| Product: |
Why (not) travel? |
| Date: |
10/12/03 (39 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Thanks to Malu for the questions.
Q: How many times a year do you travel?
More than I can afford and not as often as I'd like to. I usually manage to get abroad once or twice a year at my own expense - Malta or Spain in spring or autumn. I also have an all expenses paid five day trip to Alicante and the Cosat Blanca every September as I work for a Spanish company. Once the conference and inspection tours are out of the way I usually have at least a couple of days free.
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Q: For how long do you go away?
Usually somewhere between a week and ten days. I can't really stay away any longer because of work, which is just as well as my wife packs enough clothes as it is. Now that easyjet have started flying from Newcastle airport, I also have an occasional long weekend away; my last holiday was four days in Prague at the end of August.
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Q: Do you stay in your home country or do you go abroad?
I prefer going abroad nowadays because I travelled a lot in Britain when I was younger. We do try to have a couple of weekends a year up in Scotland or Northumberland, and we regularly drive to Hexham, Seahouses and Bamburgh in the summer. Other than that it's cheaper for me to fly abroad nowadays than it would be to take the train to London.
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Q: Do you organise your holidays yourself or do you go to a travel agency?
A bit of a mixture of everything to be honest. Being a bit of an old duffer I still spend hours in front of the Teletext holiday pages chasing all the last minute bargains, though I'm relying more and more on the internet as online bookings are cheaper with easyjet and ryannair. I tend to book my main holidays through travel agents, the odd weekend away online, and then the company organises the odd trip to Spain for me as well.
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Q: Do you prepare your holidays in advance by reading guidebooks and studying maps?
Not really, though my children always tell me I should. They usually give me advice on the best bars and restaurants to go to, and then I disappoint them when I get back by telling them I forgot all the names. Most of the time I'm just returning to places I've visited many times before though. The new things are a nice surprise and I don't need a guidebook to tell me about the rest.
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Q: Do you travel alone/with family or friends/with an organised group?
The only times I travel as part of an organised group are the company conferences and my very rare trips to see Newcastle United play in Europe. Now that the kids are grown up it's usually just my wife and I, though her sister sometimes joins us and my children invite me to go away with them if they can't find anybody else daft enough to. I don't think I've ever travelled alone; I prefer to have a bit of company.
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Q: Do you prefer the sea / mountains / plains / cities as destinations?
Nowadays it's cities and the sea for me everytime. I suffer from arthritis so mountains don't really have any appeal for me anymore (not that I liked walking uphill even when I was able to). I'm not really a beach person, though I do like to laze around by the water. If I want to go somewhere really quiet I can just drive for thirty minutes into Northumberland, so when I go abroad I prefer places with a bit of life.
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Q: Do you mainly relax or are you an active holidayer?
Only if drinking pints and complaining about the heat count as activities. I have quite a time consuming job so when I go on holiday I really like to put my feet up and relax. I do like the
sights of a place, but after that it's back to a restaurant for a long meal and then straight on to the pub. Having said that, when I went to Prague with my youngest son he had me walking round town all day because he was too tight to pay for a Metro ticket. I suppose there are worse places in the world to work up a thirst.
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Q: If you go abroad do you learn at least some words of the foreign language?
I've always been terrible at foreign languages. My kids tried to teach me a bit of Spanish a few years ago but it mostly went straight in one ear and back out the other. I know just enough to get by and then I leave the rest up to my wife. Mind, coming from Newcastle, it feels like I'm hearing a foreign language every time I drive south of Scotch Corner.
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Q: Are you interested in the cuisine of a foreign country?
Definitely. One of my children lived in Asia for three years so I've had the chance to try out a lot of Korean, Japanese and Chinese dishes (never got the hang of chopsticks though). My favourite foreign food is paella, though I harly ever get the chance to eat it when I'm in Spain because my wife is a vegetarian and I'm not greedy enough to eat a portion for two. Other than that, I'm a big fan of curry and anything foreign that contains alcohol.
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Q: Which means of transportation do you prefer?
I like driving but it's difficult for me to manage long distances anymore. A drunken mini cruise to Hamburg with my brother-in-law put me off ferries so I think I'd have to go for aeroplanes, especially with prices as low as they are right now.
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Q: What kind of luggage do you take with you? Have you got problems packing? Do you tend to take too many / too few things with you?
r>I try to take as little as I can mainly because my wife always seems to have the exact opposite idea. If I ever really need anything else, I just buy it when I'm away.
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Q: Do you send picture postcards to your family and friends?
No. One of the great advantages of modern travel is the ability to send a text message with one hand while you're holding a pint glass in the other. My wife sometimes sends postcards but they always arrive just after we've given up on ever seeing them again.
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majorb - 16/12/03 Why on earth anyone would want to travel south of County Durham is beyond me. ;-) |
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