Travellers on Tour

We are looking at going to the US for a couple of weeks holiday, and have been searching through a lot of websites for the cheapest ticket to get there. One of my friends who flies a lot told me of this website called www.kayak.com that is basically a comprehensive flight search engine.

You put in the usual things – where you are flying from and to and then your dates then kayak.com seaches through all the flights it can find. This is really not take different from any other website – but there is more…

You can search by alliance – so if you want to flu Star Alliance you can take off One World and Sky Team and it will just display flights from airlines in that alliance. You can also uncheck any airlines you would prefer not to fly.

The beauty of this website is how flexable the search allows you to be in terms of stops, airlines and prices. Next time you fly have a look at it – it is a really useful tool!

Flying can be an expensive mode of transport – but I have compiled a list of a few things you can do to be sure that you get the best deal on the flights:

Search around – This is the most important one. Unless you are going after air miles from a particular airline I highly recommend shopping around for the cheapest ticket. Travel agents can do this – or you can go to websites like ebookers or cheapflights and they will search through the airlines for the cheapest ticket.

you could also search on the web for low cost airlines that may fly between the 2 countries (especially in Europe), whose flights will not nessecarily come up in some of the travel websites. Low cost airlines are popping up all over the place – so be sure to have a look and you could potentially save a lot!

Be flexible with dates – This is really important for a cheap ticket, as if you fly close to or on a weekend the cost of the flights will increase, where as if you can be flexible and fly on a tuesday or wednesday you could save some cash.

Dont travel in peak season – If you can help it try to avoid travelling in the peak seasons (Summer when school is out, Christmas and Easter), If possible leave just before or after the peak time. One tip at Christmas is to fly on Christmas day and the price (in my experience) will be significantly lower then a couple of days before.

After my wife and I got married a couple of years ago, we went back to the US to visit her family. Landing at Dulles airport in Washington DC, we had prebooked a car for 7 days online, that according to the website was going to cost us $280 – which I thought was a great deal.

However once we landed in the US and had spent 2 hours lining up at immigration, we finally made it to the Enterprise Car Rental place. They quickly found our booking and then they added up the “extras” that conveniently were not added on the website and suddenly our $280 rental was going to cost over $1200 dollars.  We could not afford that and so we had a huge dilema about what we would do for transport for the week,

I hugely disapprove of that kind of marketting on a website – and I know they could argue that there are other terms and conditions – but the reality of this is that it is not helping the customer at all. At best it is misleading – what is the point?

It is not useful for anyone to have a quote that is wrong, which is why I am grateful that now in the European Union all flight prices on websites have to include all costs – so that you do not buy a £1 ticket that in reality costs you £29. I just wish that the US car rental firms would take a leaf out of the airlines book and stop being misleading!

If you are travelling to Asia, Africa or the South Pacific from Europe you could choose to fly with Emirates airlines. They will in nearly all cases fly through Dubai giving you a stop over of a few hours.

Dubai airport, like everything in the city, is elaborate. When you arrive and have cleared security – the first thing that will get your notice is the size of the ceilings, combine that with the architecture of the roof and you have a terminal building that feels very spacious.  The decor of the buildings are I would describe as over the top and although there is plenty of space – something about the ambience of the terminal is a little encrouching, I think it could be to do with the array of light and ornaments…but that is probably personal taste.

What I really like to do in this airport is make my way to the Transit hotel (located one level above the shops and restaurants) where for a nominal fee of around $5 you can use a lap pool and jacuzzi. I usually pass on the lap pool and spend my time relaxing in the Jacuzzi which is perfect after sitting on an 8 hour flight and before doing another one of equal length!

The shops are the same as anywhere else – and I destinctly remember being underwhelmed at the choice and “savings”- although the prices are helpfully listed in the local currency as well as dollars and euros – and helpful touch to help to separate with your cash! There are plenty of places to eat and the resturants are round the back of the shops separated from the main walkway so there is a little more peace there. so you can have you McDonalds, or Chinese food overlooking the runway through a huge wall of glass!

Dubai is a nice airport – and I use the word nice because of its obvious ambiguity. The shops are nothing special, the food is the same choices you would have in London, Brisbane, Atlanta or Reykjavik, the architecture is good and the transit hotel has good facilities. To conclude would be that this could be an airport anywhere in world just with a hint of elaboration that is becoming so common in the United Arab Emirates!

One great thing about travelling is seeing the different sports that each country plays. I recommend seeing a professional game in each country to get a feel for the place. – here are some examples from my experiences and hopefully you will come round to see why watching sport in different places definately gives you a feel any place!

In Tanzania I went to see a soccer game – the Dar es Salam (the Simbas) team play the Arusha Football Club at the Arusha Stadium. This was in my first couple of weeks of moving to the country and one of our friends got us so we could stand next to the players bench. In typical African style the game started late and after about half an hour not much had happened – so the fans started getting a bit rambunctious. It was not long before we realised we were in trouble when we had about 100 angry fans running towards us from across the pitch and a similar number of riot police running to meet them from behind us -leaving us bang in the middle. It was a great experience – especially because we emerged unhurt!!

The United States has an interesting mix of professional and non-professional sports. I had the priviledge of going to a High School football (American Football) game in Virginia – and it was obvious that these students had been well drilled in their craft – to an extent where one wonders if they study, or how pushed by parents / teachers they must be, especially as high school and college sports represent so much income for these institutions, and are doorways to bigger things for the players!
I also would really suggest trying to go to a baseball game in the US – while it is not an adreneline packed sport – the atmosphere in the stadiums is worth going to experience even if you dont have a clue about the rules (the same can be said for cricket!). It is the only professional sport in the world where everyone in the crowd sings a song before the game (take me out to the ball game)…it is quite fascinating! Remember to bring a glove cause if you catch a ball that has been hit into the crowd you can keep it!

The Australians are quite incredable at Sport – they dominate internationally in 3 sports (rugby union and league and cricket) play soccer and basketball to a good standard and then they have Aussie Rules Football (AFL) which no one else plays but is a vastly entertaining sport. All this achievement in a country of 20 million! During my stays in Australia I really got into rugby league and would try and go to see the Queensland Cowboys as often as possible. The atmosphere at these games is great it is so laid back that two ends of the statium have grass banks that you can bring a picnic blanket and have a beer while the game is on. The atmosphere directly reflects the Australian culture of being laid back – I like to call it the “No Worries Culture” and it makes Australia a great place to visit or live!

I still have a few sports I want to watch in various nations – these include an AFL game in Australia, a gaelic hockey game in Ireland, Ice Hockey in North America and a football (soccer) game in South America. It is amazing how sports really can reflect the ambience of a nation!

Having previously written about cheap, quality accommodation – I have discovered another hotel chain that are simple but effective. Etap hotels which are only in Europe at the moment, have nearly 400 hotels and offer rooms of up to 3 in a room for as little as £35 a night in the UK and 40 Euros in Europe – obviously this is not cheap enough for backpacking or anything like that -but if you want a hotel and don’t want to pay huge amounts this hotel is one to look at.

My dad stayed at one of the hotels in Birmingham this week and brought back this ‘Do Not Disturb‘ sign from the door – so I took a photo of it to share with you all. The text reads “If I wanted to be disturbed I’d go and stay at a nightclub” on one side. The other side has check boxes and says “only disturb me if…I’ve won the lottery, Its raining chocolate, Godzilla is in town or Other!” I thought that was a nice touch for the hotel. If you are looking for cheap accommodation across Europe (including Germany, Belgium, Poland, Austria, Spain and more…) – then I recommend having a look at www.etaphotel.com!