The How’s and Why’s of Travel Insurance

Four years ago I wrote a post titled “9 Ways I Break Conventional Travel Wisdom”. One of the items (which I wasn’t proud of at the time) was that I traveled for a significant time without travel insurance. I got lucky that nothing serious happened to me while I was traveling without insurance. I have …

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Sobrino de Botín: The World’s Oldest Restaurant

Last month, 47 year old pitcher Jamie Moyer set a record by giving up his 506th home run. For those of you who live outside of baseball playing countries, giving up a home run in a bad thing. You’d think that by setting the all time record for giving up home runs would make Jamie …

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Borobudur: Icon of Indonesia

Iconic symbols are a theme I will be referring to often. For example, when you think of Paris, what image comes to mind? Probably the Eiffel Tower. Rome? The Colosseum. London? Big Ben. New York, LA, San Fransisco? The Statue of Liberty, the Hollywood Sign, and the Golden Gate Bridge. I can go on and …

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Traveling to Dangerous Places

This Saturday I’m flying to Acapulco, Mexico. I’ll be there a few days before sailing on the Queen Elizabeth up to Los Angeles as a guest of Cunard Cruise Lines. Not surprisingly, almost everyone I’ve told mentioned something about crime, murders, drug gangs, or beheadings. Almost all the news coming from Mexico lately has been …

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McDonald’s Malaysia: Golden Arches Over The South China Sea

This post was nine months in the making. Just as Malaysia is split into two distinct parts, my visit to Malaysia was separated by over half a year. I visited Sabah and Sarawak on Borneo in January and I visited Peninsular Malaysia in August. I could have written the post back then, but I wanted …

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McSamoa’s….or, Polynesians Got Back

I’m going to combine the Samoa and American Samoa McDonald’s entry because they aren’t interesting enough to do separately. As far as I can tell, there is only one restaurant in each county. The Samoa McDonald’s is right in town a block off Beach St. and the American Samoa restaurant is out near the airport. …

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McDonald’s Noumea

The McDonald’s in Noumea wasn’t anything special. Nothing special on the menu. The only thing of note was how they organized their value meals. You picked a sandwich, you picked a side (salad or fries) and a drink. Each meal was the same price. They also had the Royal Cheese from Pulp Fiction fame. Not …

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You Do Not Need A Guidebook To Travel

If you have been reading the news the last few days, you have probably come across the “scandal” about the Lonely Planet writer who wrote parts of the Colombia guide book without ever traveling to Colombia. Actually, it is a non-story. He was never supposed to go to Colombia. He was just supposed to write …

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The Most Beautiful Island In the Pacific

Pohnpei is the most beautiful place I’ve visited in my trip so far. Hands down, no questions. I was completely taken aback at the flowers, birds, lagoon, mountain, and the reef. The place I stayed was the Village Hotel, which is exactly what you think of when you dream of living on an island. All …

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