Vacation ideas

Discussion in 'Everything Else' started by bfun, Jul 31, 2011.

  1. I got some Southwest Airline tickets to anywhere in the US. Figure I'll take a family vacation. I need some ideas. Any recommendations?

    San Diego and San Francisco are on my list already but I wouldn't mind going out east somewhere. A Fall trip to Maine might be neat or Palm Beach, Fl.
     
  2. Well, as an Englishman, I have to say that three weeks I spent moving through California from San Diego up to San Francisco was one of the best trips I've taken in my life...so if you are prepared to hire a car and take the pacific coastal route between stops then I'd say do that. I'm probably one of the few people I know who've been to Los Angeles and liked it which is strange because I thought NYC was a big dirty shithole and I was told for many years LA was the NYC of the west...
     
  3. I hear Vegas is always fun, cheap too (other than the gambling debts...). If your a more outdoors type I'd go to Alaska.

    Where would you like to go?? LA for E3 or Comic Con? NY for Comic Con? Boston or Seattle for PAX? Chicago for Anime Central? Frankly I'd go to Anime Boston of Anime USA in the fall in New England. It's quite pretty there that time of year too. Don't go to Florida in the summer.
     
  4. LA has it's bright spots for sure. Hollywood is a lot of fun. But if you get out of the tourist areas it can get sketchy. NYC is the same. I went to lower Manhattan for a week and felt safe walking around at night. I drove through Brooklyn and Queens and was thankful I didn't have to get out of the cab.
     
  5. Vegas is cool but I've been there 3 times and I'm not a gambler. E3 and Comic Con would be neat.
     
  6. That's the truth. I ran out of money on my trip and I had to have some sent over; we kinda hit the clothes shops a bit hard. Anyway, I got a western union transfer and they sent me to some fucking ghetto. I swear I was shitting my pants collecting this money..although I was reassured by the biggest black guy I've ever seen (I'm 6'4 and 252lbs and he made me look tiny) with the biggest gun I've ever seen holstered to him that I'd be safe...it's one of those bizarre stories I like to tell people when I'm drunk..on reflection it was funny but I don't know why the hell I picked my money up there instead of somewhere like Malibu..

    San Francisco is great though; good chinese food for sure. I did all the touristy shit there like Alcatraz and that was pretty cool too. If they still give you the tour on a headset and you do it, take your headphones off halfway through..its kinda spooky having lots of people milling around but no one saying a thing.

    I did venture into Nevada on my trip and did Yosemite and Reno and I enjoyed my time there as well. Yosemite is something else..Reno is kinda like...nowhere I've ever been but I stayed at the Silver Legacy so I can highly recommend that. My entire time at the Silver Legacy ,all I could think was "this is the Buffet bar where they a scene between Woody Harelson and Bill Murray in Kingpin"..
     
  7. What the fuck? Are you the crown prince of Nigeria?

    Out of curiosity, why did you choose to pay expenses in cash instead of using a credit card? I paid a 40 cent international fee per swipe when I visited Europe, but it helped to further my laziness so it was tolerable. I only use cash for emergencies and small shops that won't take credit.
     
  8. It use to be pretty expensive to get cash in the early 2000s when in the US from my experience. More recently on our honeymoon, it was far better - mind you, considering the money we threw at that, what's a few bank fees anyway.
     
  9. Don't a lot of banks now let you withdraw money abroad for free? I don't travel much being the pauper that I am but I am sure I have seen adverts over the years for different banks advertising this.
     
  10. Oh I had a nightmare with my Credit Card. I hired a big truck/jeep for the time we were there and everytime I've hired a car I usually leave an imprint of my card as the deposit; it's never actually charged. Anyway, I arrive and the woman at the Alamo office <i>should</i> have just took my details but instead billed my card $500 and I wasn't aware until I was told my card was no good at a hotel.

    The hotels, gas and food were all budgeted for my credit card but it got screwed by bitch face at the car hire place so I had to start dipping in my pocket money. I took quite a bit of cash and an American Express travellers cheque card for other things but I guess we went a bit wild..my debit card worked too but the charges were absolutely insane and the rate of exchange was fucking awful. It may come as a surprise to you but compared to here, back then, everything in the US was so cheap it was almost criminal of me to NOT buy everything I could lay my hands on...

    The short story is, I spent too much on clothes and food and ended up shit creek so I had to get a loan off my dad to cover the rest of the trip. I walked out of this liquor store in LA with nearly $2500 in cash and I was shitting myself. Also, the cash proved quite awkward because paying with cash was seen as some kind of indicator that I was a criminal or something; I got some funny looks when I paid with real money...infact, there was a bit of a hoohah at a fuel station in San Diego..the guy was not happy I'd tanked the truck and paid cash.
     
  11. Western Union: The scammiest/ghettoest way to send money

    Those Western Union check cashing places are a hive of scum and villainy. The people who use them usually fall into one of these categories:

    -scammers, especially of the craigslist and Nigerian variety
    -drug dealers
    -prostitutes
    -illegal immigrants
    -trying to hide money (deadbeat dads)
    -no bank account because of check fraud

    Most of the Western Union scams are some variation on this:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advance-fee_fraud

    Going into one of those places and coming out with a big wad of cash is going to make people think you're doing something shady.
     
  12. we get stories like that all the time at my store. the biggest buyers are usually German or Asian or something.
     
  13. Over here, Western Union is run through the Post Office and while they're a pretty greedy bunch they're fairly straight up in terms of business ethics. In the US it's probably different but given that I was half a world away and needed money pretty quick I had no choice in the matter.

    However, the problem and the looks werent from collecting a Western Union money transfer; no one luckily seemed to care about so I avoid edgetting my head blown off and robbed. No the problem came from simply wanting to pay for things with cash; it was like I was offering to pay for shit with blood diamonds or babies blood. I got the weirdest looks. The guy at the gas station in San Diego was talking about phoning the police..that would have been a hoot actually being carted off.

    That was the same trip where I left a Mall and managed to drive, by accident, into Mexico. Took all of five seconds to get in and about 4 hours to get out.
     
  14. I'm not sure what it's like in other countries, but people don't really pay for things with cash here much any more. Everyone uses debit cards. Use cash for big purchases and people will think you're up to something.

    Back on topic, I'm going to suggest the Florida Keys. Key Largo is a shithole, but Key West is an awesome place.
     
  15. My parents still pay cash for everything.
     
  16. And they're TOTALLY gangsters o.0
     
  17. Decided to go to Orlando, Universal and Walt Disney World.
     
  18. You can't really go wrong with that, especially if you have a family. I have been on a Credit Card application spree whenever they offer over 50,000 points to apply. I've got about 200,000 points (~ $2000-2500) to apply towards a vacation now for free.
     
  19. That's what I did with Southwest. Basically the flight is free and Disney is offering their meal plans for free in October. All I have to pay for is lodging and park tickets. Overall it should be a semi-cheap Disney trip. And I'm leaving the kiddos behind. I figure I'll doctor some photo's to make it look like they went. Then when they are older I'll show them the pictures and tell them about how much fun they had.
     
  20. Brilliant they don't need the long plane flight any way.