International Travel News

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January 2012 issue | Appears on page 36

Road Scholar’s ‘great guides’

My wife, Ginny, and I went on a two-week cruise to Greece and Turkey, “Voyages to Antiquity: Athens to Athens,” Sept. 7-21, 2010, with Road Scholar (Boston, MA; 800/454-5768).

The total cost of this educational trip was close to $16,000 for the two of us, excluding insurance but including round-trip airfare from Washington Dulles to Athens via New York, all land tours and all shipboard and tour tips.

The excellent MV Aegean Odyssey had 179 crew for 333 other passengers on...

January 2012 issue | Appears on page 36

Rewarding Amazon cruise

My partner and I had a truly stress-free, happy 10 days on the trip “Amazon River” with National Geographic Expeditions (Washington, DC; 888/966-8687), May 14-23, 2011.

Aboard the river ship Delfin II, we explored Peru’s Pacaya-Samiria Reserve and the Upper Amazon River region. The trip was run in conjunction with Lindblad Expeditions (New York, NY; 800/397-3348).

At $5,590 per person, not including any airfare (although we did have Lindblad book our San Francisco/Lima...

January 2012 issue | Appears on page 54

Italy villa, France cruise

For our 50th anniversary, my wife, Judy, and I took our children and grandchildren (11 people in all) for a two-week vacation in Italy.

I rented Villa Aquilea (contact Jim and Katie Edmunds, 3585 Longwood Ave., Boulder, CO 80305; phone 303/494-1581 or, during the season, to Italy at 011 [39] 333 668 8968), which I read about in ITN (April ’10, pg. 71). The rental price for the week we stayed there, June 18-25, 2011, was $6,800.

Located high on a hillside overlooking the...

January 2012 issue | Appears on page 55

Chambres d’hôtes

My wife and I parlayed our SkyMiles into a trip to France and would like to recommend a few chambres d’hôtes which provided good accommodation and real contact with the local people.

• From Paris we drove to the south coast of Brittany, where we stayed in the small town of Kerjean at one of the nine Gîtes de Kerjean (Kerjean F-29910 Tregunc, France; phone +33 [0] 2 98 97 36 76); the host was Christophe Cardon.

We highly recommend these fully equipped chambres. For...

January 2012 issue | Appears on page 55

Hotel Wallis, Munich

Whenever my husband, Bernie, and I go to Europe, we enjoy flying Lufthansa, and when we go to Germany, which most recently was in September ’10, we like to arrive in and depart from Munich.

Right outside the Lufthansa terminal, we catch the airline’s shuttle and take it to the Hauptbahnhof (main train station) in the city (€17 round trip). We stay in the city center area for a day in order to “Europeanize” ourselves.

For our last trip, Chris Weike...

January 2012 issue | Appears on page 56

Timor-Leste visit

A friend and I visited Baucau, Timor-Leste (East Timor), May 27-June 4, 2011. Timor-Leste uses the US dollar as currency.

In Baucau, I would avoid New Town. Because of high unemployment, shacks, crowds and no tourist sites, it “felt dangerous” to us. We recommend staying one night in Villa Antigua (Old Town) and two nights at the beach. Reservations weren’t necessary.

In Baucau, Pousada de Baucau (phone +670 724 1111) in Villa Antigua is the luxury traveler...

January 2012 issue | Appears on page 57

Fab flushers

Rick Steves’ piece on toilets (July ’11, pg. 59) brought to mind the new toilets my husband and I have run across in Asia on trips in 2005, 2009 and 2011.

The new Asian toilet is not a “squat” type but the Washlet, made by Toto®. It’s the “everything toilet.” It comes in various models, but they all have control panels. Some panels are attached to the toilet seat; others are wall mounted.

The most basic model allows the users to...

December 2011 issue | Appears on page 14

In and around Amsterdam

I spent three weeks in Amsterdam and the Netherlands in August ’11. If you have the pleasure of spending more than four or five days there, here are some ideas for saving money.

A tram/bus ticket in Amsterdam costs more than €2.50 (near $3.50) and is good for only one hour. However, if you initially spend €7.5 for an OV-Chipkaart (kaart means “card” in Dutch), adding on however much more you wish, each ride costs about half of the single-ticket price; the...