donnie Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 1) Vienna - travelled across Europe for 3 months and too be honest I never really fancied going to Vienna all that much. Assumed it would be extremely dull...turned out to be the most beautiful,inspiring place I have ever been. The architecture is simply stunning. Not the cheapest of places but a cheap flight to Bratislava and a short 30 minute train ride can make it a cheap city break to remember. 2) Toronto - just a fantastic city. I couldnt imagine a better place to live. I was torn between putting totonto or shanghai as my number 2 but toronto edges it just. 3) San Sebastian - Just simply beautiful. I know there are better beach resorts around the world but the fact it is so close to home and seems to have escaped the 'brits abroad culture' means I love it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelVilla Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 New York - amazing city and I just love it. Fun to walk around all the sites you seen in movies or on TV. Walking Brooklyn Bridge into Manhattan is breathtaking. Barcelona - beautiful city with much to do. Love the food. Villa Park - no more comments 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post tonyh29 Posted February 6, 2014 Popular Post Share Posted February 6, 2014 (edited) Yikes 3 ... I'd struggle to get it down to a top 50 Different places for different things ... I mean I love Vegas but no way am I going to put it in over Cario and the pyramids at the end of the day So taking everything into account my top 3 would be 1) Pyongyang (DPRK) .... As an overall experience it was just amazing ... To be present at the military parade just topped off what was already a fantastic trip It had an element of being an elaborate version of the Trueman show at times but there were also genuine moments about it .. I left the group that went shopping and went to the micro brewery in town (with my guide of course ) great beer but I suggest you pass on the alcoholic milk if you ever visit ... Riding the underground , picnic in the park with a local football team and of course getting dragged on stage at a children's performance in front of half of Pyongyang ( I was supposed to throw a hula hoop for the star act but deciding to have a go on my own first Much to the howls of laughter from the Koreans ) I doubt I'll ever experience a trip like it again tbh 2) Tibet ....more specifically the actual train journey up which is just awe inspiring ... You are in a train at close on 5000m across the Tibet Plateau with amazing views way up in the clouds... Tibet itself has been turned into a typical Chinese town with buildings and neon lights but old Tibet has been left intact and the potala palace is impressive. Tibet itself is a strange one .. I know Richard Gere wants to free them but I kinda got the impression that quite a lot of them actually liked the idea of running water , electricity , jobs and Chinese money coming into the region... You walk around Tibet town though and you notice you are being watched from the rooftops constantly by Chinese soldiers The flight out is also bloody awesome with views of the Himalayas , but if you go then you simple have to take the train at least one way 3) yikes this is tough but I'm going for Djibouti.... Just edging out Jordan We got to spend Boxing Day swimming with dozens of whale sharks without another soul for miles ... Forget Oz or the Philippines where you can have encounters along with 100's of others this is the great unknown in a way... The taxi to the boat took us to the wrong harbour where we found ourselves surrounded by a dozen laughing Africans amused that we were lost before then producing some battered out cars and taking us to the correct port without accepting a single penny from us ... They did accept some of the kids sweets in the end To spend hours in the water with the whale sharks was just fantastic .. My son was 5 at the time , I taught him to snorkel in the pool on Christmas Day and then next day his first time swimming in the sea he gets whale sharks ... He already has his career as a marine biologist mapped out at the age of 9 The deepest point in Africa , Lac Assal is like the Dead Sea in Israel only better .... The drive there offers fantastic views , the floating in the lake stings every part of your body then you go to a fault line in the road and essentially when you straddle it you have one foot in Africa and one foot in Arabia ... Another one to go to before people wake up to how its Africa's best kept secret There you go , ask me again and I could give different answers... Like I say Cairo and the pyramids , Galapagos isles ,Machu Pichu, Vegas , st Petersberg , Damascus ,Budapest , Jordan are all great places worthy of any top 3 in their own right ... I'm just lucky enough to be so very spoilt for choice Edited February 6, 2014 by tonyh29 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Electric Avenue Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Bronze ) kos - paradise beach Silver ) East Devon. Gold) B6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
donnie Posted February 6, 2014 Author Share Posted February 6, 2014 Yikes 3 ... I'd struggle to get it down to a top 50 Different places for different things ... I mean I love Vegas but no way am I going to put it in over Cario and the pyramids at the end of the day So taking everything into account my top 3 would be 1) Pyongyang (DPRK) .... As an overall experience it was just amazing ... To be present at the military parade just topped off what was already a fantastic trip It had an element of being an elaborate version of the Trueman show at times but there were also genuine moments about it .. I left the group that went shopping and went to the micro brewery in town (with my guide of course ) great beer but I suggest you pass on the alcoholic milk if you ever visit ... Riding the underground , picnic in the park with a local football team and of course getting dragged on stage at a children's performance in front of half of Pyongyang ( I was supposed to throw a hula hoop for the star act but deciding to have a go on my own first Much to the howls of laughter from the Koreans ) I doubt I'll ever experience a trip like it again tbh 2) Tibet ....more specifically the actual train journey up which is just awe inspiring ... You are in a train at close on 5000m across the Tibet Plateau with amazing views way up in the clouds... Tibet itself has been turned into a typical Chinese town with buildings and neon lights but old Tibet has been left intact and the potala palace is impressive. Tibet itself is a strange one .. I know Richard Gere wants to free them but I kinda got the impression that quite a lot of them actually liked the idea of running water , electricity , jobs and Chinese money coming into the region... You walk around Tibet town though and you notice you are being watched from the rooftops constantly by Chinese soldiers The flight out is also bloody awesome with views of the Himalayas , but if you go then you simple have to take the train at least one way 3) yikes this is tough but I'm going for Djibouti.... Just edging out Jordan We got to spend Boxing Day swimming with dozens of whale sharks without another soul for miles ... Forget Oz or the Philippines where you can have encounters along with 100's of others this is the great unknown in a way... The taxi to the boat took us to the wrong harbour where we found ourselves surrounded by a dozen laughing Africans amused that we were lost before then producing some battered out cars and taking us to the correct port without accepting a single penny from us ... They did accept some of the kids sweets in the end To spend hours in the water with the whale sharks was just fantastic .. My son was 5 at the time , I taught him to snorkel in the pool on Christmas Day and then next day his first time swimming in the sea he gets whale sharks ... He already has his career as a marine biologist mapped out at the age of 9 The deepest point in Africa , Lac Assal is like the Dead Sea in Israel only better .... The drive there offers fantastic views , the floating in the lake stings every part of your body then you go to a fault line in the road and essentially when you straddle it you have one foot in Africa and one foot in Arabia ... Another one to go to before people wake up to how its Africa's best kept secret There you go , ask me again and I could give different answers... Like I say Cairo and the pyramids , Galapagos isles ,Machu Pichu, Vegas , st Petersberg , Damascus ,Budapest , Jordan are all great places worthy of any top 3 in their own right ... I'm just lucky enough to be so very spoilt for choice Have to admit I have never heard of your number 1 pick :-) sounds like an intresting experience. Tibet is defo on my to do list. Is there anything on galapogos islands worth seeing other then komodo dragons?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JamieZ Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 1) Pyongyang (DPRK) .... As an overall experience it was just amazing ... To be present at the military parade just topped off what was already a fantastic trip It had an element of being an elaborate version of the Trueman show at times but there were also genuine moments about it .. I left the group that went shopping and went to the micro brewery in town (with my guide of course ) great beer but I suggest you pass on the alcoholic milk if you ever visit ... Riding the underground , picnic in the park with a local football team and of course getting dragged on stage at a children's performance in front of half of Pyongyang ( I was supposed to throw a hula hoop for the star act but deciding to have a go on my own first Much to the howls of laughter from the Koreans ) I doubt I'll ever experience a trip like it again tbh That's an amazing and enviable list, but Pyongyang alone is probably a one-in-a-million trip, maybe almost literally. How many people in our world will ever get a glimpse inside that place? Especially as an American, I don't think I'll see a DPRK stamp on my passport anytime soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 (edited) probably an easy mistake to make but Komodo dragons are found in a small island group near Bali (Komodo being one of the islands) I went there in August , the dragons can be lethal and the island wardens treat them with a certain level of wariness , more so as one of them got bitten 3 weeks before we went and was lucky to survive Worth a trip you spend a couple of days living on a boat to get there so you also get some great snorkeling and clear night sky's Galapagos isles ( its a group of them , some no more than a bunch of rock , some having bars and night clubs )has lots of wildlife ... Mainly famous for it tortoises(how it got its name ) , Blue footed boobies , marine iguanas , sea lions and penguins We were lucky enough to see a sea turtle laying its eggs on the beach and having witnessed that a black tip shark was swimming a few feet from the shore as we walked back to the boat ... Went in the water to swim with it but sadly it didn't hang around Its a wildlife lovers paradise and though I say it a lot ... Well worth a visit ... My understanding is Everything that lives amthere got there on its own steam so land animals would have drifted there hundreds / thousands of miles on debris from other islands ..and then adapted ... One breed of tortoise has a unique gap on its shell so it can tilt its neck back to feed on the plants that would otherwise be out of reach to it .... Pure evolution at its finest Edited February 6, 2014 by tonyh29 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 1) Pyongyang (DPRK) .... As an overall experience it was just amazing ... To be present at the military parade just topped off what was already a fantastic trip It had an element of being an elaborate version of the Trueman show at times but there were also genuine moments about it .. I left the group that went shopping and went to the micro brewery in town (with my guide of course ) great beer but I suggest you pass on the alcoholic milk if you ever visit ... Riding the underground , picnic in the park with a local football team and of course getting dragged on stage at a children's performance in front of half of Pyongyang ( I was supposed to throw a hula hoop for the star act but deciding to have a go on my own first Much to the howls of laughter from the Koreans ) I doubt I'll ever experience a trip like it again tbh That's an amazing and enviable list, but Pyongyang alone is probably a one-in-a-million trip, maybe almost literally. How many people in our world will ever get a glimpse inside that place? Especially as an American, I don't think I'll see a DPRK stamp on my passport anytime soon. Alas they don't give out passport stamps .. Not sure why exactly but the best I got was being allowed to take a photo of my visa They love Americans visiting , as long as you don't try and convince them of the error of their ways and about the "true " events of the Korean War... There were 3 Americans on my trip with me , one of them even jumped behind the gun on the back of the USS Pueblo and pretended to shoot everyone whilst making the universal child machine gun noise ... Few of the North Koreans had bemused looks but the majority were laughing along.... Tbh we all held our breath and were sure he would be shot or something The only restrictions for Americans is they can't leave via train into China for some reason so they have to leave by plane Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StefanAVFC Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 1) Kittery, Maine - Nothing flashy, just the spot where I probably had the nicest day of my life. 2) New York, New York - Needs no explanation. 3) Prague probably. Awesome city and although I was young when I went there, it has left an impression on me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
legov Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 Tibet itself is a strange one .. I know Richard Gere wants to free them but I kinda got the impression that quite a lot of them actually liked the idea of running water , electricity , jobs and Chinese money coming into the region... You walk around Tibet town though and you notice you are being watched from the rooftops constantly by Chinese soldiers This Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
legov Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 Tony, what do you work as? Where do you get the money to travel so often? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Avflife Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 (edited) 1) Gran Canaria - Mogan - One of the most atmospheric and beautiful places I've seen, relaxed here for a week in the Summer. 2) Madrid - Got to see the Santiago Bernabeu 3) Algarve - Quarteria - One of the longest and most angelic beach fronts in the world IMO Could of said Ibiza, Barcelona, Turin to see the Juventus vs. AC Milan match, Amsterdam or Paris, but probably the top three for me. Edited February 7, 2014 by Avflife Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
omariqy Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 (edited) Not in any order - 1) Cuba - Havana and Cayo Santa Maria 2) Lake Como 3) New York Special mentions to San Sebastian, Prague and Granada Edited February 7, 2014 by omariqy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chappy Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 Tough question! Top 3 would probably be: Ho Chi Minh City (or Nha Trang) - Vietnam is the best country that I have visited; HCMC is a brilliant city (IMO a million times more enjoyable than Hanoi) and Nha Trang was beautiful when I was there weather wise and just had a great time. Köln - my favourite European city, spent a lot of time there whilst living in Germany Toss up between Pai (Thailand) and Riga (Latvia)- would love to go back to both Glastonbury is up there too (during the festival!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shillzz Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 Will hopefully have a completely new list in a couple of months time, but for now: 1) Maldives - Paradise above, and below, the sea. 2) St Lucia - Lovely Island packed with rainforests and some amazing scenery. 3) Normandy - I found the whole war experience both humbling and extremely interesting. The food also happens to be lovely. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villa4europe Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 1) shanghai - i loved the place, i love buildings though and shanghai is full on both huge and interesting ones, plenty to do there too,from the new stuff and then the french quarter etc i've tried explaining on here before, China is strange, people stare at you all the time, strangers walk up to you take a photo and walk off, I'm over 6ft i had people ask me to stand and have photos taken with them, you're on the tube (which thanks to the olympics and expo is brilliant) and eveyone on there is just looking at you, your clothes, your hair the lot, weird feeling that i've never had anywhere else 2) Vegas - another hard to explain place, i went with the gf so didnt do the pool parties and clubs, but still enjoyed it, best place ive ever been for food, so much choice, grand canyon was brilliant too, wasnt sure if it was a sales pitch by the bloke there but we got told not to bother with the indian bridge thing because it wasnt in a good location, go to the "proper" part, cant remember where that was exactly! i know we went to the grand canyon town and it was something like a mile across and apparently a mile down 3) Barcelona - just beat Berlin, great city, been there with the gf and with a group of mates, very different place! both sides of it were really good, watched barca win the super cup and of course did the nou camp tour, magic fountain, picasso museum, la ramblas etc got a great hop on hop off bus service too! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 Tough question! Top 3 would probably be: Ho Chi Minh City (or Nha Trang) - Vietnam is the best country that I have visited; HCMC is a brilliant city (IMO a million times more enjoyable than Hanoi) and Nha Trang was beautiful when I was there weather wise and just had a great time. Köln - my favourite European city, spent a lot of time there whilst living in Germany Toss up between Pai (Thailand) and Riga (Latvia)- would love to go back to both Glastonbury is up there too (during the festival!) Have you been to Tallinn ? I thought it was nicer than Riga but i went to Riga back in 1990's so it may well have changed a lot since I got chatting to a girl online and after a few weeks of chatting she said would you like to meet up for a drink and I said yes , where abouts are you ..she replied "Riga" I was thinking where the heck is that so looked it up ( not even sure there was a google then probably used Lycos !! , it was still the days of having a 9600 modem link with BT !!) but anyway I went over for a long weekend and she showed my around Riga and we took a train out to the countryside as well .. lovely place , must go back there sometime Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 Tony, what do you work as? Where do you get the money to travel so often? I make the money work well when I arrange my trips .. I plan it all out and then fire off emails to local agencies in the countries we want to visit and research flights etc to get decent routes and cheap prices we did South America back in 2007 when the exchange rate was over $2 to the £1 .. so the same trip now would cost around a 1/3 more .... but did my homework and found out that LAN Peru did an airpass so we flew Mexico City - Lima - Puerto Maldonado - Cusco - Lima - Ecuador - Venezuela - Miami for about £420 each coach to the Nasca lines and back from Lima was about £30 it takes a bit of time making it all work but i enjoy it ... As I mentioned in another thread I found a flight for my mate in Thailand of BKK to Oslo for £154 one way ... and we will do our trip around a few countries and then finish in Tehran and head on home ... I found him an Emirates flight back to BKK for £232 .... for me I've found a £50 flight on the Friday morning to Baku ( Azerbaijan ) ..so I'm going to pop there for the weekend before getting the Sunday night BA flight back to London ...like you do sorry , I do rather go on when it comes to travel talk ..... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
legov Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 I wish people around here had the sense to do research instead of spunking money on overpriced packaged holidays tbh (I'm in Singapore right now) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AValon Posted February 7, 2014 Share Posted February 7, 2014 (edited) 1. Iceland...... The desolation of the landscape is difficult to put into words and camping, surrounded by glaciers of the bluest ice gives you such a feeling of how insignificantly small we are. 2. Norway.......Trekked from Trondheim to Oslo, bedding down on fields of deep moss and listening to the thunderous rush of wild mountain rivers. 3. Igoumenitsa........Best Moussaka and the most succulent kalamari on the Greek mainland! Not in any particular order. Edited February 7, 2014 by AValon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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