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State Your Vacation Location!
- Thread starter Huntn
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I just got back from a trip to this resort 2 weeks ago - I recommend it.
Took a little day trip to Füssen and the Alpsee so I figured I’d take pictures of some icons
Amazing trip. We stayed a week with perfect weather. Average temp was 93°, but didn’t phase us, as we were in the ocean or pool. Got a stellar bronze tan to boot.
Every day I was eating either mahi-mahi, Grouper, Flounder, Snapper, all fresh caught, but the main highlight was stuffed mahi with sautéed asparagus with crab/shrimp, just out of this world good.
Visited downtown with a few locals, not even close to being over crowded at all, being it’s not ‘peak season’.
The resort staff was top-notch, super accommodating and friendly, really clean as well.
Sunset off the main strip.
This last photo turned out terrible, but this is what I got to see on my patio every single night with the moon over the ocean, all you hear is the rippling of waves. Pure tranquility.
My girlfriend and I had so much fun in beautiful Sedona and northern Arizona last year that we went again this year.
Local businesses are not supposed to use colors that clash with the area's natural beauty, so the Golden Arches are Turquoise Arches there.
The sky at night is amazing, and we went at the height of the Perseid meteor shower. You can see a very short meteor right in the middle of Perseus on this photo.
We rented a Jeep Rubicon again to get to areas a regular car can't go. This is along Outlaw Trail.
We also visited Petrified Forest National Park and the Painted Desert.
Local businesses are not supposed to use colors that clash with the area's natural beauty, so the Golden Arches are Turquoise Arches there.
The sky at night is amazing, and we went at the height of the Perseid meteor shower. You can see a very short meteor right in the middle of Perseus on this photo.
We rented a Jeep Rubicon again to get to areas a regular car can't go. This is along Outlaw Trail.
We also visited Petrified Forest National Park and the Painted Desert.
Two days at the beach on Padre Island, near Corpus Christi. Did not get Sun until today the day we are heading back to Houston. 
In the realm of pretty we like Padre Island, but South Texas is mostly ugly imho, flat, scrub, mesquite trees. You don’t get real trees and rolling hills until up around Houston heading North East.
Now one part of Texas is pretty in a desert way and that would be West Texas and the Rio Grande area, very pretty with mountains.
In the realm of pretty we like Padre Island, but South Texas is mostly ugly imho, flat, scrub, mesquite trees. You don’t get real trees and rolling hills until up around Houston heading North East.Now one part of Texas is pretty in a desert way and that would be West Texas and the Rio Grande area, very pretty with mountains.
I almost considered moving to Corpus Christi- Texas, but I ultimately chose ‘eastern Tennessee’ with the Smokies back in the mid 2000’s. I really wanted to move there strictly for the Gulf Coast/Scenic views, but in a way, I’m glad I didn’t, because of the amount of storms that are known to hit that area. I’m a huge fan of the Gulf, lots of great fishing and the sunsets are just amazing, as you can see from your photo.Two days at the beach on Padre Island, near Corpus Christi. Did not get Sun until today the day we are heading back to Houston.
Now one part of Texas is pretty in a desert way and that would be West Texas and the Rio Grande area, very pretty with mountains.
Hi all, just found out that the first ARM-based ThinkPad are about to ship in June. I believe these are the first ARM non-Surface devices to ship, meaning the exclusive deal between MS and Qualcomm may be over. This also means, if Lenovo can ship Windows ARM that other manufacturers could too (unless there’s a new deal between MS and Lenovo…).
Finally this opens the door to Apple being able to make Bootcamp for M1! Maybe we’ll get a good news at WWDC!!
What do you guys think?
Here’s the Lenovo laptop in question https://arstechnica.com/?p=1836621
Finally this opens the door to Apple being able to make Bootcamp for M1! Maybe we’ll get a good news at WWDC!!
What do you guys think?
Here’s the Lenovo laptop in question https://arstechnica.com/?p=1836621
I've said this in the past, but Disney is a favorite place for my family and I to travel too. Sadly, we found that our planned trip that was scheduled for this past February was turning out to be exceedingly expensive. One surprising fact was that the cost of air travel from Boston to Orlando turned out to be more expensive then a flight from Boston to Honolulu.
The wife and I chose to cancel the Disney trip - We've been there many times, our kids are now teenagers and the past couple of trips to Disney have been the best experiences. One reasons was sadly, the wife was laid off, and we figure the odds will be high she'll be working by the summer, and also, our logic is that given the changes Disney has imposed, the crowds, and costs - the odds were going to be high that a new Disney vacation would be hard pressed meet or exceed our prior trips. Besides why not given them a new experience, and they're much more excited about this trip then our previously scheduled Disney trip.
The wife and I chose to cancel the Disney trip - We've been there many times, our kids are now teenagers and the past couple of trips to Disney have been the best experiences. One reasons was sadly, the wife was laid off, and we figure the odds will be high she'll be working by the summer, and also, our logic is that given the changes Disney has imposed, the crowds, and costs - the odds were going to be high that a new Disney vacation would be hard pressed meet or exceed our prior trips. Besides why not given them a new experience, and they're much more excited about this trip then our previously scheduled Disney trip.
Keuka Lake Wine Trail | Visit Keuka Lake Wineries Today
In the heart of the Finger Lakes, lies the Keuka Lake Wine Trail. Discover the many family-owned, award-winning wineries that call Keuka Lake home. Visit the Keuka Lake Wine Trail today and experience the Finger Lakes like never before.
This is where I spend my Vacations!
You know, I love Disney World. I worked at Epcot in the mid-90's. But the hand full of times I've been back, it's just not the same place. There's so much demand to go there that Disney can jack up prices indiscriminately and still be at or near capacity. There was an article on a Disney fan site about how the magic is gone at Disney due to cutbacks and leadership. But I would argue that the cost seems to have shifted the crowds at-large from genuinely happy to be there to people who are entitled to be there. As a cast member I loved creating "magic moments", but I would look for people who weren't expecting it. Today's crowd seems to demand to be enchanted and are all the more unhappy because of it.
I just booked a flight to Florida for this month. But we're not going anywhere near Orlando. Between my wife's cancer treatments last year (she's doing well, thank you) and getting beat down by Omicron, we haven't been much of anywhere. At this point, I'm so mentally shot that just sitting on the deck all week with a stack of books sounds fine to me.
I remember saying something in a disney reddit or a disney forum - I forget, but I was worried that Disney was building new resorts left and right for a time and I thought that such a move would cause the parks to get over-crowded. Many of the die hard disney fans (which I counted myself as one) poo-pooed that entire notion, but here we are seeing insanely crowded parks, long lines and high prices ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
As a family we talked, and thought do we want to spend a literal fortune on a vacation that by all appearance would be dealing with insane crowds (during a pandemic) or go to Hawaii?
Now I get that Hawaii isn't cheap, not by a long shot, but the money I had put towards Disney paid for the airfare, two resorts (one on Maui and the other Oahu) and the flight to and from Maui & Oahu. We still need a car rental, and picking out specific items to do while where there, which translate to $$ but overall I came away with the notion of how over-priced Disney has become.
What a horrible ordeal to face - but that's really good news to see that she's better.
I've been to Disney and Hawaii many times. I would gladly take Hawaii all day and every day over Disney especially with older kids. That's just me but it is a great and fun place to visit.
My wife wants to go there.Keuka Lake Wine Trail | Visit Keuka Lake Wineries Today
In the heart of the Finger Lakes, lies the Keuka Lake Wine Trail. Discover the many family-owned, award-winning wineries that call Keuka Lake home. Visit the Keuka Lake Wine Trail today and experience the Finger Lakes like never before.www.keukawinetrail.com
This is where I spend my Vacations!
Door County, Wisconsin has very similar scenery, and loads of wineries with orchards, given that’s like the ‘wine Capital’ of the Midwest. [Massive tourism right about the September time range.] We’ve been going there every fall since the last three years, and bring back bottles of wine stamped straight out of the orchards. And being that Detroit is a huge city to live in, it’s not that far of a drive trekking over to Wisconsin.
This will be the first year that we’re actually not going back to Door County, but venturing over to San Diego in June for a week.
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Left at 3am, got in to the hotel Hilton Waikoloa 20 hours later. Flights went smoothly, I’ve non-stopped, 1 stop, but as the first time on Kona, 2 stops Salt Lake, L.A. with a total of 6 hour layovers, and I’ll do my damnest never to do that again. The worst was when about an hour before leaving LA Dekta makes this announcement about COVID bracelets that you get by logging into the Hawaiian Travel site, create an account, and give them you life’s history including the dates of your COVID vaccines, and an uploaded image of your card shot. I was pissed, because this should have been mentioned before then And there was no way for me to get this done 45min prior to boarding for me and my wife,
So then I’m thinking, we’ll just show our COVID cards when we get there, and be on our way. Nope, we and about 60 other passengers had to sit in the airport for about an hour and enroll at the Hawaii Safe Travel flight. I coukd if done this at home at my leisure if something had been said in advance.
Anyway, more later.
So then I’m thinking, we’ll just show our COVID cards when we get there, and be on our way. Nope, we and about 60 other passengers had to sit in the airport for about an hour and enroll at the Hawaii Safe Travel flight. I coukd if done this at home at my leisure if something had been said in advance.
Anyway, more later.
Looks beautiful. The resorts on the Big Island are world class. Enjoy.Left at 3am, got in to the hotel Hilton Waikoloa 20 hours later. Flights went smoothly, I’ve non-stopped, 1 stop, but as the first time on Kona, 2 stops Salt Lake, L.A. with a total of 6 hour layovers, and I’ll do my damnest never to do that again. The worst was when about an hour before leaving LA Dekta makes this announcement about COVID bracelets that you get by logging into the Hawaiian Travel site, create an account, and give them you life’s history including the dates of your COVID vaccines, and an uploaded image of your card shot. I was pissed, because this should have been mentioned before then And there was no way for me to get this done 45min prior to boarding for me and my wife,
So then I’m thinking, we’ll just show our COVID cards when we get there, and be on our way. Nope, we and about 60 other passengers had to sit in the airport for about an hour and enroll at the Hawaii Safe Travel flight. I coukd if done this at home at my leisure if something had been said in advance.
Anyway, more later.
Hawaii Big Island D2- Today we got a better look at the island, leaving Waikoloa on the West side and driving South on the West cost around the bottom to Punalu’s Black Sand Beach.
Lots of people in the distance
Overall it was a nice drive, but I’ll be frank, from about the Kona Airport to Waikoloa Village about 25 mile stretch of old lava fields is ugly, desolate, relatively barren, reminiscent of the moon with some grass
, and the resort we are staying at is right in the middle of it, however there is a nice swath of green the surrounds the resort and the resort is very nice.That said when we got past Honalo and the road started rising above sea level we got into what I expected to see in Hawaii, nice, lush vegetation, those big glorious trees, walls of philodendrons cascading down embankments, and small picturesque villages. Tomorrow we will explore North and West, maybe take the Saddle road up between the two volcanoes.
Now, these lava fields, something curious about them, sections are undisturbed lava flows, where you can see how it flowed before cooling, but other huge sections look like a lot of bulldozers went at the lava breaking and churning it up with the dirt underneath, mikes and miles, far into the distance of the climbing terrain to the volcano. So I looked up “lava field restoration/recovery, but not a peep I have found.
I am strongly suspecting for tourism neither the The State, nor the Resorts are going to be advertising their lava fields as a great feature. They are interesting in a bleak scientific way, and fortunately there are the green belts of what you expect to see. Even the woman we met on the plane who lives here unsolicited said, Hawaii is not the prettyist Hawaiian Island, but there are fun things to do.
Not said as a critique, just an observation, everything is expensive, breakfast at the resort was $60 for 2 egg and bacon breakfast, for 2 of us. I was expecting that, off resort is usually always better. Gas for the car is running $5.09 per gallon. I know, by European standards that’s a huge bargain.
As of today, subject to change having been to Oahu, Maui, and Hawaii, for natural beauty I’d rank Oahu No. 1, but Honolulu is a congested mess, Maui No.2, Hawaii No.3. Maui has some nice enchanted locals. Both Maui and Hawaii with so few people living on them, they feel more like the frontier in a way and that’s good too.
I love both Tennessee and the Smoky Mountains. We lived in Nashville for a year, and I’ve tried to talk my wife into Knoxville, but so far no go. I’d want to be East towards the mountains, which all mountains, well mostly the ones with trees, ferns, and rhododendrons on them I consider to be closest to being magical places on Earth.
I’ll second you and add mountains to the list!
Have you been spelunking? My kid brother introduced me to it, when he was in high school and I was in college, it was a school field trip and a West Virginia cave. I immediately fell in love with it, crawling through dark spaces, and later did vertical caving, Hell Hole and others, most fun adventures.
I have been there too. If you want to take in the most beautiful (as in lush vegetation) scenes on the Big Island (and Oahu as well) you need to be on the eastward side of the island. This is where it rains a lot -- especially in Hilo. The mountains are so huge there, that rain clouds hit the mountains and generally dissipate. In fact, the mountains are so high, it can protect the other more western islands from Hurricanes which most often approach from the east. In Hawaii, the trade winds run east to west and so does the precipitation. In fact, I have been to the western side of Oahu during drought conditions in the summer. It looks like the Midwest -- except for the ocean.
Hawaii Big Island D2- Today we got a better look at the island, leaving Waikoloa on the West side and driving South on the West cost around the bottom to Punalu’s Black Sand Beach.
View attachment 1970823
Lots of people in the distance
Overall it was a nice drive, but I’ll be frank, from about the Kona Airport to Waikoloa Village about 25 mile stretch of old lava fields is ugly, desolate, relatively barren, reminiscent of the moon with some grass
That said when we got past Honalo and the road started rising above sea level we got into what I expected to see in Hawaii, nice, lush vegetation, those big glorious trees, walls of philodendrons cascading down embankments, and small picturesque villages. Tomorrow we will explore North and West, maybe take the Saddle road up between the two volcanoes.
Now, these lava fields, something curious about them, sections are undisturbed lava flows, where you can see how it flowed before cooling, but other huge sections look like a lot of bulldozers went at the lava breaking and churning it up with the dirt underneath, mikes and miles, far into the distance of the climbing terrain to the volcano. So I looked up “lava field restoration/recovery, but not a peep I have found.
View attachment 1970824
I am strongly suspecting for tourism neither the The State, nor the Resorts are going to be advertising their lava fields as a great feature. They are interesting in a bleak scientific way, and fortunately there are the green belts of what you expect to see. Even the woman we met on the plane who lives here unsolicited said, Hawaii is not the prettyist Hawaiian Island, but there are fun things to do.
Not said as a critique, just an observation, everything is expensive, breakfast at the resort was $60 for 2 egg and bacon breakfast, for 2 of us. I was expecting that, off resort is usually always better. Gas for the car is running $5.09 per gallon. I know, by European standards that’s a huge bargain.
As of today, subject to change having been to Oahu, Maui, and Hawaii, for natural beauty I’d rank Oahu No. 1, but Honolulu is a congested mess, Maui No.2, Hawaii No.3. Maui has some nice enchanted locals. Both Maui and Hawaii with so few people living on them, they feel more like the frontier in a way and that’s good too.
During my last trip to the Big Island we went to the Hawaii Tropical Reserve and Gardens near Hilo -- in the east. It was crazy beautiful and saw some of the largest naturally growing orchids in the world. Also, went to a small enclave beach in Hilo and swam with the sea turtles and then went to see a breathtaking waterfall in the same day. It was awesome. The water was clear as glass.
In terms of beauty, I am most taken away with Kauai. Otherwise, I personally prefer Hawaii and Oahu to Maui (which is very much geared to tourists in my opinion). All are quite beautiful in my opinion. But not everything is about the vegetation. A few years ago -- 2019 I think -- I was able to actually see volcanic the eruptions on the Big Island. Not something you forget.
Finally, I love coffee. So, I always make sure to visit some of the coffee growers near Kona to pick up some bag loads to bring home with me. It's world class coffee if you ask me. Of course, you didn't ask me. So, I'll stop now (I could go on) and just say enjoy your vacation.