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Posted: Thu Oct 12, 2006 7:55 pm
by Vonny
I travelled to Singapore from Amsterdam with Garuda Indonesia. I was delayed over 12 hours at Schiphol because a bird got in the engine :roll: Then for some reason or another we over flew Singapore and landed in Jakarta. We got straight off that plane and onto another and flew back to Singapore. Not the best journey I ever had. No one spoke English either so I didn't have a clue what was going on - I was only 20 and on my own as well.

Posted: Fri Oct 13, 2006 9:32 am
by Richard Ruck
Great Plum wrote:Got to East Africa - it's breathtaking...
You should write travel brochures, Plum.

"Visit Antarctica - it can get a bit nippy" or "Visit Luxembourg - it's completely landlocked!"............

Posted: Fri Oct 13, 2006 10:29 am
by Great Plum
I know... I was going to write something longer but then I had to work...

Posted: Wed Oct 18, 2006 10:57 pm
by Hannoir
Do go on! I want to hear about Africa. Actually, wouldnt mind seeing pics :D

Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2006 12:15 am
by DavebytheSea
Richard Ruck wrote:
Great Plum wrote:Got to East Africa - it's breathtaking...
You should write travel brochures, Plum.

"Visit Antarctica - it can get a bit nippy" or "Visit Luxembourg - it's completely landlocked!"............
Cruise the Atlantic and see the sea.

Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2006 11:35 am
by Richard Ruck
Talking of Africa, how about Malawi, a country that's in the news at the moment, thanks to Madonna and her baby-shopping excursion?

It has just about everything you could want to see - stunning scenery, lots of wildlife, friendly locals, Lake Malawi, the Rift Valley.

It's an impoverished place, even by African standards, so could use a few tourist pounds / euros etc.

I visited friends there about 14 years ago, and absolutely loved the place.

Posted: Thu Oct 19, 2006 2:12 pm
by Euterpe13
For those horrified by 'orrible airline stories :

every time I've travelled to SEA , I've gone with Cathay Pacific ( one trip travelled/ country hopped with them for 3 weeks ) and have always been treated like a princess, even in cattle class. Their ground staff are awesomely efficient too. Wouldn't even look at another airline these days.

To balance, over the long week-end of 11-15th October, it took Easyjet just over 12 hours to get us from Barcelona to Liverpool....

B.

Posted: Fri Oct 20, 2006 4:33 pm
by Hannoir
Yeah I've heard that Cathay are good too, but thanks for the heads up. Maybe I'll try flying with them sometime.

Posted: Fri Oct 20, 2006 5:32 pm
by Ferenc
Did it just happen to me, or have Ryanair just started charging for booking by card (which is all that you can do over the internet!)?

I booked a flight with them about two weeks ago, which had (as usual) no booking fee, but when I booked one last weekend, suddenly I had to pay £7 just to book it. I think it can be both more and less than that as well depending on what kind of card you have.

Anyway, this is such a brilliant conversation topic that I don't want to ruin it by talking about something as boring as card payments.....

My personal favourite place has to be Scanidinavia. Love Sweden and Finland, but Norway most of all because of its spectacular scenery. The Nordic languages (not Finnish) are very easy to learn too, even if languages aren't your forte. The great thing is that with the knowledge of only one language from Swedish, Norwegian or Danish, you can effortlessly get by in the other two countries as well! Would love to see Iceland one day, anyone been there?

The USA is just marvellous too - as someone mentioned earlier, it's so big you don't know where to start (then you learn that Canada is twice as big!). I haven't seen much of the USA but I loved Oregon and Washington (state), across Idaho, Montana and the Dakotas. Many people think of America as packed and dense in population but it's a little-known fact that it's actually one of the more sparsely populated countries in the world - especially in the plains states like MT, KS, NE etc. Places like Montana - three times the size of the UK, with less population than Brighton. Why is why there are so many beautiful and empty areas, free from the tourist routes, to explore. Has anyone been to Yellowstone?

Posted: Fri Oct 20, 2006 7:56 pm
by jhopgood
I'm afraid that since 1970 I have lived abroad rather than travelled, so it is difficult to say which was best since each had it's charm

Central America

I have lived and worked in Guatemala, El Salvador and Costa Rica. Costa Rica was reputed to be the Switzerland of Central America and certainly was both beautiful and safe. However it is now getting the modern insecurity malaise and for one who used to go everywhere without worrying, it has lost a lot of its charm. El Salvador was interesting but small and the guerrilla movement was just starting so it got a little hairy. The old Mercedes buses I travelled on all had rust holes in the floor so you had to be careful where you sat. But my Central American favorite must be Guatemala, mountains, volcanoes, lakes, beaches, Mayan Indians, Mayan and Spanish Colonial ruins, etc. If it weren't for the appalling security problem I'd probably be living there now.
I also hitch hiked to Panama, got stuck there during the US invasion, and went on the bus from Costa Rica to Miami.
I lived in Cali and Bogota in Colombia, but the security was a major problem.
Amsterdam is a great place and very few people worry about what you get up to, so it is pretty relaxed. They say you work in Rotterdam, live in the Hague and play in Amsterdam. Very true, but the weather is pretty poor. In our last year we had 10 days when it didn't rain.
Madrid was great, although not so much now as the traffic can easily go into grid lock.
Buenos Aires was fantastic, a 24 hour city, traffic jams at all hours of the day and night, pretty safe although getting worse, lots going on, the greatest beef in the world and some of the best wine, a great place to live on an expat salary.
Argentina is huge and flat. It has some very interesting things to see, glaciers at Perito Moreno, waterfalls at Iguazu, Bariloche in the Andes. Despite their reputation, the Argentines are great people. However, they go through an economic crisis every 10 years where you can become a pauper overnight or make a fortune. Also, it takes for ever to get anywhere unless you fly, in which case you see very little.
My son lives in the north of Sweden, which is remote and you have to get used to going without sun for quite some time.
So I live in Valencia, a city that almost works, has pretty good weather, paellas, argentine restaurants, beaches, is getting onto the international circuit (Bruce Springsteen is playing there tomorrow) and has some pretty relaxed people. It also has Ryanair and EasyJet.
In the end, you have to live in a place to get the feel for it and decide how it suits your lifestyle. There are interesting places and people all over the world.

Posted: Fri Oct 20, 2006 9:27 pm
by Hannoir
Wow, all of that is great, thanks :)

I reckon theres definately something to be said for living somewhere over just travelling through. You get to know somewhere, make good friends, adopt the customs and sometimes in the accent, and when you leave (if you leave) you know that you can go back to visit to see friends and cherish memories.
Whenever I go back to the place I lived in in the US I feel something good, even though I didn't have some of the best memories. But when I go back I still have a fair few friends to see and spend time with. And the same goes for NZ, even though I havent been back yet.

Posted: Sat Oct 21, 2006 10:22 pm
by englishangel
There is a great piece about iceland intoday's Indy magazine, it sounds lovely.

Posted: Sun Oct 22, 2006 10:01 pm
by matthew
Mmm, Iceland.

I spent a few days in Reykjavik back when Go still flew there (and before Go were absorbed by the queasy lot). Flights and hotel were cheap; doing anything once you're there, not so much.

Keflavik airport is some way out of town, so you get to see some of the countryside around the city on the way in. It's quite beautiful, and really feels as though you're on another planet.

Reykjavik itself is a curious place. The older parts of town have a Scandinavian feel to them, but elsewhere the place seems almost North American.
Ferenc wrote:I booked a flight with [Ryanair] about two weeks ago, which had (as usual) no booking fee, but when I booked one last weekend, suddenly I had to pay £7 just to book it. I think it can be both more and less than that as well depending on what kind of card you have.
IIRC, some of the low-cost outfits charge a fee for using a credit card, but nothing (or much less) if you use debit instead.

Posted: Thu May 31, 2007 6:49 pm
by Zob
I had a fantastic time in Iceland when I visited over 10 years ago. The best thing about the place though is the people. They really know how to party and speak english better than us.

I also love the Nevada desert and its only a couple hundred miles from where I live. Any OBs planning to go to Burning Man this year? http://www.burningman.com/ I have met many interesting and varied people there over the years but never an old blue.

Posted: Sun Jun 24, 2007 8:49 pm
by graham
Ferenc wrote: Has anyone been to Yellowstone?
Yes, I went last year (when this question was posted!!)

It's an awesome place. Kinda feels like you're on safari. I remember driving into the park on the first day I was there. A coyote ran across the road, right in front on me. That isn't so strange as I see them all the time here. Then, 5 minutes later, I see an adult male moose in the middle of a pond, feeding on water plants. It was amazing! Huge herds of bison and pronghorn everywhere. I saw grizzlies in the distance, but no wolves.

A colleague of mine actually works in Yellowstone on the wolf reintroduction project. Hopefully, I'll be getting to join in on that as part of my own research. It's such an amazing place.