Where to go on holiday?

The question that is going through this household this week is, “Where should we go on holiday this year?” That question is easier said then answered, let me walk you through the history…

We have a little over three weeks, basically four weeks, for holidays. We had decided that we would go to Cuba for our holidays. An important thing to note is that we are not beach people. We would rather prefer to go in the mountains or at the very least the forest, but Cuba has its appeal. So the plan was to fly into Mexico and enjoy a short holiday in Cancun. My parents talked about flying in for the weekend to see the granddaughter. Then we would fly into Cuba for about 10 days. Finally flying back into either Mexico or into Belize for the final couple of days. It sounded like a great holiday. We found tickets that we could live with, though not trilled with. All we had to do was buy them. The problem is, the day before we were buy them, Castro handed power over to his brother. This is the first time that Castro has released power the whole time that he has been the leader of the country. So we decided to wait and see what happens. If it was just M and I, we would have probably just gone, but we have N to think about. As we now know, nothing changed what so ever. So when we did look at getting tickets, the cost of them were 25,000:-, or $3,400 a person. We could buy around the world tickets for that price. So, as much as I would love to go to Cuba, it is not happening.

So on to Plan B. The thought was to go to Italy and tour around the country. Skipping the major cities and just going to the smaller towns that are visited less often by tourists. This trip would involve a lot of eating and drinking. We had plenty of time, so we decided to drive down and stop in Switzerland on the way (that is where M and I met). It was looking as a nice plan for a holiday. The problem came when my holidays look like they will be shortened, thus making it impossible to drive down there and not worth flying down and renting a car for a trip that neither of us were jumping up and down excited about.

So then it came to a time of indecision. What to do, what to do? Not an easy question. Both M and I are fairly well traveled. Plus, if we are not able to take an exciting, new adventure, then we do not want to lay out the cash for it. Not that we wouldn’t if something “spoke” to us, the problem was that nothing spoke to us. We went through all of our travel magazines- National Geographic Traveler, När and Fjärran, Turist, and we searched the web. Nothing screamed out at us. So we had nothing.

Which brings us to Plan C. This is not the most exciting trip in the world, nor is it one of our dream trips, but it is a solid plan. We are going to take a road trip around southern Sweden. We have 14 days to play with. The thought is that we will start in Uppsala and work our way south stopping at several national parks along the way. One of the national parks that we plan to visit is known as the Grand Canyon of Sweden. Also, we have found a trail along Vättern that is dedicated to John Bauer (very cool Swedish author and artist). We have found a couple cool hotels and youth hostels to stay in. Then we will finish our holidays with All Saints Day in Örebro.

If you think that this does not sound overly exciting, it is because it isn’t really. That does not mean that we are not looking forward to the trip. The opposite is probably true. Several years ago we took two trips in less then a year. We drove around the states in a truck for three months and then we traveled South America for over 4 months. The States trip was a “just because” and South America was the big trip. Ironically, looking back on those trips today, it is usually the “just because” trip that we reminisce on more often. Does that mean that the same will be with our trip around southern Sweden? I don’t know, but I could imagine that that will be the case.

We will let you know how it goes!