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I work at an American financial institution in Seattle. Part of best practices for American FIs is to require employees to take five days off in a row, during which they're not allowed to have any communication with their employer. So, I want to take a trip during this time; I have enough PTO that it can be longer than five days, but I don't want it to be too much longer. I'm taking a trip to Japan next March/April, with a couple of friends, so that's out. I'm a single, older dude (37). I don't make a huge amount of money, so I'm really looking for a budget trip. I'd like to avoid traveling during the holidays, but aside from that, my only date limitation is that it has to be done before the end of the year. I'm not terribly fit, but I don't mind walking (last trip I took was to Vancouver, and I was walking 10+ miles a day without a problem). I don't like camping, and I don't have anyplace to keep camping gear, so I'd have to throw it away after camping, anyhow; I don't mind nature, but I'm much more of a parks/day-trip type. I love historical stuff; I took a trip to Taiwan a couple of years ago, and loving loved the National Palace Museum and Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall. I love trying new food and liquor; I'm not super-adventurous, but while I was in Taiwan I tried stinky tofu, pigeon eggs, soy milk with vinegar, etc. Tried Balut in Seattle a few weeks ago. Since my dates are so flexible, I'm really looking to get a lot of value. In case it matters, I speak okay French (four years of high school, a year in college, and I spent a month in France during high school, though it's a bit rusty). Ideas I've had: *Copenhagen, either by itself, or with a layover in Reykjavik (probably do Iceland Air) in Fall-ish (like, October) so as to avoid the winter; I have what is probably a pipe dream of moving to Copenhagen some day. *Punta Cana, probably like an all-inclusive resort or something; would probably be early December, which I've heard is a cheap time for stuff like that. *New Orleans; I like jazz music, and I like good food. *Ashland, OR for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival (I would probably just rent a car for this, since I don't own one); I went for three years in High School, but haven't been back since. It seems like early October/early December should be the times I'm looking at, I think; the downtimes of tourist season. Places I've been that I don't really have any interest in going back to: Vancouver, BC, CA (I just went last year); Taipei, Taiwan (probably go back someday, but in a few years or so); California (parents live there, I grew up there); New York (I went to college Upstate/Western NY, been to the city several times, including a few years back for a wedding); Washington DC (spent a week there in college, really loving loved it, but I don't think Arlington, the various museums, memorials, and monuments change much); Texas (I have family there; gently caress Texas). I wouldn't rule out going to France again (it's been over twenty years). In addition to making suggestions, please also feel free to tell me why my ideas are bad ones. Ham Equity fucked around with this message at 03:36 on Jul 22, 2019 |
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Jul 22, 2019 02:52
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| # ? Apr 19, 2024 09:58 |
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Stay in North America. With barely more than five days you're going to waste over half your vacation with travelling and being jet lagged as gently caress if you try to go to Europe from that side of the country. I think your plan of going to NOLA is a good one. History and food.
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Jul 22, 2019 03:07
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HookShot posted:Stay in North America. With barely more than five days you're going to waste over half your vacation with travelling and being jet lagged as gently caress if you try to go to Europe from that side of the country. I think your plan of going to NOLA is a good one. History and food. I should have been clearer: five days is the number of weekdays off, I can fit two weekends in there, and I don't mind spending another couple of days on top of that, so total trip time can be 10+ days.
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Jul 22, 2019 03:27
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If budget is an issue and you want to go far, play around with dates and places on Google Flights and you can put an entire country or even continent name in: https://www.google.com/flights#flt=SEA.r/m/02j9z.2019-09-07*r/m/02j9z.SEA.2019-09-15;c:CHF;e:1;ls:1w;sd:1;t:e Like so. Then e.g. you can see that Scotland, England, and Iceland are all quite cheap for those dates in September (~$550 in September for a weekend-weekend flight is quite cheap). On the other side of things, you can see that Wuhan, Xi'an, Beijing, and Shanghai are all also pretty cheap ($5-600). Hawaii also although $500 sounds a lot less cheap considering how much relatively closer it is. However if budget is an issue then keep in mind that e.g. Scotland and Iceland both require car rentals to actually do anything fun (given your tight schedule; if you're a backpacker there for weeks you could hitch or use public transport), and lodging is crazy expensive in London and you're aged out of staying in youth hostels I think, although at 37 you're close enough that you could probably pass. Just make sure to lie on your age when booking online and make sure you're 34, if there's an age limit. Also if you can take last minute holidays, like telling your bank the week or 3 or 4 days before, you could go to a travel agent or watch somewhere like secretflying.com for last minute sales. Last minute sale vacation packages is like one of the very, very few things that travel agents are still super useful for. That said these are mostly geared towards like, going to Punta Cana and sitting at a resort for 7 days.
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Jul 22, 2019 07:39
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Go to New Orleans.
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Jul 22, 2019 16:36
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Although I agree with the "stay in North America for time reasons", if you want to ignore that, why not the Republic of Georgia! Features: * Great food * Great wine * Amazing mountain scenery * Cool old churches on top of amazing mountain scenery * Cheap as poo poo * Vastly fewer Russian tourists than normal due to political shenanigans
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Jul 30, 2019 06:43
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With max. 9 days I'd still stay in roughly the same timezone. If you want to avoid the US, have you considered Central or South America? I couldn't imagine flying from the east coast to anywhere that's 8 hours of jetlag out for 5-6 days on the ground. edit: New Zealand is kinda workable, being only 5 hours difference, though it's also +1 day though you get that back when you fly home. You could see a few cities in NZ in that time. Alternatively, some pacific islands? It's winter down here but they're still going to be in the mid-20s and it's the less-wet season. Basically, anything GMT+12 is about the farthest you probably want to go east. More will just be too brutal on the timezone change IMO. Nam Taf fucked around with this message at 14:27 on Jul 30, 2019 |
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Jul 30, 2019 14:20
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Go to Zihuatenajo OP.
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Jul 30, 2019 22:02
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| # ? Apr 19, 2024 09:58 |
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Stay in North America. And by that, I mean Mexico. Probably not a resort though.
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Aug 8, 2019 22:16
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