No more guessing games. This would have been my final clue. I don’t think they sell these anywhere else. I am not buying a pair.

Congratulations to Skeet for recognizing the city from my earlier hints. I’ll be in touch about the prize shortly.

We noticed that many people leave their bicycles unlocked here. I think it is a situation much like a large school of fish. There are so many bikes that the odds of yours being stolen are miniscule as long as yours is in the same place as the rest of them and doesn’t stand out.

I think I saw a few bikes that were relatively good and new that had purposely ugly paint jobs to conceal their value. There are a lot of very old, very cheap bikes on the streets. We were out very early this morning and saw a line of scooters where a couple of them had tipped over. If Hollywood laws of physics worked in the real world, the whole row of 20-30 bikes would have fallen down. I’m not in Hollywood.

Expect to see a little less from me over the next week. I am going on a trip and we will only have one laptop between us. Add to that the fact that the point of a vacation is to relax and get away from the things that you do everyday. Add to that the fact that I don’t think we will be staying anywhere with free internet access. Maybe I should keep my destination a secret and just post a few pictures while I am there.

I am going on a holiday in Italy in about a month’s time. I am starting to get excited. I have just been informed that we will be drinking Chianti quite liberally while we are there.

I hope we don’t mess up our palates in such a way that we can no longer make do with our cheap table wine. The fiasco is that bottle that is encased in woven straw. You know, those ones that you dripped melted candle all over when you were in college?

Ok, I only love it in principle. I have never been to Paris. I would recommend that you schedule any vacations or Holidays in Paris so as to avoid the middle of Summer.

When booking accommodations, I think it is more important to be close to a good chill out place than it is to be close to an attraction. The Boulevard Richard Lenoir for instance has open markets and children’s playgrounds. It is walking distance from the Bastille. I saw a vacation apartment on Holiday Velvet that was located near this area.

Do not try to rent a place that is as close as possible to the Eiffel Tower. I think you will appreciate it more as part of a distant view. Somewhere on rue Cler might be just the ticket. This is a pedestrian street. I think the lack of cars and trucks is more important than the presence of other pedestrians. I love pedestrian streets.

The descriptions of rental apartments on Holiday Velvet really bring the locations to life.

The Paris vacation apartments from Holiday Velvet look very tempting and the site has a lot to recommend it. When I was browsing, I had a pretty good idea that they had some quality control on their offerings. I think I can recognize crappy European apartments. I stayed in one for a month once. The creators have ten years of experience in the trade and you can use the site as a portal to make direct contact with the owners of the individual lodgings in a secure way. There is also a huge selection of rentals in Paris and a number of other cities including Venice, Italy and Barcelona, Spain. I am going to Florence this winter and our accommodations are still a bit up in the air for a couple of nights. I am going to browse through every last place on Holiday Velvet… that is under 100 euros.

Britney Spears made the following quote back when she was more functional:

“I get to go to lots of overseas places, like Canada.”

The reason that this statement is easy to find on the internet is because it points out her lack of geographical knowledge. Canada is not ‘overseas’ from the United States. If you were in Detroit or Buffalo, you could take a day trip or a weekend getaway to Toronto. I think Britney could try to wean herself off of the media attention that she loves and hates so much if she were to spend some time in Toronto. Kevin Federline was in Toronto when he got the famous breakup text message. The same music station that spent the day with him and then exploited the footage for months afterwards would probably be interested in massaging Britney’s ego for a few days. American movie stars generally love Toronto because they don’t get mobbed by paparazzi like they do in LA.

There is a nice summary of what is great about a stay in Toronto at ‘Bed and breakfast toronto‘

I stayed in a short let apartment with a kitchen when I took the family to Toronto for a week. I think a B&B would be a great idea if you were visiting as a couple or by yourself.

Can you think of anything more romantic than staying at the kind of quaint Bed and breakfast paris can offer you?

You get to sleep in a room with a really homey feel to it and in the morning you can chat with you hosts and maybe get some good advice on how to spend your days. Having grown up in Eastern Canada, I was taught Parisian French at school. When English speaking Canadians try their high school French out in Quebec, 9 times out of 10 they get a funny look and some English in return. In the touristy areas of Paris strangers are quite happy to be rude to you in French.

Looking at the pictures of this inverness bed and breakfast makes want to go back to the UK for another visit. I have been there a few times and I have yet to luck in to any pleasant weather. Luckily the culture is adapted to that fact of life with lots of cozy indoor places like pubs and inns.

Inverness is a large city in Northern Scotland. I have never been there.

I was born and raised in Nova Scotia. The name of that Canadian province means New Scotland in Latin. Having traveled in the UK a bit, I can make a broad generalization with some confidence…the faces are the same in both places. There is a certain comfort in that.

Many of the place names are the same as well. I used to play soccer ( that’s what we call football over in Canada ) against Inverness. We actually had a couple of boys who emigrated from Scotland in their teens playing on our team. They were the best players on the team. I chalk that up to differing priorities. To many Canadian kids, soccer is just something to bridge the gap between baseball and hockey. For many kids in the UK, there is nothing besides football.

I have seen people on vacation that seem to make getting a sunburn their top priority. First of all getting sunburned is hazardous to your health. Secondly, it only takes 20 minutes to get a sunburn,paying for airfare and accommodations just so you can get some UV damage seems like poor management of your time and money.

My ideal hawaiian vacation would involve a month in a nice condo. I would relax in the shade during the heat of the day and take trips to check out the culture and the natural beauty starting in the late afternoon. I once met a really nice guy that happens to grow coffee in the Kona region of the Big Island. I spent a few years working in the specialty coffee trade, but I never got to participate in the harvest of coffee. Coffee is picked on Hawaii between August and January. If there was any agritourism operation there, I would love to participate.

AlohaCondos.com is a great source for luxury rental accommodations throughout the Hawaiian Islands. Many units have WiFi service including several in the Kona region. I like this place.

AlohaCondos.com has great navigation features and the photos are amazing. If you want to go to Hawaii, this site will make you want to go more, assuming that is possible.

I think there is some cultural intricacies that are common to all island peoples. The Dominican Republic is somewhat unusual as an island state in that it shares the relatively small land mass with another country.

I have lived on an island for over two years and I love the way things are more relaxed. The pace on an island is just different.

Another thing that is different is Food. A typical meal in the DR might consist of rice, red beans, stewed goat meat, salad and fried plantains. Did you know that beans and rice provide a nearly perfect balance of dietary protein? If you have an aversion to spicy foods, use caution in the Caribbean. I was at a small concert in North America that was being catered by some ladies from the Caribbean and their Jerk Chicken nearly made my head explode. But it was delicious.

I hadn’t realized that the Dominican Republic is served by several international airports due to its size. If you are vacationing there, try to arrange a fight that lands near your destination to avoid the expense and delay of a lot of overland travel.

I have been snorkeling for two years now and I would love to see what a Caribbean coral reef looks like in person. In the DR, when you are finished swimming with the fishes, you can go back to a beach side restaurant and have dinner with their less lucky schoolmates.

I would be happy to see so many tourist dollars flow into poor countries like the DR that everyone in the country can have a significant benefit from the tourist industry. Agri-tourism and Eco-tourism are real growth markets that deserve some serious consideration as well. I know about a Fair Trade Cocoa Co-op that I would love to visit and I have never been in a real jungle.