Antarctica, the final frontier. These are the voyages of Lisa and Alex. Our life long mission: to explore strange new places, to seek out new people and new cultures, to boldly go where we haven’t gone before. After our first visit to Europe in 1987, Asia in 1998, Africa in 2001, Oceania in 2005, South America in 2008, Antarctica would be our final continent. I did a lot of research of the various companies that go to Antarctica; I chose…
Ushuaia “Fin del Mundo” or the End of the World, Ushuaia is the southernmost city in the world. Most Antarctica cruises begin at their ship terminal. We arrived late on Friday, February 22, a couple days before the start of our cruise so we could see a bit of this charming town. I had booked a full day tour of Tierra del Fuego National Parque for Saturday. We had a 3rd passenger, Caterina, a nice lady from Italy, joining us…
Santiago We booked the Antarctica cruise with Quark and decided to extend our trip with a few days in Santiago before heading to Ushuaia. We booked a 3-night Santiago trip through Go-Today, flying in on a direct 10 hour flight from Dallas. Santiago is a great walking city, lots of murals and interesting architecture. We booked a walking tour with Free Tours; walking tours with a local guide are always a great opportunity for learning a lot about a city…
I had been to New Zealand for a week. My daughter and I had a 3-week package tour to Australia and New Zealand in 2005, spending the last week on the south island of New Zealand with a few days in Auckland. I loved it and knew I wanted to return. Kelly was busy in our usual travel months of September and October, but was still interested in a trip this year. I remember her asking what location would be…
I went to Costa Rica for a week with Brenda, a friend from my book club. A widow, she and her husband had a time share in Aruba but she hadn’t used it for several years. She was going to lose another week but was concerned about going alone since she had never traveled without her husband. I said I’d be happy to go somewhere with her, if she was interested. After searching for a while and dealing with limited…
We wanted to see Angkor Wat in Cambodia, but we found a great itinerary for both Vietnam and Cambodia. We booked through Pacific Delight Tours. They partner with the local company Asianventure Tours, based in Hanoi, for local guides. We spent the 20th in a hotel in Chicago; it got us free parking for our stay plus we didn’t have to get up at dawn to get to our morning flight on the 21st. We had a long layover in…
Miami Kelly and I booked a week long trip to Ecuador with Go-Today. Since most flights to Quito were through Miami, we decided to spend a couple nights there on the way. We arrived Saturday afternoon. After visiting the beach, we had some Mojitos, a late dinner, and then just walked around enjoying the South beach area. The next morning, we booked a on-off bus tour of the city. We got off at Vizcaya, the beautiful home and gardens of…
Alex took a job in South Korea to teach English after she graduated college. One of her college roommates, Kim, took a job with the same company. They left September 2009. I visited in April 2010 for a week. I arrived Monday afternoon, April 26th, in Incheon, after a long flight and losing a day crossing the date line. Alex met me at the airport and we had a long, long trip to her town, Anjung-eup, south of Seoul. It…
When we started thinking about a trip to China, we thought we could plan and book it all ourselves. We looked at domestic flights and other travel options between the cities we wanted to visit. As much as we don’t really like groups tours, after attempting to book our own travel to the various cities, we decided that it would be easier with a tour group because the logistics were going to be complex. We booked a tour with China Spree…
Machu Picchu! Who doesn’t want to see the amazing history of Peru and incredible Incan ruins? We booked this trip with Go-Today. I’ve used them for a number of trips since the early 2000’s. They were consolidators and many of their trips initially were just airfare and hotels, sometimes with airport transportation. You could customize by level of hotel or add days. I had used them for a week in London, and a week in London and Paris with Eurorail…