[travel] five to try before you die

The danger, coming up to a possibly enforced overseas trip in peak travel season on no money, [just don't want to contemplate that prospect today], is not to be negative.

So when I read this piece on cliched holidays:

Finally, you round a corner, fight off a few more touts in your crap Italian, and there it is: the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Oh, and a large grassy area... Filled with about 10,000 of your closest friends... Each taking their own "hilarious" shot of their Contiki tour buddy pretending to prop up the falling tower.

... after shuddering a little, it seemed best to go the opposite way - go positive. Here are five travel things, IMHO, it's probably essential to do at least once before you get old:

1. Tick off some of the essential places - London, Paris, New York, Rome and their environs;

2. Safari of some kind either in Africa, the north of Australia, the Gobi, wherever;

3. Some sort of spiritual journey - either to the land of your forefathers or to the Holy Land - some sort of pilgrimage in the Chaucer tradition;

4. Some activity based trip, e.g. skiing in Kitzbuhel, hunting in Namibia, whatever;

5. The grand tour or luxury cruise - saved up for, transported to far off lands, all facilities laid on. Just the once, mind. Mine was the Grand Tour of Europe.

One we particularly enjoyed, sharing driving duties, was to hire an open-topped Megane and tear all over Tenerife, particularly at the peak, way above the clouds. That took some beating.

Some other ideas were advanced here.