Wui-Ping Blog

Some 80s hits

Bananarama - Love In The First Degree


Bananarama - I Heard A Rumor


Debbie Gibson - Shake Your Love


Tiffany - I Think We're Alone Now


Kylie Minogue - The Loco-Motion


Kylie Minogue - I Should Be So Lucky


Belinda Carlisle - Heaven Is A Place On Earth


Madonna - La Isla Bonita


Madonna - Who's That Girl


Roxette - Dangerous

posted by Wui-Ping @ 3:46 AM Comments: 321

Europe Vacation II (Hotel)

We uses this website - www8.hrs.com for almost all our hotel reservation in Switzerland and Austria. We did use www.booking.com once, and it was a good site for hotel reservation too.

What was great about this website is that it show us exactly what we want to know.
- Prices
- Distance to City, Rail, Motorway
- Facilities, such as parking, internet etc.... it even tells you the rate or if it is free.
- If breakfast is included in the price; if not, how much is the breakfast.
- Photos of hotel
- Direction of how to go to the hotel
- Earlier and latest check-in time (most cheaper hotel doesn't have 24 hrs check-in)
- Most hotel do not require you to pay first when you reserve, simply don't show up if you decide not to go.
- We can select 3 person, and know the price of a 3 person room.

We stayed in :-

• Arte Hotel (Zurich)

Very cheap and modern nice hotel.
City not within walking distant, however got Macdonald, bowling, supermarket, and a bit of shopping nearby.

• Spatz Hotel (Lucerne)

A little old and run down. About 20min walk to the City. No lift. Breakfast have only bread and drinks. Not easy to find, on top of that it has another name.

• Blume Hotel (Interlaken)

Nice and warm, however no lift too. In the middle of the town.

• Alt-Pradl Hotel (Innsbruck)

Easy to find, as sign are outside on the main road. The nicest room we had in Europe, pretty cheap too. About 25min walk to City.

• Hofwirt Hotel (Salzburg)

The most expensive, although it is modern and pleasant. But the attitude of the hotel staff is the worst. About 20min walk to City. No internet access in room, only 1 computer terminal in Lobby.

• Beta Hotel (Vienna)

Modern and nice lobby and room. Difficult to find, it is among apartment and only got the letter "B" outside indicating it is Beta Hotel. Not within walking distant to City.


All the hotel we stayed in comes with internet access, free parking and free breakfast; and they are most properly among the cheapest you can find.

posted by Wui-Ping @ 2:29 AM Comments: 0

Europe Vacation I

Just went for a vacation in 3 countries in Europe, Switzerland, Austria and England. So decided that I should just spend a few entries on this.

(Driving)

The plane landed in Zurich(Switzerland), and I have 8.5 days till another plane in Vienna(Austria) takes me to London(England). I have decided to drive for these 8 days in these 2 countries, there are a few reasons:-
1) Main reason is really to try to lower the cost.
2) Since we will be changing hotel almost everyday, the luggage we carry around will be pretty troublesome, on visit the places, on taking public transport, leaving it in the car is much easier.
3) We don't have to follow the schedule of the rail, and can go and stop any place, any time we want.

Usually everyone will suggest to get the Europe Rail Pass that will give you unlimited travel in the rail in Europe. That will cost about S$660 per person for 7 days, so since there are 3 of us, that will cost us close to S$2,000, and that is not inclusive of the bus or any public transport we need to take to hotel, city, places we wanted to go that could not be access by rail.

i have found mid-size manual gear car rental for 8 days at www.cheaptickets.com(Avis) to be around S$1,100 and I figured that I will not spend so much on parking and petrol, therefore went for the car. Although because of the hidden cost, such as winter tires charge, tax, one-time drop off charge etc... it end up to be around 1,100chF instead, which is around S$1,400+ just for the rental. Total we spend slightly more than S$300+ more on the car, inclusive of parking and petrol. So the total cost on car will be close to S$1,800, so I guess we didn't save that much after all, but nevertheless saved more than S$200. (We could have gotten a smaller car to save more though)

It is not that difficult to drive in Switzerland and Austria, despite the driver sitting on the left and the road is on the right. Because we are driving to another country, thus not able to rent the GPS navigation. Thus we rely a lot on www.viamichelin.com and maps.google.com and also the written guide on the various hotel to get us to the hotel, and it is quite easy.

Because of trying to drive on the shortest and most straight forward way, we actually pass by Liechtenstein(a very small country, only 1/4 size of Singapore) from Switzerland to Austria, and from Innsbruck to Salzburg(Austria), we went in Germany too. Passport was not check on both occasion. Only time our passport was stamp was when we go in Austria.



There are of course some difficulty in driving:-

1) Driving on right side of the road with the right hand changing gears take a little bit of getting use to.
2) Motorway speed limit on both countries are 130km/hr, and commonly people driving up to 150km/hr. As we are not familiar with the road, we usually drive slower at 110-120km/hr. (there are no street light and some time got fog)
3) The roads on the mountain have lots of sharp curves, and it doesn't help that when we drive at around 60-70km/hr, the car behind keep trying to tailgate and want to overtake you in such dangerous condition, usually I will just find a place to stop, and let them go first.
4) During winter, sun set at around 4pm, and it completely dark at 5pm. Thus we are force to drive a lot in the dark, which make it even more difficult.
5) Not everyone speak in English, thus not as easy to ask for direction. However most can still struggle a word or two in English and are always very eager to help.
6) Difficult to find parking space in the city, however most of the hotel we got are within walking distance to the city central. The other 2 hotel are not, but we reach there on Sun and Sat respectively, thus still quite easy on the parking




Guide to traveling by rail or car:-

1) How many people are traveling together?
Talking about cost- 2 or less, just get the rail pass, 3 person, either way. 4 person, should be cheaper to get car.

2) How many countries are you traveling to?
There are a 1-time drop off charge for car if returning in another country. (which in our case was around S$300+), however it is also more expensive if you get a Eurail for more countries.

3) Are you intending to go more of the Cities?
Usually it is very expensive and difficult to find parking in the City(usually around S$5-6 per hour, and max can only park for 2-3 hrs). However you can always get a hotel very near the City Central and offer free parking, just that the hotel may be more expensive also.

4) Do you have a good navigator?
If without my wife navigating, I think it will be very difficult for me to drive and look at the map and direction, and considering how fast everyone drive, it takes a short time to make decision.
(And sometime it is not that easy to get on the motorway again if you go off a wrong exit.)

5) Can you drive manual?
The price different between rental a manual gear and a auto gear car is quite a lot.



Note:
- I wanted to get a International Driving Permit, but end up didn't get one. I have absolutely no problem driving in those few countries without a IDP. I guess most likely is because Singapore Driving License is in English.
- The cheapest fuel you can get is in Liechtenstein. It is a small country that you will most properly pass by if you drive from Switzerland to Austria.
- Remember to buy the Vignette when you reach Austria in order to use the Motorway.





I drove in England too, to drive out of London to Brighton and Canterbury on 2 separate day. The reason is also due to cost. 4 person traveling on rail will cost around S$700+; while driving only cost me around S$400+.
England is very straight forward, drive on the left side, just like Singapore. However it is a good idea to try to avoid London, because of the many 1 lane roads, it causes major traffic jam all the time.



I rented a blue Renault Scenic in Switzerland to Austria.



















In England, it was a Red Toyota Aygo.





















Some clips of us driving in Austria. (the motorway is usually 3 lanes, which is much better than the 1-2 lanes motorway in Switzerland)

posted by Wui-Ping @ 10:44 PM Comments: 0