Archive for the Category »Holiday «

Central Utah Adventure Travel
Thursday, June 10th, 2010 /

Venture into the center of Utah and you enter mining country. This area of Utah has a diverse ecosystem from the forest with lakes, wild flowers, flowing rivers to the painted desert. Central Utah is often overlooked as a vacation destination and this would be a mistake.

Take Spanish Fork Canyon to Price and you have made it to central Utah. Price is the largest town in the area so if you need supplies stock up here. Nine Mile Canyon has been recently purchased by the State. It is an archeological treasure trove. There is painted Indian art rocks and the land was held in private ownership until about two years ago.

After a visit to Nine Mile Canyon you will want to head south towards Huntington. The two lane highway here is very deceiving it looks desolate no trees. Travel to Huntington and follow the road sign to Huntington Canyon. After reaching the power plant the terrain will change and you won’t believe your eyes. Traveling into the Manti La Sal forest you will discover pristine streams, hiking trails through abundant wild flowers, ferns, aspen and a variety of trees. It is a great place to camp for the night and see the stars and smell the fresh air.

After visiting Huntington Canyon you will want to return to the desolate highway. If you want to visit a dig for dinosaur bones the town of Cleveland offers a look into the pit where archeologists will be working for a hundred years.

There are many options in the area to choose an adventure in the mountains here. Traveling on that same desolate highway through Orangeville you will discover orange sandstone as you travel up to Joe’s Valley. The crystal blue water, orange sandstone and ponderosa pine are a perfect place to have lunch.

When you reach the town of Castledale you will see a dirt road turn off towards the San Rafael Swell. The swell has been a favorite of the locals for years. If you hike off the dirt road you will find some of the most undisturbed Utah desert I know of. You will find Indian rock art in many unmarked places, see food storage on the cliffs, hear the meadowlarks off in the distance and feel like no one else is on the planet.

Traveling further south on that same desolate highway you will come to the town of Ferron. You will see a sign to the east take it to Ferron Canyon. Here you can visit small natural lakes, see a wide variety of wild life and enjoy scenic beauty that is rare these days.

Follow the same desolate highway to the I-70 interchange and catch highway 89 and take a scenic journey to Moab. Here is one of the most beautiful areas in Utah. Take a wild white water rafting trip, visit Arches National Park stay at a hotel after all the outdoors you will enjoy a bed.

Category: Holiday  Tags: ,  Comments off
The Big Island of Hawaii
Thursday, June 10th, 2010 /

The Big Island of Hawaii is the largest and youngest island of the chain. Because it has an active volcano, this island is still growing. There are five volcanoes on the island. Kilauea, the shortest volcano of the group is the most active volcano in the world. It has been erupting almost continuously since 1983. Watching Kilauea erupt is one of the most exciting scenes you will ever witness. You can literally see the earth being born! The island’s terrain offers barren lava fields, black beaches, tropical jungles, and snowcapped mountains. The summit of Mauna Kea offers the most beautiful views from the world’s clearest skies.

Hilo Bay is home to more then 100,000 people. This city is located on the Eastern side of the island. Hilo is known as the rainy side of the island. They get around 130 inches of rain annually. The terrain is like a lush rain forest. Hilo has had two documented tsunamis and many earthquakes. You can see cruise ships docked in the harbors of Hilo Bay. Hilo has mind-blowing waterfalls.

Heading south takes you to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. This is a sight not to be missed. Watch Kilauea erupt, walk through the lava tubes, see the lava hitting the ocean in big waves of steam. This is an incredible experience!

Head south of the park and enjoy the black beaches of Hawaii, such as Punalu’u Black Sand Beach. At the most southern part of the island is Green Sand Beach. Continue driving around the southern point and drive to the Western side of the island, or the “sunny side” of the island. Kona has the most sunshine on the island. The beaches are tamer and better for swimming. Most of the island’s resorts are on this side. The Kona side gets less rain and is therefore not as lush.

At the very northern point of this road lies the picturesque town of Hawi. There are many art shops here to enjoy. Heading north to the end of the road is the Pololu Lookout. You can hike down to the Pololu Beach by a trail. At the bottom, you will find black sand dunes.

If you want a “cowboy” experience, head to Parker Ranch. Parker Ranch is known for their long-horned cattle. Hawaiian cowboys are called Paniolo. You can take a 45 minute wagon tour of a section of the range. You can also visit the Parker Ranch Historic Homes in Waimea. At the Parker Range Visitors Center, you can see videos of the ranch’s history and cruise the museum.

Enjoy your visit to the Big Island!

Category: Holiday  Tags: ,  Comments off
How to Bargain in China
Thursday, June 10th, 2010 /

Here is a guide to how to bargain and get the absolute best price while shopping in China.

Shopping is very popular in China and you can find shops everywhere, whatever your looking for in China you wont have a problem finding it, China has stores for everything. The best place in Beijing to go shopping and bargaining is Silk Street.

Now, bargaining in China is very acceptable in most shops through out China; the most famous of these places to bargain and get the best deals is the Silk Street in Beijing. Here is a guide about bargaining in China as well as some of my own personal tips on how to get extra low prices. Typically at places like Silk Street, where bargaining is expected, the shops will rise the prices pretty high for foreigners, so the key is persistence when your bargaining. Bargaining can be a lot of fun, I typically make it about joking around and make the atmosphere light, I like to become friends with the shop owners, which also helps to get lower prices, but an important thing to remember is to be sure to be respectful.

Here are some tips I have to help you get cheap prices and have some fun with bargaining.

Smile:
One of the most important thing to do is to Smile, its important to keep the atmosphere light and relaxed, not stressful, this helps so that shop owner will be more relaxed and will help you get cheaper prices.

Fun:
Have fun with it, make jokes, and you can even playfully flirt a little with the shop owner. This is my favorite part and which helps me the most with getting the lowest price. I would always create elaborate stories for why they should give me a lower price for the product i want.

Some examples of these stories are such as:

I’m a poor student
I’m Chinese (even though I’m actually an American, I would tell them I’m Chinese and say they should give me a good price)
If I were buying an electronic product I would say I’m a robot and I need it to live.
The girl shop owner would try to flirt with me saying I’m handsome and so forth so that I would give them more money, but I would always turn this around and say because I’m handsome they should give me a better price
So be creative and have fun that’s what’s important.

Flaws:
The second thing to know is that you aren’t going to be buying the highest quality of products while in China, and there is a lot of fake merchandise, and it might brake some time after buying it. However this also helps to your advantage, while bargaining point out flaws in the workmanship of what you are wanting to buy, this will help to get the price lower and put pressure on the shop owner to not charge so high of a price.

Browse the Stores:
A good thing to do is once you find something you like its good to look around first to see the other stores that have the same product, because more often then not you will find stores selling the same things. This helps to find the typical asking price so you can have a basis for where to start with bargaining as well as you can use this as a leverage point to get another store to give you a cheaper price then the other.

The Rule of 1/3:
Once the shop owner gives you a price for a product that you want, a typically good starting point for bargaining is to start with 1/3 of the price of what they suggested. An example of this is I wanted to buy a calligraphy scroll painting of a dragon, and the shop owner started at RMB 100 so I offered RMB 30 to start at.

The Rule of Three:
This is the first rule I ever learned about how to bargain in China I will call it the rule of three, which is to walk away at least three times while bargaining this helps to push the shop owner to drop the price even lower. If you walk away they will chase you and give you a lower price, if they don’t go after you then you will know that the price they gave is pretty close to their last price that they would drop to.

These are the main points to consider when bargaining and shopping in China, i hope they are helpful for you, Good luck, and happy shopping.

Category: Holiday  Tags: , ,  Comments off
Fact Filled Safari Holiday
Thursday, June 10th, 2010 /

In the past we have looked at the Order, Perisodactyls.

You will now have a look at the other Order, Artiodactyls, and learn a few field characteristics that will enrich your Safari once you are ready.This is where we meet the swines and the hippopotamus.

In Kenya, the warthog is one of the very common animals of this order. Others include the bush pig, giant forest hogs found in the woodlands of Kenya and other African countries.

On many outings on your safari, it is the warthog that you will meet mostly in the open savannahs. It is one of the amazing creatures especially when you look at their faces. The warts give them an exaggerated appearance of ‘tough’ animals. These warts are very prominent on the males. It is the only pig adapted for savannah habitats and as such it is the commonly spotted hog. You will see them on hot days wallowing in the shallow waters giving them that muddy look.

When feeding, the warthog rests and walks on its calloused carpal joints (wrists or knees). This is a behavior seen only with the warthog that makes the skin tough around the knees. This is the reason why in some old animals this skin has flaking looks due to use with time. Where there are seasonal climatic changes, they are seasonal breeders rutting at the end of the rains.

Usually they give birth to several piglets in a burrow under the ground. Unfortunately (or fortunately) they are preyed upon by a couple of predators including big birds of prey.(one time a martial eagle came down like lightning and grabbed a piglet just next to our van as we watched them and the helpless mother had nothing she could do).

When threatened by the predators, they seek their underground refuge and usually put up a defense especially for the piglets. On a couple of times you will see that when surprised or scared they run for their burrows backwards first. This is a defensive move whereby they usually attack with their teeth with the rest of the body protected in the hole.

The hippopotamus is one of the most interesting creatures. An enigma in itself. One of the most noticeable characteristic is the physical resemblance to the pigs.

There are two species of hippos in the world, but while on your safari in Kenya you will see one of them, the common hippopotamus. The dwarf hippopotamus is found in the lowland forests of West Africa from Guinea to Ivory Coast.

Hippos feed at night on land and during the day they rest in the water. This is the time to digest what they have been eating during the night. Their ‘familiar’ honking enriches the day with the sounds of the African wilds. All this in their age-old natural habitats that man has not yet managed to destroy, but unfortunately on the way.

The hippo’s jaws are often displayed as a ready protection or as a threat to intruders. You must look out for the famous “hippo yawn” during your trip and this calls for some patience when you visit the hippo pools. Usually during the night when feeding, lions and hyenas try their luck on the young calves and this is usually fierce asking for a lot of trouble from the mother. In some cases they succeed but after some fights that can vary from mild to fierce. At times, the display of the huge canines is enough to ward of intruders especially during the day when they rest in shallow waters. The fact that they are most of the times in a group also helps a lot to protect their young ones.

On your Safari with the help of the guide you will be able to interpret more of the behaviors around the hippos and the warthogs as they appear.

Category: Holiday  Tags:  Comments off