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An easy one for me. For my daughter's high school graduation, we took her to Poland to meet family she had never met and to spend time with her grandmother, who we knew would not be with us much longer. Their reunion alone was worth the price. They had not seen each other since she was in grade school. We had a wonderful time sightseeing and spending time with cousins and other family. The best time ever was sitting in an outdoor cafe in Krakow, sharing a beer in the The Old Town which is known in Polish as Stare Miasto (translates to City Center).Adam's home town Przeemsyl (pronounced Shem-ish)
Before going to Poland, we stopped in Sweden to visit an Aunt and Uncle. There was a wedding there of one of her cousins. We were the only Americans there, and we were treated like royalty, given a place of honor in seating. After the wedding, we took a day trip to Copenhagen before leaving for Poland.
Wow, that's great! I like doing stuff, going to cities, museums, historic houses, and learning something. I have no interest in lying around on a beach and not much in hiking remote areas.
I've always had some conflict with my husband in that my idea is "We're on vacation, we should be doing stuff that we planned" and his is "we're on vacation, we can sleep in and do things on the spur of the moment."
I read on planes or trains since I can't sleep anyway. I do like to be able to read sometimes on vacation, and ebooks are great for that.
Favourite vacation is a tough contest, but if I'm pushed to pick only one, it would be Patagonia - both Chile and Argentina
Andaluzia ad Paris [multiple times] would round up top three
I'm a sight-seer, including day long trekking and capital cities on foot. always carry books with me, especially now that I switched from paper to e-ink and tablet. I like to go off-script or off-track and discover something that was not in the original planning.
I don't know if I have a favorite book about a vacation, but there is the Roman Holiday movie that I tried to retrace on my visit to Rome. I also remember carrying the first three thick volumes of Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan in my backpack during a hiking trip in the Alpes Provencales. I think I finished at least two of them before climbing down.
Algernon (Darth Anyan) wrote: "Favourite vacation is a tough contest, but if I'm pushed to pick only one, it would be Patagonia - both Chile and ArgentinaMy husband belongs to a Welsh-American choir that went to Patagonia some years ago. The Welsh who had moved to the US and Canada were assimilating and losing their language so some decided to start a new colony in Patagonia. As usual, it was advertised as a paradise but it is actually very dry and windy, and the first people only survived through the help of the indigenous people. There is still a Welsh culture in certain towns which otherwise speak only Spanish.
Andaluzia a.d Paris [multiple times] would round up top three
I..."
Robin P wrote: "Algernon (Darth Anyan) wrote: "Favourite vacation is a tough contest, but if I'm pushed to pick only one, it would be Patagonia - both Chile and ArgentinaMy husband belongs to a Welsh-American ch..."
I have found a very strong Croatian presence in Punta Arenas, one of the few actual cities in the Strait of Magellan. The windy and dry part I can confirm, also the emptiness of the landscape, very sparsely populated
Well, I've travelled A LOT! Started back when I spent a Junior Year Semester studying in Paris and I made sure to see much of Europe then. Haven't stopped and in fact have finally been spending recent years seeing more of the US which I'd neglected. You have all heard some of my stories already. I'll try to come up with a few new ones while answering Jason's questions. What is your favorite vacation you have ever taken?
There isn't just one, not by a long shot. I think though I'll float one of the top trips - Visiting Russia for my 40th Birthday (we won't discuss just how long ago that was at this point). The impetus was to take a trip somewhere with friends to see an art exhibit that we would not otherwise see, as a special nod to an important birthday. This was triggered by the historic Hermitage exhibition of the stolen in WWII and kept hidden Impressionist paintings which it only revealed it had in the mid-1990s. That led to 3 friends joining me for a week trip to St. Petersberg, with a couple days in Moscow to see the Kremlin, Red Square, etc. It truly was a fantastic, incredibly memorable trip, and not too many years after Russia opened up -- it's far more closed now - Boris Yeltsin was the Russian President at that time. It was one fantastic, fascinating trip with many high points. One of the best was on the last night we were in Russia, in Moscow. Our hotel was just a block or two up the street from Red Square. We had been taken there during the day as part of the tour we had booked, but one of my friends and I decided we needed to go back and experience it that night. Off we went, walking, or rather limping (we had serious hurting 'tourist feet'), those couple of blocks and found ourselves in Red Square which is transformed at night. Or at least it was back then. Of couse there were the lighted buildings - St. Basil's Basilica, the Kermlin, cultural ones like the Mariensky Theater, and Lenin's Tomb. But the real magic was that it was not foreign tourists, as during the day. It was all families from all over Russia on vacation seeing the sights, showing them to their children. We had quite an interesting conversation with a WWII veteran -- he was a mere boy in the Russian Army at the end of WWII -- who was supplementing his pension by selling tourist trinkets. That was a far more impressive viewing of Red Square than the excellent guided tour we had been on.
I of course now wonder if under Putin, such an experience would even be possible. It certainly would not have been during most of my life.
Are you a sight see-er or do you prefer to do nothing and relax?
Huge on sightseeing - making my own way, taking walking tours, an occasional paid tour -- such as to see the Harem section of the Topkapi Palace in Istanbul, you have to pay to take the guided tour. I love historic sites, museums, historic house museums, walking the streets and looking at architecture, going to markets especially food ones, even things like EuroDisney (yes I've been), visiting the monuments and all the sites. I also like trying different foods and restaurants, wandering bookstores (even if a language I don't know), and taking in cultural events like ballet, opera, concerts. I've hiked -- nothing overly taxing too.
Doing nothing is not in my nature.
Do you like new experiences on vacation, or is that a risk to ruin a vacation?
The more new experiences the better. However, when I vacation in places I've visited many times, like Paris, London or Washington DC for example, there's a generous collection of favorites in the mix as well. Paris - first thing I do is wander over to say hello to Notre Dame. In London it's connect with friends living there. In DC it's heading to Lincoln and Vietname Memorials.
Do you read on vacation? If so, do you only do light reading?
I always read, just as I do when not on vacation - just less of it (because I'm also reading guidebooks and articles about places I'm planning to see) - and also taking a needlework project. Not only is there the travel time itself for reading and stitching, but the only way to properly experience parks for example is to settle on a bench for a while and for me reading. I also read while waiting on line at the ATM, or to go up the Eiffel Tower, and before I go to sleep at night. Back in the day when there were no ebooks or tablets to read ebooks on, I'd take genre fiction paperbacks that I would leave behind as I finished them and always light reading, often with settings matching where I am. I remember take the Blue Train to the Riviera once and finished Agatha Christie's mystery set on the Blue Train just as we pulled into Nice. I left it on the train.
What is your favorite book that included a vacation?
Hmmm - I think it has to be Missing Susan by Sharyn McCrumb - it's main charater is on a tour of England, and in London it includes a Jack the Ripper Tour, and since it's a murder mystery, a murder occurs. When my younger sister and I were in London for her 40th birthday, one of the must do's was to take the Jack the Ripper Tour. We loved it and still talk about it.
Joanne wrote: "An easy one for me. For my daughter's high school graduation, we took her to Poland to meet family she had never met and to spend time with her grandmother, who we knew would not be with us much lo..."Love, love, love this one! How amazing a trip.
I don't have favourites and have travelled, but honestly, I'd say that if I look at them as categories, the summer weeks we spent on the boat going up and down the inlets (aka fjords) are right up there as a child and teen. There's something so relaxing to be on a boat in waters that aren't going to get dangerous--the scenery was second to none, fishing, hiking, going to places most people don't get to go to, digging for clams on the beach, swimming in the salt chuck, rowing in the dinghy, staying in closed logging camps--simple things but so lovely and fabulous. The second favourite is probably when we went to Hawaii to stay with friends for a week when I was 8. I've done some travelling as an adult to various places and some of those have been a great deal of fun, but this is what I'd have to say (plus, no real responsibilities--no kids to watch, bills to pay, etc)None of these photos do justice to the beauty of the area.
We used to have to wait for the tiny window when it was safe to travel through these rapids (all the tidal water for one of these inlets moves in and out of it) --even the middle isn't safe for most boats.
We did fancier things growing up (ski trips, etc) and and I've done things as an adult that sound more glamorous, but this is still what I'd pick.
And I grew up here, so what compares? ☺️And yet, I'd never move back.
This is my "neighbourhood" but there weren't as many houses there then as it's been growing quickly all of my life:
That part missing all of the trees is the gravel pit run by the First Nations group there (they're wealthy from that plus leasing land and many other things they've done--it's the highest level of quality for gravel)
Here's one of the beaches where we took swim lessons plus went to go swimming (no barnacles, no sand so it was a favourite with many mothers)
I think my favorite has to be our trip to Vietnam about 20 years ago. We did this entirely on our own - no guided tour - and spent three weeks exploring the country beginning in Hanoi and working our way south to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh city). On the last full day in country, we hired a car and driver to take us to the village where Richard was wounded during the war. Very moving experience. I'm a sight-seer ... museums, shops, markets, parks, historic sites, etc. But I also like a couple of days of doing nothing and just relaxing. We occasionally book a week in a cabin up north where we spend most of the days just sitting around reading (me) or perhaps fishing (Richard). Neither of us is big on beaches and water sports, so a couple of days every few years is enough for us.
New experiences - yes ... though health concerns limit the possibilities these days.
And I ALWAYS have something to read (or listen to). I'll take my Mp3 player, my tablet for e-reading, and one or two paperbacks that I can leave behind for someone else to enjoy.
The only book including a vacation that comes to mind is The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim
Right now I am reading the Amalfi Curse, which I have to say... A book is further enriched when you have been there. Almost 20 years ago, maybe 18, my husband and I took a six-eight day trip... A night (or two) on either end in Paris, and four days on the Amalfi coast. We stayed in Positano, the setting of the book, and drove through some of the other towns on one of the days, Ravello being our favorite. We drove in a Smart Car, when it came out for the very first time. it was exhilirating. The trip was so memorable. Positano is one of those rare cities you never forget. it is an absolute pleasure to revisit it through this book.
My favorite vacation was actually a disaster but one of those that you look back and love. For my graduation, my sister bought me tickets to see my favorite comedian live in Atlanta. To set the scene, I had never left South Georgia without my parents and my sister had never left South Georgia without her husband or my parents. But we took this adventure together. We printed off directions on MapQuest and started off all wrong which set the tone for the whole trip.
We started our trip to Atlanta from Albany, and the directions read to travel west. Neither of us knew directional directions or how to read signs apparently. We had a 50/50 chance, right? We chose wrong. It wasn't a big deal but added a lot of time to our travel. Went to Atlanta via Columbus, Georgia instead of through Macon.
So, we get to Atlanta, still trying to follow MapQuest directions that we never started following. Neither of us understand I-75, I85, I-285, so the exit numbers are jumping all around and we are confused. We miss our exit, my sister is driving, we get off, turn around in a parking lot, and my sister hit a curb while hitting me during our banter. We get back on the interstate and we hear bomp, bomp, bomp, bomp. Tire is flat. I tell my sister to pull over, but she is not willing to on the interstate, so she rides down to the next exit. The exit ramp leads to a busy street and then a red light with no parking lots nearby. People are pointing to us cause the tire is smoking and you can smell burnt rubber.
We finally get pulled over. At this point in my life, I have never changed a tire. My sister didn't know where her jack was. She remembered she forgot to cancel AAA like her husband asked. So we wait an hour and a half for AAA. I am glad I didn't attempt to change the tire because of the lug nuts were a locking lug nut. I didn't even know what that was. Luckly, the AAA guy was a real man and showed us where the jack and lug nut key was.
Back on the road we go. We get to our hotel. We decide we have time to each lunch, come back to the room, rest some more, and then head to the show. We are staying in Buckhead, north of Atlanta. We head down Peachtree Street. Well, it's a both direction road, which then hits a one way (going the wrong way for us) and then turns back into two-way street. MapQuest don't tell you this. We are confused. We find our restaurant. I have a wonderful club sandwich. We write a haiku about our meal. I don't remember it, but it was something about it tasting just like heaven with a touch of sin.
Back to the hotel we go. The comedy show is at The Tabernacle on Luckie Street. I will never forget it. We find a Luckie Street in a semi residential area. We stop and ask for directions. Never ask a local for directions. You leave just as confused if not more. We find the Aquarium in Atlanta 100 times, which is on Luckie St. Finally, we are driving past the Fox Theatre, we are nearly late, my sister takes a turn, hits a curb, and busts a tire. We pull into a parking lot. She calls her husband in tears, begging him to come get us. I walk and look at a street sign......we are on Luckie St and The Tabernacle is two blocks away. I can't make this up. My brother-in-law finally convinces my sister he is 3 hrs away cannot come get us. I calm her down. I pay for the parking in the lot we are in and convince her to let's go to the show and have a good time. And we do. We missed the first 10 minutes but we had a great time.
We come out of the show and notice the parking lot we paid for is only good until 6 a.m. We are not getting up that early to come pay again. We drive the car on the rim across the street to a parking garage, hitch a cab, my first ever. This cab smelled bad and kept running into road work and having to back track. I think it was on purpose. Anyway, a $50 cab ride back to the hotel, we walk to a bar called Fuzzie's and get something to eat.
I tell my sister we have to call our stepbrother, who in our mind lives in Atlanta. We didn't know Lithonia is not Atlanta. He never comes to Atlanta. Also, my sister and him do not get along. I make the call and tell him what happened. Of course, he's offended we didn't stay with him or tell him we were coming. Any way, he comes picks us up at the hotel in the morning and takes us to the car so we can get the tire off (I know how to do that after watching the AAA guy) take it to a Walmart and get a new tire. Well, my brother-in-law cannot find Luckie Street. We spend hours driving around Atlanta. He is on the phone with his wife, she's on the computer, trying to give us directions. It's terrible. Finally, we find it, get the tire, spend forever trying to find a Walmart. Coming from South Georgia, I thought they were everywhere. Well, not in Atlanta. My sister buys a tire, and my stepbrother takes us back to the car. Much easier this time. He departs and we continue our vacation.
I tell my sister she isn't allowed to drive anymore. We decide to go to a Braves game. Now, my sister is out of money after buying the tire. I do much better driving although I do turn the wrong way down a one-way street (years later, I turn down the same street going the wrong way). The only tickets available to the Braves game is standing room only. I buy them and think we will find some empty seats. In the stadium, there are many empty seats. We go to the outfield and sit down. An usher comes over and asks to see our tickets. She tells us we can't sit there. My young, rude, cocky self offers her $100 per seat if she goes away and leaves us alone. Of course, she won't. We buy tickets to the indoor Hall of Fame museum at Turner Field and watch the rest of the game on TV in the air conditioning. Braves lost to the Boston Red Sox.
Then we went home. And this is still my favorite vacation. I had a wonderful time with my sister.
I am now a master at directions using only N, E, S, W. I can change a tire and change oil and all that other stuff. But at 18, I was lost.
The next day, after we got home, the yard man at my sister's work shot a rock through the back window of her car. She called me crying again.
I laughed and just love your story, Jason! The best travel memories are stories like those.
Jason, that is the making of a novel right there! So funny! And what an unforgettable time with your sister
What a great story! This could win you a prize or a spot on the Moth Story Hour (storytelling competition)
Jason, what a wonderful misadventure.Does your sister remember it that fondly?
I also loved hearing your story about the trip. It sounds like that was incredibly special time with you and your sister that you will both never forget.
Booknblues wrote: "Jason, what a wonderful misadventure.Does your sister remember it that fondly?"
Yes, my sister enjoyed the trip as well. We are really close, and it just made us closer.
Jason ... loved your story!I also have had a couple of memorable vacations with my brother. I took him when I won a trip to Hong Kong (and my husband had already been there twice that year for business and didn't want to go again). And then when he turned 60 he wanted a weekend in NYC and we met up there and had a blast.
That was a great story. Jason. Thanks for sharing it.
Jason wrote: "My favorite vacation was actually a disaster but one of those that you look back and love. For my graduation, my sister bought me tickets to see my favorite comedian live in Atlanta. To set the s..."
What a great story! The follies of youth, but at least you had a great time overall.
I would never go on a holiday with any of my siblings with the exception of the most easy-going one (adopted, what can I say? He was an easy child for my mother to raise and raised four easy children--nothing wrong with that! Not that he's perfect, mind you.)
Why? My sister and her husband enjoy holidays that involve intense physical activity--long days hiking difficult hikes, cycling trips, places like Club Med where they do the physical stuff all day. I like to walk, but not that much!
One of my brothers likes cruises, which are not my cup of tea. My youngest brother also likes different holidays than I do. Plus even though he's politically liberal as the day is long, he's entitled (not my word for him, but when I heard applied to him last summer, it fit perfectly.)
But the middle of my three brothers (second youngest) and I have enough things we'd like to do on a holiday in common we could have made it work if we weren't 6 years apart when we were still single--he was in university forever minus a gap year, getting a PhD, and by then we were both married with a child. He had his second living child during his post-doc (they lost their first at birth.)
Play Book Tag
Books mentioned in this topic
The Enchanted April (other topics)Missing Susan (other topics)
Authors mentioned in this topic
Elizabeth von Arnim (other topics)Sharyn McCrumb (other topics)
Are you a sight see-er or do you prefer to do nothing and relax?
Do you like new experiences on vacation, or is that a risk to ruin a vacation?
Do you read on vacation? If so, do you only do light reading?
What is your favorite book that included a vacation?