Do You Romanticise Travel?

On June 9, 2017June 9, 2017 By Isobar ExpeditionsIn Travel Tips9 Comments

Have you ever noticed that whenever you talk to someone who has just returned from a trip, it was always the best trip of their life. It is as if, somehow, every trip that someone takes it is nothing but sunshine, magical moments, and the most amazing sights. Yes, you are right, we are guilty of this too. The actual truth is that not every trip or travel moment is pure joy and happiness. Flights get delayed or cancelled, reservations get messed up, hotels don’t look like their brochures, and the sun doesn’t always cooperate.

That doesn’t mean that you can’t enjoy trips that have mishaps, in fact if you can face them with optimism, they can sometimes just become funny anecdotes that are wonderful to share. We have been fortunate in that we haven’t had any major issues during our travels (knocking on wood right now), but a few hiccups. One story that stands out for us was during our second trip to Cabo San Lucas we ended up in the direct path of a substantial hurricane. The airlines wouldn’t change our return flight without drastic costs unless the area was declared a disaster. As it turned out, the hurricane made landfall the day that our flight left and we managed to make it to the airport before the road flooded. The airport lost power for a while and when our plane landed, it had to be the quickest turn and boarding that we’ve ever participated in as our pilot was determined to get us off the ground before things got too bad for us to fly.

Since that trip, we have always made sure to buy travel insurance. It doesn’t cost very much compared to what it could cost you if something disastrous happens. Some credit cards automatically provide travelers insurance when you use their card to purchase airline tickets. As the old saying goes, “hope for the best, plan for the worst”. Hopefully you will never need to use it, but we have plenty of stories from other travelers where it has turned out to be a life-saver.

Obviously, we love to travel and love every aspect of traveling, even when it isn’t as perfect as we had imagined. We will do our best to share our trips as honestly as we can without glamorizing it too much. Since we do truly enjoy seeing new places, meeting new people, and trying new foods, our experiences will likely always be more positive than negative, but when there are disappointments, we will share those as well and hopefully ways to avoid whatever pitfalls we may have encountered.

How Long is Long Enough

On May 19, 2017 By Isobar ExpeditionsIn Travel Tips6 Comments

When planning a trip to a city or a country, how long is long enough? The answer probably depends a little bit on your travel style, whether you plan to revisit again in the future, the detail to which you want to explore where you are visiting, and obviously how much time you have available. Clearly there isn’t a set answer, so we thought that we would try to weigh in on some of the factors that should be considered.

How long should you spend in a new country?

Well, we suppose the obvious answer would be “as much as possible”, but time and money are always limited, so there are other factors that should be considered. As an example, for our first trip to Europe, many years ago, we decided to spend five days in France and then about eight days in England. In France, we only visited Paris, while in England, we went to London, Stratford-Upon-Avon, and Manchester. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, but we felt like we were constantly on the move and never really got to immerse ourselves in the culture. Several years later, we went to Spain and took a full two weeks just to explore the southern region. Would we have liked to spend longer and visit more than just the southern cities, sure we would, but that wasn’t an option due to the cost of our resort and hotels. What we did do, though, was to stay at one location in Estepona and then spend a couple of nights in different cities, but always returning back to our base resort. Obviously this is more expensive, but it allowed us to take overnight bags instead of packing up all of our stuff and moving it from hotel to hotel.

Back to the question at hand, how long is long enough? If you really want to understand the people, learn about the culture, understand the regional variations, you probably need at least four to six weeks. That doesn’t have to be in a single visit, that could be spread out over an entire lifetime of traveling. Two weeks is probably long enough for a specific region of a country, perhaps one with anywhere from two to five major cities. It doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t go to a new country if you don’t have weeks to spend, but understand that you are only dipping your toes into the everything that the country has to offer.

How much time should you spend in a city?

Again, the answer depends on vacation time, money, and all other limiting factors that might determine what you can do versus what you want to do. While we were living in Germany, we spent many weekends traveling around to visit as many places as possible during our somewhat limited time staying there. What we found is that there are basically three different levels of spending time in a city and seeing the sights that the city has to offer.

If you only have two days, or potentially even one, you can usually see all of the major sites, but you probably won’t be able to do tours and get in-depth information, but you will have the opportunity to at least see the sights of the city, taste the food, and get a sense of what it has to offer. Three to four days gives you enough time to take more in-depth tours, spend quality time in museums, and explore some of the more unusual attractions that might exist in the city. Four or five days in a city provides the opportunity to venture out into the outskirts of town which allows you to see beyond the urban lifestyle and get a feel for the countryside. Generally speaking, we found four days to be ideal for larger cities and two days to be just right if the city was a little smaller.

Obviously, one answer can lead to another. If there are four cities in a region of a country that you want to visit, and you want to spend three to four days in each of those cities, plus get into the countryside, two weeks in that region of the country will be barely enough time, but it would certainly work, like it did for us in southern Spain. We spent six months in Germany and felt like we were just getting to truly understand the country when it was time for us to leave. Unfortunately no one usually gets to spend as much time as they truly would like to in the cities or countries that they visit, but depending on the time that you have, at least you can prepare yourself for how much you will be able to accomplish during your trip.

Romania – What You Need to Know Before You Go

On January 23, 2017August 30, 2017 By Isobar ExpeditionsIn Travel Tips9 Comments

Our trip to Romania was definitely an interesting one and as we returned, it became clear that there were a few things that we wish we had known before travelling to this country. This isn’t at all a suggestion that you shouldn’t visit Romania, far from it, there is plenty to see and experience, but there are a few things that you should know before you travel.

- There is information out there that taxi drivers will try to defraud you and over-charge you. It is not an exaggeration. On our first night in Bucharest, we ordered a taxi from our hotel, a place we were told we could trust, and the taxi took us to a location no where near our destination and demanded ten-times the expected price for the ride. We were outraged, but paid, mostly because we didn’t know what else to do. We then found a restaurant nearby and asked for a taxi to take us to our intended destination. After a few minutes, it was clear that the driver did not know where he was going, so we asked him to take us back to our hotel. Upon arrival, the driver asked for twice the price that was displayed on the meter. When going inside to get assistance from the hotel, the driver panicked and forced the other one of us out of the vehicle. Do not trust taxi drivers, know how much it should cost before you get in, and understand that their reputation is duly deserved.
  Brasov, Romania
- Visiting Bucharest is like stepping back in time to the 1950’s. Unlike most of the European cities that we have visited, this city was bleak, sterile, and not-particularly welcoming. There isn’t much to see and when we did visit the old town area, where normally you see the most interesting historical architecture, we were surprised to see a variety of sex shops, strip clubs, and massage parlors amongst the various restaurants. It certainly was a different experience from other old towns that we have had the pleasure to see.
  Old Town Bucharest
- Train travel is not as convenient as other places. We have become quite accustomed to being able to take trains to all of the important destinations, but this is not necessarily true in Romania. You can get from one large city to another, but that is all and you must purchase your tickets in person at the train station. Also, we purchased first class tickets, which wasn’t really necessary as there was relatively little difference between first and second class. It is still a convenient way to travel, but clearly not as nice as transportation in other countries. We ended up taking a shuttle back from Brasov to the Bucharest airport just because it was not only not convenient, but also meant that we didn’t have to deal with the taxi drivers of Bucharest once again, so for the same price and time, it was an easy decision.

- The country is in EU probationary status, which means that you are required to go through customs, even when travelling from within the EU. This is not a big deal, but it was surprising since we had gotten used to just showing our passport at the airport gate versus having to spend time going through customs.

- Romania does not use Euros. Once again, this isn’t necessarily a surprise, there are other countries where this is true, but be aware that your bank might flag any transactions as fraudulent. We had obviously let all of our banks know that we were travelling to Romania, so we were surprised when we weren’t able to make a withdrawal from our account. When we contacted our bank, we were told that it didn’t have to do with our travel notification, it is simply that they didn’t trust any transaction emanating from Romania, so withdrawals were disallowed. Obviously this is always the best way to get local currency, so it was frustrating and a surprise, but we were able to work our way around it, but at a higher cost.

Communism did not Change the Beautiful Churches

Driving can be quite challenging. We were warned not to rent a car while we were in Romania, which we didn’t, and it was probably for the best. Driver’s are quite aggressive and don’t respect lanes, turn signals, or pedestrians. Basically, it is as simple as driver beware. You need to be defensive, whether walking or driving, and assume that the driver next to you is going to do something erratic and ignore your safety.
Bran Castle

As we mentioned, this isn’t meant to deter anyone from visiting Romania, especially since we would recommend that people do visit. We have been to many different countries, some of which were considered to be dangerous or risky. We wouldn’t put Romania in exactly the same category, but it was an eye-opening destination, one which will definitely leave an impression upon us. We enjoyed our time there, but there were definitely some things that we wish we had known before we had travelled, so hopefully this will help you if you should desire to visit Romania.