Travelling

[Prowler]

How much travelling experience do you have? How many different places have you been to and which ones did you like the best? What places would you like to visit and still haven't been able to do so?

I've been to the following countries: Spain, France, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Liechtenstein, Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, England, Republic of Ireland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Tunisia.

Hard to say which place I liked the most but I loved Paris and Innsbruck. Also liked Vienna, London and Amsterdam a lot. As for rural places, I absolutely loved Norway and its fjords.

Sadly, I haven't been able to visit some cities and places in some of the countries I've been to already. I have much left to see in Germany and Italy, per example Haven't even been to Munich, Berlin, Milan, Rome or Florence.

I'd like to visit Poland, Hungary and Czech Republic. I really love the architecture of those countries. I find central Europe really beautiful both in terms of architecture and nature. It's the perfect mix, imo. Also would love to go to Finland, Greece, Japan, among other places. As you've noticed, the only time I've traveled outside of Europe was to Tunisia. There's a world beyond Western/Northern Europe.

[Katie]

Its too expensive to travel out of country right now, but I've been to most every state in the US. That includes most major cities: New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, DC, Atlanta, Miami, Vegas, and plenty of others. I've driven fom east to west and north and south.

But I will say I always love the south. Its where I grew up and where I love to be. Other parts of the country are nice to visit, but I'll only be happy living where the tea is sweet, people are friendly, and the air is so thick and humid you can wear it.

[Mzx10484]

Traveling means a lot to me, it broadens one's horizon (mind)!

The longest time I was out of Germany were the 5 months I lived in Norway (capital Oslo). I have experienced summer, autumn and winter there and it was very nice. Beautiful fjord Islands, awesome nature / who wants the city bustle, has the beautiful city.
http://i1276.photobucket.com/albums/y468/mzx10484/IMG_0319a_zpse1e79f23.jpg (http://s1276.photobucket.com/user/mzx10484/media/IMG_0319a_zpse1e79f23.jpg.html)

Another place I love was a small village in South of France - Tavel. Will visit this place again.

[Prowler]

Oslo didn't impress me much. I liked Bergen better. But the best thing about Norway are its rural areas, not its urban ones, imo.

Only been to Frankfurt and Koln in Germany when I was a little kid. Don't remember much of either city. I remember Koln's amazing cathedral and the square it was on and that's it.
What places in Germany would you recommend visiting? Other than the usual ones such as Berlin and Munich, obviously.

[HotNunchuckFury]

I've been lucky in this respect. I live in England but have visited France, Italy, Spain (including the Balearic islands), Portugal, Greece (including Crete, Kalimnos and Cyprus), Wales, Scotland, US (California), Hong Kong and seen some pretty amazing stuff. Loved the Gaudi architecture in Barcelona and the raw landscape of the Scottish Highlands is pretty breathtaking. Venice was a place I always wanted to see and glad I have as it's beautiful but not surprisingly very touristy and I have no desire to go back. Favourite destination has to be Hong Kong though. Been 4 times and can't wait to go again. The city is buzzing, with tranquil parks that sit comfortably between the skyscrapers. Everyone is so friendly, the food is delicious and the shopping is the best! There's even a beautiful beach on the south side of the island. Love it there :D

[Mzx10484]

I liked Bergen better. But the best thing about Norway are its rural areas, not its urban ones, imo.

I've been in Bergen for some days. Made some nice pics.
http://i1276.photobucket.com/albums/y468/mzx10484/IMG_1156a_zps5f6d177c.jpg (http://s1276.photobucket.com/user/mzx10484/media/IMG_1156a_zps5f6d177c.jpg.html)

Still like Oslo more. Has great nature around the city, if you like the rural areas, you have them, but also around Bergen, I just had not enough time there.

Germany has beautiful nature, too. North Sea
http://i1276.photobucket.com/albums/y468/mzx10484/Nordsee_zpse952b341.jpg (http://s1276.photobucket.com/user/mzx10484/media/Nordsee_zpse952b341.jpg.html)

and Baltic Sea
http://i1276.photobucket.com/albums/y468/mzx10484/ostsee_zps6b7e0c65.jpg (http://s1276.photobucket.com/user/mzx10484/media/ostsee_zps6b7e0c65.jpg.html)

South Germany - Bavarian Forest.
http://i1276.photobucket.com/albums/y468/mzx10484/Arbersee-im-Bayerischen-Wald_zpscb3b4008.jpg (http://s1276.photobucket.com/user/mzx10484/media/Arbersee-im-Bayerischen-Wald_zpscb3b4008.jpg.html)

Depends on what you prefer. The sea, the woods, the mountains - and what possibilities you have, means time and money.

[HotNunchuckFury]

Germany is somewhere I would like to go. Besides the UK I haven't explored northern Europe at all yet. Those woods look beautiful. I live near Sherwood Forest and we often visit there for walks, bike rides and picnics. Can't beat it for a family day out :)

[Whatswiththeheadbands?]

I do an extremely small amount of travelling (like, never), but the one place I've always wanted to go to is Italy. I hope to go there some day.

[BubblyShell22]

Haven't done much traveling here either. I've gone to Florida for vacations a few times, but that's it. I'd love to visit California and Las Vegas here in the U.S. As far as internationally, I'd love to visit Ireland, England, and even Scotland.

[Icebot]

I've been to New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Florida, Louisiana, Texas, Iowa, South Dakota, Nebraska and a couple other states. I'd like to go back to Florida some day and visit the western US, such as California.

I only went to Canada once, that's the only time I was ever in another nation.

There are some places I never want to go to, such as North Korea and Pakistan.

[Lou 500]

I haven't been out of the country for a few years now. But I've been to Portugal, Malta, Spain, Australia, Germany, Mexico, Wales and Florida so I consider myself fairly well travelled.

[Prowler]

I've been lucky in this respect. I live in England but have visited France, Italy, Spain (including the Balearic islands), Portugal, Greece (including Crete, Kalimnos and Cyprus), Wales, Scotland, US (California), Hong Kong and seen some pretty amazing stuff. Loved the Gaudi architecture in Barcelona and the raw landscape of the Scottish Highlands is pretty breathtaking. Venice was a place I always wanted to see and glad I have as it's beautiful but not surprisingly very touristy and I have no desire to go back. Favourite destination has to be Hong Kong though. Been 4 times and can't wait to go again. The city is buzzing, with tranquil parks that sit comfortably between the skyscrapers. Everyone is so friendly, the food is delicious and the shopping is the best! There's even a beautiful beach on the south side of the island. Love it there :D
I haven't been out of the country for a few years now. But I've been to Portugal, Malta, Spain, Australia, Germany, Mexico, Wales and Florida so I consider myself fairly well travelled.
Did you guys happen to go to Algarve? Not to sound stereotypical but most tourists from the UK tend to come here for the sun and the beach. :P

[Kanon]

I was in France, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark, Malta and Austria.
I visited all in vacations and if I have to choose I would say France, because we (me and my family) were in LILLE and It was sooooo clean there and the People were amazingly friendly.:D

[Prowler]

Ah looks like I made a thread about travelling 11 years ago already. So many users ITT I haven't seen in ages.

Last year I visited both the Czech Republic(Czechia) and Poland. Very nice places. Prague is indeed beautiful and has amazing beer. Plzen is pretty cozy and the Pilsner-Urquell factory tour was cool. Krakow was a nice city and of course I ate Pierogi there. I also went to visit the Wielizcka salt mines and the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration-extermination camp built up by the Nazis.

[DarkFell]

The only out-of-country 'traveling' that I did, was when my mother flew to Augsburg Germany and I came out a few months later. (I didn't really have a say in the matter. :lol:)

** That was a different time as well:West Germany and East Germany were still a reality, and so was The Cold War.

As for in-country travel: New York, Arizona, New Mexico (to and from Arizona), Tennessee (twice), Arkansas & Mississippi (to and from Tennessee), and traveling to certain cities and camp-sites within my state has been my traveling history so far.

[Barkworm]

I think for a country almost as big as the entirety of Europe, visiting different states definitely counts as ‘travelling‘.

I enjoyed travelling when I was younger but today I‘m fine with going to places within Germany. The only time I went abroad in the last 8 years was the occasional trip to France and the border is about 2 hours away from our place.

Oh, and I go to England almost every year. That slipped my mind for some reason, possibly because it‘s usually work-related.

[CyberCubed]

I think for Europeans traveling is more accessible because well...all those countries in western Europe are literally right next to each other. You guys have like 20+ countries basically all piled up there.

For us Americans, we're basically isolated on the other side of the globe. Other than Canada which most of us don't care about, all we have is Mexico and South America and unless you're hispanic we don't really travel there much due to all the drug dealers, crime and dangerous activities. It's much harder to travel to Europe from here, or Australia or Japan, or any of the miscellaneous dangerous countries in Africa or the Middle East where they chop off the head of Americans upon landing.

[Barkworm]

I'll give you only 2 out of 5 dumb thumbs for this post.

[Prowler]

I think for Europeans traveling is more accessible because well...all those countries in western Europe are literally right next to each other. You guys have like 20+ countries basically all piled up there.

For us Americans, we're basically isolated on the other side of the globe. Other than Canada which most of us don't care about, all we have is Mexico and South America and unless you're hispanic we don't really travel there much due to all the drug dealers, crime and dangerous activities. It's much harder to travel to Europe from here, or Australia or Japan, or any of the miscellaneous dangerous countries in Africa or the Middle East where they chop off the head of Americans upon landing.

Well to be fair you're not entirely wrong. The farther a country is away from yours, the more expensive it is to fly there. There's the main reason why most Europeans haven't been to Japan, myself included. It's very expensive to fly there. You might get lucky searching for cheap flights on google Flights but a cheap flight/return flight to/from Japan means about 500-600 euros these days. average is significantly above that and expensive is 1000+ euros especially in the high season(cherry blossom spring season). And flying, like many other things, became more expensive since Covid. I suppose the fact lots of airlines don't fly to or over Russia nowadays also doesn't help either when going to Asia. Hence why flying to Mongolia is prohibitively expensive these days.

When I went to Prague last year I remember how you could just easily buy a train ticket to to Slovakia, Austria and Germany. Had I spent an extra night or two in Prague, I'd probably have gone to Dresden on a day trip or something.

[FredWolfLeonardo]

The only country I'd travel to is the United Arab Emirates because I have family living there, I will be flying out there shortly and I aim to go there once every 2 years.

Saudi Arabia I will go once in my life for religious reasons. Pakistan, probably not, I don't hate the place or anything, I think its a beautiful country with great people, but I'm not close enough to my distant family there for it to be a priority when the Emirates itself is exhausting enough.

[Prowler]

The only country I'd travel to is the United Arab Emirates because I have family living there, I will be flying out there shortly and I aim to go there once every 2 years.

Saudi Arabia I will go once in my life for religious reasons. Pakistan, probably not, I don't hate the place or anything, I think its a beautiful country with great people, but I'm not close enough to my distant family there for it to be a priority when the Emirates itself is exhausting enough.

A lot of people flying from Europe to places like China, Korea, Japan, Thailand, etc. have layovers in the UAE or Qatar.

[FredWolfLeonardo]

When I was super young, my dad took me across mainland Europe basically but since I was like 5, I don't even count it as I hardly remember anything of it.

All the places I've been to otherwise are Pakistan, New Zealand, United Arab Emirates, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.

My dad is a huge travelling buff, he travels like 2-3 times a year. He always asks me randomly when I'm travelling when we're together and it absolutely drives me nuts.

What used to be a "I'll think about it" in response to him asking me when I'm touring Europe has turned into a blunt Never. I can't even fake being interested anymore lol

[Prowler]

When I was super young, my dad took me across mainland Europe basically but since I was like 5, I don't even count it as I hardly remember anything of it.

All the places I've been to otherwise are Pakistan, New Zealand, United Arab Emirates, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.

My dad is a huge travelling buff, he travels like 2-3 times a year. He always asks me randomly when I'm travelling when we're together and it absolutely drives me nuts.

What used to be a "I'll think about it" in response to him asking me when I'm touring Europe has turned into a blunt Never. I can't even fake being interested anymore lol
I'm jealous of your dad. A pity you don't like travelling because many people would love having a dad like that :lol:

[FredWolfLeonardo]

I guess the grass is always greener on the other side.

My grandad hated travelling too and didn't care about anything aside from his work and home life.

Maybe the boredom got to my dad who started travelling really young. But now that my dad has pushed that lifestyle on me, I've returned to what my grandpa was like.

And so the cycle continues.

[Prowler]

Btw, do you guys prefer travelling alone or with company?

I'm a very lonely man so I travel alone always. Last time I traveled with someone else was with my mother when I was a teenager. A an adult I've exclusively traveled alone.

I don't have anything to compare solo travel with anymore. And traveling with a parent when you're a kid is a whole different experience from travelling with, let's say, friends or a gf when you're an adult, I assume.

[sdp]

Even if the distance is longer, the difference in culture between California and New York or Texas is not all that different between them. Go to France and Spain and you get a very different feeling despite being so close.

[CyberCubed]

I'd probably like to travel more but a few things prevent me from bothering:

1. Too expensive. Plane ticket, the hotel, a possible rent-a-car, then food/dining...add this all together and even if you only go away for 1 week, it could very well add up to thousands of dollars.

2. I don't really get enough time off from work to bother. Going away for only 2-3 days would not be worth it.

3. The language barrier. I only speak english, traveling to foreign countries and not knowing the language is rough. And I know a lot of them speak english too, but the issue is reading signs, dining/eating, or basic interactions.


And last but not least, I am "El Cheapo," meaning I don't want to spend a lot of money on 1 week that I'll forget about in a few months. Maybe when I'm retired.

[Prowler]

I'd probably like to travel more but a few things prevent me from bothering:

1. Too expensive. Plane ticket, the hotel, a possible rent-a-car, then food/dining...add this all together and even if you only go away for 1 week, it could very well add up to thousands of dollars.

2. I don't really get enough time off from work to bother. Going away for only 2-3 days would not be worth it.

3. The language barrier. I only speak english, traveling to foreign countries and not knowing the language is rough. And I know a lot of them speak english too, but the issue is reading signs, dining/eating, or basic interactions.


And last but not least, I am "El Cheapo," meaning I don't want to spend a lot of money on 1 week that I'll forget about in a few months. Maybe when I'm retired.

1. I do wonder now... is it more expensive for Americans to fly to Europe than vice-versa? I know the Euro and the British Pound are stronger than the US dollar, but not all countries use the Euro. Scandinavian countries, Poland and Czechia don't, for example. Neither does Russia. The Czech krone is definitely not that strong. The Polish Zloty seems fine in terms of strength.

2. I forgot about the fact you Americans get so little vacation time and that you don't even get paid vacation days. That sounds terrible.

3. I understand the anxiety but do you really think I speak Polish, Czech, Swedish, Irish, Danish or Norwegian? :lol: I could barely pronounce the basic Polish words for thank you and please when I went there. Most people will travel to countries they don't speak the native language of at all. People in the tourism sector will usually be bilingual, at least.

Anyway being European is a great advantage when it comes to travelling. Our continent is rather small and easily connected. And if your country is a EU and Schengen Agreement member, you don't even need a passport to travel to many other nations. I can just travel to Poland, Czechia, Croatia, Slovakia, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Holland, Belgium, etc. without needing a passport. I just need my national ID and they only ask to see it at the airport before I board the flight. No dealing with immigration officers in those countries.

Visas? I literally never needed one in my life. And if I ever decide to visit Japan and South Korea one day, I won't need one either. Just a passport. Portugal is one of those countries exempt from visas for places like Japan and SK. It's actually a very powerful passport. More powerful than a US one in fact: https://www.passportindex.org/byRank.php