August 17, 2006
A couple of nights ago, I got back from a long trip to upstate NY, Montreal, and Quebec. Travel tends to stress me out–my mother tells a story that when I was about 8 or 9, I freaked out in the parking lot of the Ocean Spray factory museum, screaming about how I wanted to travel alone, or at least without the rest of the family–and this trip was no different. It marked the first time for several things, including my being in charge of planning and executing a trip with hotels and fanciness and everything.
See, my usual idea of travel involves getting in a car, driving to Boston, Philthydelpha, or DC, and crashing on a friend’s couch (or futon, if it’s a high-class friend) for a weekend. One time, I went with a couple of friends to Ireland for a couple of weeks, but we stayed in hostels and were totally laissez-faire about the whole enterprise. So it wasn’t without a little bit of nervousness that I booked rooms in two nice hotels. It was definitely more money than I’d spent on any room (except for a completely unappreciated suite in VA for a friend’s wedding) but I figured it was time to be a grown-up.
And I learned something: the best times travelling come when they are the least expected. My favorite moment in Quebec, for example, came on our last day in the city, when none of my party were speaking to one another (too much time in a highly claustrophobic tourist district will do that). We were walking back to the Old City to scrounge up some dinner. This walk involved an absolutely nightmarish (especially for me, with my at-that-point-undiagnosed tendonitis) set of stairs that scaled the massive rock on which Quebec was originally built. About halfway up, I turned around to see where we’d been and how far we still had to go. And I realized that everything would be okay once I slept and decompressed.
I don’t know if I’m ever going to travel like that again. I suspect I will eventually, but not for a while. In the meantime, I’m getting ready to go to a wedding in Baltimore this October. Anyone have a couch I can sleep on?
August 17th, 2006 at 8:47 pm
When did we go to the Ocean Spray factory museum? Maybe I was too busy reading while walking to notice that we were there…
Sara
August 18th, 2006 at 12:30 am
Yeah, most likely. You were probably 6 or 7. I don’t remember it either.
August 18th, 2006 at 6:59 am
Hey Jeff, Great to hear about your trip. Welcome back. Check out the Alstons in Baltimore area-
Yes, I’m still here…waiting to leave.
August 22nd, 2006 at 2:47 pm
Thems some nice hotels. Congrats on booking your first grown up vacation. However, please note that your favorite moment was not in the hotel. My new policy (it wasn’t official until just now) is not to spend more than $40 on a hotel room unless someone else is paying (and even then I tend to shy away from more than is necessary) or the hotel is a spa or for some other reason qualifies as “the vacation.” (Cross reference an excuse to stay at the San Francisco Klimpton for a night when my wife returned from Romania)
I used to be all about hostels, but when travalling as more than one person, it can suck. Both the worst hostel in San Francisco (HI-Fisherman’s Wharf) and several fairly nice yet overpriced hostels in northern Wales actually cost more for two beds than a nice B&B or budget hotel room!! (Plus, the B&Bs give you Breakfast. Mmmmm….)
Incidentally, I’ve got a couch you can sleep on, but at the moment it’s near Spokane, which is quite a ways from Baltimore.
Abschicken!
August 23rd, 2006 at 1:53 pm
I absolutely agree–though it’s mighty hard to find a $40 hotel in Quebec during the high season (meaning any time the weather isn’t fraite, the fancy Quebecois word I learned that means “really incredibly cold, like colder than anyone from Connecticut can imagine, quite frankly.” I learned the word, incidentally, from a waiter who’d moved to Quebec from Nice, of all places, so he could learn how to fly helicopters.
I’ve paid way too much for hostels (The Generator in London comes to mind) and gotten some incredible deals in them too. But yeah, there comes a time when you have to just deal with the fact that businesses charge a lot of money for convenience and cleanliness.
Parking garages, on the other hand, are a whole ‘nother story.