My Travels

I had a 10-day trip to Japan and I'm breaking my posts to each area of Japan I visited in the next few posts. Took off on United Airlines to Narita International Airport . I originally had friends who were going to join this trip and was approaching the trip differently. They were unable to join so I pivoted to visit Tokyo Disney rather than go to Tokyo. I have been to Tokyo often enough that I am not concerned with visiting the city. As an alternative to Tokyo and to give me an opportunity to right my time zone differences, I thought it would be nice to see the only Disney franchise park. I had heard that Tokyo Disney was the best foreign theme park. From my understanding, Disney trusted the operator enough to spin off Tokyo Disney and Tokyo DisneySea as franchises in Japan. When I booked the theme park tickets, the website is not super friendly to non-Japanese visitors. I even asked my Japanese friend to translate some sites that wouldn't publish in English. In that sense, ...

 For this trip, it was a family vacation for someone who hasn't been to Hawaii in almost a decade. This year has been a trips for first timers or long enough to be considered a first timer. Hopped onto a Southwest flight due to a companion pass promotion and checked into the Kohala Suites by Hilton Grand Vacations Club.  Picked up the rental car from Dollar Rental and ran around Big Island. On the return flight home, spent the day in Honolulu with local friends before flying back to the mainland Dining Kona Broke Da Mouth Grindz - Picked up plate lunches from our favorite restaurant specifically the garlic furikake chicken. Kuleana Rum Shack - A go to spot for rum drinks and light eats. Kona Coffee & Tea - I like stopping at this coffee shop for the coffee jelly option.  Kona Mountain Coffee - enjoyed coffee drinks. Mrs. Barry's Kona Cookies - My favorite cookie bakery on this side of Big Island. My favorite is the wedding cookies. Hawaiian Style Cafe - located at...

 I flew out to Honolulu for a quick weekend vacation for a friend. The friend had never visited Hawaii so we decided to make a weekend of it. I booked a flight on United and checked into the Lagoon Tower by Hilton Grand Vacations Club.  We actually lucked out and was able to knock out my friend's desire to see a luau. Our bedroom balcony faced the lawn at the Hilton and we were able to watch the performance from our balcony and enjoyed dinner in our room.  Activities Diamond Head Crater Hike - As part of the introduction to Oahu tour, we went to the Diamond Head trail to check out the views of Waikiki. You do have to buy tickets to enter the national park so I opted for the first hour ticket. The timing is essential because the weather can get quite hot and there is no shade. The plan was to take a cab to Diamond Head and then walk down the crater and through the neighborhood and back to Waikiki/hotel. It took most of the day but the beer crawl was fun. :) Dining Bogart'...

For 2025, I wanted to visit Vietnam’s central coast and debated various cities before committing to visit Da Nang. It took me a few months to decide what part of central Vietnam to visit so I didn’t pay attention to the fact that the government would be celebrating Reunification Day in the month I was visiting. For the history buffs, this marks the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam conflict with America. I was using a number of itineraries to make this travel work. The complications came from booking an extra seat for the transpacific flight and using miles and promotions for the shorter legs. My flight path was one short trip to San Francisco International Airport (SFO) and then three seats for a party of two from SFO to Changi Airport (SIN) and then miles from SIN to Da Nang International Airport  (DAD)/Tan Son Nhat International Airport (SGN). I basically had three round trip itineraries for this trip! I did this because I have found that booking an extra economy seat ...