Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/12/05

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Off topic: England vacation plans/ Contax group
From: "Henning J. Wulff" <henningw@archiphoto.com>
Date: Sun, 5 Dec 1999 15:24:00 -0800

At 4:47 PM -0600 12/5/99, KPETERS wrote:
Dear Leica friends,  I am hoping to go to England this spring for a photo
trip and have a couple questions about 'European' vacations for a starter! 
I've never been there before and want to make the right choice!  Would you
suggest a 'tour' or would you just go "on your own"!??  We're trying to
debate if a tour would be easier as it would all be planned out?  Any bad
experiences with European tours in general?  Any experience with buying
airline ticketets to England over the internet?  Any ideas would be
helpful, and I know you are all a worldly bunch!!  I'm selling my IIIf
(ends on ebay in 4 hours!) in hopes of buying an M6 prior to going (time to
get a viewfinder that I can see through comfortably!    Anyways,  thanks
ahead of time.  You are a swell bunch of folks and I shudder to think what
I would do without my "family" of leicavolk!
 
Also, unrelated to Leica.  does anyone have the address to subscribe to a
good contax (G1/G2) users group (like this wonderful LUG!)???   


...and you were doing so well until that last sentence!

With respect to the trip, the basic decision is whether you want to take
the time to research the trip, whether you like things like driving fast on
tight roads on the 'wrong' side, possibly getting lost, and whether the
joys of finding things for yourself (expectedly or unexpectedly) outweighs
the advatages of having things done for you, and having the security but
also a lack of serendipity.

Photographically speaking, I dislike tours intensely, because they are
never long enough at the photogenic places, and way too long at the
souvenir shops.

If you are on a tight timeline and don't have time to research, a tour can
be a decent introduction. Otherwise, IMHO, a self-administered trip has all
the advantages.

I generally try to find out about tickets, packages, itineraries etc over
the internet, but then go with this info to my ticket agent. He can
sometimes get better deals through wholesalers that I can't get at. OTOH, I
usually reserve a car over the internet if at all possible, and have often
arranged hotels as well.
   *            Henning J. Wulff
  /|\      Wulff Photography & Design
 /###\   mailto:henningw@archiphoto.com
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