@whatisyourquest The scenery. Very beautiful. George and Amal sightings.
Ha. That’s interesting. I was actually going to ask if you saw them there.
Anyone else both miffed and intrigued by the travel postings of friends on social media?
I have a friend now who is southern Hungary and it looks just beautiful and completely uncrowded. Another one wanted to visit “Mother Africa” and so far she’s been in Ethiopia and also at the headwaters of the Nile. Chilly highlands and ancient temple sites that I’d never heard of. I wouldn’t have thought of visiting these places but they look great.
Another friend is sailing in the Greek Isles, following in the path of Odysseus. A few years ago he sailed in the Croatian isles. I asked him how they compared. He said the food is better and cheaper in the Greek Isles, but the Croatian villages are prettier. He also said that the Greek Isles are more challenging, especially with anchoring and that they had “a lot of useless people motoring about”, lol.
None of those miff me, it’s the people who went from France to Hawaii that miff me.
I have to put Croatia, Japan, New Zealand, and France during lavender season on my bucket list. I have family history in Croatia so I should get going. Would love to visit those islands off of Southern California too.
Love Italy, Ireland, the American Southwest and many other places. The Amalfi was beautiful but far too crowded for my comfort so I would never go back.
I love national parks, but I also love national historical parks. Chaco canyon comes to mind.
“He said the food is better and cheaper in the Greek Isles, but the Croatian villages are prettier.”
I added Croatia to my bucket list, based on multiple posts upthread that lauded that state. But if the food is worse and more expensive than in Greece, I’ll have to rethink visiting Croatia. I just got back from Santorini and Mykonos, and I found the food to be very good but expensive, relative to restaurant prices at home. Maybe your friend went to less “touristy” Greek isles than I did, @greenwitch .
The rainforests in Washington state.
Na Pali coast hike in Hawaii.
Oregon’s Ecola State Park (hike)
Niagra falls —very impressive! [So far these all involve water]
The buddist temples in Japan are pretty great.
Seoul is a beautiful city and very inexpensive compared to Tokyo. DMZ interesting to see but with things heating up between NK and the US, it may not be a good time to go. Still, I am very impressed with all the trekking done there and the amount of walking all the people do there. You will not see any obesity for the most part.
My backyard in mid coast Maine. I am waiting until I can live here year round. Until then, the summer will have to do.
My DD was a Peace Corps volunteer in Rwanda, and went gorilla trekking several times there. She said it was fabulous…actually beyond so. Many people choose to go to Uganda, but she says…go to Rwanda…it’s amazing.
@thumper1 …A friend of mine recently went gorilla trekking in Rwanda. She had an amazing time and it is now moving up my bucket list.
My son was also a PC volunteer in Rwanda too! Coincidently, we went to Rwanda as a family when he was 15 years old and saw the mountain gorillas. My husband has also seen them in Uganda and we have seen the lowland gorillas in Central African Republic. We feel Rwanda is a better experience, but this spring the Rwandan Government has just doubled their cost for a trekking permit. It is now $1500 per person per day! This is too bad, as I feel it will send many people to the cheaper priced Uganda. I have travelled the world, and Rwanda and the gorillas in that amazing country remain the best experience of all!
more good gorilla trekking reviews… fantastic.
bad news is I think it takes like a day to get there from the U.S.
I do have a friend in Nairobi… maybe I could work that into the vacation, lol.
What a great thread! My family loves to travel and have had the good fortune to take some great trips. We lived in South Africa number of years ago and it is on/near the top of my list of favorite places to visit.
Favorite Foreign Travel Memory: Seeing the Southern Cross for the first time from the middle of the Okavango Delta, Botswana. There was absolutely no pollution, allowing us to see the brightest stars you can imagine!! Agree with whatisyourrequest and MaineLonghorn that Kruger Park and neighboring game reserves are outstanding places to make memories and see game. There’s nothing like rounding a corner in your vehicle and seeing a mama elephant nursing her baby. (Did you know an elephant’s udder is between her front legs? --Just one thing I learned on a safari in SA!) The protective coloring of African mammals is an amazing thing to see “in action”…How can you NOT see that giraffe lunching on a treetop only a few yards from your vehicle?!
Machu Picchu was awe-inspiring for us, especially since we hadn’t done much traveling in South America. Peruvians are special people!
Favorite Domestic Memory: This is tough since we have made it a point to visit lots of our National Parks. ( I have a ‘thing’ that, someday, we won’t have these wonderful places to visit, so I insisted that we take the kids to visit them whenever we could!) Rafting the Colorado River in the bottom of the Grand Canyon is an experience I also recommend every chance I get! So amazing!! Acadia National Park and the ruggedness of the Maine coastline also made for a wonderful family memory. Yellowstone and Yosemite are must-sees in my book!
One place that hasn’t been mentioned is Mackinac Island, Michigan…Stay at the Grand Hotel and ride a bicycle built for two! (Which movie was filmed there? A wonderful love story if memory serves.)
Visit the Texas Hill Country–Austin, San Antonio and the country between the two–in late March/early April. The bluebonnets are breath-taking that time of year and are not to be missed, especially if you are a lover of wildflowers.
On my List: Pacific Northwest–Oregon and Washington, Bryce Canyon and Zion National Parks, Idaho/Salmon River… Amsterdam (preferably during tulip season), Budapest, Galapagos…
D1 was amazed when giraffe walked through their compound, right past their hut door. This was Tanzania and a shorter trip, fewer tourists.
Some of our favorite moments, when living in Bavaria, were local festivals we wouldn’t have found if on a tourist trip. Or hiking with locals. Of course, we joked that many trails end at a biergarten.
@rutgersmamma Yes, the bluebonnets and Indian paint brush (probably not culturally appropriate now, but that’s what we used to call them) are very cool in the Hill Country. From what I remember, the Texas flowers were due to a campaign by FLOTUS “Lady Bird” Johnson. The roadsides were seeded with these flowers because of her. They weren’t a Texas “thing” before that.
@lookingforward All the best hiking trails end at Biergartens! I do miss Munich.
So nice to see Ireland and Italy on many lists as I am going there for the first time.
I’m a beach person so I love Hawaii (Kauai–Waimea Canyon my favorite), I’ve enjoyed Cancun (love the Mayan ruins), Cabo San Lucas, South Florida. I live in Southern California and love Coronado, La Jolla and Laguna beaches.
Favorite cities to visit for food, people, vibe, things to do: Chicago, NYC, Boston
I went to school in Berkeley so I’ve always loved/visited San Francisco but did not like living in the Bay Area. I’ve been to Napa once for a girls weekend and found it just ok (I’m not a huge wine/winery person)
Surprise: Ithaca NY
Want to visit domestically: DC, Seattle, Austin, Nashville, the Outerbanks, bottom of Grand Canyon (been to the rim, I thought it was beautiful)
Bucket list: Greece, France, Australia & New Zealand
How did I miss this thread when it started?
Oh yeah, I was hiking the Camino de Santiago–500 miles across northern Spain. The Camino is not so much sightseeing as it is an international experience of hiking and talking with people from all over the world. It was hard. Somedays my feet hurt. But it was wonderful and filled with a feeling of community and friendship among strangers. And I feel stronger now looking back and realizing that I did it!
Still the most beautiful place in the world is the High Country of Yosemite. (Not the Valley - too crowded). The trails reached via the Tioga Road are beautiful, peaceful, eternal.
Oh,TatinG, that’s the word: eternal. Thanks. That’s the feeling that rings, in some experiences, in some places.
Some new lovely places–Glacier National Park and Waterton Lakes area in Canada are very lovely.
Florence for the artwork, architecture, history and food.
If you are taking teenagers (gamers), you can get the Enzio tour from selected tour guides also. Enzio is the main character of Assassin’s Creed 2 which is set in Florence about 1470-1500.
Oahu, driving the road along the pineapple fields heading north. You come over a small hill and then you see the ocean, the North Shore. That was always awesome. For a year, I had a view from my apartment of the Arizona memorial and Pearl Harbor. My wife, girlfriend at the time, had an apartment on the other side of the building with a 225 degree ocean view. The sacrifices I made serving my country. LOL .
Washington State anywhere with a view of the Sound. People don’t realize how close they are to the Sound sometimes. Being in the military at Fort Lewis, i had to do casualty assistance for a military widow who lived in Lakewood. I picked her up to take her to post. I took a turn that was not what she expected for the easy way to post. I told her to trust me. Followed the road and you end driving by a quarry and I knew she thought I was lost. A few minutes later she said this was her new way to post as we entered the town of Steilacoom which has an awesome view of the sound and is about 10 minutes from post.