World travel

[infection]

This is somewhat of a silly question. At some point, my wife and I will hit Antarctica. We don't anticipate this will be for quite some time, however, because of the amount of time it would take and having kids at home and such. By extension of that, we'd only need to see Australia for all 7 continents, which is more of a novelty, I'll admit. We'll hit New Zealand at some point for sure. It's harder to make a compelling reason to have Australia higher up on the list. No offense to the Aussies, and part of posting this to maybe get a bit more info. I'd actually love to visit Australia. But with its distance and cost, there are so many places that would be high on our list, so it's no specific slight to down under. Looking at it, though, the only continent that my wife and I have been to that our kids haven't is Africa, and between places like Egypt, Morocco or Tanzania that are definitely on our "opportunistic" list, where we'd jump on it if we found a good deal. My oldest is 16 and a half and our youngest turns 7 in two weeks. Antarctica would be a huge PITA to take a family (or even to not take a family) but hypothetically, it would seem cool to me when I'm on my death bed to be able to look back and know we'd been together as a family on all continents. That last one would obviously be something we'd have to wait until a number of them are probably well into adulthood (which if they have families of their own may make it more complicated). Anyhow, this very hypothetical idea would require us to get our kids to Australia without a huge compelling reason. Fiji Airways often runs pretty decent deals periodically on flights, and they have a similar "stop-over" program like Iceland Air does. Fiji with AirBnb and food prices overall is quite cheap, much cheaper than many other alternatives in terms of a tropical vacation. So the question becomes, if one goes to Fiji, and you're already that close to Australia, would it be stupid to tack on a very short stay (2-3 days) where you're likely in Sydney, Brisbane or Melbourne, or is that just trying to be too cute and just be more relaxed and save the money in Fiji. My brain definitely tells me the latter but my heart is looking for justification of the former.

 

[Rubashov]

This is somewhat of a silly question. At some point, my wife and I will hit Antarctica. We don't anticipate this will be for quite some time, however, because of the amount of time it would take and having kids at home and such. By extension of that, we'd only need to see Australia for all 7 continents, which is more of a novelty, I'll admit. We'll hit New Zealand at some point for sure. It's harder to make a compelling reason to have Australia higher up on the list. No offense to the Aussies, and part of posting this to maybe get a bit more info. I'd actually love to visit Australia. But with its distance and cost, there are so many places that would be high on our list, so it's no specific slight to down under. Looking at it, though, the only continent that my wife and I have been to that our kids haven't is Africa, and between places like Egypt, Morocco or Tanzania that are definitely on our "opportunistic" list, where we'd jump on it if we found a good deal. My oldest is 16 and a half and our youngest turns 7 in two weeks. Antarctica would be a huge PITA to take a family (or even to not take a family) but hypothetically, it would seem cool to me when I'm on my death bed to be able to look back and know we'd been together as a family on all continents. That last one would obviously be something we'd have to wait until a number of them are probably well into adulthood (which if they have families of their own may make it more complicated). Anyhow, this very hypothetical idea would require us to get our kids to Australia without a huge compelling reason. Fiji Airways often runs pretty decent deals periodically on flights, and they have a similar "stop-over" program like Iceland Air does. Fiji with AirBnb and food prices overall is quite cheap, much cheaper than many other alternatives in terms of a tropical vacation. So the question becomes, if one goes to Fiji, and you're already that close to Australia, would it be stupid to tack on a very short stay (2-3 days) where you're likely in Sydney, Brisbane or Melbourne, or is that just trying to be too cute and just be more relaxed and save the money in Fiji. My brain definitely tells me the latter but my heart is looking for justification of the former.

A mate of mine just got back from Fiji, its not that cheap is you're staying in resorts, which I would recommend, they've got some significant social issues in the countryside at the moment.

The flight from Fiji is not long 4 or 5 hours. Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane are all fun for a weekend, three very different vibes, Melbourne is culture and food, Sydney is the harbour and beaches, Brisbane is the weather and nightlife. (I have the inside news that Melbourne may soon have its own Disneyland, Disney has recently bought a significant site in the docklands region and is buying apartments in the area, they are either building an amusement park or a studio, my word is its a park.) and the flights shouldn't be too taxing, I think Qantas and United fly direct to LA from Sydney.

I would do Australasia in 6 weeks, 2 weeks in NZ driving North to South, 4 weeks in Australia, start in Melbourne, do 3 or 4 days of sight seeing in Melbourne, get your timing right and you can take in an AFL game at the G, visit the goldfields, then drive the great ocean road to Adelaide, visit Hahndorf and the Barossa Valley, then either fly or drive to to Alice Springs (Alice Springs can be pretty dodgy at night) check out Uluru. From there fly to Sydney, again 3 or 4 days to take in the sights. From there fly to Byron Bay, rent a car and drive to Brisbane via the Gold Coast, somewhere along that drive you will find somewhere to take in a great barrier reef tour. And maybe finish off with a few days rest in the Whitsundays before you head home. Also if you have the time squeeze in a visit to Tasmania, Hobart is a cool little city.

 

[infection]

A mate of mine just got back from Fiji, its not that cheap is you're staying in resorts, which I would recommend, they've got some significant social issues in the countryside at the moment.

The flight from Fiji is not long 4 or 5 hours. Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane are all fun for a weekend, three very different vibes, Melbourne is culture and food, Sydney is the harbour and beaches, Brisbane is the weather and nightlife. (I have the inside news that Melbourne may soon have its own Disneyland, Disney has recently bought a significant site in the docklands region and is buying apartments in the area, they are either building an amusement park or a studio, my word is its a park.) and the flights shouldn't be too taxing, I think Qantas and United fly direct to LA from Sydney.

I would do Australasia in 6 weeks, 2 weeks in NZ driving North to South, 4 weeks in Australia, start in Melbourne, do 3 or 4 days of sight seeing in Melbourne, get your timing right and you can take in an AFL game at the G, visit the goldfields, then drive the great ocean road to Adelaide, visit Hahndorf and the Barossa Valley, then either fly or drive to to Alice Springs (Alice Springs can be pretty dodgy at night) check out Uluru. From there fly to Sydney, again 3 or 4 days to take in the sights. From there fly to Byron Bay, rent a car and drive to Brisbane via the Gold Coast, somewhere along that drive you will find somewhere to take in a great barrier reef tour. And maybe finish off with a few days rest in the Whitsundays before you head home. Also if you have the time squeeze in a visit to Tasmania, Hobart is a cool little city.

I definitely don't have weeks to be there. Because of the nature of my work, like 10 days is pushing it on how long I can be gone. This fall I'll be gone for over two weeks which will be interesting, but yeah it's typically 7-10 days. A Fiji/Australia would have to come in at under 14 days... maybe right on it depending on weekends. Who knows.

 

[Rubashov]

I definitely don't have weeks to be there. Because of the nature of my work, like 10 days is pushing it on how long I can be gone. This fall I'll be gone for over two weeks which will be interesting, but yeah it's typically 7-10 days. A Fiji/Australia would have to come in at under 14 days... maybe right on it depending on weekends. Who knows.

I don't think I'd be prepared to spend two days sitting on a plane for two weeks here, cause at the end of the day its not enough and you'll end up killing yourself trying to squeeze as much in as possible to make it worthwhile. I got the travel bug off my folks and we would do short holidays when i was young locally, you know everyone in the van and we'd drive to Adelaide or Sydney or would holiday in our state. As i got older and we had a bit more money our first big OS holiday was to the US and Canada in 91. I was 8 years old and it is still is one of the best holidays I've been on. Seeing Topol on Broadway do Fiddler on the Roof for my parents 10th wedding anniversary, Niagara falls, Disneyland and Disneyworld, the first time seeing the Smithsonian, the national parks on the west coast, the lights of Vegas. I can still remember it now.

That basically became the model for our family holidays, every 2 or 3 years we'd take generally 3 months and go to Europe or the US and see as much as we could. We'd also see and stay with family in Europe (and they'd stay with us when they'd come here) my parents attitude was if you're going all that way you might as well stay for a while. We'd also do short trips in the off years to Malaysia or Thailand or New Zealand for a week or two, later in life my parents loved going on cruises. (I hate them I feel like its a floating prison.) Their template has basically become mine, I tend to like long holidays 2 to 3 months, I suppose the difference is where I go and why. I tend to combine my tourism with watching sport and taking in somewhat different sights to my folks, (I don't do churches) but i do museums, galleries, battlefields historical sights, I also don't do organised tours, I prefer to do it at my own at my own speed, if I like a place I can stay there for an extra couple of hours or days and explore. As a family we used to do bus tours and they were great the guides were great and knowledgeable and you'd take an awful lot in in a short time but you're attached to their schedule and I always kinda hated that.

I've seen adds here for the Antarctic cruises, they're about 15k which seems reasonable. I really want to do the Canada and Alaska cruise, mostly because my folks always wanted to do it and weren't able to because of ill health.

 

[infection]

Catching up a little bit here... going back to last fall, took a couple weekend trips. We had never been to the Grand Canyon before so we spent a night in a "tiny home" that's south of the entrance. On the way down, we passed through Zion really quick, as it had been like 17 years since we had last been there. We'll have to go back but I'm not sure on the timing because all we ever hear about are all the crowds. We went there in the evening and went in from the east side so it wasn't as packed as it normally would be.



We spent the night in Page and the next morning caught X Canyon, which is part of Antelope Canyon but is not as often visited. We had bought tickets in the afternoon for one of the Antelope Canyons (upper, maybe?) but there was going to be a storm so they cancelled all the afternoon ones.

Spent a day in Grand Canyon National Park. Did a little bit of trail walking and rode the bus along the way. Had fun and saw the sights. When we passed by the lodge, in the back of my mind I had thought it was from Vacation, which it was.



Returned back through Page again and had bought tickets to, I believe, Lower Antelope Canyon, which was awesome.





It was shortly after this that my son had had his motorcycle accident and we were in limbo for quite a while. The next month over Thanksgiving we ended up doing another short trip. My wife and I went to Cabo for our honeymoon and since forever I've been trying to get her to go to Tijuana. She was agreeable to go but it just never worked out. We drove down and spent the night, before heading up to Disneyland for a day. It was interesting crossing the border without any kind of passport check. We rented a place that was up on the hill south of town and had a great view of the city. The next morning we drove by the temple.



We were originally going to the main area to do some shopping or sight-seeing but then realized how absolutely massive the traffic line was to get back in to the US and so we scratched that. They had the taco carts out in the traffic while we waited and the best tacos we had while we were there came from that. On the way back, we stopped at the beach at Coronado and my youngest son (8 at the time) told me, "Dad, how come we didn't eat Mexican food while we were in Mexico?!" I informed that we had for dinner the night before, we ate a bunch of tacos and other things. He then said, "no, not like that... like Mi Ranchito!" I got a good laugh out of that.

It had been about 6 years or so since we'd been to Disneyland so our youngest two definitely didn't remember it and it was fairly iffy on if our third kid had remembered anything. We hadn't been since they did the Star Wars land and my youngest son is obsessed with Star Wars. I also had been waiting because Splash Mountain has forever been synonymous with Disneyland for me and going while that would be closed would not be appropriate, so we were able to time it when they had just re-opened as Tiana's Bayou Adventure. What we didn't know, though, is that the tickets were on some kind of lottery and you'd have to log in to the app in the morning at a specific time and you may or may not get tickets, and there was no stand-by line. We had everyone with a phone do the same thing and initially we thought we missed out and I was going to be pissed if we had planned this whole trip around making sure we could ride that and come away not being able to. Anyhow, somehow I saw the reservation in my app so we were able to get those. The crowd was quite manageable as we went on a low-time after Thanksgiving. It was ridiculous seeing them under-fill the ride and having many logs going down with 2-3 people on it. I wonder how many people could have actually ridden that that wanted to but because of how dumb they were doing it (it opened to stand-by I think like 2 weeks later). Anyway, we rode the two new Star Wars rides which were fun. It's also funny because my wife hasn't been a huge fan of Disneyland, I think mostly because of the crowds and also because she's been pregnant a couple times we've gone, but she absolutely loved it this time and I think she was surprised by that. This was the first time we had all of our kids tall enough to ride all the rides, so we got to do everything together.




I also thought it’d be cool since the logs hold 7 people and since this was the only time we’d ever been on the ride all together since everyone was tall enough, that the picture would be great, but you can’t see my oldest son behind me and my wife and daughter are scrunched together in the back barely pictured. Oh well.



On the way back, we stopped in Vegas at Lindo Michoacan, which we had discovered a month earlier when my two older sons and my dad drove down for a concert. That place is unbelievable.

 

[Ron Mexico]

I just got back from Laos and it is a beaitful country. Its a little sleepy but I think a lot of people enjoy that for vacation. People are pretty nice and relaxed. I would definitley recommend it. It seems very safe as well at least where I went. I still prefer Cambodia but they both have their perks.

I went to Singapore last month. Oof that country is not for me. If you love luxury shopping and high end restaurants thats the place for you. It does not have much character and everything is stupidly expensive. But it is really nice as far as infastructure and such and clean.

I went to Bali 2 months ago. It was really amazing views and really nice things to do. But it is crazy over crowded and traffic is a nightmare. I would probably go back but its lower on my list now.

Heading to Vietnam next month and probably Thailand the month after. I have not been to either. I expect to like Vietnam and not like Thailand as much based on what many people have told me, but I am sure both will be enjoyable.

Gotta love living anywhere in South East Asia though. Its super cheap (besides singapore) and easy to get around to the area.

 

[fishonjazz]

I just got back from Laos and it is a beaitful country. Its a little sleepy but I think a lot of people enjoy that for vacation. People are pretty nice and relaxed. I would definitley recommend it. It seems very safe as well at least where I went. I still prefer Cambodia but they both have their perks.

I went to Singapore last month. Oof that country is not for me. If you love luxury shopping and high end restaurants thats the place for you. It does not have much character and everything is stupidly expensive. But it is really nice as far as infastructure and such and clean.

I went to Bali 2 months ago. It was really amazing views and really nice things to do. But it is crazy over crowded and traffic is a nightmare. I would probably go back but its lower on my list now.

Heading to Vietnam next month and probably Thailand the month after. I have not been to either. I expect to like Vietnam and not like Thailand as much based on what many people have told me, but I am sure both will be enjoyable.

Gotta love living anywhere in South East Asia though. Its super cheap (besides singapore) and easy to get around to the area.

Can you speak the languages of these places in asia or do they speak English? Or is your wife able to translate?

Sent from my OPD2203 using Tapatalk

 

[Rubashov]

Can you speak the languages of these places in asia or do they speak English? Or is your wife able to translate?

Sent from my OPD2203 using Tapatalk

Dunno bout Laos but everywhere else Ron mentions you'll get by pretty easily with English.

 

[infection]

I just got back from Laos and it is a beaitful country. Its a little sleepy but I think a lot of people enjoy that for vacation. People are pretty nice and relaxed. I would definitley recommend it. It seems very safe as well at least where I went. I still prefer Cambodia but they both have their perks.

I went to Singapore last month. Oof that country is not for me. If you love luxury shopping and high end restaurants thats the place for you. It does not have much character and everything is stupidly expensive. But it is really nice as far as infastructure and such and clean.

I went to Bali 2 months ago. It was really amazing views and really nice things to do. But it is crazy over crowded and traffic is a nightmare. I would probably go back but its lower on my list now.

Heading to Vietnam next month and probably Thailand the month after. I have not been to either. I expect to like Vietnam and not like Thailand as much based on what many people have told me, but I am sure both will be enjoyable.

Gotta love living anywhere in South East Asia though. Its super cheap (besides singapore) and easy to get around to the area.

Lol I was about to bump this because I've been working on a couple posts and I'm a year behind. I've got more time over this weekend so should get it up.

I've had the concerns about Singapore, as it's so small and seems like there's little culture outside of the big city stuff. Definitely plan on seeing it one day but it would have to be a 1-2 day stop-over when we're really going somewhere else in SE Asia. Laos has a lot of pretty landscapes I'd like to see. But in Thailand try to see Khao Sok. That's the one place that we ended up not being able to make it to that I think may have been the best place. Sounds like there are very few people there and the views are incredible.

Would have also loved to see Chiang Mai but we went during the burning season and so didn't make it. Sounds like it's less congested up there, too.

ETA: Post some pictures of your trips.

 

[infection]

I figure I'm going to go out of order here and do this one because it's Christmas. We'll see about getting a couple others later this week.

My wife has always talked about going to Christmas markets in Europe as she's always wanted to go. I was up for it but with having 5 kids, it's not the best time to get away and seemed like it would be something we'd do at some point in the future when the kids were older or out of the house. There's typically an idea that when you're flying somewhere far away, you need to go for a longer period of time to make it worth it. Since we're pretty accustomed to jet lag and also hit the ground running pretty hard, we ultimately wised up to this erroneous idea and decided to slip away during a brief window of time that equated to an extended weekend. We booked a flight to Prague, Czech Republic. We had initially intended to just stay in Prague. I ended up looking at renting a car because of how cheap it was, that it'd be easier to get to and from the airport, and preserved our ability to see something else. I had looked at the map and had seen Dresden, which is where the oldest Christmas market is in Germany. I had also seen that we were about 3.5 hours from Wroclaw, Poland. There wasn't much fanfare about a Christmas market there but it was supposed to be less busy and actually looked pretty good from what I could see on Youtube. So with our limited time, we were thinking we'd only choose to do one other location. Ultimately we decided to do both. We wake up super early on vacation (when it's just us) and hit the road and stay out way late, so we always end up being able to see things in 1/3 or less of the time than what's always recommended (we totally destroyed the entire island this year that I'll post about later).

Anyhow, we landed in Prague and our first afternoon and evening was trying to figure out WTF to park. There was a mall parking garage that I had planned to use, but there was some guy out there waving people away and not letting them in, despite it saying that there's room. We circled around a few times and tried to ask questions where we were supposed to park but they weren't helpful. It took us quite a while to figure out parking. There were some places on the street that you could park that we eventually did, but the app would only let you do an hour at a time. We ended up parking in a private lot but it required having cash only. We got checked in and went out to the market that first night. It was crazy busy so we did very little other than just seeing things. Below is my wife with the huge crowds of people in the middle of Old Town.



This next picture is from the town square with one of the churches. To the left is the Astronomical Clock, which I think is the oldest one in the world. This setting is really crazy. It honestly looks fake, like you're at Universal Studios or Disneyland or something, or like you're on a movie set. It's crazy to think it's real.



The next day we got up pretty early and drove up toward Dresden. About 40 minutes outside of Dresden we stopped at the Freiberg LDS temple.



It may not be the most spectacular one aesthetically but it may have the most unique history of any LDS temple, at least politically, as it was not specifically proposed by the LDS church to put a temple here but the idea had arisen by the communist East Germany government who was otherwise having to approve visas for members to travel to Switzerland. Instead of doing that, they suggested a temple be build within their borders.

Walking to the Dresden market we apparently found Wurst Kuche.



The Dresden market was probably the best one for getting crafts and souvenirs.


We climbed to the top of the church to get a top view.



We then drove about 4.5 hours or so over to Wroclaw, Poland, where we were going to stay the night. Despite not much publicity surrounding this market, I think we both agreed that it was the best for the absolute market. Prague was the best for the setting within the city. Dresden was the best for traditional gifts.





Does anyone remember this popcorn? I saw this in Poland and hadn't thought of it since I last saw it at some point in the 90s.



Our AirBnb was above one of the squares from the market and we got an absolutely incredible sunrise the next day.








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[infection]

Reached my maximum of attachable pictures so continuing with the sunrise...



We then returned back to Prague for the last two nights. We drove through some mountainous areas of Poland where we went through numerous small areas that were interesting. Right across the Czech border there was a place that had these really tall and cool rock formations that was fun. We ended up eating McDonald's somewhere along the way, which was the most similar to US McDonald's. Europe all has a pretty generic McDonald's taste, with their nuggets being similar to the US but definitely different. I wouldn't have known that about the Czech McDonald's if I had been blinded to its location. That said, the best international McDonald's we've ever eaten has been in Spain and Thailand. Not because of unique menu items, just with how good the food was (the same food we'd get in the US.... just better).

We climbed up to the top of the Astronomical Clock tower for a view over the city and market. This picture isn't of the main square area. I believe my wife has that photo, but has a different view of the city.



We then walked across the river and up the hill to Prague Castle, where there historically had been a Christmas market but apparently not then...



We came back across Charles Bridge, a pedestrian bridge. It's really cool but these pictures don't fully capture it.





Another view of the church during the day.



Flying over Greenland never disappoints. I'd love to do a fjord cruise there.



Bonus: we've flown in and out of Paris CDG numerous times (not a huge fan of connecting there) but finally ended up in the terminal where U2's "Beatiful Day" video was shot, so I took some pictures while we were waiting for our delayed flight:

(From the video)


From my roll:



Overall, Prague was amazing. It's such a surreal setting with the architecture. The skyline is probably the best one we've seen in Europe. It's all over between the old town, the castle on the hill, and the bridge(s) that you have a wildly unique view everywhere, it's not just one single shot of the skyline.

 

[fishonjazz]

I figure I'm going to go out of order here and do this one because it's Christmas. We'll see about getting a couple others later this week.

My wife has always talked about going to Christmas markets in Europe as she's always wanted to go. I was up for it but with having 5 kids, it's not the best time to get away and seemed like it would be something we'd do at some point in the future when the kids were older or out of the house. There's typically an idea that when you're flying somewhere far away, you need to go for a longer period of time to make it worth it. Since we're pretty accustomed to jet lag and also hit the ground running pretty hard, we ultimately wised up to this erroneous idea and decided to slip away during a brief window of time that equated to an extended weekend. We booked a flight to Prague, Czech Republic. We had initially intended to just stay in Prague. I ended up looking at renting a car because of how cheap it was, that it'd be easier to get to and from the airport, and preserved our ability to see something else. I had looked at the map and had seen Dresden, which is where the oldest Christmas market is in Germany. I had also seen that we were about 3.5 hours from Wroclaw, Poland. There wasn't much fanfare about a Christmas market there but it was supposed to be less busy and actually looked pretty good from what I could see on Youtube. So with our limited time, we were thinking we'd only choose to do one other location. Ultimately we decided to do both. We wake up super early on vacation (when it's just us) and hit the road and stay out way late, so we always end up being able to see things in 1/3 or less of the time than what's always recommended (we totally destroyed the entire island this year that I'll post about later).

Anyhow, we landed in Prague and our first afternoon and evening was trying to figure out WTF to park. There was a mall parking garage that I had planned to use, but there was some guy out there waving people away and not letting them in, despite it saying that there's room. We circled around a few times and tried to ask questions where we were supposed to park but they weren't helpful. It took us quite a while to figure out parking. There were some places on the street that you could park that we eventually did, but the app would only let you do an hour at a time. We ended up parking in a private lot but it required having cash only. We got checked in and went out to the market that first night. It was crazy busy so we did very little other than just seeing things. Below is my wife with the huge crowds of people in the middle of Old Town.

View attachment 19741

This next picture is from the town square with one of the churches. To the left is the Astronomical Clock, which I think is the oldest one in the world. This setting is really crazy. It honestly looks fake, like you're at Universal Studios or Disneyland or something, or like you're on a movie set. It's crazy to think it's real.

View attachment 19742

The next day we got up pretty early and drove up toward Dresden. About 40 minutes outside of Dresden we stopped at the Freiberg LDS temple.

View attachment 19743

It may not be the most spectacular one aesthetically but it may have the most unique history of any LDS temple, at least politically, as it was not specifically proposed by the LDS church to put a temple here but the idea had arisen by the communist East Germany government who was otherwise having to approve visas for members to travel to Switzerland. Instead of doing that, they suggested a temple be build within their borders.

Walking to the Dresden market we apparently found Wurst Kuche.

View attachment 19744

The Dresden market was probably the best one for getting crafts and souvenirs.
View attachment 19745

We climbed to the top of the church to get a top view.

View attachment 19746

We then drove about 4.5 hours or so over to Wroclaw, Poland, where we were going to stay the night. Despite not much publicity surrounding this market, I think we both agreed that it was the best for the absolute market. Prague was the best for the setting within the city. Dresden was the best for traditional gifts.

View attachment 19747

View attachment 19748

Does anyone remember this popcorn? I saw this in Poland and hadn't thought of it since I last saw it at some point in the 90s.

View attachment 19749

Our AirBnb was above one of the squares from the market and we got an absolutely incredible sunrise the next day.

View attachment 19750






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You two are a cute couple. I would do both of you (kidding of course but you are both attractive)