we rarely used it.
The bartenders poured heavy, tip them and they poured heavier. I can't imagine how much Rum they go through in a year...it seemed like they were cracking open a new bottle every 20 minutes.
Activities from snorkeling to boating required a refundable deposit, but no cost to "rent" the equipment. On-site scuba diving and certification is available for an additional fee. Don't be "lured" by the sidewalk vendors' spiel on the jewelry, or artwork, but the cigar officianoto's are worth doing some higgling-haggling with... If you stick with the price you're willing to pay, they will come down--however each are VERY well trained in counter-offering...Cuban cigars run about $10-12 (Cuban Cohiba Robustos). They also feature the fruit lady who cuts up fresh pineapples, mangos, watermelon and all types of passion fruits daily--Vitamin C is VERY important...as are vitamins R-U-M-V-O-D-K-A.
Definitely do the spa treatment. Hottest steam room I've ever been to in my life...really helped allow you to consume more Rum the next day. Pay for it once for the week (about $250) and you'll be a VERY happy man, as the masseuses were female only and my Sweedish massage included some extra-curricular areas not necessarily done any other place I've EVER been to...
Stay away from the dinner cruises, why pay for something you're getting for free anyway? Definitely do the 4 or 8 hours of fishing for about $70 to $100.
Bottom-line is that I'd go back next week if I had the vacation days to do so. We're either returning or going to Aruba next year. P.S. Condos on the beach are selling for $48K...no error, $48,000.
Well that's what I was sent. After reading about the massage, I'm not sure my wife will let us go to Sunscape the Beach Punta Cana.
May 30, 2007
Parrot Cay: exclusive Caribbean resort vacation experience
This author went to Parrot Cay where 2 people will spend over $5,000 for a 3 night package. I guess I should read the article carefully because it will be a while before I pay that much for a vacation...
May 11, 2007
Sawadee Spa Cebu travel tip
Here's a little Cebu travel tip on the Sawadee Spa near Plantation Bay. My wife and I went there on a Saturday night because the Kilimanjaro Springs Spa at Plantation Bay couldn't accommodate my wife and I at the same time.
When we got to Sawadee, we asked them if they could give us massages at the same time. If we waited an hour then they could. They showed us the massage price list in US dollars and we were surprised to see the prices were about the same as in the resort (though they had more massage choices). The prices started at $25 for an hour-long massage.
My wife insisted on seeing the price sheet for locals, in pesos. At first they pretended not to know what she was talking about but when my wife insisted they gave us another price sheet. Here the $25 massage was 550 pesos, about $11.50. This is the first travel tip: insist on paying in pesos and make sure you see the peso price list.
We chose Shiatsu massages but still had to wait an hour. We asked them where we could pass the time and the recommended the bar downstairs. My wife and I knew the only other option was to walk around the area sweating our butts off because it was so hot. We would have seen real Filipino life since there were lots of natives out and about. But we would have gotten hot and sweaty (no fun for the masseuse) and the area was a little depressing because it looked so poor.
We went to the bar downstairs and saw posters of women on the way. My wife started wondering what kind of bar this was. Before entering you had to pay the cover (100 pesos that included a drink) for the show. There was an opaque door with a picture of a woman with large breasts painted on it. My wife asked what kind of show we’d be seeing. The woman said it was kind of a comedy show. We didn't believe her but we paid and went in.
The place was empty; we were the only customers. There were a few waiters and some women in tight dresses walking around. We sat down at a table not to close to the bar and a waiter brought us some menus and told us which drinks we could get in exchange for the cover we'd paid. As we were ordering two ladies in fancy dresses came over, sat down with us, and said hi.
When my wife saw their faces and heard them say hi she was quite relieved because she realized they were (or at least had been) male. I didn't share her relief. Male or female, my wife didn't want to buy them drinks so she told them we didn't want any company and they left. An hour later (at 9:30) the show (which was supposed to start at 9:00) still hadn't started. We left and got our shiatsu massages at Sawadee – these were very good.
We could have gone back downstairs to see some of the "comedy" transvestite show, but we decided to go back to Plantation Bay to do some night swimming instead.
Interestingly, the taxi driver that had taken us there was waiting for us when we got out. Apparently he had waited 2 hours even though we told him not to wait (we saw him waiting on our way to the transvestite bar and told him we'd be a while so he shouldn’t wait). I’m not quite sure why he decided to wait. Maybe he knew that we'd feel obligated to give him a nice tip on the way back to the resort. On the way there the meter came to 67 pesos (about $1.40, the price of 4 mangos in the supermarket) and we’d tipped an extra 20 pesos. I don’t remember what the meter was on the way back, but thinking we didn’t need any more Filipino money we gave him most of ours.
Of course the next day we'd be looking for an ATM to pay the exit fee we didn't know about, but that’s another story. I'll blog about Cebu’s terrible airport in a few days.
Speaking of future blog entries, I'll soon begin talking about and sharing pictures of Royal Carribean’s new Liberty of the Seas. Royal Caribbean sure knows how to impress travel agents and writers – it was a wonderful experience and everything was free. Thank you again for reading this blog. If I didn't have lots of readers I never would have gotten to experience the new Royal Caribbean ship.
May 9, 2007
Acapulco vacation experiences and comments by Sharon
I’ve read a number of the articles about various beach resorts in different parts of the world. This is what prompted me to write about one of my favorite vacation destinations, Acapulco. On my first trip there, I flew from San Antonio, Texas (my home) to Guadalajara, where I stayed two nights at El Tapatio (a quiet hotel built on a terraced hillside that I would also recommend). Leaving there it was another short flight (approximately 2 hours counting customs, etc.) to the Acapulco airport and a quick taxi ride to the Acapulco Princess Hotel, now the Fairmont Princess Hotel. The resort sits on over 400 acres with a history of its own, where Howard Hughes spent his last days virtually enclosed in the entire top floor of penthouses. With six swimming pools, one salt water, a cave and swim-up bar, tennis courts, golf course, hammocks and cabanas, the place is amazing. There’s music and entertainment every evening, daytime water activities, horseback riding on the beach, a choice of restaurants on the grounds, and a shopping arcade of boutiques featuring jewelry, artwork, glass, and clothing.
There is much to see and do, but let’s start with Los Rancheros on the hillside overlooking the bay. Grab a taxi (rates are posted at the front entrance of the Princess) to this typical Mexican style hacienda restaurant for some great nachos, a cold cerveza (Mexican beer is excellent), and an order of guacamole (avocado with lime and cilantro) for an appetizer. Then, try the beef or pork entrees, black beans, and rice, or if you happen to like fresh seafood, or shrimp (which I personally prefer), you’ll find a good selection on the menu prepared any way you like it.
From there, it’s a short, but beautiful ride on a winding road along the bay to downtown Acapulco. Here, you’ll find more of the crowds and the hustle bustle you hear about. Still, there are fascinating shops and restaurants to explore, offering every type of product and cuisine imaginable, and music to listen to from strolling guitar players and small bands in local cantinas. As in most of Mexico, food is relatively inexpensive, and the atmosphere is casual.
For the adventurous, deep sea fishing is a must. The boats are certainly not modern by any means, but the captain and his crew (at least one) are muy agradable (very friendly). The boats go out from shore about two miles into the bay, where you’ll see all sorts of fish and hopefully catch a few. If not, don’t despair, just kick back and relax in a deck chair and enjoy the ocean, the warmth of the sun, and the beauty that’s all around you.
Nighttime activities range from fine dining and soft music, with a Latin beat, an evening cruise on the bay to late night dancing at one of several discos – your choice. Take time to go to La Quebrada at the opposite end of the bay from the Princess and watch the famous cliff divers do the impossible. Check out the Convention Center schedule if you like exciting flamenco music. Or, you can always sit on the balcony of your hotel room, count the stars, and watch the moon rise above the endless tide.
Would I recommend Acapulco – indeed! Forget all the hype about being too touristy, too commercial, and too crowded. True enough, it is a very popular tourist place, with an economy that is largely based on that popularity. I’ve found this to be the case, however, in many other vacation spots. One thing is certain – the scenery is magnificent, the Sierra Madre Mountains are majestic, and the bay just has to be one of the most beautiful in the world. I have returned many times to find perhaps a few more people, a few new restaurants, and many more things to do. Yet, some things never change and Acapulco’s natural beauty remains the same.
This guest article was submitted by Sharon L. Slayton who is a regular reader and commenter here. Thank you for sharing your experiences Sharon! Anyone can submit their experiences to jtrotta@gmail.com.
April 21, 2007
Quick update on my Cebu vacation
This will be a quick update as I have to go back to my vacation / review of Plantation Bay. I do want everyone to know that my wife and I are having an excellent time. Plantation Bay is a large resort and if you count trying out all the different swimming pools, there's a lot to do here.
I mentioned in my previous post that I felt a review was necessary because there were a good number of negative reviews mixed in with the positive online. I can see both sides of the assessment fairly clearly now. The resort is beautiful and the staff is friendly. The rooms are very nice and there is more than enough to keep you busy if you don't like relaxing on vacation. There were a few issues with both the room and with the staff but nothing too serious. I'll describe them in detail when I write my review.
Many of the complaints involved price and I'll be giving lists of what we did and how much it cost. Certainly, if you're used to all inclusives and you plan on coming to Plantation Bay and not spending any money beyond the room rate you are going to leave unhappy.
I knew that we would spend money while we were here and while some people call me cheap, I am willing to spend money when it means having more fun. So we're spending a good bit of money - I don't know if I can give you much of an estimate now but in one full day we might $75 (beside the cost of the room obviously). This includes lunch, renting snorkeling stuff, a mango shake at the swim-up bar (I love swim-up bars), and a car ride to the Ayall shopping mall. We ate dinner in the mall and took a taxi back and that was a lot less expensive than the resort.
No surprise there. Please excuse any typos - I'm not using a word processor.
April 13, 2007
the French West Indies island of Saint Barthélemy, better known as St. Barts or St. Barths
Here's a fairly short article about a 4-day trip to St. Barts that the author says felt like a 7 day vacation. Luckily it wasn't actually 7 days because St. Barts is an expensive vacation destination. There are exclusive resorts (the author paid 340 Euros a night), expensive French restaurants and fancy designer shops.
To get to St. Barts, you fly into Juliana Airport in St. Maarten and then get a "puddle jumper flight" or take a ferry to St. Barts.
They said some interesting things about St. Maarten: "There’s a mountain and a steep drop to the short runway that stops just shy of the sunbathers on the adjacent beach. (One could literally hop off the plane, strip down to their swimsuit and have a refreshing Ricard in hand on the sand in a matter of minutes.)" I used to have a video of that, but YouTube removed it for a terms of use violation - I guess it was copyrighted somewhere.
I found a couple of more for you. I don't know why, but I never get tired of watching these planes so close to people on the beach. These videos do make some noise - just so you know if you're at work or something and have your speakers on.
April 5, 2007
Disney honeymoon experience, new Four Seasons Orlando, & 2007 Magic Your Way Plus Free Dining vacation package
Nicole went to Walt Disney World for her honeymoon in April 2004. She emailed this to me and wanted to share:
Florida is beautiful and not too hot then, so the weather was great. We spent 1 day at each Land, i.e. Epcot, Magic Kingdom etc. to get the full fun of them with no stress. On the last day, we spent it going to our favorite spots 1 last time... Epcot, by the way, has so many countries in it, it's like visiting them without a passport. So I COULD say I went to Japan, Italy, Germany, etc. for my honeymoon.
Then we moved on to 2 days at Universal Studios, and we took in International blvd. as well.
I highly recommend WDW for honeymoons, as you have no kids yet! You can do what YOU want! Ride what you want, shop when you want, there's no crying.... we had a great time. We stayed off property in a Day's Inn that had free shuttle service, and saved $11 daily on parking... I love that mouse.
This is me again. Read more comments on honeymooning in Disney.
By the way, for all you rich folks who think the Disney resorts are too cheap, you'll soon have a Four Season resort near Disney: "Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts will build a luxury hotel and 18-hole championship golf course along the northeast border of Walt Disney World, theme park officials said Thursday."
But I also have good news for the rest of us (the people on a budget). I read that Disney is bringing back Magic Your Way Plus Free Dining. This promotion allows tourists who book at least a four night / five day package between August 26 and September 22 to eat free on Disney property. You have to book between April 12 and June 24.