Any Travel Plan for 2019?

[Sunset]

Google flights or kayak are pretty good, but some discount carriers may be missing. Travel forums for the specific area can usually help.

Looks like more reading is in order. Since some airlines don't allow aggregators to offer their flights I'll probably just have to be content with what I find.

 

[tulak]

I'm in the throes of planning a trip in the Spring of 2020.

Either Japan, or Athens Greece, or Transatlantic cruise combined with Mediterranean cruise.

One issue is, I've never booked a flight from 1 country to the other, example Athens to Czech Republic, so I don't even know if Expedia or what to use , since here in the USA I book directly with AA/United/Delta.

What do folks do/use ?

Check out Google Flights. SmartWings or CSA are based out of Prague, so I would check with them too. I also like flying EasyJet in Europe, but they might not have connections between Athens/Prague.

 

[Nemo2]

. I also like flying EasyJet in Europe, but they might not have connections between Athens/Prague.

I think, but I'm mentally vague at the moment, that Lufthansa does too.

 

[NW-Bound]

...
We're flying 5/25/2019 with our 7 year old granddaughter to Madrid, taking a bus to Granada to see Alhambra. Then we're flying to Barcelona before taking a fast train to Paris.

We now try to take in two unfamiliar cities on our trips, and finish in one city we've been to before. Trouble is we've been to most cities before.

We really enjoyed the Alhambra Palace and its garden, the Alcazaba Fortress, and the Generalife Garden. Entrance to the Alhambra Palace required advanced reservation that I bought online a few months before the trip. I almost missed the chance to see it.

This reservation system limits admission and makes the experience more enjoyable, compared to the Pena Palace in Sintra, Portugal. The latter made people spend hours in a queue, which we avoided by driving from Lisbon, leaving at 6AM, and getting there before the gate opened. We beat all the people who took public transportation to get there from Lisbon.

Otherwise, for us the visit to Pena would not be worth the several hours standing in line. On the other hand, the visit to the undervisited Monserrate Palace in Sintra was a lot more relaxing because there was no mob.

 

[tulak]

I think, but I'm mentally vague at the moment, that Lufthansa does too.

Lufthansa is German based. Another airline to try is Aegean. Also, keep in mind these airlines might not have daily flights and/or sometimes fly out of secondary airports, which can be closer to tourist destinations, especially for Greece.

 

[brett]

There are many smaller airlines in Europe that service cities that the majors do not. Or service them at more convenient times, days, etc.

Apart from googling discount airlines in Europe ( and you can get this by country they serve or where they are based) we use Skyscanner, Google, MatrixIT On every trip it seams that we learn of an airline we did not know existed.

Last trip it was Air Malta. Before that Vueling, Pegaus, etc. We are doing some planning now and it seems that Transavia and Voletea have the direct fligts in Europe that we need. Never heard of either of them before.

 

[Nemo2]

Lufthansa is German based.

No kidding?

 

[brett]

scuba...we tend to travel in shoulder season but sometimes we cannot avoid prime time. This fall we are looking at a late Sept/Oct trip to either Greece and Isreal or Portugal/Spain Morocco. If it turns out to be the latter it will be an Oct/Nov trip. Depends some family issues and what fares are available to where when we book in August.

In wintertime we travel to avoid the snow. Either SE Asia or Central America. Prime time but the only issue we have to be aware of in the Asia is Lunar New Year. We have only done cruises in Caribbean so have no idea about accommodations. Never, ever had a problem to find accommodations one, two, three days in advance. A few times on the day of when we have decided at the last moment to move on.

We did two weeks of independent travel between Playa and Puerto Morales, Mexico last Oct/Nov. Enjoyed it immensely. Great weather, no crowds, finding accommodation was a snap. Just ordered a Mexico travel book. Thinking of a winter trip at some point where up or down the Pacific coast of Mexico for a month in the winter and then go to Costa Rica/Panama for a month. High season everywhere be not it would seem, dificult to get reasonable accommodation 2 or three nights in advance. DW is not so sure about Thailand again for this coming winter so I am researching some alternatives.

 

[Chuckanut]

This reservation system limits admission and makes the experience more enjoyable, compared to the Pena Palace in Sintra, Portugal. The latter made people spend hours in a queue, which we avoided by driving from Lisbon, leaving at 6AM, and getting there before the gate opened. We beat all the people who took public transportation to get there from Lisbon.

.

I had one day, a Saturday, to visit the Pena Palace. I took an early train. I followed the Rick Steves guidebook advice, and skipped taking the public bus. I hired a Tuk-Tuk to take me to the gates, bypassing the crowds that had already formed at the bus stop near the train station. Best 5 euros I spent on that trip. I was in the first few dozen to enter the palace and got may fine photographs without having to fight the crowds. Two hours later the place was absolutely mobbed. I had lunch at the palace café, and then headed back down using the trails through the lovely forest garden that was not crowded at all.

FWIW, the ride in a very old Tuk Tuk up the bumpy road was grueling. I thought my kidneys were going to end up in my throat. Hire a more modern Tuk-Tuk that has a spring suspension if you can.

 

[Scusan]

Month (or so) long solo fly fishing boondoggle in the US West. Living mostly out of a 7x7 tent. I'll depart in a mid-late June and return by August. I'll know some places I'm staying in advance and will figure some out on the fly, which is probably good for me. Also will take in the Folk Fest in Butte, MT.

I've been doing this a couple years now. It's always interesting to "watch myself" as I go through the planning and preparation and then actually get out there and do it. Things that used to be important and take up time are not so critical, and vice-versa.

Met an interesting guy on my trip 3-4 years ago that would do well on the forum here...mid 60s, living off S/Sec and a $300/mo pension, he spent 4-5 months fishing in the West living in a cot with an integral tent over it and another 4-5 months in the winter fishing in Argentina driving a motorbike that he'd buy after he got there. Not everyone's cup of tea, I realize, but it's cool to meet folks who have designed a life that works fine for them that might not fit completely "in the box".

 

[Teacher Terry]

We usually book 6-12 months in advance. We avoid Europe in the summer as it’s too crowded. We did once go 2 weeks after booking because my son found cheap tickets to Poland and the 4 of us went.

 

[NW-Bound]

I had one day, a Saturday, to visit the Pena Palace. I took an early train. I followed the Rick Steves guidebook advice, and skipped taking the public bus. I hired a Tuk-Tuk to take me to the gates, bypassing the crowds that had already formed at the bus stop near the train station. Best 5 euros I spent on that trip. I was in the first few dozen to enter the palace and got may fine photographs without having to fight the crowds. Two hours later the place was absolutely mobbed. I had lunch at the palace café, and then headed back down using the trails through the lovely forest garden that was not crowded at all.

FWIW, the ride in a very old Tuk Tuk up the bumpy road was grueling. I thought my kidneys were going to end up in my throat. Hire a more modern Tuk-Tuk that has a spring suspension if you can.

Prior to the trip, I spent a bit of time studying how to get from Lisbon to Pena Palace. Every guide book said to not drive, and to take the train from Lisbon to Sintra, then Bus 434 from downtown Sintra up the hill to Pena.

But in researching further, I saw that there were travelers who were able to drive from Lisbon, and then using Google StreetView extensively to study the route, I saw that there were parking lots on the hill, and very close to the Palace. Hence, I made the decision to drive. I suspected setting out early in the morning was the key, and that proved to be crucial.

Not knowing how bad the traffic would be around Lisbon during morning rush hour, I started out early at 6AM. At the Pena car parking lot just a couple of hundred feet from the Palace Gate, I was the 3rd car there. The parking was even free.

We hanged around for 1 hour before the Palace workers even showed up. The one thing I failed to do was to purchase online tickets, so I had to purchase tickets at the booth before entering. In just those few minutes, a few hundred people with advanced tickets already got past the Palace gate and were queuing up inside. What for? It turned out that it was to take a bus up the hill from the gate to the Palace. We skipped that and walked up the hill ourselves.

Another thing we did wrong was to linger too long on the terraces and balconies of the Palace to take photos. We did not realize that to enter the interior rooms, there was a line quickly forming, and this line cost us something like 30 minutes of waiting.

On the way out, I saw lines snaking everywhere. It would take easily 3 hours to go from the gate to the Palace interior. Driving back into town, I saw lines for the 434 bus as you mentioned.

Aye, aye, aye... All that waiting in lines would not be worth it to me, but I told my wife that if we already committed a day trip from Lisbon to Sintra we would have just toughed it out, not knowing what was ahead and how long it would take. People just waited and waited, and I told my wife I was tempted to shout to them that they should just abandon the Pena Palace and go somewhere not so mobbed. It was not really worth it. My wife agreed.

Anyway, another reason to drive the car was that so I could go elsewhere in the same day. It was tough finding a parking spot in town once we drove out of the Pena parking lot, but Monserrate a few miles out-of-town was deserted and such a joy to visit with its extensive garden. We ended the day with a drive to Boca da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe.

If Pena Palace was that crowded in late April, I would have to be paid big bucks to visit it in June-August. How big? It has got to be many tens of thousand. Even then, I may not do it.


PS. By the way, April 25th was a big holiday in Portugal, the so-called Carnation Revolution. And May 1st was Labor Day. Perhaps many Portuguese took this occasion for an early vacation, hence the foot traffic was so bad. Would it die out the next week? I would not know.


PPS. On this trip, we never encountered crowds as those at Sintra again, until the end of the trip when we got to Barcelona. This being the 2nd time we were in Barcelona, I don't think we ever want to go back there. Even Barcelona residents had enough with tourists, and wanted some measures to limit them.

 

[Sunset]

We really enjoyed the Alhambra Palace and its garden, the Alcazaba Fortress, and the Generalife Garden. Entrance to the Alhambra Palace required advanced reservation that I bought online a few months before the trip. I almost missed the chance to see it.

This reservation system limits admission and makes the experience more enjoyable, compared to the Pena Palace in Sintra, Portugal..... .

Are you meaning that even months before it was nearly sold out
or your schedule almost made you miss it ??

ps - GREAT travel tips by the way !!

 

[Lsbcal]

NWB you have way more patience than I have. I try to avoid the crowded ares of touring but not always successful. I think we need an app similar to a weather app which forecasts tourist traffic.

 

[NW-Bound]

Are you meaning that even months before it was nearly sold out
or your schedule almost made you miss it ??

ps - GREAT travel tips by the way !!

I had planned for a 3-night stay in Granada, as the Alhambra was something I really wanted to see. The Palace interior was what required advanced reservation, and not the palace ground and gardens. Even if one fails to get reservation for the interior, the rest is still worthwhile to see, and nowhere as crowded as Pena on the days of our visit.

The reservation is for a specific time slot, and for a specific day. Hence, I waited for my itinerary to firm up before I booked online. And that was when I found out that there were only a few slots left, and on the last day of my stay in Granada. Wow, that was close! And I booked 2 months in advance, for a visit in early May.

Because admission to the palace interior is limited, you do not have people hustling and standing elbow-to-elbow like at Pena. Either you get to visit it or you don't, but you do not afterward say thst the experience is not worth the horrible hassle.

 

[YVRRocketSurgery]

I'm in the throes of planning a trip in the Spring of 2020.

Either Japan, or Athens Greece, or Transatlantic cruise combined with Mediterranean cruise.

One issue is, I've never booked a flight from 1 country to the other, example Athens to Czech Republic, so I don't even know if Expedia or what to use , since here in the USA I book directly with AA/United/Delta.

What do folks do/use ?

As others have mentioned, we use Google Flights, Kayak, and Expedia to do initial base searches.
We also use Wikitravel to search on a particular city. In the "Get in" section, it typically provides a general synopsis of the airlines that fly into the city, nearby airports, train options, ferry/ship options, etc.
In Wikipedia, we'll pull up the page on Low Cost Carriers page to identify if any LCC's are based out of a particular country and then go to their websites to get more info on routes and schedules.

 

[NW-Bound]

NWB you have way more patience than I have. I try to avoid the crowded ares of touring but not always successful. I think we need an app similar to a weather app which forecasts tourist traffic.

I do not mind spending hours hiking in the open space, or just walking around city streets observing life in foreign land, but I have a strong aversion to just standing in a line surrounded by a mob. It's such a waste of my time.

There is just no palace, no famous painting or statue, no attraction that is worth standing in such a line for 2 or 3 hours to me.

I don't think my feeling about this is all that unique or rare.

PS. OK, I will stand in a long line to wait to see a true alien from outer space, but that is it.

 

[W2R]

PS. OK, I will stand in a long line to wait to see a true alien from outer space, but that is it.

Well good luck with THAT....

And if you do ever get a chance to stand in a long line to see a true alien from outer space, I hope the alien doesn't have some terrible disease that is contagious to humans. It might be prudent to keep one's distance and just look at video footage of the alien on youtube, instead.

 

[NW-Bound]

I was talking about looking at an alien, not shaking hand with him. And he would be most likely dead from a spaceship crash.

I am sure that if the government let us see a dead alien, the body would be safely placed behind layers of glass for isolation.

 

[Ronstar]

I’m looking into taking a photo taking trip somewhere for sometime in June or July. Don’t know where yet.

 

[Chuckanut]

FWIW, if your are visiting Krakow and wish to see the Schindler Museum, get your tickets 3-4 weeks ahead of time. I would get them months earlier during high season.

 

[imnontrad]

Well, so far, my travel has been to see my mother and then attend her memorial service 2 weeks later.
A ~ 1 week trip to camp at the Grand Canyon will be in July. there will be at least one week of camping trips this summer in Colorado but still being planned.
But a ~4 week trip to Portugal/Spain to walk the El Camino Portuguese is September/October timeframe.
Then for fun, I thought I'd go to the Bogleheads conference in Philadephia in mid October.
Then skiing season begins in November and I plan to ski enough that I have more confidence on the Colorado slopes (just started back after 25 years away).
I'm thinking of Chapala/Ajijic, Mexico in March 2020 to decide if I want to be a snowbird in a few years.

 

[flyingaway]

26 day solo travel in June to Thailand, China, and Nepal, just with a backpack.

 

[Nemo2]

26 day solo travel in June to Thailand, China, and Nepal, just with a backpack.

+1 Enjoy!!

 

[Scuba]

scuba...we tend to travel in shoulder season but sometimes we cannot avoid prime time. This fall we are looking at a late Sept/Oct trip to either Greece and Isreal or Portugal/Spain Morocco. If it turns out to be the latter it will be an Oct/Nov trip. Depends some family issues and what fares are available to where when we book in August.

In wintertime we travel to avoid the snow. Either SE Asia or Central America. Prime time but the only issue we have to be aware of in the Asia is Lunar New Year. We have only done cruises in Caribbean so have no idea about accommodations. Never, ever had a problem to find accommodations one, two, three days in advance. A few times on the day of when we have decided at the last moment to move on.

We did two weeks of independent travel between Playa and Puerto Morales, Mexico last Oct/Nov. Enjoyed it immensely. Great weather, no crowds, finding accommodation was a snap. Just ordered a Mexico travel book. Thinking of a winter trip at some point where up or down the Pacific coast of Mexico for a month in the winter and then go to Costa Rica/Panama for a month. High season everywhere be not it would seem, dificult to get reasonable accommodation 2 or three nights in advance. DW is not so sure about Thailand again for this coming winter so I am researching some alternatives.

Good to hear. We were in Greece last September and pre-booked some but not all accommodations. When we needed something on the fly, no problem. The relative scarcity of options online for the ABC Islands has motivated us to book in advance there this time, but we are going to explore while we’re there and see how easy it is to find rentals quickly on the fly during high season. Since we want to go somewhere warm in the winter, I guess we will often travel during high season.

Thanks for your response. I’m encouraged to hear that.