Hmm, it looks like I have not much to post as I have not been staying in a hotel for quite sometime nor have I been visiting other places at the current moment. Travel bug is biting big time at the mo' and I'm already itching to just be anywhere but here.
So I guess, to while the time away, here are some places that will be coming up in the next few months, Godwilling, which are both work and leisure related.
My annual European trip is coming up and this time around it will be Berlin and Paris (yeah, Paris again. It's always a good idea! and besides, I couldn't justify to my husband why we need to go back to Italy, my ultimate favorite vacay spot!). Berlin will be very interesting. I've been to Germany but never to the larger cities. However, after looking at places to go in Germany, we decided on Berlin as it's one of the places offering history that is more "current" (you know, the Wall and all that). We'll be staying at a hotel there as this will be an "I don't want to have to think about waking up to make breakfast" leg of the two-week European trip. So a definite posting on our hotel of choice in due time.
Paris, on the other hand, will be a tad different. We decided to stay at an apartment that is rented directly from the owner. It looks promising based on the owner's description, the guest reviews, so I'm banking on an affordable stay without compromising on comfort and amenities. My husband and I love staying at apartments as we get to experience how other people live and since I'm interested in interior design, particularly apartment lifestyle, it gives me an insight as to how other people put together a home. I sometimes get inspired by the decor and sometimes I share the ideas with my friends who often seek my opinion on design and decor. (I wonder if I should start charging them? Hmmm).
"Why Paris again?" Said my husband. Well, the last time we were there, it was during a time when the weather was not at its best. Our trip to Paris was cut significantly short due to logistical delays which began with our transit in Doha.
Oh man, that was SO not funny. It was the only time we decided to fly Qatar Air and it had to be the time we got stuck in a country we didn't plan to stay for two days! Only because we were told that Heathrow was snowed in and no aircrafts were allowed to take-off nor land.
I wished then it had been Dubai. At least I'm okay with Dubai. It's like eye-candy for me and that is just the airport! Anyhow, we were solid packed for winter save for a couple of t-shirts for our flight to and from Europe and they were all in our suitcases which we couldn't retrieve since it was still in the aircraft. After 10 hours of waiting, the airline put us up at a hotel without releasing their cargo and we had to obviously purchase light clothing. I was hell bent on NOT using the same clothes for two days unlike some passengers plus I had my knee high boots on and that's not a good idea in a super hot country. Luckily we had packed other "necessities" plus toiletries in our hand luggage. After that was sorted, rather than kicking-up a fuss about having all our pre-paid bookings screwed over by all these delays and we couldn't do anything about it anyway, we thought, we'd make the most of this prolonged transit. We took advantage of the temporary visas issued and went out to have a look at what Doha had to offer and even had time to meet with my husband's friends who were working in oil and gas there for lunch.
The overall take away though - it's a reeeeeaaaaaally dryyyyyy country.
The upside of all this hoopla was that we sorta became famous for a bit - after we landed in London. While standing in snow with our suitcases in a 1.5mile long queue to get into the St Pancras station for the Eurostar to Paris, the media came by to interview some of us and we were featured. (yeah, I did the "Hi Mom" bit too!).
(we only got inside the building after 2.5hours and we saw this line!)
Anyway, after the ice was cleared from the pipes, electrical lines and tracks, we reached Paris, three days later than planned, and that meant having to forfeit some of the other key sights. To make it worse, with the unusual weather pattern, Paris was frozen! It made it difficult for us to walk about for too long. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE winter. But it's supposed to be Paris winter, not Antartica. So there you go. I want to go to Paris again. I need to go to Paris again. Haha.
In addition, there will be a couple of company events before we leave for our vacation at the end of the year and the team will be staying in a couple of hotels for this purpose. Hopefully they'll pick one that I've not tried before so I can give a fresh review of my experience rather than updating them.
Meantime, am toying with the idea of just spending a night or two in Penang or Langkawi or another island over this weekend just to satisfy the bug. The next post will tell us if it'd happen.
No comments:
Post a Comment