I don't stay in youth hostels often these days. Been there, done that. Especially with a family there are usually cheaper, more comfortable accomodations available. Besides, I snore like on oncoming freight train and there's an issue of fairness here. Still the best deal I could find at short notice for our overnight in Portland was at the Portland Northwest Hostel (I did find a slightly cheaper place but the six reviews I found online were all negative and the most generous began "Never having stayed in a crackhouse before. . .")
So yes, I'm over youth hostels. But that does not mean that it is okay for the first guy I see to say "Can I help you with that bag, sir?" That's not okay. Even if I was having a little trouble manoevering that 53 pound of camping gear up the stairs.
Thursday, August 9, 2007
You Know You're In Portland. . .
when you disembark from the airplane and the first thing you see in the terminal is three guys with watch caps and skateboards.
Planes, Trains, and Automobiles: How Not To Start A Blog.
It's probably not the best idea to start your new blog the week before you leav on a three week vacation, even if it is a travel blog. Here I am in Oregon, facing several weeks of extremely sporadic internet access, as well as very little interest in blogging. I resent having to have a cell phone with me when I'm travelling, let alone checking email and the like.
The only good news is that since no one but me is reading the blog there's no one to get disappointed by lack of new posts.
It strikes me that a useful blogging feature would be the ability to "stack up" a bunch of posts in advance and have them publish themselves one per day.
Our trip will take us to Oregon, then down the California coast (camping on the way) to San Francisco. From San Francisco we go by overnight train to Albuquerque where we'll rent another car and join my parents for a few days of mushroom picking in the Rockies. Because we have two flights, two car rentals, and a change of trains from San Francisco to Albuquerque the trip really does qualify as "planes, trains, and automobiles".
The only good news is that since no one but me is reading the blog there's no one to get disappointed by lack of new posts.
It strikes me that a useful blogging feature would be the ability to "stack up" a bunch of posts in advance and have them publish themselves one per day.
Our trip will take us to Oregon, then down the California coast (camping on the way) to San Francisco. From San Francisco we go by overnight train to Albuquerque where we'll rent another car and join my parents for a few days of mushroom picking in the Rockies. Because we have two flights, two car rentals, and a change of trains from San Francisco to Albuquerque the trip really does qualify as "planes, trains, and automobiles".
Sunday, August 5, 2007
Always Procrastinate.
I really felt that I had learned my lesson about eight years ago when my wife and I, after waiting until the week before Christmas, got excellent fares on Swiss Air for a ten day trip to Spain. The lesson? Always procrastinate; do not buy today that ticket which you could buy instead tomorrow.
Last Tuesday night, I spent the hours from 11pm to to 2am with several browser windows open to kayak.com and Orbitz, on the basis that airlines generally release unsold seats in lower-fare classes between midnight and 1am on Wednesday morning (in their local timezone). During that period the price didn't budge, and I finally booked four flights for our upcoming vacation at $468 each.
This morning, almost identical flights were available on Northwest for $380. True, Northwest is running out of pilot hours at the end of each month which might have cast doubt on our August 27th return flight, but still!
Last Tuesday night, I spent the hours from 11pm to to 2am with several browser windows open to kayak.com and Orbitz, on the basis that airlines generally release unsold seats in lower-fare classes between midnight and 1am on Wednesday morning (in their local timezone). During that period the price didn't budge, and I finally booked four flights for our upcoming vacation at $468 each.
This morning, almost identical flights were available on Northwest for $380. True, Northwest is running out of pilot hours at the end of each month which might have cast doubt on our August 27th return flight, but still!
Saturday, August 4, 2007
If This Is Tuesday At 5pm, It Must Be Italy
The New York Times Travel Section is running a piece titled 36 Hours In The Cinque Terre, Italy.
Excuse me? 36 hours?
The 36 Hours series traditionally features cities in which you might reasonably find yourself with an overnight change-of-plane, or perhaps a weekend stuck on to the end of a business trip. But the Cinque Terre? You have to go out of you way to get there. Who's going to go for 36 hours? And doesn't that kind of negate the entire idea of visiting Italy? Has the Times never heard of dolce far niente?
The actual article is pretty good, packing a lot into a two day itinerary. But still, talk about unclear on the concept!
Excuse me? 36 hours?
The 36 Hours series traditionally features cities in which you might reasonably find yourself with an overnight change-of-plane, or perhaps a weekend stuck on to the end of a business trip. But the Cinque Terre? You have to go out of you way to get there. Who's going to go for 36 hours? And doesn't that kind of negate the entire idea of visiting Italy? Has the Times never heard of dolce far niente?
The actual article is pretty good, packing a lot into a two day itinerary. But still, talk about unclear on the concept!
Airlines travel forecast to get heaps worse.
A squib in the New York Times business section (Passengers Scowl as Airlines Smile) demonstrates that air travel is bad, and is likely to get worse as airlines decide that it isn't really cost effective to care about the quality of their passengers' experiences.
How bad has it become? The Times says:
Of course, at the same time I'm helping to drive down the quality of air travel, which hurts me and everyone else to some extent. Look at that 73% on-time figure. Coupled with the fact that most flights (especially the cheaper ones) now require a change of plane at the airline's hub, the chance of a missed connection is increased. And the high booking level makes it much harder to hop on another plane an hour later. The result? This spring on a family trip to Puerto Rico we missed a connection in Charlotte (the first time it's every happened to me) and weren't able to get another plane until the next morning -- delaying our arrival almost an entire day and cutting down our time on the island of Culebra from four to three days.
Unfortunately, in the perfect marketplace of the web, I don't see things improving anytime soon.
How bad has it become? The Times says:
For the first five months of this year, the on-time arrival rate of the big airlines was 73.5 percent, the lowest in seven years. Complaints about service were up 49 percent from May 2006. This summer, flights are booked at average levels of about 90 percent, a historic high.Notice the substantial deterioration since just last year. The money quote in the article:
But from the airlines’ perspective, “having a lot of rankled customers beats having a handful of happy ones,” wrote Tom Van Riper of Forbes.com.I'm the kind of person who considers the best flight to be the cheapest, and a good flight to be one that gets me and my luggage to the destination. I make heavy use of internet price comparison web sites and generally choose the cheapest fare. While the exigencies of family life now require that I can't necessarily choose the cheapest time of year or day of the week (or even time of day, red-eyes being out of the question) I'm still an exemplar of the marketplace. I help drive prices lower.
Of course, at the same time I'm helping to drive down the quality of air travel, which hurts me and everyone else to some extent. Look at that 73% on-time figure. Coupled with the fact that most flights (especially the cheaper ones) now require a change of plane at the airline's hub, the chance of a missed connection is increased. And the high booking level makes it much harder to hop on another plane an hour later. The result? This spring on a family trip to Puerto Rico we missed a connection in Charlotte (the first time it's every happened to me) and weren't able to get another plane until the next morning -- delaying our arrival almost an entire day and cutting down our time on the island of Culebra from four to three days.
Unfortunately, in the perfect marketplace of the web, I don't see things improving anytime soon.
Thursday, August 2, 2007
Travel Buddha I
I said "Oh Travel Buddha, I've learned that possessions are only encumbrances. The true traveler knows he will find anything he needs along the way. On my next trip I'll do nothing but tuck my toothbrush in my pocket on my way to the airport."
The Travel Buddha sat still. "Why take the toothbrush?" he asked.
The Travel Buddha sat still. "Why take the toothbrush?" he asked.
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
New Travel Camera.
We're going on vacation in a week and I needed a new digital camera since the old one is broken.
Previously we used a Casio Exilim seven megapixel camera. I liked everything about this camera except for the extreme fragility of the lens mechanism, which frequently jammed and finally gave out altogether -- a failing this line is apparently well known for. I thought for a while to replace it with a new Casio model that features a longer zoom (7x rather than 3x) using a lens mechanism entirely inside the camera (there's no protruding lens at all).
In then end I settled on the Panasonic Lumix TZ3, which was somewhat cheaper and offers a 10x zoom, a shorter lens at the wide-angle end (the equivalent of a 28mm lens on a traditional camera) and a larger 3 inch screen. The camera itself is slightly larger than the Casio and the battery life is somewhat less. In addition, the video recording is considerably less compressed than on the Casio, meaning that a 1GB card will hold 10 minutes (as opposed to the Casio's 30 minutes) of high quality video.
I took the camera along on our weekend trip to visit my parents on the East End of Long Island this past weekend. Here is a picture of my daughters skipping off towards their breakfast treat at Pat's Farm Stand in Amagansett. The only change I made from the "snapshot" settings on the camera was to set the color profile to "vivid" in order to mimic the high color saturation I was used to from the Casio.
And here is another image I took, using flash, of some chanterelles we collected by the side of the road (which road, I'm not saying).
Your digital photography tips (especially related to travel) are appreciated!
Previously we used a Casio Exilim seven megapixel camera. I liked everything about this camera except for the extreme fragility of the lens mechanism, which frequently jammed and finally gave out altogether -- a failing this line is apparently well known for. I thought for a while to replace it with a new Casio model that features a longer zoom (7x rather than 3x) using a lens mechanism entirely inside the camera (there's no protruding lens at all).
In then end I settled on the Panasonic Lumix TZ3, which was somewhat cheaper and offers a 10x zoom, a shorter lens at the wide-angle end (the equivalent of a 28mm lens on a traditional camera) and a larger 3 inch screen. The camera itself is slightly larger than the Casio and the battery life is somewhat less. In addition, the video recording is considerably less compressed than on the Casio, meaning that a 1GB card will hold 10 minutes (as opposed to the Casio's 30 minutes) of high quality video.
I took the camera along on our weekend trip to visit my parents on the East End of Long Island this past weekend. Here is a picture of my daughters skipping off towards their breakfast treat at Pat's Farm Stand in Amagansett. The only change I made from the "snapshot" settings on the camera was to set the color profile to "vivid" in order to mimic the high color saturation I was used to from the Casio.
And here is another image I took, using flash, of some chanterelles we collected by the side of the road (which road, I'm not saying).
Your digital photography tips (especially related to travel) are appreciated!
Welcome to Notes on Travel. Let's talk about ME!
Welcome to Notes On Travel, which is intended to cover both my own family travels and other travel issues. My hope is that this will become a meeting place for travelers to swap stories and information.
I'm a forty-five year old husband and father of two daughters (six and eight years old) who doesn't get to travel as much as I did previously and would like to today. This blog is in part therapy for that part of me that would really rather be on the road.
Two things I dislike about travel writing (not to suggest that this blog rises to the level of travel writing in any real sense): not being told what things cost and not having enough information about the author. So I'll use this post to introduce my self -- or, rather, my travel-self.
My first trip was at six months when my family spent a year in Ireland while my dad was on a Fullbright exchange. From the age of eight to eleven we lived in Paris while my father directed solar energy programs for UNESCO (an agency of the United Nations). We traveled widely in Europe, while my dad traveled even more widely to Africa, Asia, and other places in which UNESCO was sponsoring projects.
My independent travel career began after college when I did a work exchange program in England and then spent five months hitchhiking around Europe -- from Greece and Turkey up to northern Denmark and down to Italy. I did the entire five months on about $2,000 -- or $400 a month!
Throughout the 1980s I traveled frequently on shorter trips, alone or with travel buddies or my girlfriend (still my girlfriend but now also my wife). I did a lot of courier flights, once leaving for Germany with five hours notices and once even flying the Concord.
In 1991 my girlfriend and I "checked out" of our jobs and settled lives and spent 5 months on a cross-country trip followed by 14 months in Asia and the South Pacific -- Japan, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Malaysia, Indonesia, Australia, New Zealand, and Fiji. On our return (we settled in Brooklyn, New York) I started a backpacker van line called the East Coast Explorer connecting New York, Boston, and Washington DC. I ran that for five years but although it was a fantastic experience as a business it was a flop. I managed to sell out to a national competitor that was just starting up (they lasted less than one season).
After closing up the East Coast Explorer I returned to my previous work as a freelance computer programmer. We had our two daughters and moved to a brownstone in Harlem. And here you find me now. The computer business can't hold a candle to driving backpackers around the Amish country in terms of fun, but as a living it has a lot to be said for it. Unfortunately it, and exigencies of family life (by which I mean the school vacation schedule) mean that we're lucky if we get to make two trips a year.
I've always been a budget traveler and a backpacker. I remember back in the glory days of rec.travel (an old-style internet travel site, before even Web 1.0!) a conversation between to people about the merits of the Plaza and St. Pierre hotels in New York -- two hotels that, even then, were in the $500 a night range. My contribution was
Thanks for visiting my blog. Please use the comments to introduce yourself.
I'm a forty-five year old husband and father of two daughters (six and eight years old) who doesn't get to travel as much as I did previously and would like to today. This blog is in part therapy for that part of me that would really rather be on the road.
Two things I dislike about travel writing (not to suggest that this blog rises to the level of travel writing in any real sense): not being told what things cost and not having enough information about the author. So I'll use this post to introduce my self -- or, rather, my travel-self.
My first trip was at six months when my family spent a year in Ireland while my dad was on a Fullbright exchange. From the age of eight to eleven we lived in Paris while my father directed solar energy programs for UNESCO (an agency of the United Nations). We traveled widely in Europe, while my dad traveled even more widely to Africa, Asia, and other places in which UNESCO was sponsoring projects.
My independent travel career began after college when I did a work exchange program in England and then spent five months hitchhiking around Europe -- from Greece and Turkey up to northern Denmark and down to Italy. I did the entire five months on about $2,000 -- or $400 a month!
Throughout the 1980s I traveled frequently on shorter trips, alone or with travel buddies or my girlfriend (still my girlfriend but now also my wife). I did a lot of courier flights, once leaving for Germany with five hours notices and once even flying the Concord.
In 1991 my girlfriend and I "checked out" of our jobs and settled lives and spent 5 months on a cross-country trip followed by 14 months in Asia and the South Pacific -- Japan, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Malaysia, Indonesia, Australia, New Zealand, and Fiji. On our return (we settled in Brooklyn, New York) I started a backpacker van line called the East Coast Explorer connecting New York, Boston, and Washington DC. I ran that for five years but although it was a fantastic experience as a business it was a flop. I managed to sell out to a national competitor that was just starting up (they lasted less than one season).
After closing up the East Coast Explorer I returned to my previous work as a freelance computer programmer. We had our two daughters and moved to a brownstone in Harlem. And here you find me now. The computer business can't hold a candle to driving backpackers around the Amish country in terms of fun, but as a living it has a lot to be said for it. Unfortunately it, and exigencies of family life (by which I mean the school vacation schedule) mean that we're lucky if we get to make two trips a year.
I've always been a budget traveler and a backpacker. I remember back in the glory days of rec.travel (an old-style internet travel site, before even Web 1.0!) a conversation between to people about the merits of the Plaza and St. Pierre hotels in New York -- two hotels that, even then, were in the $500 a night range. My contribution was
I don't have anything to say about the two hotels you're discussing, but it strikes me that one of the benefits of never spending more than $20 a night for a place to stay is that it's almost impossible to be disappointed.I still largely feel that way, but at the same time I've definitely outgrown youth hostels. That's probably a good thing considering I snore like an oncoming train. On a trip to the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico a year ago I found myself happily spending $60 a night for rooms in some very cool hotels. On the other hand, having to pay $150 a night in Puerto Rico earlier this year was definitely a bummer! So my present travel orientation is what I'd call the "grown-up budget" level and my posts here will reflect that.
Thanks for visiting my blog. Please use the comments to introduce yourself.
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