Category: Travel

Moving to the New York City area can be a bit intimidating. There are many areas to choose from and finding a suitable house or apartment can be a challenge.

One of the most lovely and desirable areas, although as you might expect, also one of the most expensive, is The Hamptons. Fortunately, there is a website that makes your search a lot easier for Hamptons real estate listings as well as for New York City, Long Island, Manhattan, and many surrounding cities and regions.

You will also receive assistance in finding apartments for New York, current home listings, using a home valuation calculator, and resources for relocating to the New York City area.

The New York City area is one of the most exciting in the world to live in. Use the above website to make it much easier to find your New York area home.

Disclosure Notice: This is a paid post paid for by Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate.

I have not been to Austin, Texas in a few years but I still have fond memories of the three busy days and fun filled nights I spent there.

Austin has developed into an American high tech center, a music center, and a thriving college town with the University of Texas, Austin campus in the downtown area. I was there for a computer company marketing presentation and was fortunate to have the company President, who lived in Austin, show me around. My associates and myself had a fantastic time in Austin.

The blend of high tech and laid back Texans along with causally clad fun loving, hard studying and hard playing college students at every turn make Austin unlike any other American city.

If you love live music you want to visit Austin. If you love great food you want to visit Austin. If you like to bar hop while you search for just the right kind of music you won’t want to leave Austin.

If you require a hotel you are in luck. Austin Hotels are well priced. You will find a comfortable room in Austin near super restaurants and fun filled night life action.

The Sidestep Austin Hotels website covers Austin in great detail so it is a fantastic resource to  use in planning your trip.

If you have been thinking of visiting Austin my advice is go. Hey, with great music, great food, interesting bars, friendly people, and reasonable hotel prices you can’t go wrong.

Are you one of the millions who have dreamed of traveling into space since you were a kid?

Well, if so you will soon be in luck. That is if you have an extra $260,000 dollars laying around to shell out for a ticket.

For your money you will get a swift one and one half hour ride that will take you over 100 KM above the earth. That will place you in space outside the earth’s amosphere. You will experience about three to four minutes of weightlessness as you reach the highest altitude level of your flight.

The European aerospace giant EADS is going to build the space vehicle and manage the flight. The space vehicle will takeoff from a regular airport using normal jet engines and reach an altitude of 12 KM before a rocket engine will take over and blast the space craft vertically to a height of 100 KM.

Once the rocket engine kicks in it will only take about 80 seconds to reach space at the maximum altitude of 100 KM.

That should be quite a ride. If it’s one you want to take you had best make reservations early.

While the first journey into space isn’t expected to occur until 2012 that’s only five years away. Since the vehicle will only hold four passengers a trip your deposit should be made early or you may find yourself in a long queuqe of folks eager to spend $260,000 for a 90 minute ride.

Obviously space travel will not be for the masses for quite a long while.

It’s a long day and night of travel from Pattaya, Thailand to Atlanta, Georgia, USA.  Plan on about two hours by taxi from Pattaya to the new , Suvarnabhumi, Airport, Bangkok, Thailand, then a five hour flight on Korean Airlines to Seoul, Korea. There is only a 50 minute wait in the modern and clean Seoul airport until the Korean Airlines flight KE 035  non stop 14 hour flight to Atlanta.
In spite of the 747 being such a fine flying machine it feels really good to get off the 747-300 aircraft after such a long time in the air.

I must say that Korean Airlines does a nice job on every stage of the flight. The aircrew and flight attendants work tirelessly to make the flight as comfortable as possible. The 747 is equipped with the latest in flight entertainment system so if you enjoy movies or games you are all set for quite a few hours of entertainment over about 19 hours of flying time.

For those of you who are considering flying from the US to Korea or to Thailand I do recommend Korean Airlines. They also offered another plus, the lowest fare from Bangkok. 

The biggest hassle of the trip was reclaiming my checked baggage at Atlanta. Once off the aircraft the processing by US passport control and customs went very fast and professionally. The US officials do a great job. However, getting your luggage back is a challenge.

You have to claim it from the airline conveyor system then check it back in with the airport security folks to have it x-rayed and perhaps manually checked. Then you have to reclaim it at a location far, far away from your original arrival point. I believe that the final baggage claim was a full six train station stops away at the vast Atlanta airport. Plan on at least an hour to finally get your checked baggage back when returing to the USA from overseas flights.

When you travel don’t take unnecessary chances with your cash, tickets, passport, and important documents.

Unfortunately, in many locations worldwide pickpockets are a real threat. They usually work in teams and are quite professional at what they do. The unsuspecting and unprepared tourist is an easy mark.

Take precautions before you travel. By placing your valuables into this hip pouch instead of your pockets you may well save your self a lot of money and trouble during your travels.

Hidden Pocket Hip Pouch  For safe traveling, this leather hip pouch has an enlarged theft-deterrent pocket in back to securely accommodate a passport, currency, or rail pass.