This was one of the more exciting weeks this year. Two trips booked, a Friday evening date, and birthday celebrations!

I bought a ticket to Bosnia after what must have been the shortest decision process.
I still have 22 days of vacation left this year that I had to use before the end of the year. Obviously, I was not good at planning because it's August and I have not used any of those days. So, couple of weeks ago I decided I'll go to Bosnia in September. I also wanted to go somewhere I haven't been and wanted to spend a few days in Germany to visit my godmother. I was hoping I can get a ticket that would allow me a layover in Germany of few days, instead of having to buy a separate ticket from Bosnia to Germany. But, my godmother is on vacation until Aug 19th, I have no way of contacting her (I tried!), and I just couldn't wait till a week before the trip to buy this ticket.

I have never bought this overseas ticket that close to the departure, as the prices tend to go up as the time shrinks, so I new I had to act quickly. So, after searching the web and calling a few agencies, I found my ticket on Friday of last week.

BUT, there was no confirmation email. Not on Friday. Not on Saturday. I thought maybe it's because the agency closed soon after I bought it, then maybe they were not open on the weekend. But when it still wasn't in my inbox on Monday morning, I gave them a call. The first person I talked to just said they'll send it right away. But couple of hours later, the owner of the agency called back and said there was a problem with issuing the ticket. It's not my credit card, it's not their system, there is just something with that ticket that they can't process it. They had no explanation of what it is, they already spent several hours trying to resolve it, and she was basically just giving up on it!

So, Monday was kind of hectic, now researching again all those same resources for another ticket while this agency did the same. By the end of the day, they were able to find me another flight, slightly more expensive and slightly worse connection, but it's the exact same itinerary I used for few years.

Ticket to Bosnia secured - check!

During that week when I have already decided to go to Bosnia for 3 weeks, but before I actually got the ticket, I got an email with a promotional offer for Peru! Now, South America was on my bucket list of places to visit this year. I kind of hoped for it for the last couple of years. But, I couldn't find someone who was excited about going as I was, and since I didn't have a really specific place I wanted to go, it was hard to start the planning. I just had this idea in my head that this year I was going to visit my 6th continent, and the last one I care to visit (Antarctica - nah).

The trip package looked very inviting; 8 days, full itinerary planned (which is huge as I wouldn't have to plan anything), all the guides, tickets,...for half price ($1699). And I have vacations days. And it's in South America! The promotion was ending yesterday, so I had to act quick. Contacted a few friends who I thought might be interested, but only my friend from Canada started to seriously think about it. It took some convincing, long hours on the phone figuring out flight options, but in the end we both signed up for it before the promotion ended.

The agency offered two options for departure, Miami and Los Angeles, but neither of those had good connections with Vancouver for the same day flights. My friend didn't want to have to spend another day in one of those places, so I offered him to come here the day before and then we could travel together. That somehow turned into 4 days before, so my friend will have a mini vacation in Austin before we both embark on our Peruvian adventure.

I realized I still have so much to research about Peru before I leave. For example, I had to look at the map to realize, even thought it's on the west coast, it's not vertically bellow California, but Florida! Now that I know the geographical location of the place I am going, I feel already more prepared! :) Aside from Lima, the capital, I didn't recognize any of the other cities on the itinerary (Cusco, Puno,...). Of course, I knew about Machu Picchu, but that's about it for my knowledge of this country. It will be exciting to learn more!

South America trip booked - check!

Oh yeah, I mentioned something about Friday night date. :) Yes, it was very nice...and that's all I am gonna say about that. For now.

And tonight, I get to celebrate early my birthday with two of my good friends, Julie and CJ. Julie knows how much I dislike having to plan birthdays and pick places to dine, so the two of them graciously suggested we go to the Rainey street. It's a very popular, funky area of Austin, with lots of restaurants, laid back atmosphere, and people on the street. I actually was down there for the first time just a few weeks ago for a coworkers going away party, and got a taste of what it's like. I have a feeling I am going to have a great time tonight!

Perfect Score

Although I completely disappeared from this blog for months, just dropped off from the blogosphere, I'll pretend like nothing happened and just add this post here. Mostly because I just needed a place to store this. It's a kinda neat feature of having a blog. You can write when you feel like it.

So here goes...

I was recently introduced to this addictive new Google thingy called GeoGuessr. It's kind of a game (read: time-waster) that uses Google Maps. It gives you a "street view" of some random location, and you have to guess where it is. You can, most times, move the position along the road to find clues, markings, signs,...and then of course you can Google those to find where they are, and then you can use Google Map to also map it and see if the street view of the location you find matches what was given to you.

That's the best I can describe it.

Well, I've been addicted to it lately. It's quite fun, actually. You should try it! And today I was able to get (almost) perfect score, with all my guesses wihtin 0.0x km. That's pretty good, I thought, so it needs to be recorded here.

The Perfect Score

Since I can't figure out where to travel this year, and with whom, I am getting my travel fix for now this way.