Starting to travel again: Iceland

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Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Kurt » Mon Apr 19, 2021 4:32 am

Got tickets for just 1 week from Sept. 1 to Sept 8.

Gonna try to get to Greece in October. Thanks to the Evil Vaccine Passports we both will be cleared to travel anyplace that will have us by May 14th.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Vincent » Mon Apr 19, 2021 12:18 pm

Since January 2020, I have been On 4 continents, 6 different countries and a dozen US states.

Going to Germany for some family fun in November.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Kurt » Mon Apr 19, 2021 1:01 pm

Vincent wrote:Since January 2020, I have been On 4 continents, 6 different countries and a dozen US states.

Going to Germany for some family fun in November.


For work I am guessing but that is still a luxury.

Where in Germany?

That is on my list as well. I have two people I need to visit in Braunschweig.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby seektravelinfo » Mon Apr 19, 2021 4:14 pm

I was briefly in Germany last year. In the Black Forest my cousin bought me a cuckoo clock. Very expensive. Simple mechanism and I can’t get the damn thing to work. It’s me, not the clock. I noticed how dry, joyless and unwelcoming the people in small towns were, at tourist spots no less, as though everyone were clinically depressed. Or rude. I think they’re just rude. Cologne though, was different. Liked that city. I’d go back. Strasbourg too, which was Germany for awhile. One thing I could say about Germany, it’s very clean and tidy.

Now that we are talking about travel, I am seeking advice. Thinking about flying to Oklahoma (family there) and then renting a car to drive back to Cleveland, with stops in Little Rock to see friends, the Ozarks for Crystal Bridges (the art museum built by the WalMart heiress), the Shiloh battlefield near Memphis (went there when I was six and for some reason want to go back), some days in Nashville (more family, the fun and decent contingent), maybe a stop in Kentucky for bourbon and the ventriloquist museum near Cincinnati.

But, car rental prices are jacked up, so I guess I’ll probably drive my own car and skip flying into Oklahoma. Here’s my question: What should I do to prepare my car for road trip? It’s a Chevy Trax with 99,000 miles, new tires and runs good.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Kurt » Mon Apr 19, 2021 5:58 pm

seektravelinfo wrote:I was briefly in Germany last year. In the Black Forest my cousin bought me a cuckoo clock. Very expensive. Simple mechanism and I can’t get the damn thing to work. It’s me, not the clock. I noticed how dry, joyless and unwelcoming the people in small towns were, at tourist spots no less, as though everyone were clinically depressed. Or rude. I think they’re just rude. Cologne though, was different. Liked that city. I’d go back. Strasbourg too, which was Germany for awhile. One thing I could say about Germany, it’s very clean and tidy.

Now that we are talking about travel, I am seeking advice. Thinking about flying to Oklahoma (family there) and then renting a car to drive back to Cleveland, with stops in Little Rock to see friends, the Ozarks for Crystal Bridges (the art museum built by the WalMart heiress), the Shiloh battlefield near Memphis (went there when I was six and for some reason want to go back), some days in Nashville (more family, the fun and decent contingent), maybe a stop in Kentucky for bourbon and the ventriloquist museum near Cincinnati.

But, car rental prices are jacked up, so I guess I’ll probably drive my own car and skip flying into Oklahoma. Here’s my question: What should I do to prepare my car for road trip? It’s a Chevy Trax with 99,000 miles, new tires and runs good.


Change the fluids first.

These days 99k is not that much assuming every fluid has been changed, every rattle inspected etc. etc. You are most likely probably already set and don't realize it.

Maybe get an AAA membership?

But yah, Rental prices are crazy. Some of the prices I have seen actually seem like buying a 20 to 25 year old Toyota and selling it when the trip has ended might be more worthwhile than renting.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Darcy » Mon Apr 19, 2021 7:13 pm

Vincent wrote:Since January 2020, I have been On 4 continents, 6 different countries and a dozen US states.

Going to Germany for some family fun in November.


Same, all over the Caribbean and US, Ethiopia, Turkey, Djibouti and some I can't mention, all work related with paperwork that gets me waived though without a glitch. Flying a small helicopter up to the Arctic next week, will probably be up there all summer. Not too far from you in Iceland!

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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Kurt » Mon Apr 19, 2021 8:01 pm

Yep, That is closer to Iceland but I am hoping Iceland is just a bit warmer in early September.

At some point I would like to drive to Hudson Bay...your flight plan reminded me of that.

I 'spose I will need a car though.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Darcy » Tue Apr 20, 2021 10:08 am

There's no driving to Hudson Bay that I'm aware of. Most of those communities are only served by boat or plane. You might be able to get pretty far up James Bay on the East side via Hydro Quebec roads. I may be wrong but never heard of anyone driving there. If you figure it out, take a 12 gauge and slugs, the polar bears aren't afraid of anything. We always carry one.

Even flying up a small helicopter is daunting. I have to pre-arrange 45 gallon fuel drums along the route to make it. Carrying lots of survival gear, as most legs are 300 miles of nothing, and I'm on my own. It would take any SAR unit at least a day or three to get to me. It's was -20 F in Pond Inlet this morning...

My wife is from down the North Saint Lawrence Coast, I think the road may run the entire way nowadays, but back when we met, all the communities were only accessible by boat or plane, or ski-doo in the winter months.

Far cry from what I have been flying the past two decades...

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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Kurt » Tue Apr 20, 2021 12:15 pm

When I was in high school we wanted to drive from central Wisconsin to Mooseonee. I think it would have been 900 miles and, in theory, we would have started running into to the worlds southern-most Polar Bears at about the 700 mile mark.

I think it would be possible to drive from NYC to Raddison QB but that could just be that the farthest I have been from NYC since Jan 1 2020 is 80 miles.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Vincent » Tue Apr 20, 2021 1:47 pm

Kurt wrote:Where in Germany?

That is on my list as well. I have two people I need to visit in Braunschweig.


Going to visit the Christmas Markets in Heidelberg. Heidelberg is one of my favorite cities on the planet.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby snaark » Tue Apr 20, 2021 4:09 pm

seektravelinfo wrote:I was briefly in Germany last year. In the Black Forest my cousin bought me a cuckoo clock. Very expensive. Simple mechanism and I can’t get the damn thing to work. It’s me, not the clock. I noticed how dry, joyless and unwelcoming the people in small towns were, at tourist spots no less, as though everyone were clinically depressed. Or rude. I think they’re just rude. Cologne though, was different. Liked that city. I’d go back. Strasbourg too, which was Germany for awhile. One thing I could say about Germany, it’s very clean and tidy.


It's not a small town thing, it's a southern Germany thing. Freiburg ist basically the Florida of Germany so it's full of angry, middle-class pensioners.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Kurt » Tue Apr 20, 2021 5:33 pm

Vincent wrote:
Kurt wrote:Where in Germany?

That is on my list as well. I have two people I need to visit in Braunschweig.


Going to visit the Christmas Markets in Heidelberg. Heidelberg is one of my favorite cities on the planet.


I had a wonderful Xmas in Nurnberg in 1990. Had zero cash but locals got me drunk. Plus the market there is quite Christmas-y.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby ReptilianKittenEater » Wed Apr 21, 2021 2:27 am

You could drive as far as Cochrane I believe then catch the train up to Moosenee. You could even further up in Manitoba, however the rail service may have ceased to Churchill. They are slowly buildings, you can now drive to the Arctic Ocean near Inuvik.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby seektravelinfo » Wed Apr 21, 2021 4:30 am

[quote="Kurt"][quote="Vincent"][quote="Kurt"]
Where in Germany?

That is on my list as well. I have two people I need to visit in Braunschweig.[/quote]

Going to visit the Christmas Markets in Heidelberg. Heidelberg is one of my favorite cities on the planet.[/quote]

I had a wonderful Xmas in Nurnberg in 1990. Had zero cash but locals got me drunk. Plus the market there is quite Christmas-y.[/quote]


Xmas market in Strasbourg (actually France) was pleasant & the city had sort of a punk/artsy vibe. Because of a spree-stabbing there a couple years back had to show passports to be able to enter. Cologne had a delightful Xmas market. I got a seriously decadent raclette from a stall vendor. A huge wheel of cheese on some kind of contraption that held it in place & melted it which he scooped out and slathered on crusty bread that had been prepped with melted butter and herbs. Doesn’t every good trip have a memorable culinary surprise like that? Grilled fish sandwich on the Bosphorous with a slice of raw onion & an ice cold CocaCola in a glass bottle, eating sheep head soup at a 3 a.m. diner in Istanbul, the time I was treated to the bus-drivers feast at a truck stop in Batman, Turkey (they had v.I.p. lounge for auto bus staff), the pralines sold on the street in Oaxaca. A little French restaurant in the dusty Mexican town of Comonfort, MX that served nothing but frog legs That Mexican restaurant at the Ponca City, OK airport that people actually fly to for a meal. Not to get all Anthony Bourdain but there is something to be said for those food experiences.

So y’all have some swell trips planned. I’m jelly. And I’m going to Oklahoma. Though actually kinda psyched about. I’ve seriously never done a road trip.

True fact: Colmar, France at Christmas is command central for pate de foie gras. Did you know that it was the Egyptians that told Napoleon how full and rich the geese livers were. The goose would fatten up to fly south to Egypt for the winter.
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Re: Starting to travel again: Iceland

Postby Kurt » Thu Apr 22, 2021 2:02 pm

ReptilianKittenEater wrote:You could drive as far as Cochrane I believe then catch the train up to Moosenee. You could even further up in Manitoba, however the rail service may have ceased to Churchill. They are slowly buildings, you can now drive to the Arctic Ocean near Inuvik.


I keep on forgetting that Canada is not like the USA in more ways than the many ways it already is not like the USA.

Including rail service to hinterlands.

I have no idea what I would do in Mooseonee besides just being there. Perhaps fish.
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