Travel Stories

Recently, I posted some travel stories on (http://www.exchangetravelstories.com/) about the Scandanavian tour I took with Globus in August/September 2007. I don't care for the standard sales pitch Globus puts on their tours. I want to know what people thought was good about a tour and what they thought stunk. I feel this is more honest and enables me to make a more informed decision on whether to do a particular tour with Globus or not. This is what I tried to do with my stories. They aren't sugar coated sales pitches for the tours. I try through descriptive words to give some idea of what some of the experiences were like. An example would be the 2 hour cruise we did on the Sognefjord. The quiet peaceful waters and pictureque small tours with vast mountains in the background. The numerous beautiful waterfalls spilling water into the majestic fjord. The stories we were told of people living to old age in those towns and claiming it was the water. The farm we got to see that was over 80 feet up! The group of 45 strangers that in 2 weeks time became 45 friends and shared incredible experiences. These are some of things that my stories told about.

Apparently, Globus liked my stories. Out of the 7 that I submitted, 6 were rated as High Quality. I think that's pretty neat. Now, I wish they would create a webpage for Denmark so I can finish telling of my Scandanavian adventure. There are stories to tell of Denmark such as the mad cyclists in Copenhagen and how Copenhagen got its canals. There the story of how we ended up polishing the floors in Christiansborg (Christian's Palace). Also, there is the story of how we happily contributed to the Danish arts and sciences. Yes, I gladly helped by savoring a good many pints of Carlsberg beer.

As I said in the end of my Oslo story, I'm looking forward to writing further stories for Globus's website. France should be nice and Egypt should be awesome. For those of you who don't care to check out Globus's website, stay tuned to this blog site and read of my further adventures and mis-adventures. Cheers all!

Stories

Today, I finally finished writing the stories of my Globus Scandanavian adventure. Writing the stories brought back the memories of the trip and the awesome things I got to do. I've kept in touch with a few members of the group we had. It's nice to hear from them. I wish they were going on the France tour I'll be going on as it would be great to see them again. The magic of the trip has faded some. It doesn't feel so close now. I may buy a videocam to take on the France tour so I can better remember the tour. Perhaps the magic of the experience will last longer that way. It might be funny to see how I do making an amateur video of France. We'll see. Once my friend Harvey and another member of the group have reviewed the stories, I plan to post them on the http://www.exchangetravelstories.com/default.aspx site. That way, others can see what the tour was like. It is definitely worth doing. Moments like what I got to do on that tour are what make life worth living. Cheers all!

Published

To my total surprise, I will soon have something published that I wrote sort of. As I've mentioned in previous blogs, Globus and their family of tour groups has a website called The Travel Exchange (http://www.exchangetravelstories.com/default.aspx). You can post stories on this website of your adventures on one of their tours. You can also earn Go Points which are redeemable for gift certificates with Amazon and Gift Certificates.Com. When I found out about the site, I decided to tell about my Globus tour of Australia. The tour was absolutely fantastic and really sold me on Globus tours. Because of that tour, I did a tour last year to Scandanavia and will be doing a 2-week tour of France this year. Anyway, to my surprise, I heard from a lady at Globus who informed me they wanted to use an excerpt from one my Australia stories in their eNewsletter. I was delighted. I'm going to be published sort of. I think that's pretty cool. A side result of this is that I've started writing stories for the site about my Scandanavia tour. I hope those stories will turn out as nice as the Australia ones did. We'll see.

Globus Documents

I've been waiting anxiously for my Globus documents. I need them in order to go on the Scandanavia trip I signed up for. My travel agent Joel mailed them on July 31st. All of last week, I anxiously checked with the carrier who delivers my mail. He never saw them. Today, I decided for S&Gs to see if they were at the apartment manager's office. To my surprise, they were. The normal procedure if that if the mail carrier can't deliver the package to you, he will leave a 3849 or some other kind of note letting you know you have a package at the apartment manager's office. For some reason, I never got one. I plan to ask the carrier what happened when he gets back from a trip he went on this week.

I'm thankful I have the documents. They were my biggest worry. Now, I get to start figuring out what I'm going to take clothes wise and what optional tours I'm going to take. Globus has some nice ones. They have a walking tour of Old Copenhagen which would be neat. There is also a ride of the Flam Railway. I haven't forgotten the train I rode out of Cairns. It was awesome. There is also a trip to the museum housing the Ra and Kon-tiki boats. It'll be neat to get see those.

I hope to find internet cafes I can use while on my trip so I can post updates on the tour. Then, you'll get to see where I've been and hear about any sights of interest. I don't plan on posting any pictures until I get back. I hope you'll find those posts interesting. It should be an awesome trip.