Spendthrift Shoestring

My (Sort of) Bucket List

The end of the calendar year is good for reflection. On my long flight on Sunday from Schiphol to Dulles I found myself thinking about some future experiences I want to have. Most of these relate to traveling, writing, and/or endeavors that require a little bit of courage. This isn't exactly a bucket list—a morbid prospect if there ever was one—but it isn't a million miles from that idea; like a bucket list, there are several items here that are tough to accomplish without advance preparation or hard work or careful budgeting.

So here it is: my (sort of) bucket list.

1. Publish several books. Start with the current idea I have, which is quite good by the way.

2. Found a destination branding firm. (Anyone seriously into this idea? Email me.)

3. Travel as much as possible with my parents. Priorities include a northern Minnesota road trip with my dad and a visit to Kosovo's Decani Monastery with my mom.

4. Track down my long-lost relatives in Brazil.

5. Strengthen my German.

6. Formally learn Dutch instead of relying on my ability to recognize 95% of the Dutch words I come across.

7. Vastly improve Spanish to advanced conversational state.

8. Achieve conversational Swedish.

9. Learn to cook well.

10. Visit Fish Lake.

11. See the Badlands.

12. Return to the castaway Caribbean island I’ve decided never to write about.

13. Spend a week eating smørrebrød in Copenhagen.

14. Visit Tristan da Cunha.

15. Spend a weekend at an onsen in Japan while snow falls outside. Do the same at Therme Vals.

16. In fact, sample many different mineral hot springs. 

17. Fly Qantas first class long haul once.

18. Stay at these three hotels/resorts: Fasano São Paulo for its aesthetic, Petit St. Vincent for its quiet solitude, and Coco Point Lodge for its dated aristocratic air.

19. Have meals at the handful of Michelin-starred restaurants I’ve identified as particularly appealing.

20. Get the tattoos I’ve been putting off forever.

21. Skydive at least once.

22. Bungee jump.

23. Go zorbing.

24. Take rockclimbing lessons.

25. Become a minor media figure in a country with a population under 10 million, like, say, this one.

Nicaragua: Big Corn Island

I spent four nights last week on Big Corn Island, Nicaragua, and I'm currently finishing up an article about the ramshackle island for koucou.

Tomorrow I head to St. John's, Newfoundland on assignment.

For now, some photos of Big Corn.

Room detail at Princesa de la Isla guest house.

Banner celebrating Nicaragua's National Independence Day.

Nicaraguan television.

Where is the Cheapest Bed in the Caribbean?

For a few months now I've been stealthily working on my new big project, a budget/independent Caribbean site. Though the site is still in an early beta phase, feel free to take a look.

In researching cheap accommodations in one of the world's priciest regions for travel, I've often wondered if I might be able to identify the very cheapest bed in the Caribbean. Setting aside free accommodations—surprisingly common in the form of free campsites, couchsurfing spots, and beds offered up in exchange for volunteered labor—super-cheap beds are altogether less rare than you might think.

Here are a smattering of super bare bones beds in the region. I should clarify that beds even cheaper than these exist in the Caribbean, all of them just waiting for inhabitation by extreme shoestringers.

1. Rates for beds at the FUAJ youth hostel in Morne-Rouge, Martinique begin at €11 per night.

2. Rates at a campsite with access to facilities at Jungle Jeanie's By the Sea in Hopkins, Belize are just  $7.50 per night.

3. A $9 dorm bed (or $15 for a private room sleeping up to three) can be found at Rancho Wendy in Bonao, Dominican Republic.

4. A hammock at Rosalie Forest Eco-Lodge in Rosalie, Dominica is just $13 per night.

5. The rate for a single room with shared facilities at Hotel Rios Tropicales in Lívingston, Guatemala begins at $8.

Titanic Awards: Bad Ann Arbor Hotel, Dreadful Schnitzel, & More

Check out my top five "World Worsts" list on the Titanic Awards site. The list was one of the most enjoyable things I've had the opportunity to write in some time. Thanks to Doug Lansky for letting me pen my contribution.

JetBlue: Barbados, Kingston, St. Lucia

Want to fly from JFK to the Caribbean in October or November for under $198 round trip, excluding taxes? JetBlue is adding three more Caribbean destinations in October: JFK-Barbados (October 1); JFK-St. Lucia (October 26) and JFK-Kingston (October 30). Taxes inflate fares a bit, but your lowest round trip fare to St. Lucia, for example, will come in under $285. (See screen grab below). I'm happily surprised by this expansion. It will be interesting to see how these routes do, how low fares remain, and the degree to which Jet Blue's further saturation of the region will affect fare pricing on other carriers between New York and the Caribbean.

Experiment Completed

I returned on Wednesday night from my first ever experience as a guest at a super high-end Caribbean resort. (The only other resorty hotel I've frequented in the Caribbean is Curaçao's Kura Hulanda, which is a different sort of place altogether.)

This resort was exquisite in many ways. While my experience there hasn't dislodged me from my shoestring values, I have a new and different appreciation for top-tier resorts. I'll keep the lid on this one until publication. For the time being, here are two views—one at sunrise and the other at sunset.

Daybreak. I woke up with a start and grabbed my camera.

A dreamy sunset, even with clouds on the horizon.

Luxury Experiment In Progress

I'm en route again in this, my craziest travel period ever. I'm on an unusual assignment through Wednesday, dipping my toes into luxury travel writing for the first time. (I suppose those city profiles I wrote years ago for Genre rubbed up against luxury travel writing, but this assignment is more explicitly high-end.) I'll link to the results of this experiment in due time.

I remain simultaneously shoestring and spendthrift to the core, however, so there's no need to remove me from your bookmarks or unsubscribe from this blog's feed. (Um, please do neither?)

Feb Budget Travel: Mixed Bag

I returned last night from Jordan to the February issue of Budget Travel in my mailbox. I'm growing accustomed to reacting schizophrenically to each issue of the magazine. This one has an absolutely fantastic feature on boutique hostels. Included are Mama Shelter in Paris (with rooms beginning at €79), Stay in Los Angeles (rooms beginning at $65), and Lub d in Bangkok (rooms with shared bathroom beginning at $30). All of the properties are beautiful and aesthetically interesting.

Less pleasing is the "Where Next" feature on various Caribbean destinations. The hotel rate range begins at $150 and proceeds up to $270 per night. I've just booked a room for $50 a night in an old sugar mill in the middle of high season on Nevis—a property surrounded by several acres of fruit trees just feet from a lovely pool, no less. In March Matt and I will spend a few nights on Terre-de-Haut off Guadeloupe, where our room at an exquisite little hotel will run, somewhat splurgily for me, €82. Perhaps, if I hadn't just made these reservations, I wouldn't find the inclusion of the above properties so annoying. But I have, and I am prompted to wonder, yet again, just how hotels at $270 per night belong in a budget travel magazine.

Rio Guesthouse: Best Caribbean Budget Guesthouse Web Site

It's almost the end of the year, traditionally the time when best-of lists get published. If I were to give an award for good hotel Web sites, Rio Guesthouse would be in the upper rankings. The Barbados nine-room guesthouse's site is appealingly retro, with a mesh of antiquated and contemporary fonts, faded and distressed images, and funny audio accompaniments. The site includes a link to its Web designer as well. 

Best of all for us budget hunters, high season doubles at Rio's Guesthouse begin at US$51 per night, including tax and service.

True Shoestringer in the Caribbean

Just back from Santo Domingo, I'm thinking nonstop about returning to the Caribbean. So it's either a good or a bad thing, depending on perspective, that I chanced upon the Prodigal Son's Travel Pod blog, which covers a multi-year adventure through the Americas. Entries from November 2006 through June 2008 are more or less devoted to the Caribbean; following that, Mr. P. Son carries on throughout Central America and down into South America. (Still, there's lots of zigging and zagging and some good Caribbean briefs through August, including this video reaction at an Ocho Rios Burger King to Jamaica's men's relay world record 4x100m win at the Olympics.)

And there's this great list of cheap Caribbean accommodations, a true resource. I'm itching.