Travel Blog

Remember, the Marriott charged me 30,000 points for 1 night. On the Starwood card I get an easily redeemed (even before special offers and free nights) 3.6% return vs. Marriott’s pain in the ass 1.2% return on their card. Northwest Airlines offers a card at a dollar a point as well. Getting to from LAX to NYC and back (with significant restrictions) would cost you 25,000 points, worth $378 at NWA.com for the exact same flights. That’s 1.5% of highly restricted return on investment that you may not be able to redeem if they go belly-up. United Airlines is much the same. Discover Card gives you greater flexibility but only 1% cash back. I haven’t seen any cashback cards that go over 2% except for certain types of purchases.

Today I made flight reservations via Northwest Airlines. I’m flying from Portland International Airport to Narita International Airport on September 11, 2006. Trust me, that was not my choice for a flight date (I even get to pay an additional $2.50 fee for “September 11 Security”).

Yet, check Travelocity and you’ll see that a flight from New York to London takes as little as 6 hours, 25 minutes and is non-stop! Better yet, on Virgin Atlantic I came up with a round-trip air fare of $551 US, just over half what I paid to travel within North America.

I also learned that the Russian word for “making a reservation” is the same as the word for “adding armor to”—бронирование [bronirovaniye]. I guess it means you’re protecting your room from anyone else using it. It sure looks odd, though. You can do the same with airline tickets.

I could even make good use of Metrolink, on the condition that there was a train available for people traveling the wrong way. I could now cross counties with only one transfer. If I were to include Amtrak, I could theoretically go as far as Florida and only have to leave a vehicle once. Of course, the train would take over three days, and I’d have to pencil in being a day and a half late. And the destination is Florida, after all.

Driving through the Amalfi Coast. [The video is actually a picture that you click on which wasn’t apparent in Firefox but worked on Explorer.]

The word "cruise" has several meanings. As a noun it means "an ocean trip taken for pleasure" while as a verb it can mean "to sail or travel about for pleasure, relaxation, or sightseeing" and "to look for a sexual partner in a public place."