GRcade

Go to De Halve Maan brewery and do the tour. It's pretty cool. The people who run the place wanted photos of my friends and I for their website, so we got two trays of free beer as well.

Edit: The photo with us in it comes up as the Google maps photo if you Google the brewery.

Joer wrote:I've booked up a long weekend to Bruges in October for myself and my girlfriend. Anyone have any recommendations for places to visit whilst we're there? Doesn't matter if it's a landmark/bar/restaurant/anything else at this stage since we've got nothing planned yet.

You can climb to the top of this.



Don't do it if you are the size of an elephant though, you could have a heart attack.

Yeah Anung nearly died going up it. Avoid the historium unless you wanna pay £15 to see the worst/best taxidermy fox.

Bunni wrote:Yeah Anung nearly died going up it. Avoid the historium unless you wanna pay £15 to see the worst/best taxidermy fox.

Bunni...it's an inanimate strawberry floating object!

Tafdolphin wrote:

Bunni wrote:Yeah Anung nearly died going up it. Avoid the historium unless you wanna pay £15 to see the worst/best taxidermy fox.

Bunni...it's an inanimate strawberry floating object!

Ignore Taf, it's like a strawberry floating fairytale.

Moggy wrote:

Tafdolphin wrote:

Bunni wrote:Yeah Anung nearly died going up it. Avoid the historium unless you wanna pay £15 to see the worst/best taxidermy fox.

Bunni...it's an inanimate strawberry floating object!

Ignore Taf, it's like a strawberry floating fairytale.

YOU'RE AN INANIMATE strawberry floatin' OBJECT!

Anyway, best areas to stay in Berlin?

Me and banjo did Friedrickshain first time and Neukoln the other week. I think you'd like either. Bars, good food, trendy banana splits. You going with your missus?

Joer wrote:I've booked up a long weekend to Bruges in October for myself and my girlfriend. Anyone have any recommendations for places to visit whilst we're there? Doesn't matter if it's a landmark/bar/restaurant/anything else at this stage since we've got nothing planned yet.

Don't spend the whole weekend in Bruges, it's strawberry floating tiny. Train's are great over there, visit basically any other town or city in Belgium to wander round and you'll have a nice time.

Exactly a week until I fly to Australia for a month

For people that have been to Ha Long Bay, how long did you spend there and which tours did you use?

Just looking and there seem to be an insane number of options, I'll be going with a mate so don't need anything fancy/romantic. I was think of a 2 night/3 day trip. Any tips would be great!

BTB wrote:For people that have been to Ha Long Bay, how long did you spend there and which tours did you use?

Just looking and there seem to be an insane number of options, I'll be going with a mate so don't need anything fancy/romantic. I was think of a 2 night/3 day trip. Any tips would be great!

We did ours from Cat Ba island where we were staying and did 1 night-a day on Ha Long Bay and a night stay in a floating hotel and then some kayaking around a private area of Lan Ha Bay. Was really nice.

I think 3 days on Ha Long Bay is a little long personally but it depends what you want. There's the party boats like Castaways or if you're spending a bit more I think the more luxurious boats are much nicer.

Personally I'd recommend doing 1 night wnd spending some time on Cat Ba Island too which is beautiful.

BTB wrote:For people that have been to Ha Long Bay, how long did you spend there and which tours did you use?

Just looking and there seem to be an insane number of options, I'll be going with a mate so don't need anything fancy/romantic. I was think of a 2 night/3 day trip. Any tips would be great!

We actually went to Bai Tu Long Bay, which is one bay down. It is exactly, exactly, the same as Ha Long but there were no tourists, and a 2 day tour with a stayover at a fisherman's house was much cheaper. We had the whole junk, made for 40 people to ourselves and one other pair. It was amazing

http://www.ethnictravel.com.vn/3_days_B ... ng_Bay.htm

Pretty sure it was this exact tour

Booked a couple of weeks in Canada in September. Been a few times before, but looking to explore Ontario this time (excluding Toronto as I've been there and 'done' it). Any advice on where to go or what to see? Gonna be based in Ottawa primarily.

Also, what sites do people use to book their trips generally? I've got friends who always book everything separately through Trivago, hotels.com, direct with airlines etc, and they always says that's what works out cheaper for them, but I always find it's cheaper through the likes of Expedia or laterooms, etc.

I'm a manic collector of airmiles and just getting into hotel loyalty schemes so I use whatever gets the best return for my money and book whichever airline I can get premium seats on. For hotels I will do a quick comparison on a few sites for the place I want to stay (Trip Advisor is good for this) and see which site offers the best cash back or airmiles.

Lotus wrote:Booked a couple of weeks in Canada in September. Been a few times before, but looking to explore Ontario this time (excluding Toronto as I've been there and 'done' it). Any advice on where to go or what to see? Gonna be based in Ottawa primarily.

I think Rightey lives in Ontario, he might be able to help with some non-obvious stuff (Niagra is the most obvious thing to do!).

Rightey wrote:

Niagara is definitely worth a visit, I was there in June

Go to Niagara on the Lake, I think it's called.

Moggy wrote:

Lotus wrote:Booked a couple of weeks in Canada in September. Been a few times before, but looking to explore Ontario this time (excluding Toronto as I've been there and 'done' it). Any advice on where to go or what to see? Gonna be based in Ottawa primarily.

I think Rightey lives in Ontario, he might be able to help with some non-obvious stuff (Niagra is the most obvious thing to do!).

Rightey wrote:

I have been summoned from the depths!

Niagara falls and Niagara on the lake are good calls. You can spend an entire day at the falls, or just a few minutes depending on what you want to do. They have the maid of the mist boat rides which take you up close to them, then there are other tours that go behind the falls and all that jazz. The problem of course is that if you are based in Ottawa, it's going to be a bit of trip considering it's about 600km away.

A bit closer to you would be Montreal, it's pretty nice although coming from Europe some of its charm might be lost on you. I went there about 2 years ago and they have lots of nice museums, and gardens to see. They also have an old town, but again that might not interest you so much.

Another nice (or annoying, depending on if you want to practice) thing about Montreal is that pretty much everyone will speak English to you when they see you are trying to speak French so there isn't much of a language barrier. You will still run into the odd person who speaks only French but they will normally get an English speaker to come help you.

Even closer to you is Ottawa itself. If you like museums there will be a lot there for you as the national history, nature, war, and aviation and space museums are all located in the city.

Another thing you might want to consider is an overnight train trip. I've never been on one myself but I've heard good things about them.

Thanks for the suggestions. I've actually been to Niagara Falls and Niagara on the Lake before (did that while I was visiting Toronto), and I've also spent a good amount of time in Montreal.

I know Ottawa has plenty of museums and art galleries, but not sure what else at the moment. I don't mind those kinda things, but if it's good weather I'd rather not be stuck inside. I'm not sure how much there is to do there, and so I'm keen to explore smaller cities nearby or maybe some national parks. Rightey, do you know anything along those lines that would be worth checking out?

Lotus wrote:I know Ottawa has plenty of museums and art galleries, but not sure what else at the moment.

I can think of something you can do with 20% of Ottawa.