The web-housed thoughts and statements of an attorney practicing employment law, fighting for justice for all Nevada workers, in Las Vegas, Nevada USA, the best city in America in which to practice law and the most exciting city in the Milky Way Galaxy. This was going to be a law blog, but it turned into a travel blog. A blog of my travels. And that's a better use of a blog in everybody's estimation.
Thursday, December 31, 2020
Top Five Favorite Hotels 2010-2020: #1: Hotel Libertador, Trujillo, Peru
Wednesday, December 30, 2020
Favorite Hotels 2010-2020: U.S. Edition: Wilderness Lodge, Walt Disney World, Florida
Top 5 Favorite Hotels 2010-2020: #2: Grandhotel Pupp, Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic
The most luxurious hotel in which I have ever stayed -- anywhere, any country, anytime -- was the Grandhotel Pupp in the Czech spa town of Karlovy Vary.
Tuesday, December 29, 2020
Top 5 Favorite Hotels 2010-2020: #3: Azur Palace, Split, Croatia
Monday, December 28, 2020
Top 5 Favorite Hotels 2010-2020: #4: Casa del Arzobispado Hotel, Cartagena, Colombia
The job of the Archbishop in Cartagena, Colombia, must've been a cushy gig, because I stayed at his house and it was awesome.
The Casa del Arzobispado (House of the Archbishop) was a small boutique hotel within the Old City walls of Cartagena, which, if you are going to stay overnight or three in Colombia's #1 international tourism destination, you really ought to stay in the Old City (rather than the high rise corridors of the Miami Beach knock-off Bocagrande neighborhood) (your other option). It doesn't look like much from the outside:
I don't see me going back to Cartagena. I enjoyed the place, but it's a little too "romantic" for my tastes. And it's a Caribbean city. It's not South American in personality. But if I circumstances steer my toward Cartagena in the future, the first I will do is see if the Archbishop has a spare room available for me.
Sunday, December 27, 2020
Top 5 Favorite Hotels 2010-2020: #5: art'otel, Budapest, Hungary
The Year of Our COVID, A.D. 2020, has not been the year for travel that I anticipated at the ringing in of the new year. I had planned an active international travel agenda on the occasion of my then-upcoming 60th Birthday in May. The one exception was a five-day trip to Quito just as the COVID lockdowns were being put into place. Other than that, 2020 had the least amount of international travel for me since 2009, the last year I failed to venture out of home country.
Rather than mourn the inability to do international travel this past year -- of which I have done plenty -- I would rather honor a preceding decade of an extraordinary, fantastic, marvelous, wonderful travel opportunities. I will now count down my five favorite hotels where I was able to stay during that great decade of travel, my 50's.
#5: art'otel, Budapest, Hungary.
Isn't the lobby artsy?
The room was quite nice and quite comfortable:
But it wasn't extraordinary. In fact, except for what will be #1, none of the hotels at which I've stayed qualify as "luxurious." I do not stay in the premier, world-class most expensive hotel in any town, unless the most expensive hotel in town is around $100 a night.
What made the art'otel of Budapest so extraordinary, so worthy of mention and acclaim, was the view:
Friday, December 25, 2020
Christmas Vacation of a Lifetime: Final Stop: Christmas Day in Salvador
Where I spent my Christmas vacation: Salvador da Bahia, Brazil |
When I got home after my trip, I went to the Sahara Camera Center, the best place in town to get film developed, to get my five or so rolls of vacation filmed developed. When I went to pick up the photos a few days later, the clerk was apologetic. He said one roll was ruined. I knew immediately which roll it was going to be. And I was right. But when I saw that the exact point where the ruining started, I literally burst out laughing.
Thursday, December 24, 2020
Christmas Vacation of a Lifetime: Stop 4: Brasilia
In Brazil, Santa Claus wears cowboy boots because of course. |
The Christmas adventure of a lifetime moved on to the one destination in my itinerary that my travel agent desperately tried to talk me out of seeing: Brasilia.
He tried to tell me that there was nothing to see here. Oh yeah? Well, if there was nothing to see, explain this cathedral: