Travel thread ... ?

[p0ke]

No they are intra-Caribbean. Usually you'll take a major airlines into PR, DR, St Lucia, etc... then fly around to all the other smaller islands via LIAT or Seaborne. American Airlines shuttle used to fly those routes but they stopped. Not sure if they restarted.

Ah, ok. No wonder I've never heard of them before. I guess instead of flying from some south american country it'd be possible to go by boat? I read somewhere about Oasis of the Seas, which sounds really nice (a week on a huge cruise ship with one day stops on islands), but that might a bit over budget

Cuba is another option. I had a friend visit and he had a great time and it's quite cheap. You have to be abit careful and not leave stuff unattended but he said he had a great time. Great beaches, great food and things to do aside being on the beach all the time. I don't know what's the situation for US citizens visiting though

Yep, Cuba is on my list for sure. Flights (even direct ones!) there are within my budget and according to what I've heard it's a place to visit now before it turns into tourist hell I wouldn't leave stuff unattended anywhere anyway, so I think I'll be fine.

 

[USMarine75]

I used to take ferry/boat tours all around the islands. There's always tons of small cruise type deals, including island hopping "booze cruises".

 

[p0ke]

I used to take ferry/boat tours all around the islands. There's always tons of small cruise type deals, including island hopping "booze cruises".

Sounds great. A booze cruise might be something to do with friends rather for a honeymoon though But yeah, I'll be looking into cuba + various destinations from where to get on a cruise ship.

 

[p0ke]

Hah, my wife didn't like the sound of going on a caribbean island hopping cruise
Anyway, we just checked our budget, and it looks like it's around 1800€ in total, so I guess we can go almost anywhere in the world (some places would require finding a last minute flight, but still).

I'm mostly considering Cuba at the moment - there are direct flights from Helsinki for around 700€ a piece and then we would have some money to spend there too. But I'm still weighing all options and looking for deals etc Oh and of course the budget isn't strictly limited to 1800, that's just what we've got reserved exclusively for the trip.

 

[man jerk]

I'm actually working on getting my family to your part of the world. I'm planning a trip for next summer, mostly in Sweden with some other stops as well. Stockholm, Helsinki, Copenhagen, Gothenburg, Oslo, Reykjavik. My kids are 7 and 10 and I could NOT be more excited to travel with them. I know that it'll be tough with young kids, but I think it will be an amazing experience for them that will serve them well throughout their lives. This will be my first real international trip as well and I'm beyond stoked.

 

[p0ke]

I'm actually working on getting my family to your part of the world. I'm planning a trip for next summer, mostly in Sweden with some other stops as well. Stockholm, Helsinki, Copenhagen, Gothenburg, Oslo, Reykjavik. My kids are 7 and 10 and I could NOT be more excited to travel with them. I know that it'll be tough with young kids, but I think it will be an amazing experience for them that will serve them well throughout their lives. This will be my first real international trip as well and I'm beyond stoked.

Sounds like a nice trip, given you haven't been around here before. Don't expect to see any snow during that time of the year though. If that's what you're looking for, January or February would be the time to travel (it's the coldest time of the year). If you're planning a longer trip though it might be better to do it in the summer, the cold weather can be a bit of a shock. Also, you never know what the winter's gonna be like anyway, sometimes the temperature barely goes below 0 (Celsius) and then all of a sudden it can be -20 or even colder

 

[man jerk]

This will be a summer trip, trying to make it over midsummer. Right now I"m looking at June 16 - July 7.

 

[p0ke]

Ok, so it's been a bit quiet here for a while. I've been busy buying a house, so travel plans are postponed for now.

We did get to the conclusion that we won't be going quite as far as South America, mainly because of how long it takes to travel there. We figured we'll go there once we are comfortable with leaving our daughter at grandma's for a week or so. Maybe when she's 5 or so. She's only 1 year old now, so a week (or more even) away from us is a bit too much. Plus, traveling to SA takes almost 1 day there + 1 day back, so either we'd be there for two days less or away from our daughter two days more. And I can't be bothered sitting in a plane 24 hours just to be somewhere a couple of days, I'd prefer to stay something like two weeks.
Anyway, because of this "restriction", we decided we'll go somewhere in Europe where we haven't been yet. And to be fair, we haven't seen most of Europe yet. We've been to Spain, Greece, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Turkey and Hungary (+ Finland, Sweden and Estonia of course), but the rest would be new to us. Thing is, Europe is cold during autumn and winter, so we'll have to wait until spring. Southern Europe does get warm earlier than Finland though, so I guess we'll go before our summer starts. I believe I listed the places of interest in the OP, but right now we're mainly thinking about Italy.

 

[bostjan]

When is summer in Salo? Some of us in Northeastern Vermont joke that summer here is 2 August - 10 August plus one random day in March. Even though we are pretty far south compared to Finland, our weather here is influenced either by the midwest USA or northern Canada, depending on the direction of the wind, so consistent summer days don't last very long.

 

[p0ke]

When is summer in Salo?

Summer here (in almost all of Finland, typically starting a little bit later and ending earlier up north) is about from June to August depending on the year. This year we had a couple of really warm weeks in the beginning of June (I think) and then it rained and was fairly cold the rest of the summer Our wedding day was sunny and warm though
The typical joke about Finland is that the summer is short but not very snowy

 

[p0ke]

I figured I'd revive this old thread instead of making a new one!

Anyway: now that we're allowed to travel again and I had about 200€ worth of flight points about to expire, I bought tickets to Split, Croatia. Gonna be there for a week at the end of May.

Has anyone here been there, or even just in Croatia in general? Got any tips on what to (or not!) do/eat/drink/etc there? Gonna be traveling with my wife and our 1yo daughter (seems to have become a recurring theme for me, see the previous posts ), so that's a bit of limiting factor.

 

[jaxadam]

We had friends that had a houseboat in Croatia and they flew over for the summers and spent a few months there (he was a pilot for Delta so he could pretty much fly anywhere any time). They absolutely loved it. I’ve spoken to a few people who were just recently there and they had nothing but good things to say about it as well. It’s a place that is definitely on my radar.

 

[p0ke]

Oh and if anyone's curious about what happened with our previous travel plans... Well, they didn't happen
We kinda decided that a honeymoon isn't a honeymoon if we bring our daughter, so then the only option was to postpone it until she's a bit bigger. And then covid happened, and then we had another kid, so now we're basically in the same situation.
We still have most of the money reserved though, so it will happen eventually.

 

[sleewell]

I love Costa Rica. Been there twice and would love to go back.

 

[p0ke]

I love Costa Rica. Been there twice and would love to go back.

I've wanted to visit South/Central America for a long time now, but it's too far away. I don't mind traveling far, but like I said a few years ago in this thread, if the journey takes a whole day it doesn't really make sense to be there just 1-2 days.

I've mostly been looking at Mexico, as I'm a huge fan of Mexican food + the pictures I've seen of Puerto Vallarta for example look exactly like the kind of place I'd wanna spend my holiday at. The thing is, if I wanna bring the kids it'll be expensive af and I gotta sync it with their school holidays, which are basically in the summer. And who wants to go to a wam place during the time it's actually warm at home And to travel without the kids, the youngest is still years away from being able to stay with her grandparents for a week.

As for traveling with the kids, we're planning on going to Estonia this summer. We've been to Tallin many times with and without the kids, but this time we'd take the car and head further into the country, maybe to Saarenmaa or something.

 

[jaxadam]

Panama in Central America was great, beautiful, modernized, and relatively affordable.

 

[sleewell]

Traveling w kids is a blast lol. Getting ready for our yearly trip down to cocoa beach. Let me tell ya 4 kids in a van driving from MI to FL will test the will of anyone lolololol. Trip down isn't that bad, it's coming back that takes days off your life hahaha. But it's always a fun time.... basically beach in the morning and pool in the afternoon or vice versa w no driving.

 

[p0ke]

Traveling w kids is a blast lol. Getting ready for our yearly trip down to cocoa beach. Let me tell ya 4 kids in a van driving from MI to FL will test the will of anyone lolololol. Trip down isn't that bad, it's coming back that takes days off your life hahaha. But it's always a fun time.... basically beach in the morning and pool in the afternoon or vice versa w no driving.

Yeah, longer drives are "fun" I bought a new tablet last summer for this specific reason, so I can shut them up once in a while And also wireless headphones so I don't have to listen to their annoying cartoons while driving. So now the main problem could be our baby - she's absolutely fine on shorter trips, but we'll see what happens in the summer when we do a few longer ones.

 

[jaxadam]

Traveling w kids is a blast lol. Getting ready for our yearly trip down to cocoa beach. Let me tell ya 4 kids in a van driving from MI to FL will test the will of anyone lolololol. Trip down isn't that bad, it's coming back that takes days off your life hahaha. But it's always a fun time.... basically beach in the morning and pool in the afternoon or vice versa w no driving.

Wow that sounds like a blast, 4 kids in a minivan driving for a day…

We took 4 “mini” vacations with the kids last summer and we had the best time. We went to two different Great Wolf Lodges, Disney’s Animal Kingdom, and dirt bike riding. They are at the age now where everything is fun and they were some of the most memorable trips I’ve ever had. I’ve only been looking forward to doing “kid” vacations again from here on out.

So are you gonna swing thru Jville and do some jamming?

 

[odibrom]

I've been in Tibet 25 years ago. Not sure if it's possible to do it today due to... errr... China being China...