Travel Quote

Travel Quote: “If God had really intended men to fly, he’d make it easier to get to the airport.” George Winters

Photo by Cynthia Dial

#travel #traveltips #travelquote #travelingcynthia

Vacation - Wellness Resort - Health Retreat

Recharge Mind, Body, & Soul by Traveling to a Wellness Resort

It’s no secret that taking time off work for a vacation is beneficial to your health and wellness. Travel helps us to relax and recharge, while immersing us in different cultures and locations. Statistics show that timely vacations can help with a reduced risk of heart disease and a reduction in stress levels.

Why not increase those benefits by traveling to a wellness resort? While many destination vacations provide health benefits, often when returning home from long flights and tourist attractions, you feel even more exhausted than before your vacation.

 Photo by Cynthia Dial

There are many reasons to travel to a wellness resort, but the main one being the focus on health. Allowing your health and wellness to be at the core of your vacation can help to unplug from the noise of the world, help you to detox, with prepared meals that focus on your body’s needs, as well as helping you to relax through spa treatments and meditation.

Health retreats offer different combinations of activities like yoga, meditation camps, spa sessions and detox holidays. Helping individuals to focus on both their physical and mental health is the key goal of health and wellness resorts, ensuring that visitors leave feeling rejuvenated.

It’s these kinds of activities that also help people focus on themselves for a change, and provide an escape from the pressures of their daily lives. Many people who have visited well-being retreats in the past, claim that such holidays help them to treat issues like sleep disorders, high blood pressure, stress, reduced energy levels, and mood swings effectively.

A break from routine is often needed to help the mind rest and reset. When visiting a wellness retreat you can expect to have time for hiking, socializing, enjoying a myriad of spa treatments, and a complete and total focus on your physical and mental health.

Visiting a wellness resort is more than refreshing, it’s necessary in today’s fast paced environment to take time to focus on your needs as a person. We often get so bogged down in the day-to-day that we forget how important it is to take care of our minds and bodies, and traveling in this fashion is the best way to refocus.

Vacations are great when you want to travel and see the world, but when you need to relax it’s best to travel to a health and wellness retreat. Indulge in everything that helps to slow down your mind’s rapid thinking and unplug.

There are steps that we can all take to work towards a more peaceful and healthy state of being. Rewire Me is a website dedicated to promoting spiritual growth and transformational journeys, which has a wealth of information on happiness and well-being. The site lists some of the best meditation and wellness retreats, as well as ways that travel can improve your quality of life.

Retreats help you reconnect with nature and yourself, and they can help spark creativity back into your life. Relaxing and enjoying the solitude of a wellness retreat may be just the trip you need to reduce stress and focus on your well-being.

#vacation #healthretreat #wellbeingretreat #travel #traveltips #travelingcynthia

Top-Earning Deceased Celebs

As I'm still in Vegas mode, here's a factoid from the list of Top-Earning Deceased Celebs:

~ #1 - Michael Jackson earned $160 million last year.  Much of the money comes from two Cirque du Soleil shows, including One, which opened at Las Vegas' Mandalay Bay in May and is routinely sold out.  Big bonus: a hologram-like illusion of Jackson performing "Man in the Mirror" occurring at the show's end.

Photo by Cynthia Dial

~ #2 - Elvis Presley

~ #3 - Charles Schulz, the creator of "Peanuts"

Tips on Tipping on Cruises

From VacationsToGo.com

Cruising is the easiest way to see the world, but there is one part of the cruise experience that can cause anxiety for otherwise carefree passengers -- tipping. Here's a look at how tipping is handled by each of the world's major cruise lines.

Photo by Cynthia Dial

On most cruise lines, but not all, gratuities are expected and encouraged. The traditional tipping procedure is to hand cash gratuities to the service staff on the last full day or evening of the cruise. For longer itineraries, tipping on a weekly basis may be the norm. The cruise lines that follow this tipping procedure are American Cruise Lines, Blount, Hurtigruten, Lindblad, Quark Expeditions, Star Clippers, Viking Cruises and Voyages of Discovery.

Tipping recommendations from these lines range from about $8 to $18 per passenger a day, depending on the company. In some cases, passengers hand the money to the ship's hotel manager or reception desk, to be distributed among the crew later.

It is customary to tip bartenders and wine stewards 15%, and many cruise lines automatically add this gratuity to the bar or beverage bill. Gratuities for special services such as spa treatments usually are left to the discretion of the guest, but 15% is considered typical.

Most other cruise lines automatically charge tips, usually around $12 per person, per day, to shipboard accounts and divide the total among all dining room personnel, cabin stewards and others who are involved in serving passengers. These lines include Carnival, Celebrity, Costa, Croisières de France, Cruise & Maritime Voyages, Cunard, Disney, Fred. Olsen, Holland America, MSC, Norwegian, Oceania, P&O, Princess, Pullmantur, Royal Caribbean and Windstar.

These amounts do not cover tips for bartenders and wine stewards, which again are generally 15% added to the beverage bill at the time of service.

If a passenger feels that the amount automatically charged to his or her account should be adjusted higher or lower based on the service received, some cruise lines will make that adjustment when the bill is settled at the end of the cruise. If you have a shipboard credit on your onboard account, it can be applied to automatic gratuities on most cruise ships.

A few cruise lines specifically state that gratuities are included in the cruise fare and that tips are neither expected nor encouraged. Azamara, Crystal, Hebridean, Paul Gauguin, Ponant, Regent, Seabourn, SeaDream, Silversea, Swan Hellenic and Voyages to Antiquity fall into this category. Even on these lines, some passengers still tip for outstanding service or special favors.

Does any tipping policy tend to encourage better service than the others? I'd love your thoughts.

#cruises #cruising #cruisetipping #tipping #travelture

Kings Canyon National Park - California

Welcome to Kings Canyon National Park! It 's home to the nation's largest canyon, Zumwalt Meadow, John Muir Rock, Grant Grove and more. 

#sierrafam #seki #jonhmuirlodge #grantgrove #travel #travelpics #traveltips #travelingcynthia 

Yosemite - Tenaya Lodge

Goodbye Tenaya Lodge at Yosemite and room 152 on its newly renovated Suite floor. 

#SierraFam #Tenaya #travelingcynthia #travel #traveltips #traveltuesday #yosemite 

Tenaya Lodge - Yosemite

Tenaya Lodge's evening 'Flashlight Hike' gave an entire different perspective of the forest at Yosemite.

#SierraFam #tenaya #travel #travelpics #traveltips #travelingcynthia #tenayayosemite

Yosemite - Tenaya Lodge

Two-night home in Yosemite in Tenaya Lodge. 

#tenaya #tenayalodge #yosemite #travel #travelpics #traveltips #travelingcynthia 

Yosemite - Valley View

Yosemite's Valley View, a popular photo op, may be the photo on your Visa card. Check it out. Better yet, check it out in person! #sierrafam #tenayayosemite #yosemite #valleyview #travel #travelpics #traveltips #traveltuesday #travelingcynthia 

Fashion Week San Diego

Fun evening, fun fashion. Only one peek of the finale event at @FashionWeekSD. Another success for founder and director Allison Andrews. 

#fwsd #fashion #sandiego #travelingcynthia

Newport Beach Country Club News

So Cal news: Ground breaking for the Newport Beach Country Club (NBCC) and its new $40 million clubhouse that will offer ocean, coastline and 180-degree golf course views.  Scheduled for completion October, 2015, it will be followed by the 21st Annual PGA Champions Tour Toshiba Classic the weekend of November 1, 2015. It was a fun day of celebration!  Congrats NBCC!

#newportbeach #nbcc #travel #golf #californiagolf #travel #traveltips #travelingcynthia

Priciest Hotels in Canada - Toronto - Montreal - Vancouver

From eturbonews.com

TORONTO, Canada - Canada's most expensive city-situated hotel is located in Toronto, according to the latest survey. In fact, as the survey reveals, six of the country's 10 most expensive hotels are located in the most populous city of Canada.

Four Seasons Toronto

The survey specifically compared luxury hotels in cities across the USA and Canada based on their average rates for a regular double room. The month of October 2014 served as the basis of comparison. Only such hotels located inside major cities were considered.

With an average rate of $532 per night for a standard double room, the Four Seasons Toronto, located in the Yorkville district, leads the list of Canada's costliest hotels. The Ritz Carlton Montreal takes the number two spot with an average price tag of $505 nightly. Vancouver's priciest hotel is the Fairmont Pacific Rim, ranking eighth most expensive in the country with an average overnight rate of $358.

In the United States, eight of the 10 most established hotels are located in New York City. The SoHo House NYC tops the rankings. At an average price of $1189 per night for a double room, this establishment is more than double the rate of the most expensive city hotel in Canada.

Following are the 10 most expensive city hotels in Canada. The rates listed reflect the daily rate, on average, for the most affordable double room in each hotel during the month of October 2014.

1. Four Seasons Toronto $532
2. The Ritz-Carlton Montreal $505
3. The Ritz-Carlton Toronto $468
4. Trump International Hotel & Tower Toronto $464
5. Hotel Le St-James (Montreal) $400
6. The Hazelton Hotel (Toronto) $370
7. Shangri-La Toronto $364
8. Fairmont Pacific Rim (Vancouver) $358
9. Windsor Arms Hotel (Toronto) $356
10. Shangri-La Vancouver $341

#priceyhotels #canada #toronto #montreal #hotels #canadapriceyhotels #travel #traveltips #travelingcynthia #torontohotels #montrealhotels