We were staying on Zimbabwe side of Victoria Falls town. We took a cab from our resort to the border post (all cab rides $5). After passport stamping, we crossed the border to Zambia side. We walked across the Victoria Falls bridge (about 15 minutes walk) to the Victoria Falls Park entrance. Just a fair warning, there are a lot of touts on the way from the border post to the park and they will pester you to buy knick-knacks but not that aggressive so it was not much of a concern for us. After paying the entrance fee we …
Africa Destination Trip ReportsJune 2024: Victoria Falls, Zambia Trip Report
Africa Destination Trip ReportsJune 2024: Etosha National Park, Namibia – Day 3 & 4 Trip Report
Day 3: We started our day early by leaving Okaukuejo camp. Our plan was to drive eastbound in Etosha park and reach Namutoni camp by evening while stopping at Halali camp for lunch for a couple of hours. After reaching Halali camp for lunch, we stopped by the Halali waterhole and saw a huge herd of elephants come in. The rest of the drive to Namutoni camp was fairly uneventful besides seeing mostly herbivores. What we were mainly hoping to see was some big cats but this was not to be on this trip. Day 4: This was our last …
Africa Destination Trip ReportsJune 2024: Etosha National Park, Namibia – Day 1 & 2 Trip Report
Day 1: We had arrived in Windhoek the night before and stayed at Hilton Windhoek which is about 40 minutes from the airport. In the morning we started our 415 km drive to Etosha National Park. It took us around 5 hours with breaks. We entered the park through Anderson Gate as we were staying in Okaukuejo Camp for first 2 nights. Right after entering the park we drove towards Okondeka waterhole. After we entered the Okaukuejo Camp where we were staying the first 2 nights, we checked-in at the reception, paid our park fees for the entire stay. We …
Destination Trip Reports South AmericaMarch 2024: Buenos Aires, Argentina Trip Report
MilesPointsTravel Disclaimer: This review is very light on photos. My phone was snatched from my hand in Santiago, Chile at the end of the trip and since I did not backup my photos to cloud, I lost majority of the photos taken during this trip. Only photos that my wife took with her phone made it to the trip report. Day 1: We were staying at the Buenos Aires Marriott Hotel which was only a 2 minute walk from one of the iconic Buenos Aires landmark, the Obelisk. We decided to walk from our hotel to Mercado Central, a great …
Destination Trip Reports South AmericaMarch 2024: El Calafate, Argentina – Visiting Perito Moreno Glacier
Day 1: We spent 2 days in Argentinian Patagonia in the town of El Calafate. We took the 3 hours 20 minutes flight from Buenos Aires to El Calafate Airport and arrived early in the morning. After picking up our rental car from the airport, we checked in at our hotel Mirador del Lago and were soon on our way to the main attraction of this trip, the Perito Moreno Glacier. The drive from El Calafate town to Perito Moreno takes about 1.5 hours and some portion of the trip is quite scenic where you can see the beautiful blue …
Destination Trip Reports South AmericaMarch 2024: Iguazu Falls, Argentina Trip Report
Day 1: We walked from our hotel (Panoramic Grand) to Puerto Iguazu bus station and took Rio Uruguay bus to the entrance of the Argentina side of Iguazu Falls. Again the fares are cash only, no credit cards accepted at the bus station. After paying for the entrance tickets (credit cards accepted here), we entered the park. If you are visiting 2 consecutive days, you should save the ticket stubs as the 2nd day is 50% off. There are 3 main hiking routes on the Argentina side of the falls – the Lower circuit, the Upper circuit, the Green trail. …
Destination Trip Reports South AmericaMarch 2024: Iguazu Falls, Brazil Trip Report
We were staying at Panoramic Grand Hotel in Puerto Iguazu, Argentina. There are multiple options to visit Iguazu Falls on the Brazil side from Puerto Iguazu. One can take a cab (or a private transfer service) directly to the Iguazu Falls entrance or take a bus from Puerto Iguazu bus station. The hotel was about 10 minutes walk to the Puerto Iguazu Bus station. After arriving at the bus station we purchased a round trip ticket on Rio Uruguay Bus to Iguazu Falls, Brazil. The fares are cash only, no credit cards accepted at the bus station. The bus requires …
Asia Destination Trip ReportsNovember 2023: Neil Island, Andaman & Nicobar Islands Trip Report
Day 1: We stayed just 1 day at the Neil Island (now renamed Shaheed Dweep). This island is much less tourist oriented compared to Havelock Island. After arriving late morning on a ferry ride from Havelock, we were driven by our transfer service to the resort (Seashell Samssara Neil Island). We only had the afternoon for sightseeing on the island and our first stop was Bharatpur Beach. It was low tide time and you could walk on knee deep water for close to 1/2 mile from the shore. Next stop was Laxmanpur Beach #2 that has the popular attraction, “Natural …
Asia Destination Trip ReportsNovember 2023: Havelock Island, Andaman & Nicobar Islands Trip Report
Day 1: We started early in the morning from Port Blair to travel to Havelock Island on Makruzz Ferry. The journey takes about 1.5 hours and the ocean was not choppy so went by pretty quickly. I had already arranged private transport so the driver was waiting for us at the Havelock Ferry terminal and drove us to our resort (Tilar Siro Andamans, CGH Earth) where we were staying for 2 nights. We arrived around 10 AM and spent a couple of hours walking along the resort’s private beach. In the afternoon we had our driver take us to Radhanagar …
Asia Destination Trip ReportsNovember 2023: Port Blair, Andaman and Nicobar Islands Trip Report
Day 1: Port Blair is the main island of the Andamans and your main point of entry and exit for all flights. We arrived at Veer Savarkar Airport just before noon and had our transport waiting to take us to our hotel (Lemon Tree Hotel Port Blair). The hotel is right outside the airport so pretty soon after checking-in we were ready for sightseeing. Our first stop was Corbyns Cove Beach. Its just 8 km from the airport on the south eastern part of the island. The beach had calm waters surrounded by beautiful greenery from 3 sides. The beach …
Asia Destination Trip ReportsMay 2023: Boracay, Philippines Trip Report
Day 1: We arrived at Caticlan International Airport on a short 1 hour Philippines Airlines flight from Cebu International Airport. I had already pre-booked a transfer package for seamless transfer for the trip. It included Bus transfer from Caticlan Airport to Jetty – ferry from Caticlan to Boracay – Bus transfer from Boracay Jetty to hotel and back in reverse order at the end of our trip. Total cost was 20 USD per person round-trip. It was late afternoon when we checked into Ambassador in Paradise hotel in Boracay (located in Station 1). We decided to have dinner at …
Destination Trip Reports North AmericaJanuary 2023 – 3 Days in Big Island, Hawaii
Day 1: We arrived at Kona International Airport from Los Angeles early afternoon. After picking up our rental car, we drove to our hotel for the first night, Courtyard by Marriott King Kamehameha’s Kona Beach Hotel. After checking in, we went wandering along the hotel grounds. The water being very cold for January, we spent a couple of hours by the hotel pool instead. We used our welcome drink vouchers from check-in at the pool bar and took it to our room to enjoy the view from our patio. After enjoying the drinks we left the hotel for dinner. After …
Asia Destination Trip ReportsDecember 2022: 3 Night in Hilton Maldives Amingiri Resort
Day 1: Me and my parents arrived in Male International Airport in the morning from Kochi, India. Karen’s flight from London was delayed by 3 hours so I made the decision to send my parents to the resort so they did not have to wait with me at the airport. Hilton Amingiri representative at the airport assured me that my parents would not have to wait at the hotel to get a room even though both rooms were booked under my wife’s name and mine. After Karen arrived at the airport, we took the same speedboat to the resort. After …
Africa Destination Trip ReportsMay 2022: Praslin, Seychelles Trip Report
Day 1 (Day 3 of Trip): We drove from our hotel (DoubleTree by Hilton Seychelles – Allamanda Resort and Spa) to the Cat Coco Ferry Terminal for our ferry to Praslin Island. The ferry takes about 1 hr 30 mins from Mahe to Praslin. I had heard that the seas are rough starting June and so we had already applied a motion sickness patch about an hour before leaving for the terminal. After arriving at the ferry terminal, we picked up our rental car (Capricorn Car Rental) and drove to the resort (Le Deuc de Praslin) where we were staying …
Africa Destination Trip ReportsMay 2022: Mahe, Seychelles Trip Report
Day 1: We arrived at Mahe International Airport from Addis Ababa around 2 PM. After picking up our rental car, we drove 15km south along the coast to Doubletree by Hilton Seychelles – Allamanda Resort and Spa. We stayed here for 2 nights before visiting Praslin Island. After checking in at the hotel and freshening up, we hit the beach. It was early evening by now and we did not get in the water although it was quite warm!! The hotel is a beachfront property with private beach access. We walked along the beach to nearby rocks which had a …
Destination Trip Reports EuropeMay 2021: Naxos, Greece Trip Report
Day 1: We arrived at Santorini Athinios port (new port) for our SeaJets ferry to Naxos. The ferry ride takes about 3 hours from Santorini to Naxos (depending on which ferry boat you choose). We arrived at Naxos port early afternoon. We were staying at Fanis Hotel close to Agia Anna Beach. The hotel provided complimentary shuttle service to hotel. After freshening up we walked to Lefto’s Souvlaki Kebab House at Agios Prokopios Beach for lunch After lunch, we went to Agia Anna Beach right across from Fanis hotel. The water was still very cold so we shifted to the …
Destination Trip Reports EuropeMay 2021: Santorini, Greece Trip Report
Day 1: We arrived at Santorini (Thira) International Airport early afternoon. After picking up our rental car we drove to our hotel (Avant Garde Suites) in Akrotiri. After freshening up we decided to have lunch near Kamari Beach. Greece had just reopened post-covid and many places in Santorini were still closed (or work being done for reopening). We were lucky to find Soul By Splash restaurant open, right on Kamari Beach. It was amazing having wonderful food while hearing waves a few feet away. After lunch, we walked along Kamari Beach but the very cold water along with rough pebbles …
Destination Trip Reports EuropeMay 2021: Athens, Greece Trip Report
Day 1: We arrived at Athens International Airport (Eleftherios Venizelos) in the afternoon on our flight from London. After a rapid covid-19 swab test at the airport, we were on our way. Athens Metro Line 3 serves the airport and we took the metro to Syntagma Square (9 Euro/person). Our hotel (New Hotel, Athens) was only 5 minutes walk from Syntagma metro stop. After freshening up, we decided to pick up our combo Acropolis tickets ($30 Euro for 8 sites over 5 days) from Gymnasium of Lykeion. We walked from our hotel to the National Garden. We walked through the …
Asia Destination Trip ReportsDecember 2019: Kandy and Colombo, Sri Lanka Trip Report
Earlier part of the Sri Lanka Trip involves sightseeing in Bentota, Weligama, Ella and Nuwara Eliya. Day 5: We left Nuwara Eliya after having breakfast at our hotel. After 30 minutes of driving towards Kandy, we arrived at Damro Labookellie Tea Centre and Tea garden. The tea factory here is actually running and the management offers complimentary 15 minute guided tour around the factory. We learned about various stages of processing of tea as well as about different varieties of tea. Finally we were treated with a variety of fine Ceylon tea. We ended up buying a good amount of …
Asia Destination Trip ReportsDecember 2019: Bentota, Weligama Bay and Nuwara Eliya, Sri Lanka Trip Report
Day 1: We arrived at Bandaranaike International Airport late afternoon and after clearing immigration we met with our driver Nishanta from Ceylon Escapes in the arrival hall. Our first night stay was at Bentota, about 110 km from the airport. We reached Bentota in about 2 hours and checked into our homestay at Shangri-Lanka Villa. We were fairly tired after traveling since the morning that day and went to bed early Day 2: We left after having breakfast and made our way south. First up was Bentota Beach. The beach was very clean and the water quite warm for December. …