Top Travels

 

Top Travels

Hey hey, this is Lucas, and welcome to the podcast. To be honest, picking a topic wasn’t easy, because I have a long, long list of ideas to cover. I think I’m just going to have to move in some sort of logical progression, while at the same time staying reasonably topical.

That being said, as someone who has tried his best to get out and see as much of the world as he can, a rundown of some of those countries seems like a good transition from my little self-introduction. Most people love travel, or even if they can’t find a way to travel (especially now), they love the idea of travel, and of discovering other cultures and places. That old chestnut about travel being broadening is totally true, and it’s something that I would recommend to anyone. Somewhere out there, there is a country just begging for you to go and fall in madly love with it. At the very least, you’ll learn some fascinating little things about a new and interesting culture that you’d probably never learn from seeing it on YouTube or on TV. There really is something to be said for firsthand experience, and hopefully sharing some of mine can give you a better idea of where you might want to go when the world returns to some semblance of normalcy.

Of the 195 sovereign states that currently exist, I feel that having only seen 11 of them in person I have a lot of work to do, but once I have the time and the money, more travel is definitely on my agenda. I’ve seen a fairly good chunk of Japan, having lived here for about a decade, but I may set Japan aside and give it its own episode, so that I can truly do it justice. Let’s just do this in chronological order otherwise.

The first foreign country I ever visited, as you might imagine, was the good old US of A. My house is about 45 minutes by car from the US border, so not only did my family go shopping there once in a while, but Kingston also gets a lot of tourists and weekend partiers up from the south as well. Being a university town, Kingston has a pretty decent night life, and possibly more importantly, we have a lower drinking age than New York does (19 compared to 21), so for that reason we have a lot of young military recruits come up from Fort Drum. Let’s just say, in my experience, they held their liquor about as well as you might expect a lot of guys between 19 and 21 would. All that aside though, when my family went to the US, all I can remember is thinking about is how similar it was to Canada. The road signs looked sort of weird, the shops and brands were a bit different, but other than that, upstate New York barely seemed like another country.

Florida, on the other hand…wow. We went to Disney World when I was about 12, and that place did strike me as though the culture was somehow…different. It’s hard to put my finger on now. It was 30 years ago, mind you. Based on what I’ve heard Florida has become about 1000% weirder in that time, but even then it was a bit of a shock. I think the heat and a bug I picked up somewhere along the way may have colored my experience a bit though. My memories now are a blurry mix of fireworks at Epcot on New Year’s Eve, breakfast at IHOP, a lot of signs for alligator farms (like, why would you even farm alligators?), and a pervading nausea. It’s quite possible the heat and humidity in Florida just messes with Canadians, because I felt equally queasy when I first set foot in Okinawa.

One thing that did stick with me from that trip and subsequent trips I made to upstate New York throughout high school though, was that yes, there is definitely a “politeness gap”. I mean, not all Canadians are polite, and not all Americans are rude, but…I just have this one memory of brushing past some guy in a restaurant in Albany, saying “Excuse me”, and the response, I kid you not, was a very aggressive “Yeah, whatever”. Alrighty then. My experiences of Americans living abroad though have been almost universally awesome. It’s like night and day. It just demonstrates how different the culture is from area to area in the US, and how you really can’t judge the US (or any country, for that matter) unless you get a really broad sample. Overall I love the country, wish them the best, and hope that I can see more of it someday, but the weirdness of the Trump era has made me put off those plans until America learns how to make peace with itself.

Moving on, once I had made my way to Japan in 2005, I actually got roped almost immediately into joining several other teachers on a trip to Thailand over the winter holidays. I hadn’t planned on going to Thailand, but they had booked a whole package tour, someone had subsequently dropped out, and I figured…why not? To this day, I am incredibly glad I went. Thailand is stunning in its natural beauty, filled with diverse and friendly people, and has a cuisine that just doesn’t even compare with anything else in the world: spicy, savory, complex, and incredibly varied.

We started in Bankok, as many do, and were lucky enough to have a wonderful guide named Noot as well as six other people in our tour group, all of whom were lovely, with the exception of one miserable older British man who we generally ignored. During the days, Noot showed us all of the standard sights – The Grand Palace, Reclining Buddha at Wat Pho, a boat tour of the Chao Phraya River – while at night we were free to explore on our own. Some people poo-poo tour groups, but this worked very well for us. We saw the things we wanted to see, some sights that we would never have known were there, and still had time to explore.

From Bankok, we took a night train down the isthmus of Thailand to Khao Sok National Park, a completely surreal place to someone like myself, who had hardly ever traveled before. Soaring, ancient-looking limestone cliffs cloaked in thick jungle, jutting out of a steaming tropical lake; this is where we stayed for three days, on floating bamboo raft-houses. Our meals were expertly prepared, and there were daily excursions to explore caves, the nearby town, and to ride elephants through a rubber plantation. Every day revealed more of this unique culture, and I think I speak for everyone when I say that we were all just drinking it up. It was here I actually learned how to use poi (P-O-I), which, if you are unfamiliar, is a type of performance art, popular in Thailand. The name refers both to the art, and to the tethered weights that one rhythmically swings around their body. In a way, it was actually good training for certain weapons I later studied while taking Kung Fu.

After the raft-houses, we moved on from the park to the nearby town, where we stayed in huts in the jungle. There, I vividly recall riding inner tubes along a gorgeous stretch of river, insulated by thick jungle on either side. A number of us also had traditional tattoos done by a local artist, something that in retrospect sounds sort of crazy, but I don’t regret doing at all. Later, we moved further down the isthmus and stayed in a beach resort in Krabi, where we had a breathtaking tour of the Andaman Sea by yacht, and spent a full day and night camping on one of the local islands. There, we went snorkeling, sang songs by a campfire, ate fish freshly caught that afternoon, and gaped at the enormous monitor lizards that happened to live there. That day was definitely a highlight.

This was followed by an overnight stay at a rubber plantation, where the owner took us out to watch a Muay Thai tournament. As a martial artist this was easily another one my favorite experiences, and I was just stunned by the raw skill and discipline of each of those fighters, some of them as young as ten. Later, we had gotten back to our huts on the plantation and had just settled in for the night when we were suddenly startled awake and shaken out of bed by music booming out of the nearby jungle. Of course, with sleep utterly out of the question, we got up and went to check it out. As it turned out, someone was putting on a rave. I didn’t know jungle raves were a thing, but they totally are. It was about as epic and surreal as one might expect, but after dancing for a few hours, I was so tired my brain basically shut down, and I don’t remember much else.

This is just a brief overview of some of the things we saw, and I loved it so much I ended up going back to Thailand again a few years later. I did a few of the same things for the sake of nostalgia, explored a few new spots, but to keep it reasonably brief I’ll just say that it’s hard not to have fun in that country. Thailand most definitely left a little bit of itself in my soul, along with that little bit of ink on my ankle.

The next country I ticked off my bucket list was Korea, because while I had been working in Oita, my cousin Brian had been working in Busan, also as an English teacher. This is definitely a common theme in my family; my sister did it too. Anyway, I took the train to Fukuoka, and from there actually made my way by hovercraft to Busan. A hovercraft over a choppy ocean is about as bumpy as you might expect, but it was definitely a cool way to travel. It costs 32,000 yen for a round trip, which is about 300 dollars, takes about 3 hours, and if the weather is nice you do get some cool views.

My experience of Busan was overall quite good. I started off having dinner with my cousin, sampling some of the local cuisine and nightlife. The cuisine didn’t win me over quite the way it did in Thailand, but it was colorful, unique and well-prepared. I’m not huge on kimchi, but until I went to Korea I had no idea the number of varieties there were. Even I, a lifelong opponent of all things pickled, ended up enjoying a few of them.

Korea is of course a modern country, but one that celebrates its roots. Ancient temples mingle with modern skyscrapers, gaming centers juxtapose with tranquil gardens, and I found it to be home to a people that seek to balance working hard with having fun. Koreans may not want to admit this, but they do have at least this in common with the Japanese. Also great sushi and a lot of karaoke bars. I admit, I may not remember a ton about Korea because they have a definite drinking culture there, and I certainly partook. Fun fact, they actually drink more per capita in Korea than in any other Asian country. Still, I did not meet anyone there who could drink a Canadian under the table.

So after I moved back from Japan, I was working in Ottawa for a while, and during that time I took a trip to Europe. I had wanted to see Europe for myself for the longest time, because my mother had gone backpacking across Europe after university, and she really made it sound like the experience of a lifetime. One of my best friends from Ottawa. Marc, wanted to go as well, and so we just decided to throw together a budget backpacking tour. We planned everything out pretty meticulously, so that we got the most bang for our buck. We used a homestay network called “SERVAS”, which I highly recommend, in order to avoid paying for hotels. Basically how it works is that you join the network, they interview you, determine you’re not a psycho, and then give you lists of people who are willing to host in each city you plan to visit. Then, you just contact some of them, and if they are open to hosting during the time you’re passing through, you’re set. We didn’t score homestays in every place we visited, but we did in Rome, Paris and London. We also got Euro-Rail passes to get around, which is pretty much the best option for anyone traveling around Europe on a budget. We set off in early August of 2011, if I remember correctly.

The first country on our itinerary was Italy. We flew into Rome, and were met by our host family. They were a family of four with a nice place in downtown Rome, and some of the most gracious hosts ever. The idea with SERVAS is different from Air B&B in that you are expected to socialize with the hosts while you stay in their home as a means of cultural exchange, and this actually made it better. Their daughter in particular was eager to give us tips on where to go and what to do, and with her help we really enjoyed the city. On our own we saw the typical sights like the Coliseum, the Pantheon, Trevi Fountain, the Forum, Trajan’s Column, the Vatican, and strolled along the Tiber. Later, we came back to their flat and they cooked us a wonderful dinner, after which we chatted and split a bottle of wine.

The second day was actually off-script. Marc and I had planned an itinerary, but the family we were staying with actually made us an offer we couldn’t refuse: they wanted to take us to their private cottage on the outskirts of Rome, on the edge of a picturesque lake, where a local festival was taking place. Of course we ditched our plans and agreed in a heartbeat. We drove out in the afternoon, along the way taking in the spectacular countryside (complete with ancient aqueducts!), and arrived after about an hour at Lago di Bracciano. (Apologies for any butchering of the Italian name.) This is an ancient volcanic lake to the northwest of Rome, and their cottage, although modest, had a spectacular view overlooking it. We did a little walking tour of the area, and then they cooked us a lovely dinner of authentic Italian pasta. After that, they told us there were going to be fireworks, and that we were free to use their kayaks to go out onto the lake and view them from there. I really can’t adequately convey to you how awesome these people were. It was like we won the host family lottery.

The next day however, we had to sadly bid them adieu, or I suppose, “arrivederci”. We were moving on to Venice. I had been tempted to stop in Pisa along the way (to see the tower), but as it was a significant detour, we had decided against it. We set out on the train, and it seemed like it hardly took any time at all. We were seated near some other travelers, a trio of very friendly girls in their twenties, who we chatted with most of the way, and before we knew it we were pulling into the Venice station. There, we had reserved a room in a hostel instead of a homestay, and as soon as we settled in we were off again to explore the city.

Venice, I should be clear, is uniquely beautiful. There is no other city even remotely like it. Walking around it is a feast for the senses, with classical architecture everywhere, shops full of handcrafted goods, a variety of incredible cuisine ranging from gelato to fresh seafood, and the ever-present smell of the sea. On some days, I’ve heard that the smell from the canals can be a little less than pleasant due to them doing double duty as Venice’s sewer system, but the tides had done their duty while we were there, apparently.

As you might expect, we were quick to tour the must-see sights, like the Piazza San Marco, the Grand Canal, and the Rialto Bridge. We also took a short ride on a vaporetti, or water-bus, out to Murano, the island historically famous for its glass-making. While unfortunately we arrived during the Ferragosto holiday when most of the shops were closed, we were still able to wander the streets there, and take in some of the fantastic glass sculpture. We capped it off with drinks by the canal after one of the most stunning ocean sunsets I have ever witnessed. If it’s a little cliché to say that it was magical, then so be it.

After Venice we were on our way to Nice, in the French Riviera. Again we took the train, and this time the trip was even faster, with more spectacular views along the way. It’s really the best way to travel in Europe. We pulled into Nice in the afternoon, this time settling into a hotel rather than a hostel, and proceeded to just wander around for a while. My mother had been there many years before, and recommended the pebbly beaches, so we put our feet in the ocean, enjoyed the sunshine, and had lunch at a patio nearby. Marc convinced me to try some local olives, even though I hate olives, because you can’t fully experience the Mediterranean until you do, but it only served to verify that yes, I do indeed hate all olives, and to the very core of my being. The mussels, however, were delicious, and while we ate we were treated to a street performance of Brazilian capoeira, randomly.

While we were in Nice, we decided it was worth taking a side trip to Monaco, which is essentially right next door. There is a local train that takes you, and after a short ride we spent part of the next day just wandering around there. The city is obscenely wealthy, and it shows. Mega-yachts lined the harbor, top-end luxury cars drove the streets, and we had some definite trouble finding a restaurant that didn’t overcharge. Eventually we found one overlooking the sea, with a nice selection of local seafood. We took a brief peek inside the Monte Carlo Casino, but to be honest neither of us had much interest in gambling, and we were content to leave it at that. We spent the evening back in Nice, mostly just taking in the scenery rather than any specific tourist attractions.

From Nice, we were off to Paris. If we’d had more time in France, I would have loved to have seen the countryside and toured some little winery in the middle of nowhere, but you can’t do it all on one trip. Paris was a must-see, and we had been lucky enough to score a homestay with a man living right downtown. He worked in cosmology, which I thought was super-interesting. Not to be confused with cosmetology – he studied space, not make-up. When we arrived, we were pleasantly surprised to find him as gracious as our last hosts, and happy to give us a walking tour of the area. We were lucky enough to be able to see Notre Dame before it burned, along with the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower, the Champs-Elysees, the Arc de Triomphe, and Pont Royal. One thing I do regret missing is the Paris Catacombs, but there is just so much to see there that it completely slipped my mind as we were running around. We did, however, take a side trip to see the Palace of Versailles and its spectacular gardens, which was well worth the time.

In the evening, we decided to cook for our host, and even though for the life of me I can’t recall what I made, he seemed pleased with it. We spent some time on his rooftop patio sipping craft beer and gazing over the lights of the city, and then Marc and I went out to sample the night life. We went to a few bars, but I have to say, the welcome in Paris was a bit frostier than in some of the other places we visited. The attitude there seemed to be that tourists were to be tolerated but engaged with only if absolutely necessary. I understand it in a way, since they get (or got) about 38 million of them a year, but it didn’t help alleviate the image of Parisians as snooty and aloof. Overall though, Paris was as fantastic as people build it up to be.

Next, we had booked a night in Amsterdam, just a single night due to homestay and train scheduling. I sincerely wish we had had longer, because it turned out to be one of my favorite places. We booked a rather posh hotel at a bargain rate, right downtown, and basically just wandered around again initially, trying to get a feel for the city. Due to our time constraints, we didn’t want to really spend a lot of our precious time traveling back and forth between tourist traps, so we opted to see the canals, the Red Light District, the pot cafes, and sample the local cuisine. In retrospect I have no regrets, because my memories of Amsterdam are all warm, if slightly fuzzy. We enjoyed the warm summer night on a patio, munching on some chocolate-dipped waffle delight we discovered in a local bakery, sipping a local beer, and called it a day. The next time I go to Europe I will make time to see more of Amsterdam though, because the place was everything I had pictured and more. Also, the people are just ridiculously attractive. If I could date a country, it would totally be the Netherlands.

From there, the last leg of our tour was London. On the way, our train went through the famous “Chunnel”, which I had been sort of fascinated with since first hearing about it. Pretty cool, but the view sucks for about 40 minutes there, so bring a book. In London we had our last and most…interesting homestay. Having only briefly corresponded previously, we arrived to discover that our host, Maggie, was a very elderly lady, confined to a wheelchair. This wasn’t a problem with us of course, but it did make for some strange moments.

She had a passion for jazz as it turned out, was actually still quite active in organizing live jazz performances. She had even helped organize one on our very first night there. So, for dinner she insisted that we all go out to the restaurant where the performance was taking place. Sounded great, we thought. We all went out together, no doubt appearing to all like two young men and their grandmother out for a night on the town. Now Maggie was pretty independent, which I respected, but perhaps a bit more so than was actually warranted. She insisted on making her own way in her wheelchair as we strolled along behind her, but it was raining, and there were some hills along the way. At one point, Maggie started gaining a bit of momentum on one of those hills, and if Marc and I hadn’t had some quick reflexes, ol’ Maggie would have gone shooting down that alleyway and out into four lanes of London traffic. After that, we thankfully made it to the restaurant without further incident.

It turned out, the performance was spectacular, and the food was surprisingly amazing. I say “surprisingly” for two reasons, the first of course being the generally held opinion that British cuisine is terrible. The second being that Maggie insisted I try the haggis. Now, to those of you who are unfamiliar, haggis is traditionally made from the heart, liver and lungs of a sheep, minced with onion, oatmeal, spices, etc., and cooked inside the sheep’s stomach. As you might imagine, I was not leaping at the chance to try this, but after she insisted that I order it, she also insisted on paying for everything, so there wasn’t really any excuse I could give. Despite my misgivings though, I actually found myself liking it, and everything else about that evening. We got prime seats, and Maggie was delightful company.

The following day we did the typical tourist thing, making the rounds of Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Tower Bridge, The London Eye, and Piccadilly Circus, among others. We also made time for a trip out to Stonehenge (something I insisted on), and I’m thrilled to have had a chance to see it. The weather wasn’t ideal (typical of the UK, ha-ha), but standing in a place of such immense history, that I had read so much about, was really a satisfying experience. Stonehenge, if you don’t know, is in Wiltshire, about a two hour bus ride to the west of London, so it was a bit far, but in my opinion not to be missed. Long story slightly less long, we flew out the next day, and that was it for Europe. Great trip overall, made all the more excellent by Marc, who was great company.

Fast forward to few years later, and I was back living in Japan, this time in Okinawa. Another friend from Canada was visiting, and after I had shown him the sights in Okinawa we decided to take a little side trip to Taiwan, since Miyakojima, where I had been living, sits basically right next to it. To be honest, I didn’t really know what to expect, because my research had been minimal. When I travel sometimes I like it that way, because it gives you a lot of room to just explore and discover things.

What surprised me most was how multicultural it was – signs in English, Chinese, Japanese, Western chain restaurants mixed in with authentic Thai, traditional Chinese, and all around I could hear all of the above languages being spoken. People were quite friendly too, and I ended up enjoying it a lot. We saw Taipei 101 (the tallest building in the world from 2004 to 2009), the National Palace Museum, Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall, Ximending (or the “Harajuku of Taipei”), the Taipei Zoo, and a few other points of interest. I regret missing out on the famous night markets, but overall I liked it so much I’d definitely go back and see them then.

Since then, I’ve mostly just alternated between visiting Canada and traveling within Japan. Visiting friends, exploring local points of interest, and dealing with the move here to Fukuoka has taken up a lot of my time. I do have a bucket list once life returns to something resembling normalcy, however. At the top of that list is another trip across Europe, this time to include Portugal, Spain, the French countryside, The Netherlands part II, Germany, and Denmark, probably in that order. Following that, I’ve got my eye on New Zealand, mostly because I’m a huge Lord of the Rings fan, and Vietnam, largely because my sister taught there and had good things to say, but also because their food is amazing.

This one ended up being a bit longer than I intended, sorry for that, but there were a lot of good times and good stories in each destination. Of all these, what would I recommend the most you ask? Well, I suppose it has to be Thailand. It was after all the only country so nice I visited it twice, unless you count Japan or the US of course. Yeah, there are some tourist traps, but once you find your way around, there’s something for everyone, and so much fun to be had. Plus, the exchange rates are not to be scoffed at – I had a lobster dinner for the price of a bowl of ramen in Japan.

In the end I hope this helped inspire you to travel, even though right now it’s basically an ordeal to do so. That will change soon enough. In part it was also meant to remind us that there is a great big world out there, even though sometimes we may feel trapped in our own little corner of it. As I see it, we’re not just members of a family, a community, or a country, but global citizens; human beings with a lot in common. Half of the thrill of travel comes from diving into the unfamiliar, but the other half is from discovering that even in the most unfamiliar of places, you can find shared values and new friends.

Stay awesome everybody.