I took my daughter and son-in-law on their first trip to Italy, Sept. 10-22, 2015. I worked with an agent to design a private tour, including Rome, the Sorrento area, a train to Florence and some time in the Tuscan countryside. We were joined by a friend in Florence, adding details that needed to be worked out.
Having only two weeks to spend in Cambodia and Vietnam, my husband, Paul, and I decided to do an independent tour rather than a group tour.
After visiting family in Singapore, we flew to Phnom Penh to start our tour, which had been arranged by Indochina Odyssey Tours (Sai Dong, Long Bien, Hanoi 10000, Vietnam; www.indochinaodysseytours.com). It took place Jan. 18-Feb. 1, 2016, and cost $2,172 per person, including three internal flights.
Crystal Cruises celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2015, and to mark the occasion it scheduled a world cruise — not an ordinary world cruise like the ones it and other cruise lines schedule every year but a true world cruise, a circumnavigation of the globe, from Miami to Miami, for 108 days.
You can purchase self-guided food tours of Berlin with the app bitemojo, free on iTunes and Android. Once you activate a tour, selected eateries are notified that you will arrive in due time to receive “bites,” specially designed small entrées, served with chef’s commentary (sometimes in English).
“FOOD LOVER’S CATALONIA” — 9-day, 8-night, culinary walking tour (“moderate” level) in SPAIN, May 14-22 & Sept. 17-25, 2017. Highlights: In Barcelona, La Boqueria market, cooking class, tapas crawl/drive to Pyrenees for cheese and wine tasting, Michelin-rated dining/Aigüestortes National Park/volcanic Garrotxa region/ninth-century Girona. $2,840 ppdo. Single supp., $650. UTracks (47 William St., Ottawa, ON, K1N 6Z9, Canada; 866/441-6232, www.utracks.com).
Vietnam
My husband, John, and I live in upstate New York, and most of the retired people in our area are “snowbirds,” who head south to spend the winter in warmer, snow-free states. John and I head all the way to Asia for three months. We find Asia reasonable, cost-wise, and enjoy the diversity of cultures. We like the flexibility of wintering for a few weeks each in several countries.
