17 days, 16 nights in Ladakh, northwestern INDIA, Feb. 10-26, 2017. Highlights: Fly from Delhi to Leh for Leh Palace, Victory Peak/hike along Zingchen gorge to base camp for 10 days of tracking the endangered snow leopard/Hemis National Park, home to blue sheep, Tibetan wolf/Himalayan homestay/at Likir Monastery, attend Dosmoche Festival. $4,875 (group of 4-7) or $4,650 (8-9) ppdo. Single supp., $500.
12 days, 11 nights, May 22-June 2, 2017. Led by Joseph Benatov, expert on Balkan culture. Highlights: In Bucharest, ROMANIA, open-air National Village Museum/Sinaia Monastery/cross Danube into BULGARIA/in Veliko Turnovo, working artisans/Etara open-air crafts museum/in Plovdiv, ancient Roman theater, 14th-century mosque/in Sofia, Museum of Socialist Art/in Thessaloniki, GREECE, Macedonian Museum of Contemporary Art/in Vergina, tomb of Philip II. $3,750 ppdo. Single supp., $650. Brattleboro Museum & Art Center (Brattleboro, VT; 802/257-0124, ext.
8-day, 7-night music festival, Jan. 14-21, 2017. Highlights: Throughout MALTA, see concerts and recitals by local groups and soloists/in Mdina, Palazzo Falson/on island of Gozo, megalithic G˙gantija Temples /in Birgu, Malta at War Museum. £2,390 (near $3,153) ppdo. Single supp., £295 ($389). Ciceroni Travel (2 The Square, Aynho, Banbury, Oxfordshire, England, OX17 3BL, U.K.; phone +44 1869 811167, www.ciceroni.co.uk).
10 days, 9 nights in ITALY. Departures Feb.-April 2017. Highlights: In Venice, St. Mark’s Square and Accademia Gallery/in Florence, city tours, Palazzo Davanzati, Uffizi Gallery, cooking class/in hills of Umbria, tasting at winery/in Rome, Trevi Fountain, Pantheon, Vatican museums. $2,395 per person, double occupancy (ppdo). Single supp., $725. Rick Steves’ Europe (Edmonds, WA; 425/771-8303, www.ricksteves.com).
This month’s winner is SALLY KEVERS of Roswell, Georgia:
Dining at the fabulous Le Train Bleu at the Gare de Lyon station in Paris was on our bucket list for fall 2015. Since our TGV train would arrive at the rail station at 1:30 p.m., my husband and I had made lunch reservations.
In the station, since we had our luggage with us (a roller suitcase and a tote each), we asked for directions to the elevator up. We knew the restaurant had a special cloakroom just for luggage storage.
While volunteering on the island of Crete in October 2015, I took a bus from Heraklion and spent a wonderful weekend in Chania.
I stayed at Lidra Rooms (Sarpaki 3, Chania, Crete 731 32, Greece; phone +30 698 319 6039, www.lidrarooms.gr) on Mitropoleos Square, just five minutes from the Old Town Venetian Harbour and numerous shops and waterfront restaurants.
During the world trip I take each year (Sept. ’14, pg. 34), one of my annual stops is Bangkok, Thailand, and in July 2015 I stayed there for four nights.
The airport is a long distance from the city, and, upon arrival, after stopping at the luggage carousel, you walk out of the terminal lobby right to the taxi stand area, where you can sign up for a $20 taxi. The woman at the desk tells you the price, and you can pay then or later. They keep track of where you are going, and there’s no waiting for a ride.
My wife and I were on a cruise that, on May 24, 2016, stopped at Horta on the island of Faial in the Azores, Portuguese islands located in the North Atlantic. The cruise ship wanted nearly $200 per person for a shore excursion, so, instead, we walked out to the end of the pier.
I prefer to travel independently rather than with a tour group, and, over the years, one of the benefits of planning my own travel has been achieving a level of expertise in the various transportation systems abroad. On our September 2015 trip to Europe, my wife, Kris, and I and four friends used quite a few different conveyances to get around, many of which we booked before we left the US.
Trains
Train travel in Europe is generally safe, efficient and fast. Traveling by train with full suitcases can be somewhat stressful, however.
Wendy Bach of Minneapolis, Minnesota, wrote (April ’16, pg. 2), “My husband and I are now 63 and in good health, and we want to chart out the active ‘this is the time to do it’ type of trips. We love hiking and biking and have taken bike tours. We haven’t done much of the big-group tours; we tend to plan our own itineraries and make our own arrangements.