Do it Yourself Vacations Part 2

   I assume if you are reading this post, you read Part 1. Having done everything on the REI tour of the Everglades gave me an understanding of what the people on the tour expect. You could see I was pretty focused on how much the tour cost compared to what it cost me. This was easy, I had been to all the places the van was going to pull up. I knew the cost, the weather, and where we would be staying each night. 

  I also don't want people thinking I was picking on REI. As I said in the last paragraph yesterday, the reviews are great. Everyone seemed happy and wants to do it again. There are a zillion tour companies. You can find many of them if you've ever went to a AAA Travel Marketplace. It looks as though REI trips are extremely well done and customers are happy. I just could not justify the expense and loss of freedom on a trip to the Everglades.

  What about a guided to a place I had never been? What are the upsides and downsides? There are multiple branches of answers to these two questions. Lets start with trips in America

   No matter the upsides of going on a guided tour in the USA, I would never take one. The reason, two words- English and Freedom. As long as things are in English I am comfortable. It doesn't matter where I plan a trip in the US, I'd rather do it on my own than go on someone else's tour. Doing the research is almost as fun to me as actually going. I love to plan the itinerary for a trip. 

   Planning a week in Washington DC was fun. There is so much to do and not enough time to see it all. Trying to figure out which museums to visit and when to see the monuments (the museums close at 5 pm, go see the monuments after hours, so you can stay at the museums longer. It's also cooler later in the day, and the museums are air conditioned). I worry about what we are doing but don't think very much at all about what or where we will eat. Seeing a statue in the Museum of Natural History from Easter Island is far more important to me than the food afterwards. 

   I have dozens of backpacking trips planned for wilderness areas and national parks out west. I assume that someday, I will get to them. For example, I really want to go to Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota. You've never heard of it? Exactly why I want to go there. I know the trips I want to take in the back country, the wildlife, and what to expect on the way. 

   Likewise, I have a trip planned for the Sawtooth Mountains in Idaho. There are multiple overnight hikes I'd like to do as well as a 2-3 day backpacking trip. I hope to get there one day also. The point is, I enjoy the reading of guidebooks, the taking of notes, and the planning.  

   I know many other people that would never take the time to plan their vacations (never mind dozens of hypothetical vacations in a notebook). My friend Scott has seen almost 800 species of birds in the Lower 48. He has travelled all over to see rarities when they show up. Yet, when he travels, he has AAA set up the flights, rental cars, and accommodations.  I will never travel as much as Scott, so although we have two totally different pre-travel styles, who am I to judge. 

   Above, I wrote the words English and Freedom. English is obvious. I can travel to any place in the United States and not have to worry about communicating with a hotel manager, park ranger, or a museum docent. It is not like going to Rome where I would be totally out of my element. My son has no problem going to foreign countries and the language barrier does not bother him at all. That is a topic for another paragraph. Suffice to say, travelling anywhere in the USA (other than high crime parts of major cities) and I am still in my comfort zone.

  The second word id freedom. Freedom to eat when I am hungry, not to eat if I am enjoying something. Freedom to linger in a museum or a mountain top ( I can loaf at the top of a mountain with the best of them). Freedom to take side roads and side trips. These are all things you can do on your own but not on a guided tour. I know many guided tours will give you a "free afternoon" to do what you want, but that does not seem like enough for me. 

  I have my own schedule and do things my way. For example, if I am camping and it is cold in the morning, I probably will jump straight in my car and drive to the day's adventure to warm up. I'll probably eat my breakfast while driving (Pop Tarts and Bananas are my go-to). I can't tell you how many times I've done this and brushed my teeth in the parking lot before starting the day. I do not want to waste precious daylight hours waiting for bacon and eggs to cooked and eaten by twelve of your new best friends. 

 
When DJ and I went to Yellowstone, we had a week planned. Most National Park tours hit a park a day or at best two days in one park. We explored a different section each day. We went to Yellowstone Lake one day, the Artist Point/ Lower Falls area another day and so on. The day we went to Old Faithful and the Geyser Basin, we saw Old Faithful go off three times. We got up very early and saw it go off about 6:30 am. This was by far the most memorable time for us. Not because it was the first time we saw it, but because it was July 10 and there was frost on the boardwalk. The recycled plastic boardwalk was so slippery from the ice. July 10!. We had the place to ourself. There were maybe five other cars in the giant parking lot. Fast forward a few hours later. All the tour buses showed up, it was seventy degrees and the tourist were thick as ants on a rotting apple.  We spent more time amazed at how many people were at the once peaceful geyser basin than we did watching Old Faithful go off a third time. 

He had the freedom to spend a day at the geyser basin, not just an hour or two. We weren't lined up like robots getting out of a tour bus and hurried right back on to rush to Artist Point. Instead we got to see multiple geysers go off. DJ and I spent half an hour with two rangers watching a minor underwater geyser blow smelly air bubbles at us. It was just us and the rangers for the full 30 minutes. We saw how many people get packed into the benches and truthfully, it was morbidly interesting to see. This is what I mean by freedom. 

Well, that leaves me with the possibility of international travel...someday. Would I take a guided tour? Good question. First off, let me say I'd be more willing. However, I don't want to visit other countries just to say I have. I want to see specific things. There are only a few places I want to go internationally and I can count them on one hand. I'd like to go on an African Safari, England/Scotland, Galapagos, and Paris. Of these, by far Paris is where I want to go most (followed by safari). So I'm going to concentrate this section on Paris. If I ever leave this country Paris is the number one place on my bucket list, so it would make sense to plan a vacation there instead of something down the list.

   For me, Paris has more things I want to see than anywhere else in the world. I've researched the museums, the boat trips on the Seine, and the Cathedrals. I even have a walking route planned out. A week seems like enough time to see almost everything. 

   So, the obvious disadvantage for me would be my lacking of speaking or reading French. This would be my number one reason for going on a guided tour. I wouldn't have to worry about accommodations. I would just have to follow the crowd into a museum. 

  However, the downside would be the same is at Yellowstone. Time. I can not imagine going on a week long tour and spending only four hours at the Louvre. This would be unfathomable to me. If I go to Paris I'd like to spend a couple days there. I have been the victim of "information overload" too many times at museums. At some point your feet hurt and all the descriptions of paintings blur together and you just don't care anymore. I'd like to leave a museum when that happens and go eat some bread and cheese. But, I know I'd want to go back. The Louvre is the largest museum in the world and four hours doesn't do it for me. 

   I've checked out some quality guided tours of Paris, and honestly, they are pretty affordable. They seem to be a much better value than the Anhinga Trail in the Everglades. So the cost really isn't a deciding factor. In fact, in the case of Paris, the value of not having to worry about where to sleep and the safety of a group might be worth the few hundred extra Euros to go on a tour. 

   You can even make an argument that going on a tour will save you time and you will see more. The attractions know you are coming. You can bypass waiting lines. You will go to restaurants that you know are good.

   However, for me, the downside is that lack of freedom. I don't know how I would fair if I wasn't ready to leave a museum.  There are times when I'd rather get a little hungry and stay at something I am interested in than go get lunch. And there are times I know I'll have more fun on a full stomach so I eat first. 

   I don't have a clear answer (for me) on whether an international (Paris) guided tour is for me or not. I've weighed the pros and cons. I've checked out multiple tours, some of them seem to be almost what I am looking for. I guess I have plenty of time to figure it out. There's plenty to see in the United States for me first.