sieffron's VirtualTourist Home Page
| Page Views: 3,288 | Spreading the Love by sieffron - last update: Jul 11, 2006 |
Let me please introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste...
Well, not really, not yet anyways, but I'm working on it. In the meantime, I've done some traveling. I recently completed a 3.5 month trip to Southeast Asia and I've traveled extensively in Europe. I like my travels to be "well-rounded" experiences, taking in as much as I can of what a location has to offer, from sites and activities to cuisine and nightlife. What really hooks me to travel is that it's a tantalizingly imperfect pastime. For every eye-opening experience, the desire for another one increases and the further I get from feeling like I've done or seen enough.
I just moved to Somerville, which is a suburb of Boston. It's one of the "hip" areas of Boston to live, but I plan on changing all that. I re-located down here for my new job in the travel industry. I figured it was time to balance a career with great journeys, so we'll see if that happens. Another long, far off excursion may call me away again at some point in the next few years, but until then I'll make a go of settling in here for a little while. |
| Dubrovnik's Stari Grad, through the city walls. |
|  | Eastern Europe/Turkey/Greek Islands - Summer 2004 I traveled through Eastern Europe, Turkey, and the Greek Islands in the summer of 2004. It was my first long solo backpacking trip, beginning in early June and concluding in early September.
I started off in Prague, where I met up with a few friends from my time studying there in college. I visited Croatia, Slovenia, Serbia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, and wrapped up the trip in Greece's Cyclades Islands.
Among the many highlights of my trip the ones that stood out were walking the city walls of Dubrovnik (Croatia), visiting the village of Sapanta (Romania), the well-preserved Roman ruins of Ephesus (Turkey), Cappadocia's (Turkey) startling landscape, and Crete's Samaria Gorge.
It was easy traveling wherever I went as all the countries were well-connected. It may have served me a little better to spend more time in less countries, but I would have missed a lot of nations. Europe's a great choice for whirlwind travels. It's easy to get from place to place and the compactness of the continent makes it convenient to see and absorb a lot in limited time.
If I went back, the top places on my list to return to would be Romania, Bulgaria, and Turkey. They were the most exotic countries I went to and I would like to explore more of what each has to offfer. |
Southeast Asia - Autumn/Winter 2005-06 I traveled through Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand from October 5 - January 20. Asia bowled me over, nearly literally, from the moment I stepped out of Bangkok's air-conditioned international airport and into the hug of the muggy air.
The cultures over there, while similar to each other, can be very far from Western ways. Noodles are a breakfast staple and karaoke performances are never ridiculed, no matter how grating on the ears (American Idol wouldn't hold quite the same entertainment value in this part of the world). Most purchases don't come without haggling and national celebrations often revolve around natural occurrences rather than historical moments.
Probably the most striking aspect of Asia for me as a visitor from the West, was my inability to blend in. I've never visited a place where I was instantly identified as a non-inhabitant and that made it challenging to pierce the veneer between visitor and local. It's certainly worth a few more trips to try to dig a little deeper.
Southeast Asia offer numerous activities in addition to warm welcomes for its visitors though. There are many beautiful Buddhist temples and ruins to see, hill tribe explorations, market visits, museums, and outdoor sports activities such as trekking, rafting, rock climbing, mountain biking, and scuba diving. Then again, you could do nothing but lie on a powdery sand beach, eat fresh pineapple, and ponder partaking in these pastimes on your next visit. | | |
| Fire show on Occheuteal Beach, Sihanoukville. |
| | Favorite Destinations (In No Particular Order) - Krakow, Poland
- Luang Prabang, Laos
- Sihanoukville (Kampong Saom), Cambodia
- Capadoccia , Turkey
- Ios, Greece
- Hoi An, Vietnam
- Ha Long Bay, Vietnam
- Romania
- Ljubljana, Slovenia
- Dubrovnik, Croatia |
Travel Wishlist Diving Burma's Mergui Archipelago
Skiing on Hokkaido (Japan)
Touring China's Yunnan Province
Visiting Cuzco and Machu Pichu in Peru
Traveling through Malaysia
Hanging out on Zanzibar (Tanzania) |
 Comments for sieffron | | | | |
haze21cn Wed Jul 30, 2008 12:18 UTC
nice pictures,i planned to visit Vietnam last year unfortunately failed. | a2lopes Sat Sep 8, 2007 18:49 UTC
Happy birthday Steve and many happy returns of the day in your life. Greetings from Lisbon | chbuchie Mon Sep 11, 2006 13:28 UTC
happy belated birthday !!! | Dyesebel Fri Sep 8, 2006 20:28 UTC
May you have many more birthdays and travels to come! Happy Birthday! |
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