The Travel Thief

A few days late, but Happy Christmas!  Funnily enough, I don't typically get travel themed gifts from people.  I have relatives who always get me things that are stuck in a certain theme, but they haven't latched on to the fact that I am travel obsessed.  A few years back, my brother/sister-in-law got me and my husband an awesome travel map that's worth its own post sometime, but this year, my stepfather takes the prize for most enjoyed gift. He got me a book of transit maps of the world.  And to be honest, it sounds boring when you type it, but I LOVE IT.  It has the rail/metro/subway/etc. maps from about 250 cities worldwide, including some places I've never heard of before (note to self: learn more about Brazil, what is there outside of Salvador, Brasilia and Rio?). I think the reason that I love it so much is that when I travel, figuring out how to get around is part of the fun. Then, when your plan works seamlessly and you are transiting around with eas...

It's been a long time since I last posted ! My life schedule has been allowing only a sliver of time daily in a jam packed schedule.  One of the fun things that contributed to that hectic time was our trip to Hong Kong and Bali!  It was the first time to visit either destination and Hong Kong officially marked off 60 different countries that I've been to around the globe. Cheers to me! A drink called a Mulan at the Chin Chin bar Before I get into the main part of the post, I'm reminded of something a friend said to me at a holiday party last week. I was talking about visiting new countries versus revisiting places around the world and she asked "Why would you ever go back to any place you had already been?". As much as there is the thrill of conquering a new country I do LOVE going back places that I've already been. There are of course places that I would not really want to revisit, but most places I've gone to I can find a reason to go back. Travel...

The cold weather has me thinking about my trip to China 4 years ago.  It was for work and I am glad it was because it meant it was a short trip with purpose.  I didn't enjoy China like elsewhere I've traveled but that's a story for another day.  What I DID enjoy was the Chinese hot pot meals I had. Chinese hot pot dates back over 1000 years when the Mongolians invaded.  This just shows  how much food transcends borders since the Chinese built a wall that can be seen from space to keep the Mongolians out, but absolutely love their hot pot. My colleagues could not stop talking about it and ate it multiple meals while I was in Beijing. It's not hard to see why it's such a star of Chinese cuisine.  I was in China in November and it was colder that usual with a strong, biting wind.  After a 14 hour flight, I met my local colleague for my first taste of it.  He and I had met before, but hadn't worked together extensively.  The hot pot served as t...

I'm really shocked that I don't hear about more people getting lost on the international date line.  I haven't been posting much here trying to figure out where we're going to travel next year.  Take this with the knowledge that I am still not done planning all the details for our trip to Bali & Hong Kong in about 6 weeks.  I like a little bit of pressure to really get my focus on planning all the details plus starting to get excited about the upcoming trip.  The other, less emotional part of it is wanting to have the most current info since I plan everything down to the restaurants that we eat at to the shops, the time to visit the museums to exact hour.  I realized that one of the tours that I had planned time around in Hong Kong (Kung Fu in the park) is no longer available and now I am desperately trying to find an equivalent replacement. The other version of planning is the FAR out planning.  I found this to actually be more difficult because I ge...

Not even going there about the emotional support squirrel bit (OK, in posting this I guess I AM going there ;-)) but how emotionally fragile are you if you are flipping people off after being kicked off the flight? Personally, I think there are probably a small subset of people that desperately need these animals because of some trauma, but most people are just trying to get their pet on the flight.  Someone even tried to get a PEACOCK on a flight in Newark.  I am an animal lover, and if the squirrel was properly contained, it's less offensive than other animals... ....Such as the small furry dog that was jammed under my seat by the woman behind me on my flight from Athens to Crete this Summer.  The dog was generally fine except its owners: Wealthy grandma who kept blabbing about chartering a private jet and yachts blah blah blah AND bratty teenage granddaughter who whined the entire time and was super rude to Grandma and the flight attendants.  Then SuperBrat proc...

OK, the Thief is having serious travel envy right now as Mr. Thief travels for work to Prague. He gets to fly business class because he is a VIT (Very Important Thief). Only kidding, he just works hard and is lucky. We do tend to travel from Newark Airport on United and have visited the lounge a few times. This is the first time visiting since United redid its business class lounge in Terminal C. The prior United lounge there was comfortable, but underwhelming compared to other carriers and airports globally. Previously, the only real pros were the staff and the actual size/layout of the lounge space. The places where it really showed a lack of polish were the bathrooms and the food offerings. It's been going under a major overhaul for what I think was a year and it finally opened this June.  Actually, Newark airport had undergone it's own renaissance recently and with an array of nicer restaurant options available, the United lounge was lagging behind.  You can find some mor...

I say this in an bemused sort of disapproving sort of way of how stereotypes come about. The fact that this guy got out onto the tarmac to chase a plane (Like it was really going to stop) is ridiculous in itself.  THEN after being charged and leaving court on bond, he moons the press and takes a swing at them with his suitcase. I feel my Irish heritage (many generations removed) identifies with this sort of bad behavior and I find it on the humorous rather than horrifying side of things. Oh, and it was a RYANAIR flight from Dublin to Amsterdam  What did that cost him anyway?  like 20 Eur? https://www.irishcentral.com/news/irish-man-arrested-chasing-flight-moons-photographers

You cannot visit Marrakesh and not visit the Bahia Palace. It is a massive complex with over 160 rooms built for Ba Ahmed over 100 years ago in the late 19th century. It is ornate with Islamic patterns though they are a little simple compared to other Moroccan palaces. What is most impressive is its sheer size. My pictures don't do it justice because I was so tired at this point from the morning touring. Even with all the space, it was still pretty crowded and make sure to leave enough time to see it. The name "Bahia" translates to 'Beautiful/Brilliant" which is a bit insulting to Ba Ahmed's wife when you consider this was built for his favorite mistress and concubines. I mean the wife got an expansion on her residence with him for her and the kids but she would probably like her own space too - like an ancient day She-Shed? ;-) The same French general that discovered the Saadian tombs also made this palace his residence while he was in Marrakesh.  He added...

The Saadian tombs are another must see when visiting Marrakesh. What I most adore about their story is that they were sealed away for 300 years. As the name suggests, they are in fact a burial site for members of the Saadian dynasty. Headed by Sultan Ahmed el Mansour in the 1500 and 1600s, there are something like 200 members of his family group buried here.  In the late 1600s, Moulay Ismail had taken over Morocco and went about erasing all the evidence of his predecessors to solidify his own power.  However, he didn't destroy the tombs and respected the sanctity of the dead intact by instead sealing them off.  There was one entrance still available from inside the Kasbah Mosque, but it was largely forgotten about. In 1917 a French general located the tombs and they were restored from that point.  Why I like that they were sealed off from the public for that long is that there wasn't the opportunity for anything to happen to them over the years, whether it be actua...

 What do you think of the Cathay Pacific spelling mistake on their own plane; mistake or publicity stunt? It's possible someone was lazy, then someone else overlooked it especially considering Chinese and English share 0 letters in common. Buuuut the fact they have someone on social media draped in fairy lights in their first class it is possible they thought it was a way to generate buzz. www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-45572275 I really don't care, I'm still excited to fly them this year when I go to Hong Kong and Bali!

Taking a little break from Egypt posts, but staying in the Middle East / Northern Africa neighborhood, I'm shifting gears to my trip to Morocco in this past year.  Morocco is one of those wondrous places that blends multiple cultures while maintaining its own identity. It's a little French, a little Arabic and a little African but totally Moroccan. I'll start with one of the last things I visited on this trip. It's one of my favorite sites, the Le Jardin Majorelle in Marrakesh also known as the Yves Saint Laurent garden. It's a main place to visit but maybe not one you immediately think of for visiting in Morocco. The 'Majorelle' comes from the name of the French artist who originally created it on his property that he lived on. Yves Saint Laurent came on to the scene when he purchased it in 1980 after it had fallen into disrepair over the 30 years that Majorelle no longer owned the villa and grounds. I love gardens, but what was really striking is the us...