What destinations or experiences exceeded your expectations?

[sleddy]

It is funny how we become used to using acronyms here. I find it spilling over into my other communications and occasionally wonder if folks have a clue what I'm talking about. Of course, we here have no monopoly on those acronyms.

That is a thing that bothers me. My problem, not yours. I suspect sometimes people do it to sound like experts. Usually I can figure them out but DW indeed had me stumped. Back in the day she was called SHMBO.

 

[YB88]

I quite enjoy the 'soup-to-nuts' logistical support of cruises and packaged tours, but the overseas trips I remember best are the ones where I had more interaction with locals or travelers from other countries. So for example, I've not done the Danube river cruise that is so popular, and I'm sure that I'd enjoy it, but my wife and I biked the Danube bike route and had a lot more interaction with people that way (plus spur of the moment impulse stops or minor detours).

For us it's been learning the local language via in-country language schools, and/or hiking/biking trips, or in a couple of cases, just getting an apartment in an overseas city and living like locals for a while. Our next trip will be a 2-week hike from Munich to lake Constance on a pilgrim route, followed by a 2-week bike trip from lake Constance to Salzburg. These trip will be a sort of perfect balance for us I think --- logistic support in the way of an agency booking hotels and schlepping our luggage from stop-to-stop, but no tour group, just us walking and then biking.

There are different good ways to travel but when traveling to a country I'm familiar with, I'm not keen to be in lock step with and almost entirely interacting (only) with fellow Americans on a tour bus.

 

[athena53]

I quite enjoy the 'soup-to-nuts' logistical support of cruises and packaged tours, but the overseas trips I remember best are the ones where I had more interaction with locals or travelers from other countries.

When I think back to my E. European trip, which WAS an organized tour, I'd say one of the best stays was an overnight in Karanac, Croatia on the way from Sarajevo to Dubrovnik. Not on my radar at all. We stayed on a farmstead (our rooms were converted horse stalls but well-appointed!). The couple made and grew just about everything- she canned, made soap, stencilled the walls and many gift items for sale, strung up peppers to dry, etc. They brought in a neighbor the night we arrived and we made cheese, which we ate with breakfast the next morning. The milk was still warm from the cow. (What would the Board of Health say? ) The woman who taught us to make the cheese had learned English with help from the tour company, whose foundation also supported a local school. We had a pottery-making demonstration by the husband's cousin and I bought a few of his creations.

It was such a contrast to my own life, in which I spend an inordinate amount of time on the computer. These were people who did honest, down-to-earth work and ate real food and made things. It does change your perspective. Here's my review. https://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_R...c-Karanac_Osijek_Baranja_County_Slavonia.html

 

[Catkins]

Great Travel

Galapagos Islands, so interesting and lively.
Blue Ridge Mountains in late fall, magnificent.
Savannah and Cumberland Island, fascinating history.
Florida Sanibel & Captiva Islands, best sunsets ever.
Driving the west coast CA to WA in a convertible.
Experiencing the unfathomable Great Lakes.
Costa Rica, the diversity of land and critters are incredible.
Hoping to add Italy this year to our exceptional list.

 

[brett]

For us it could be Thailand.

My spouse reluctantly agreed to a last minute trip.

We spent the next five winters snow birding in Thailand or using it as a snow bird travel base.

 

[autonomousdog]

The Taj Mahal. We have seen the pyramids, the Eiffel tower, the Parthenon, etc. We have also seen the big falls: Niagra, Iguazu, Victoria, ... and the big five African animals. But for me nothing comes close to the Taj. The size of the thing is impossible to comprehend from pictures and the detailed craftsmanship of the marble carving and inlays astounds. They told us it took something like 23,000 craftsman 25 years to build it.

I remember vividly having my breath taken away at the first glance of the main building. It's one of my favorite memories of many years of traveling. I can't wait to take my little ones there some day and have them have the same experience...

 

[autonomousdog]

Where to begin? Spent 30 years of international travel 200 days a year. Here's a sampling:

Having dinner at the old Carnelian Room in San Francisco and being above the clouds just below our window
Skiing above the clouds in Switzerland…seeing the Matterhorn as an island above the clouds
Walking along the Bundt in Shanghai…the lights of the skyscrapers; old buildings lit up
Temples in Kyoto and Kamakura
Seeing Mt. Fuji from the bullet train in Japan
Christmas Island (Kiribati) for an entire week
Church on Christmas Island. Incredible acapella singing, just incredible
Italy. Anywhere in Italy. Period. IMHO
The Mare’s Tail in the Borders Scotland
Spending a very long night in Austria with a bunch of crazy, drunk Germans in a small slopeside ski shack halfway up the mountain.
Aurora Borealis from the plane over Siberia
The Concorde flying right below us one day
Flying into the old Hong Kong airport between the buildings
Dinners at the Eiffel Tower
Buena Vista Cafe SFO! ( if you know, you know)
Burford England; the Cotswolds
Stonehenge
Three whales breaching just below our rented condo in Kauai
La Sagrada Basilica, Barcelona. Speechless.
Yehliu Geopark, Taiwan.
"The Cabbage" sculpture at the National Museum Taipei

Where's the MIND BLOWN emoji here...

 

[autonomousdog]

For us it could be Thailand.

My spouse reluctantly agreed to a last minute trip.

We spent the next five winters snow birding in Thailand or using it as a snow bird travel base.

Do you have any favorite experiences/places in Thailand? We spent 6 weeks there 10 years ago, and what we remember the most are the liveaboard diving and the cooking classes. Oh and the amazing $7 massages.

 

[brett]

Thailand. So much that we have been back for five winters. Vietnam....so much that we plan to go back for a month next winter. Geek Islands and Turkey...we keep going back.

Australia, Portugal, Sicily, Malta,

 

[brett]

Do you have any favorite experiences/places in Thailand? We spent 6 weeks there 10 years ago, and what we remember the most are the liveaboard diving and the cooking classes. Oh and the amazing $7 massages.

We tend to avoid Ko Samui and Phuket. We prefer the south. Ko Lanta, Khao Lak, Ko Ngai, Ban Krut, Ko Mook, Ko Libong, Ao Nang, etc. We enjoy the small island where you have to access by motorboat or long tail boats.

Then either we continue south to Penang and KL or we go north to Vietnam and work our way up the coast.

We generally book our outbound flight and homebound flights into either Bangkok or Kuala Lumper. Everything in between is very much spontaneous. Last time we went to Ban Krut for three days and spent 10 days. Always a few days in Bangkok and/or KL.

 

[braumeister]

Geek Islands

If you're really into technology, that has to be the place to go.

 

[foxcreek9]

Hitting Japan at the perfect time for the cherry blossoms
2017 Total Eclipse, cloudless sky
Bastogne

Family discovery trip to Norway and meeting my GGF's youngest sister's granddaughters. He was the last of 3 brothers to migrate to the US in 1911, leaving behind his mother, a brother and sister.

 

[ElizabethT]

Our 6 night backpacking trip thru 55 miles of the Jewels of the Grand Canyon. 10 intrepid backpackers, one highly skilled backcountry leader. The hardest physical feat I've accomplished to date, and the most beautiful vistas and night skies I have ever experienced. A trip I will think about for the rest of my life.
Accomplished post-FIRE, with me age 54 and DH age 61.

Other places that blew me away: Hiking 115 miles thru Switzerland's Alpine Pass;
Cambodia, because I went in with 0 expectations and had both my mind and heart blown; Paris, because I went in with big expectations, only to have every one of them exceeded; and Costa Rica & New Zealand for their sheer beauty and diversity.

 

[timbervest]

2017 Total Eclipse, cloudless sky
Bastogne

I saw the 2017 total eclipse in Missouri. Pouring down rain and overcast the day before and broken clouds that morning. Was sure we would miss it. 10 minutes before totality, the clouds broke, and the skies opened crystal clear. It was probably the most amazing astronomical experience I have ever seen in my life.

 

[Markola]

We’ve been in southern CA for a few days and my favorite experience was visiting Mission San Juan Capistrano (you know, where the swallows return). I’m not religious but I appreciate history, and this is where so much of modern California started, including several crops and the entire wine industry. There’s plenty of tragic history for the native people, too. But the site is beautifully maintained by legions of volunteers, who have made it really beautiful and comfortable, and it is interpreted well. Recommend.

 

[Koolau]

I've been to Niagara Falls 4 times. Loved it every time.

First time was when I graduated Univ. and took off in my dad's clapped out station wagon with a college buddy. We both stuffed $80 in our one pair (each) of jeans. I had all my gas cards that were a big deal back in the day. Every oil company sent their cards to those graduating. I figured that would cover our gas (at $.30/gallon.) By the time the bills came in I had my Megacorp j*b to pay them off. Only issue was the "hairy-eyed" look-over we got at the Canadian border when these two guys with "republican" hair cuts told them we were 22 (in 1969.) Buddy and I slept in the back of the station wagon on air mattresses/sleeping bags for the whole trip.

Got married to DW a year or so later and we made a stop at the Falls. It was a real hoot for me to be able to show her all the places that Marilyn Monroe had walked in her movie "Niagara" from 1953.

Next time was early '70s road trip to upstate NY with some friends. Not exactly Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, but there were a few tense moments as we did share a double double with them. We stopped at the Falls and showed them around. They loved it too.

Finally, DW and I took a second honeymoon in early 2000's which included a stop at the falls.

Probably won't make it back, but I have memories for a life time.

 

[JoeWras]

I saw the 2017 total eclipse in Missouri. Pouring down rain and overcast the day before and broken clouds that morning. Was sure we would miss it. 10 minutes before totality, the clouds broke, and the skies opened crystal clear. It was probably the most amazing astronomical experience I have ever seen in my life.

+1 from South Carolina. Skies parted perfectly. 10 miles away they were shut out. So fortunate.

The cheers of the crowd still give me chills.