Do You Cook On Holiday/Vacation?

medtran49 said:
We never eat in hotel restaurants, other than maybe breakfast since it's usually free and decent. Learned that lesson really quick.
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When I travel, I try to book a room near a Denny's or a Waffle House. Complimentary hotel breakfasts are usually bad, with a few exceptions.

CD
 
Here in Australia, for my husband at least (I've not stayed in a hotel in Australia yet! ) breakfasts don't come with the room and more to the point are often not made at all by the hotel. You have to find an open cafe to buy breakfast, or make sure you have you're own supplies, however that's difficult when you fly because even between states you can't fly with all sorts of fresh produce (count dairy, cheese, meats and so on in that as well as the usual fruit and veg). So hubby had taken to researching the area first looking for vegetarian or vegan cafes open early in the morning! Thankfully he travels to the same places a lot, so now knows the haunts to go to (Melbourne mostly).
 
caseydog said:
When I travel, I try to book a room near a Denny's or a Waffle House. Complimentary hotel breakfasts are usually bad, with a few exceptions.

CD
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Really? The ones we stay in have waffle batter where you cook your own, nice muffin, bagel and pastry selections, fruit yogurts, fresh fruit selection, juice selection, oatmeal (which we don't eat so can't comment on it), milk cartons, tea bags and hot water, and coffee. Some of them even offer sausage/bacon or cold cuts. That's usually more than enough for us.

If we want a hot breakfast with eggs, etc, we'd go out, but it certainly wouldn't be to a Denny's or Waffle House. They are as bad as hotel food as far as we are concerned. We'd find a diner that has good reviews.
 
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My brothers all like to camp, but I'm notorious as the "posh" one who prefers hotels.

We used to get together once a year for a camping/fishing/bullshi**ing holiday, and it took them two nights to figure out that I was leaving the campsite after everyone had turned in and going to a nearby motel for the night, returning before anyone woke up. They never let me live that down.

Hotel breakfasts...in the US, generally no. Those self-serve things are horrible, and not just the food, but the state of the people visiting them. Some folks think that just because the breakfast is in the hotel, they can roll down there in their jammies, with uncombed hair, unwashed face, and sleep crud still in their eyes and have breakfast. In public. :headshake:

Higher-end hotels, the breakfast might be better, but it's usually not included, and it's pricey. We always find a nearby place for a proper breakfast. Breakfast is my favorite meal, so I like it to be treated right! :)

In Europe/UK, included breakfasts are much better, we've found, so we always plan on those. However, I like a little variety, so I'll usually suggest changing it up occasionally.

Some of my best vacation memories are centered around breakfast. The last time we stayed in London, we rented an efficiency apartment, and the breakfast they offered (for a fee) was from the restaurant next door, so we just ate there ourselves. We were delighted to find, on this little two-block section of street, three excellent places for breakfast, so we were happy with that.
 
SatNavSaysStraightOn said:
Here in Australia, for my husband at least (I've not stayed in a hotel in Australia yet! ) breakfasts don't come with the room and more to the point are often not made at all by the hotel.
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The last time I was in Perth (W.A.) in 2008, the cost of the breakfast was included in the room price (which my employer was covering). Unfortunately it was pretty crap and my usual routine, time permitting, was to eat breakfast at a local restaurant - which I paid for (A$16.00)
 
Another breakfast story:

We went to Ireland several years ago (more than a decade ago!) and our first two nights were in a little nothing-special tourist hotel just south of the river in Dublin.

The breakfast was a small buffet affair, food was competently prepared, but nothing with panache - just good, basic food. No problems there.

After we got our food, I started paying attention to the other guests: there's a family of four speaking German very quietly...there's (by all indications) an older same-sex couple, sounds like French...some English folks...us and another US family, and on and on. Everybody was doing their thing, talking quietly, some occasional giggling from kids and subdued scolding from parents, all these languages, all these singles and couples and larger families, it just really touched me.

It could have been because I was overly tired, and our first day in Ireland had been an unmitigated disaster (to the point that, after six hours in-country, I looked at my wife and seriously asked, "Is there any way we can just go home? Please?"), but something about this simple act of consuming the day's first meal, done by all these different people from different cultures and in different situations, just made me feel an overwhelming sense of contentment.
 
TastyReuben said:
Another breakfast story:

We went to Ireland several years ago (more than a decade ago!) and our first two nights were in a little nothing-special tourist hotel just south of the river in Dublin.

The breakfast was a small buffet affair, food was competently prepared, but nothing with panache - just good, basic food. No problems there.

After we got our food, I started paying attention to the other guests: there's a family of four speaking German very quietly...there's (by all indications) an older same-sex couple, sounds like French...some English folks...us and another US family, and on and on. Everybody was doing their thing, talking quietly, some occasional giggling from kids and subdued scolding from parents, all these languages, all these singles and couples and larger families, it just really touched me.

It could have been because I was overly tired, and our first day in Ireland had been an unmitigated disaster (to the point that, after six hours in-country, I looked at my wife and seriously asked, "Is there any way we can just go home? Please?"), but something about this simple act of consuming the day's first meal, done by all these different people from different cultures and in different situations, just made me feel an overwhelming sense of contentment.
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A very nice breakfast story.
Sometimes a wee detail can change entirely a situation, both in negative and in positive.
It’s curious : I have been to Ireland about 20 years ago too, great experience already from the first step I walked there
 
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caseydog said:
In my twenties, I did backpacking and wilderness camping. I brought frozen meat and fresh veg to cook on the campfire. As I got older, the backpacking gave way to tent camping out of my truck. I could bring a cooler full of food to cook over the campfire, or on a grillI brought with me. When I got too old to sleep on the ground (and not hurt in the morning), I built a Teardrop Camper. I don't know if those are a thing down there, but there is a pretty big following up here.

You have a sleeping chamber, and a galley. I did lots of cooking on those camping trips. I had a stove in the galley, and brought a small grill with me, or big grill or smoker along when I was camping with other teardroppers.

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CD
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You see those campers every now and then, a customer and friend of mine built one, he also built a T bucket with a rover V8. I couldn't work that out, a rover??. Towing a tear drop? He passed away about two years ago. I wonder what happened to,that camper?? Cd, we were tenting back in the day too. We had all the gear , toilets ,showers, TVs air beds. We lived pretty good. Btw , You four guys look like you could muster some trouble? Lol.

Russ
 
rascal said:
You see those campers every now and then, a customer and friend of mine built one, he also built a T bucket with a rover V8. I couldn't work that out, a rover??. Towing a tear drop? He passed away about two years ago. I wonder what happened to,that camper?? Cd, we were tenting back in the day too. We had all the gear , toilets ,showers, TVs air beds. We lived pretty good. Btw , You four guys look like you could muster some trouble? Lol.

Russ
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We still camp though I have just graduated from a short height tent to a full height tent due to my back problems, but we still sleep on the floor (on camping mats that is).
 
rascal said:
Air beds are the way to go.i wouldn't try it now, I prefer comfy accomodation now. Btw that was 35 ish years ago.

Russ
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add 10 and you've roughly my age... and 15 and you've got hubby's. I don't know that I will change (ours are exped downmats… ) the sort of thing that goes down to -20C without batting an eyelid. But we still have the foam mattress that is also an air mattress (I think the make could be wanderer) from the roof tent we swapped out for a load of logs (long story but we were going to give it to him free of charge...)
 
rascal said:
Air beds are the way to go.i wouldn't try it now, I prefer comfy accomodation now. Btw that was 35 ish years ago.
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No good for me unless they're at least 2 foot off the floor. I cannot get up directly from the floor.
 
medtran49 said:
If we want a hot breakfast with eggs, etc, we'd go out, but it certainly wouldn't be to a Denny's or Waffle House. They are as bad as hotel food as far as we are concerned. We'd find a diner that has good reviews.
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As much as I enjoy breakfast at Brennan's, scrambled eggs, sausage and hash browns at Waffle House are the beginning of a good day for me.

CD
 
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