Trying to plan my vacations this year, need some inspiration. What say you?

It's one of my favourite places. So much inspiration and culture there. Definitely want to go back at some point and do Kyoto, Osaka, Hiroshima etc.

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the weather...it rained a bit on 2 of the days I was there, but even after the rain ended, the sun would come out for the rest of the day. Snorkling in crystal clear water, touring the island, buying J's at the Nike Store on Waikiki Beach, Pearl Harbor, driving in my rented convertible along the shore, the Luau, the drinks...and I know there was still so much untapped.

I've been told by multiple people that Thailand is amazing.

been to lima a couple times, some parts near, through the valley. i met some bitches from iquitos and they were WILD in the sack and cool girls. if you're single that's an off-the-beaten path place, decent sized city but amazonian all the way. prolly a good place to do ahuasca if you are tryna fuck with that (i am too old to try that shit).

me and my jawn gonna do cuzco and macchu picchu soon. shit is fascinating.

lima got some good ass food. gastronomy is on point. delicious, varied and not heavy. i like it, top 5 food cities i have visited, and i fuck with two things in every city 1) food 2) jawns.

you could party there one weekend. nothing slammin like sao paulo but adequate. the first time i went i was single, got it in big time. they don't have the vanity or beauty of like colombia, venezuela or brazil but they have down to earth girls and enough beautiful ones to enjoy yourself. if you are a woman or a gay dude, ehhhh, i dunno, most of the dudes were kinda short and whatever looking from the little attention i paid.

i went back with my ex and we had a good time. dude some naturey type shit like swam with sea lions and saw penguins and shit. they got a cool park full of fountains that i went to both times, just a pleasant place to chill, watch the families and see the little show. go like at sundown, shit looks better at night.

if you like drugs and shit like i said they got that shaman experience and some good ass yola if that is your thing, personally i don't fuck with it. the weed was shitty, i heard you could get some OK stuff in cuzco. booze they got pisco, shit is too citrusy for me but they make a lot of cocktails with it.

thanks for the info.

Lima just great variety and not too heavy. Everything is flavored with something natural, herbs, spices, fruits, veggies. Tokyo I admit is more knowing chefs from there (and Osaka) and seeing their game. Paris I love the quick street food, I love the upscale places and everything in between. There is a lot of junk like any major city but they bring the passion when it comes to food.

Buenos Aires is a curious one, huge city with lots of options and price is not really correlated with quality. I had better meals for $3 than I had for $300. You have to sift around but you can find incredible pizza (would take the top places over NY Pizza in a heartbeat) and I had one of the best steaks I have ever eaten for about $18. They could be bigger on seafood (oddly Montevideo had way better stuff) but it's decent there. If you like bread and sweets there is a very serious culture surrounding both there. Great jams, breads, ec. Ice cream is like a fucking religion there and their obsession with caramel is even more extreme.

It's hard to pick just *one* place in Italy, obviously Rome has the most options, Milan and Florence both had incredible meals and there are a lot of places I haven't been. Brazil also has good food though you have to really seek it out at times. I think Rio would be close to my top 5 just the same, oddly mostly for foreign fare though (two of my favorite French restaurants are there, good sushi, etc). I ate great in Madrid also. Montevideo had some great stuff but you really had to seek it out and it was relatively expensive.

Maybe if I had to pick I would go off the board and pick Ushuaia, Argentina. Pretty small place (maybe 75K people and it's grown a lot recently to get to that number) and in the middle of nowhere. The food was incredible. They have these huge ass crabs that you can get pick out live and eat whole or have prepared a lot of different ways. Incredible, better than Alaskan King for sure. They also have great lamb, the most tender and pleasantly flavored lamb I have ever had and my family is Moroccan so we know a little about lamb. You could practically shake this stuff off the bone, it was not as fatty or gamey as most lamb either. Texture was incredible. There were mostly locally sourced ingredients though most vegetables, fruits and shrimp were pretty much all brought in from elsewhere in the country. I ate great, didn't have a bad meal the whole time there and some were really exceptional. We didn't come thinking about the food at all but it was one of the highlights of the trip, in fact it was probably the best thing consistently and that's in a place with pure air, mountains, ocean and wildlife in abundance.

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http://tinyurl.com/pp7xc89

including egypt, morrocco, kenya, south africa, tanzania

In that order

https://www.lonelyplanet.com/seychelles

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summer? Tokyo

FML man that the last day when I was leaving it was sunny and beautiful as fuck ... for our ride to the airport.

shit is kinda cool but a little overhyped to me. i wanna fuck around with some smaller cities in brazil, both times i just went there and SP, some surrounding shit but that's it. gotta get my portugues up tho.

I don't even need to go far for that, I'll take the forests of northern Canada in the summer.

I'm headed back to Cuba soon and Brazil has to be on deck again asap!! I was in the Philippines over the holiday with fam, scuba diving, partying, island hopping on Coron, debauchery etc.

I've been to about 10 countries in recent years. Various parts of Mexico are amazing but the east coast south of Cancun is spectacular. Colombia was fun but I need to spend more time there, like in Cartagena. Berlin's booming art scene is on deck this summer, as is Carnaval in Cuba. Probably Spain, Portugal, Holland, as well.

I'd recommend wikitravel or wikivoyage, and couchsurfing.com

should be fun, it's my home away from home. I've only been in the colder months
and thoroughly enjoyed, want to check it this summer too.

I'm looking at Cuba in feb. How was your experience?

you got colombia questions, hit me up. ask vex id and other dudes here. i think i know it as well as the u.s. if not better now.

cartagena is a tourist trap. very little culture of its own at least that is accessible. i know some cool costenos but it takes a lot of effort and you gotta go into the dingy areas to meet them. the whole thing is a hustle. it's annoying. i spent a lot of time in other parts of the coast, too. it's a weird culture, very different from the interior. you got a lotta, um, simple-minded folks i'll say, but not in a particularly charming way. i'd say what you wanna do in CTG is a couple days in the walled city and a couple day trips to islands. baru is aight, rosarios got some decent spots (plan ahead), mud volcano is popular but i never did it. the beaches ain't shit in the city, islands only and they aren't blow-away either.

go to san andres or santa marta for beaches.

you wanna see something else cool go to meta and canon cristal but make sure it's open (like july to november roughly).

if you got time to set up shop the medium sized cities can be fun but i mean a good amount of time and there isn't much to do there besides chill and lay down chicks. i am talking like pereira, armenia, manizales, bucamaranga, shit like that.

medellin is getting gringoized but not if you avoid the ritzy areas. home away from home, that is a place i could take you around like a local. it's got a lot to offer once you figure out what the fuck is going on.

bogota is big and cold, lots of shit to do if you seek it out but the people are not nearly as friendly as other areas. i gotta go back for the first time in like five years soon. again it's got a lot to do but the day to day lifestyle isn't my style.

cali is cool, thinking about spending an extended stay there because my girl likes it. nice weather, good food, not too too much traffic (bogota and medellin are terrible). maybe a little slow but i don't mind that and it's got enough to do for a short stay, too.

barranquilla is aight, some nicer people and fun ass partying. beaches are mostly kinda dirty but they are abundant. santa marta is more my spot, you got the national park which is rich in natural beauty, teganga for diving. the centro aint shit but it's like a jumping off point and there are a couple good places to eat (ouzo is a top ten restaurant in the whole country IMO).

the other parts of the coast are pretty much whatever, kinda dingy. some nice beaches but you gotta seek them out. if it rains, there is nothing to do at all.

san andres i think i mentioned. cool little island. do providencia for sure if you go. old time island living. day is over by noon, maybe 8:30 if someone tosses you a beer. lazy people who DGAF, chill all day. catch your food in the ocean, get drunk and high, chill. tomorrow is not really a consideration.

was the highlight of a short stay that included bogota, the mountains above it, and cali to peep the dance scene. i didn't line up people/connects ahead of my bogota time so i didn't get a feel for the city and the art, which is a priority when i travel. art, ladies, and nature haha
right now brazil has me sprung so before heading back to colombia i'm probably going to wild out some more there. i had such an epic time with national parks, ladies, and art: spray painted a mural in a favela with some local graff writers while i overheard some little brother and other hip hop bumping loudly nearby before the machine guns blasting in the streets killed my vibe.

I like Bogota but it is 'gray"

i just came back from kenya tho, so i gotta spread it around before doing east africa again


so this year will probably be some combo of

cuba/costa rica/belize
ghana/senegal/south africa & bali if any of them have a glitch fare

my mom been to over 100 countries (all before age 26 and like two since!), she said madagascar was the most beautiful place she visited. i seen seychelles islands on this weird spanish show about the world's best hotels. shit was jaw ... dropping.

>so this year will probably be some combo of
>
>cuba/costa rica/belize
>ghana/senegal/south africa & bali if any of them have a glitch
>fare


cuba is getting bammerized but it will only get more bammer so go. i wanna go, too. costa rica, nah fuck it, skip it. better places to go that arent that far away. belize was aight but my trip was truncated. i would go to barbados first, shit is extra nice. a dude i work with is from there and dude has that creamy azz guapamole plus he's like a local celeb. i wanna get him to take me but he just laughs it off. his pictures are fucking amazing.

I've been wanting to go there for some time.

Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland also appeal.

i dunno how long you goin and how much you wanna spend? i havent been to the places mentioned but i have been to a lot. what type of shit do you want? beach, big city, forest, mountains, partying, chilling?

got like two weeks to play with. want to go somewhere end of feb/early march. I went to brazil and tokyo last year. I'm looking for all the usual stuff - good food, beaches, chicks, parties. At the same time, i can't just chill on a beach for two weeks and so looking for a place with art/culture/museums that i can immerse myself in during the day.

I had a particularly good time in Brazil. The culture, beaches, women, music, parties, everything was on point and i'm trying to replicate that experience.

I've imagined it...

nm

I have never been to Tahiti and it has always been a favorite destination of mine. Hawaii on the other hand, I would move there now if I could and never look back. it is the most beautiful place I have ever visited. Absolute perfection