Best resort on the Ganga at Rishikesh

For those traveling to DC on Jan. 6th, I'm a native to the area and I would like to share with you what I will be doing this time and what I have done for the last two rallies...1/

I've been asking people after their trips if they liked it or not.
854 trip reviews later, here's the % most liked cities:

Mexico City: 100% liked it
Vienna: 100%
Saint Petersburg: 100%
Madrid: 100%
Tokyo: 100%
Belgrade: 100%
Budapest: 93%
Lisbon: 93%
Berlin: 93%
Singapore: 91%

Most disliked cities by trip reviews:

Ho Chi Minh City: 36% disliked it
Bucharest: 30% disliked it
London: 29% disliked it
Canggu: 29% disliked it
Warsaw: 27% disliked it
Krakow: 25% disliked it
Amsterdam: 24% disliked it

Interestingly, almost 1 out of 3 people (29%) going to top destination Canggu have a bad time. Not unexpected because it takes quite some effort to have a good time there with no choice other than having to drive a motorbike the biggest one.

More than 1 out of 3 people (36%) have a bad time in Ho Chi Minh City. That's also understandable. It's not an easy city either. Locals are less easygoing than for ex Thai and again you have to drive a motorbike everywhere. Not much public transport except buses I think

The divide between 93% of people having a good time in Berlin vs. 29% having a bad time in London is interesting too. These are two big W-EU cities. It's been said before that London is a playground for the rich. Berlin is more affordable, spacious, creative and fun I think

The US averaged over 2 million airline travelers a day over the last week for the first time since March 7, 2020.

We're now only 21% below pre-covid airline travel levels and closing the gap fast. With business travel accounting for roughly 12% of total airline travel, we may not see a full recovery until businesses resume their pre-covid travel routine (which may not happen).

So, if you drive out into the mountains in Bedford county you come to this very remote area. Aside from a ski resort and some state park infrastructure here and there it's pretty isolated. Only 40 minutes or so from Altoona or Johnstown but you have to work to get out here.

You wind around ridges and through valleys, woods, farms, and the odd tiny village for quite a while and then take a very long dirt and/or gravel road in various states of upkeep. Keep going for a few miles and you come across a small pull off, and a sign.

In 1856 this area was pretty wild, and one spring day two children, brothers ages 5 and 7, disappeared. Their dad had gone off into the woods to see why their dog was barking. When he returned they were gone.

The dad looked for them and not finding them enlisted neighbors. Within a few days there were apparently hundreds if not thousands of people from the wider region out combing the mountains.

A guy wrote a book about this whole series of events in 1888 that chronicles how weird things got, which if you have the time and inclination to read this extremely dramatic and maudlin retelling of things, you can find here:

@niteen_india He could calc his hotel valuation in following way ...

25000 rooms @ Rs 2 crore per room = Rs 50000 cr
400 restaurants @ Rs 5 /10 crore = Rs 3000 crores

+ Banquet halls + Gym + Store space + commission business

Pan Borneo Highway Sarawak:

Review as of 10 December 2020. Been getting queries on road conditions so here goes.

*Personal driving experience with a small car. Hilux different story.

Kilo Nol: Tg Datu- Sematan

Complete, gorgeous but not dual lane.

Sematan-Lundu: Gravelly, some smooth stretches.

Lundu-Bau: SHIT. Steep drops, gravelly and potholed. Dark at night. Just use Rambungan-Sampadi ferry instead, worth the detour for your car's sake.

Bau-Singai-Batu Kawa (Kuching)
Diversions plenty, but drivable

Kuching:
Stephen Yong - Kota Padawan
Road ok, clear diversion. Flyovers all in various stages of completion. Traffic clogs at Kota Sentosa and 10th Mile.

Kuching-Serian
11th Mile onwards complete, onwards to Serian

Serian: Roads still in the works but looks almost complete except for stretch going uphill/downhill after Ampungan.

Serian Bypass (flyover 1 & 2) both complete! Can zip and go straight out of town.

Simpang Gedong - Pantu Junction

Heaven is a place like this. Both dual lanes complete, but as of now only one side is open. Smooth, no diversions, blissful 120km/hour speed.

Then it starts to get patchy here and there (Balai Ringin, Sg. Tenggang)

Lachau: Bad, uneven, gravel.

Better than Milford Sound. Tehri Dam is a must visit and it must be fun staying on the floating cottages

Veda5, Ayurveda living village. A paradise in God's own country.

1. THE PLAN

We see countries like China & New Zealand succeed by implementing border controls and wonder why our government didn’t do the same. Unfortunately, it’s been following the 2011 influenza pandemic plan, which says...

2. China & New Zealand have international travel (limited in the case of New Zealand) and freight, and rather than delay their peaks, their border controls have helped keep cases to a minimum. Border controls might not work in a flu pandemic, but they worked for #COVID19.

3. Countries that have done well against #COVID19 have high adherence to mask wearing. The pandemic plan tells us the British people won’t bother wearing masks over time so let’s no bother asking them to, eh.

4. Mass super spreading events have been shown to play a significant role in the transmission of #COVID19.

But the pandemic plan tells us they don’t play a role (perhaps the source of Jenny Harries’ comments about Cheltenham?) and therefore the government will not restrict them

5. I call this the white flag clause. Surrender was built into the assumptions behind our pandemic response. The success of other countries has proved this clause completely wrong.

Figure a lot of people have a lot of questions right now so thought a quick thread signposting to where what info we have is might be helpful...

This is the current law on travel restrictions, in force now. It includes a legal ban on travel between Scotland and the rest of the UK, and in and out of council areas in levels three and four, without a “reasonable excuse”

Again the cross-border travel laws are in force *now* - the plan was they would be relaxed for Christmas, the change is that they now will not. Travel *within* Scotland permitted on Christmas Day - but next day whole mainland goes into L4, which means no movement between councils

There are a LOT of potential exemptions included in the travel-ban regulations and the list is non-exhaustive. *As it stands* I haven’t heard any talk of removing specific exemptions, just of potentially toughening enforcement.

“Toughening enforcement” might just mean “starting some enforcement” because police insist their approach didn’t change when the law came in. They are not setting up roadblocks or spot checks, they mainly just occasionally fine people they stumble across who are clearly in breach

In this thread I compare Bahria Town (Karachi) to other cities, local and international, to relay the spatial scale of 'legalized' fraud involved. Try to also grasp that all of the areas in these cities fall under one developer.

Image: Bahria Town Karachi overlay on Lahore

Image: Bahria Town Karachi overlay on Islamabad and Rawalpindi

Image: Bahria Town Karachi overlay on Peshawar

Image: Bahria Town Karachi overlay on New York

Puneet Chhatwal, MD & CEO Indian Hotels, in the analyst conference call:
"Hotel is a cyclical business. It should not be bought at the top of the cycle and not be sold at the bottom of the cycle."

<> 🙂

If you could live in any city (assuming you don't currently live there) which would you choose?

Today is a very special day for my family and a testament to the Scottish NHS and to @StagecoachEScot - And now you are thinking what the heck has a bus company and the NHS got to do with each other. Well, today marks the 30th anniversary of my mother and her colleagues...

....establishing a midwifery unit in Malawi which over the last 30 years has saved tens of thousands of lives.

On this day, 30 years ago, after collecting massive amounts of unused medical equipment from hospitals around Scotland, my father and I transported them to....

...the stagecoach depot in Perth. Stagecoach loaded all of that equipment onto buses and transported it to Malawi where my mother (who was a midwife) and colleagues used them to create one of the first dedicated midwifery units in Malawi.

Everything from basic midwifery supplies to things like mosquito nets was transported en-masse to the new unit.

It was a co-operative effort by hospitals from the borders to the Highlands.

What would have been thrown out because it was fast approaching the end of its use, was retasked to assisting some of the most impoverished in the world. This unit still exists to this day and continues to provide proper midwifery care to tens of thousands of expectant...

WATCH LIVE NOW: Premier @jkenney expected to address reports of staffers, politicians travelling abroad:

The presser has been pushed back to 12:30 p.m.

WATCH LIVE NOW (For real this time)

Kenney starts by offering condolences of family and friends of Sgt. Harnett.

He didn't acknowledge the fact the press conference started 40 minutes late.

No offense to anyone But #Telangana Beauty is Very Very Underrated (Except Hyderabad) :

My Thread 🧵 :

1. Bhadrachalam

2. Basara (A Divine Destination)

3. Alampur Jogulamba (Shakthipeetam) 🙏

4. Nagarjuna Sagar & Ettipotala Water Falls ♥️

Bogatha WaterFalls (Mulugu Dist)

Planning my first jungle safari trip.

Folks who've been to Jim Corbett, please drop in your best suggestions - stay. zone, safari, food! 🐅

Beautiful mud house to make your holiday memorable!!!

The Riverwalk, Tirthan Valley!!!
Devbhoomi Himachal!!!

a perfect resort to stay in Gauhati when you are planning?