Any Travel Plan for 2019?

[Chuckanut]

It always amuses me when I hear people say they will take escorted tours when they are older . I have been on two escorted tours and that was in my 40's . They are brutal .Up every day at 6 and touring to 7pm then dinner and bed so you can do it again. I am now 71 and there is no way that type of travel interests me .Slow travel is they way to go as you age .

I find myself agreeing. I will admit the escorted tours I have taken have been, overall, interesting and helpful. I've gone to places and had experiences I may have never found on my own.

But, the activity level can be intense. I am finding that I often prefer cafè cruising around a city. Take the bus or tram to Point A where I visit a museum or see an interesting sight. Then wander to Point B via and eclectic unplanned route, stopping often for coffee or wine and a pastry or gelato. I will pay extra to sit at a nice table with a view. I wander down streets I never heard of and poke my head into all sorts of stores. Sometimes I talk to a local or fellow tourist. Often I find great photos. When I get to Point B I take the bus or tram back to my room where I rest for a few hours. The trick is that Point B has easy access to public transportation. Later, in the early evening, it's out again to see the night lit city at a leisurely pace.

 

[braumeister]

It always amuses me when I hear people say they will take escorted tours when they are older . I have been on two escorted tours and that was in my 40's . They are brutal .Up every day at 6 and touring to 7pm then dinner and bed so you can do it again. I am now 71 and there is no way that type of travel interests me .Slow travel is they way to go as you age .

That's very true (we did that twice) but it just applies to mainstream tours.

You can find more upscale tours that have some flexibility and common sense built into them (For cruises, Tauck, Lindblad/NatGeo, and Viking (to some extent) are examples we have used, and OAT often offers some good options for land tours).

But these days we mostly tend to do what Souschef recommends. Find a good tour, then use their itinerary to craft your own version of it.

 

[Gumby]

Go to R. Crusoe & Son and get them to put together a private tour for just the two of you. That's how we did Peru - the young wife and I with our own guide and driver. They took care of us from the minute we got there until the minute we left. We had a basic itinerary, but we varied it to suit our interests and moved at our own pace. Quite expensive, but worth every penny.

 

[Souschef]

Go to R. Crusoe & Son and get them to put together a private tour for just the two of you. That's how we did Peru - the young wife and I with our own guide and driver. They took care of us from the minute we got there until the minute we left. We had a basic itinerary, but we varied it to suit our interests and moved at our own pace. Quite expensive, but worth every penny.

Great idea! We did the same thing in Cornwall, with a guide called Cornish Welcomes.
We would do one big thing each day, and a number of small tours. Our host knew all the byways to get around.

 

[Bestwifeever]

+1 on local guides and drivers (and blow that dough!). They enrich the experience and become part of the memories. Having said that, DH and I are going in the opposite direction and taking a classic group "guided tour" of Greece this spring. I'm laughing already.

 

[Souschef]

+1 on local guides and drivers (and blow that dough!). They enrich the experience and become part of the memories. Having said that, DH and I are going in the opposite direction and taking a classic group "guided tour" of Greece this spring. I'm laughing already.

We found that Tauck tours, although pricey, are worth it. You stay in first class hotels, and have choice of menu for meals.
On a recent trip to Canada, we were put up in Fairmont hotels. The tour is also more leisurely paced for an older, more affluent group

The caveats I have about bus tours are the time it takes for 40 people to get on or off a bus, and if you are at all mobility limited,like DW is, climbing or descending the steps more than 4 times a day can be difficult.

 

[NW-Bound]

I love Europe. The history, architecture and culture are fascinating. We also like the food...

I have enjoyed travel in the US and Canada the same way. Their history is quite recent compared to that of the Old Wold but still very interesting, and being American does not mean you know it all.

When visiting National Parks, we always spend a lot of time at the Visitor Centers to see the displays, and to watch any film that is shown. Of course being retired and taking month-long trips at a time means we have time to do things others cannot.

 

[NW-Bound]

+1 on that. It is bags outside at 7 AM, an the bus at 8...
DW and I have the solution, however. We look at the tours and find one that is interesting, and use their itinerary, BUT at our pace...

YES!

In our recent trip to Provence, I looked at tours to see where they took people, and one of the day tours from Marseille took people to L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue to their famous Sunday Market. And we were going to stay right inside L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue (a small island surrounded by the two branches of the River Sorgue). Son of a gun!

I juggled the itinerary so that our stay included a Sunday, and man oh man, we almost missed out. They actually have a market going all days of the week, but the Sunday Market is the Mother of them all. This Sunday Market was visited by the locals too, not just the tourists.

All this talk makes me wants to go back.

 

[MarieIG]

I booked apartments through hotels.com. The maps, reviews, cost, pics of the exact rooms I booked are there. The apartments are huge and beautiful. This is the best value for a vacation. Now I have to wait 5 months until we leave The planning is so fun! I keep picturing the cafes, castles, old world feel, historical events...the U.S. has beautiful parks and beaches but you'll never get the historical experience like this.

I hope that you will post the details of this trip. I have always wanted to go. My grandmother was from that location, but it was still under the Emperor when she left. My mother wanted her to take the two of us with her to visit when she went, but grandmother never did.

 

[travelover]

Next month we are going for a week to SW Florida just to dry out from our new PNW home.



Then in June, two weeks in Scotland with Road Scholar with a little unscheduled time on each end to explore Glasgow and Edinburgh.

 

[Scuba]

I love to walk the streets, looking into shops, seeing what food they have in grocery stores. I like to see how people live their daily life.

Recently, when we started to use Airbnb, we thought it was great to live in a real home, and see what people use for kitchen appliances and utensils.

Me too! I really don’t like all inclusive resorts unless they are beach/dive resorts on a private island.

 

[Scuba]

+1 on local guides and drivers (and blow that dough!). They enrich the experience and become part of the memories. Having said that, DH and I are going in the opposite direction and taking a classic group "guided tour" of Greece this spring. I'm laughing already.

We mostly did a self-guided stay in Greece and loved it, but one day we hired a guide and did a private tour of a goat cheese farm followed by a cooking class at an organic farm. Wonderful day!

A friend of mine does a lot of OAT tours. I wouldn’t want to try to keep up with that pace!

 

[iloveyoga]

So far in 2019, I only have two trips planned. Key West with my DH at the end of January and Disney World in December with my son, DIL, and grandkids.

 

[Nemo2]

Currently juggling....contemplating a cheap flight from Gdansk to Kiev

Booked the flight, and also what appears to be a nice little airbnb in Kiev.

https://www.airbnb.ca/rooms/13376745?location=Kiev, Ukraine&guests=1&adults=1&s=Fj72EWbi

At this point we've (tentatively) decided that we won't make any more advance plans, but will decide which way to go when we're in Kiev in the latter part of May.

 

[Teacher Terry]

We love to travel in the states as well. We do want to see more of Canada also.

 

[Sunset]

We love to travel in the states as well. We do want to see more of Canada also.

Especially as you get a 25% discount in Canada, due to the exchange rate

 

[Teacher Terry]

I didn’t know that sunset.

 

[Bestwifeever]

We found that Tauck tours, although pricey, are worth it. You stay in first class hotels, and have choice of menu for meals.
On a recent trip to Canada, we were put up in Fairmont hotels. The tour is also more leisurely paced for an older, more affluent group

The caveats I have about bus tours are the time it takes for 40 people to get on or off a bus, and if you are at all mobility limited,like DW is, climbing or descending the steps more than 4 times a day can be difficult.

We mostly did a self-guided stay in Greece and loved it, but one day we hired a guide and did a private tour of a goat cheese farm followed by a cooking class at an organic farm. Wonderful day!

A friend of mine does a lot of OAT tours. I wouldn’t want to try to keep up with that pace!

DH booked this Globus trip last summer; here’s the itinerary, which is followed by a three-night Aegean cruise; total cost including air from Chicago is $3760 for the two of us https://www.globusjourneys.com/tour/greek-escape/kga/. I didn’t even know he wanted to see Greece, and I think the okay group trip we took last spring to Ireland with relatives perhaps appealed to him with no planning on our part (vs the amazing Spain trip we took this fall with friends, after two years of DH planning an awesome itinerary down to the tiniest detail using TripMaster). I don’t ever mind being perceived as a tourist because duh, we are, and am looking forward to it and seeing it with DH. We have traveled a lot so this is just another little dancing lesson for us.

SousChef, I hear such good things about Tauck but this one likely will not come near that level.

Scuba, I told DH we can skip part of the group stuff and get a guide on our own considering this trip as is is pretty reasonable. I am sure we will be up at dawn every day!

 

[misanman]

Last night some friends asked us if we'd like to go see Ireland this summer. That's an invitation we wouldn't turn down but we might have to scramble to make arrangements. Any suggestions for tours or tour companies would be appreciated.

 

[NW-Bound]

Me too! I really don’t like all inclusive resorts unless they are beach/dive resorts on a private island.

When we were still working, we loved just to be able to get away, relax, and do very little.

But now that we are relaxing all the time in retirement, heck I have my own high-country boondock 2nd home where I can go hide from people, when I travel I like to go see new places, walk the cities, do some hiking, etc...

 

[Souschef]

DH booked this Globus trip last summer; here’s the itinerary, which is followed by a three-night Aegean cruise; total cost including air from Chicago is $3760 for the two of us https://www.globusjourneys.com/tour/greek-escape/kga/. I didn’t even know he wanted to see Greece, and I think the okay group trip we took last spring to Ireland with relatives perhaps appealed to him with no planning on our part (vs the amazing Spain trip we took this fall with friends, after two years of DH planning an awesome itinerary down to the tiniest detail using TripMaster). I don’t ever mind being perceived as a tourist because duh, we are, and am looking forward to it and seeing it with DH. We have traveled a lot so this is just another little dancing lesson for us.

SousChef, I hear such good things about Tauck but this one likely will not come near that level.

Scuba, I told DH we can skip part of the group stuff and get a guide on our own considering this trip as is is pretty reasonable. I am sure we will be up at dawn every day!

I have attached a copy of our trip story to give you an idea of what you will see,
Another company I would recommend is Odysseys Unlimited. They feature small group tours of about 20 people. I have taken tours of China and Italy with them and enjoyed both of them.

 

[Christine]

Some plans are emerging...


My mum wants me to drive my Motorhome to Britain in the summer. And I have agreed. But that is all we have planned so far.


Before that I want to be a snowbird. I usually take my Motorhome but this year I will probably try something new - drive my SUV and stay at AirBnB type places.

On these trips I usually don't plan much. I have a general idea of where to go - like Spain or Italy. The actual route and places visited emerge from local weather reports and googling for information about what is nearby.

Living in Norway I have to cross a few other countries first. Taking my time. Staying for a few days if the weather is nice. But it's winter. So if it's not I am driving further south.

 

[ohyes]

If you go to SF, try to get tickets to Beach Blanket Babylon. It is hysterical. Like SNL on steroids and no censor. We loved it

Thank you. I remembered hearing about BBB after reading your post; it is included (Day #4) on Road Scholar itinerary.

 

[gayl]

We just got back from a Hawaiian cruise. Our story is attached.

The other thing about being elite is the loyalty OBC! I spend it all and the wine prices don't bother me when comped

 

[grasshopper]

Some plans are emerging...


My mum wants me to drive my Motorhome to Britain in the summer. And I have agreed. But that is all we have planned so far.

And I just learned to call them caravans.