As the son of a railwayman I have always been interested in trains. In Japan the enthusiasm for trains is at a whole new level. There are conventional trainspotters taking photographs and recording numbers called Tori-tetsu (tori means to take, and tetsu means train) Sharyo-tetsu are fans of train design, who love this one of … Continue reading Nation of Trainspotters
You arrange to rent a car for your holiday for around $40/day; when you get there they want to charge you another $30/day to remove a $4,000 excess in case you have an accident. So should you pay? My travel hack answer is NO! . . . . . and here are two reasons why … Continue reading Car Rental Insurance Excess
Now with many countries having Goods and Services Tax (GST) or the similar Value Added Tax (VAT) the tax saving advantage of Duty Free on most goods is only 10-15%. When you buy at airport shops you may be avoiding duty (including sales taxes) but the rents at these stores are astronomic. The owners reflect … Continue reading Few Bargains at Duty Free
Tigers Nest Bhutan Do you sometimes get a little bit jealous when your friends go to all those exotic places, like Bhutan, and then rub it in with lots of photographs on Facebook. Well I have an antidote to that because I make a point of posting bad holiday photographs on facebook. Most people would … Continue reading Bad Facebook Posts
My # 1 Under-Rated Destination Hotel Lafayette Back in 2017 we went on an eleven week world tour for our 40th wedding Anniversary, and one of our stops was Buffalo. Most Americans we talked to said "WTF are you going there?" I must admit we originally only considered Buffalo as a destination because it had … Continue reading Buffalo, New York State
Last year I was on a 19 day highlights of China group tour. One of the men on the tour wore the same kind of blue lightweight shirt every single day! I hope he had brought a few different shirts and changed shirts every night . . . . . but I wasn't going to … Continue reading Take Different Shirts
Advantages Its great to be able to get views like the one in the photo. Some people like to lean against the side of the plane to sleep. (Although I have never found that much benefit) You won't have people asking you if they can get passed. Disadvantages On lots of trans ocean flights there … Continue reading Are Window Seats Overrated?
I hear that Airlines performance with checked luggage is getting better. According to a SITA Baggage Report for 2017 about one bag for every 170 passengers fails to arrive at the carousel. Only a small proportion of those cases are permanently lost, around 1 case per 2,500 customers. Reason for loss Almost half of all … Continue reading Lost Luggage
