seryn

How do you decide where to vacation? What inspires you?

Sure we all save up for those big-ticket trips, the kinds of things everyone's heard of like "taking the kids to Disney World" or going to non-Waikiki Hawaii. Some of us know of popular places nearby, Californians go to Yosemite, midwesterners go to Branson (supposedly, it didn't become popular enough for me to hear of it until after I'd left the area), and everywhere has their little escapes.

How do you decide where to go when you're taking more than a "weekend" away?

Honestly, if I've never been somewhere, how do I know I'll like it? For me my experience depends on things going smoothly and the food being good and me not having to walk too far every day. But I want there to be something to do other than lounging in my hotel room or going out to eat. Everywhere has stuff you can do, but some of it isn't so exciting. We stayed in the middle of nowhere California for a weekend last fall and I got a lot of knitting done because there wasn't anything else to do after I'd spent a half an hour looking through the shops in town. (I bought a jar of pickled Brussels sprouts.) We really don't feel any pressing desire to go back there.

We had a really nice time when we went to Toronto. We love Vancouver (although I think we won't stay downtown next time.) Portland OR was fun (haven't been to Maine) and they have great public transit so it's a cheap trip for us (we waited for airfare sale and didn't need to rent a car). We didn't really like Seattle because there didn't seem to be anything to do once you'd seen their permanent farmers market thing, but we weren't there long enough to branch out from downtown.

We've been to Dallas (family obligation). New Orleans (family obligation and we're NEVER going back there, it's a hellhole and was even before Katrina.) Chicago (family obligation). Kansas City (family obligation). I've been to North Carolina for several family obligations. And I'm sure these places have something good to do, but we don't really enjoy visiting those places even incognito. Chicago and Kansas City are better than NC by far, just because the food is better and there's fewer stereotypical "rednecks".

We haven't been to NYC or Boston, but every time we meet people from there they look at my shoes and try to kiss me, so the idea of going there purposefully appalls me. I've been to Florida and it was okay 30 years ago, but eh.

I was browsing on Oyster.com today (They were the people who helped me settle on a hotel in Hawaii... before then I knew we weren't going because all the hotels looked the same from here and I knew I'd get screwed if I chose randomly or based on price.) And they have a new section on Costa Rica. The AAA sent an email advertising a special on Tahiti. (You know you've picked something expensive if Tahiti is cheaper than Hawaii!)

I want to go somewhere clement, intellectually stimulating, with excellent food, and easy-access to activities. I saw a commercial for Citibank where the guy used his credit card reward points to go to Rock and Roll Camp. That's not my chosen activity, but that's the kind of thing I think would be fun. I've seen some for gourmet cooking, but Simon doesn't want to do that.

I found a Saori weaving teacher whose studio is in a beach town on the central coast (California) and they have a number of B&Bs and restaurants in town. So I could go and do something (theoretically) fun and Simon could read a book or shop for used books or whatever. Which wouldn't be a bad choice for a weekend type thing. But we're looking for something bigger. Something to plan ahead so when things are finally good here, there's a reward. It's meant to be something to anticipate as well.

But I can afford to spend the money now. I've had the Hawaii money saved for 2 years. I could also consider it as saved Las Vegas money. Or going to Mexico money. ($5K, $1K, $2K size trips.) So we could go to Tahiti using the AAA sale. Costa Rica is within reach. We have passports. I can pack my underwear in a carry on bag and let the "girls" "swing low, sweet chariot" so going through airport security might not be ridiculously traumatic. (It's best if you don't have an underwire bra at my local airport. Because the metal detectors go off and then they want to pat you down... which is was already overly invasive before they expanded the search procedure to force people to use the overpriced death machines they call "body scanners".)

I wouldn't mind going next month either, if that worked out. But I'm kind of shopping for October because people who travel in June/July/August really shouldn't complain about children being around and I would prefer not to have to put up with that kind of rambunctiousness when I can't even justifiably whinge.

We like nice hotels. We like small hotels and B&Bs that are also nice. There needs to be breakfast available and the coffee can't suck. I'd kind of like there to be a bar or wine on-site because Simon doesn't drive and doesn't drink and I might enjoy a cocktail on my vacation. But mostly we want to stay somewhere nice. Oh, and if it's a B&B, I'm not keen on clawfoot tubs. I'm really short and those tub rims are really high. I might be more athletic than a year ago, but I'm more limbo than high jump.

posting via phone, so please forgive errors and lamenesses.

We went out for the "weekend". We got lost on our way. Even with directions, there are still roads with the same rte number that both head off to the left but which go complely different places, without any labels.There was one sign saying Bakersfield # miles Sacramento # miles. On the same sign going the same way. And no, one wasn't 24 thousand-ish miles.

We went out to see some touristy stuff toay and I knew when we were going the wrong way because we were back at the sign indicating a transporter beam is available.

I had polenta for dinner last night that was fabulous. Breakfast was only okay. But I got what I wanted, someone else made the coffee.

Didn't sleep well. Have read none of my book, and gotten no knitting done. This will post whenever weLre back in civilization enough that there is ambient wifi, since there is no phone signal out here where people listen to country music win public.

I figured I should think about where I might like to go on vacation. This is a good year to travel. Many things are on special. There is the woe of flying anywhere due to the Touch Someone Again staff and the inevitable public molestation.

I want to go to Maui. I want to take the sunrise bike tour that goes down the volcano and stops for breakfast afterward (bikes are taken up by truck). I want to see the lava flows from a helicopter and snorkle with sea turtles. I want my hotel to include breakfast and have a view of something other than the parking lot. I want to be able to find lovely dinner places that the locals eat at. What stops me from doing this, all the hotels look exactly the same from here and they all are on these giant plantation-sized resort grounds so you just know there will be miles and miles of walking between your room and anything. Plus they charge for parking and hide the "because you're staying here" resort fees and energy fees, so your room is going to cost probably $100 more per night than they say it does. All the stuff I want to do costs extra and a lot of extra.

I want to go and see Machu Picchu, but it's hard to get there and the amount of hiking requires a level of foot health I don't think I have. Plus people visiting it are destroying it so there is this massive guilt for even wanting to see it. It can be very expensive if you go with a tour, though supposedly most of those things can be bought locally for a fraction of the cost. My Spanish is not up to that.

I would love to visit the Galapagos and see the giant tortoises in person. That was the most disappointing thing about the San Diego Zoo... the way they painted numbers on their tortoises like they weren't important enough to actually care about their individuality or appearance. Most of the Galapagos trips are ludicrously expensive. Supposedly it's because there were increased fees for accessing the delicate islands, but it doesn't appear that the fare increases were really passed along.

National parks are having a free week in late April. Including the Grand Canyon. I think that might be neat to see... a lot of these things are much more impressive in person than one would suspect. Like Mount Rushmore, which seems kind of stupid, it's astonishing when you're actually there and it's actually not fogged in and you can actually get up close to the rail and have an unimpeded view. But some of the big deal things weren't all that impressive in person; Yosemite rather sucks. We went on the lowest gate day they had had in 10 years and there were people everywhere. Three mile hikes had people moving in a queue like lines for the good rides at Disneyland. I liked Yellowstone, but Old Faithful was kind of a disappointment compared to the mud cauldrons which had no one else watching them.

It's a good time for us to travel. We're old enough that something unexpected might happen and we might die before we do any of this stuff, so we should start now. But it's a lot of work to pick a where and find enough places to eat that it won't seem like a wasted trip even if the destined attraction is disappointing. Often by the time I have sufficiently researched potential locations I'm mentally exhausted and have no interest in actually going.

We had 3 months in which to book a weekend trip 2 hours from here and the deal expired before we went. It didn't sell out, it expired, we could have called them the morning of the last day and gone but did not.

I came up with a travel idea. Because of the network page, so that's not all bad.

Cave hotel. The one I saw was in Italy. Ewwwww.

So I searched to see where else there were cave hotels. Spain, France (Provence), Turkey, some underground stuff in Australia, a mine in Sweden, a fake cave in NM, and a $1k/night place in remote Arkansas.

It just sounds amazing. To be somewhere where there were tons and tons of solid rock between me and the world. You'd never be able to hear the highway or helicopters hovering over a crash. There wouldn't be gunshots. No one with a screaming baby would ever go there.

I think I should just buy a cave and retrofit it. I'd put in a tower room that could get internet and TV and phone.

Of course there could be negatives. Cave spiders. Seepage. Vitamin D deficiency would be rampant. Gas mileage for 4WD vehicles really sucks.

Not to mention the fact that there aren't many caves for sale outside Bedrock.