Req: Tips 4 students on travelling to the USA

R. van Remortel wrote:
getting a realistic impression about the states.

I question whether that's possible. Although we share a government,
language, and currency, the diversity of this nation, however you
choose to define it, defies credibility. New Orleans is at least as
different from Chicago as Amsterdam is from Vienna; New York,
Seattle, and San Francisco are completely different from Denver,
Minneapolis, and Omaha. And one can make countless similar comparisons.

We would like to see as much as possible! And to be honest, I
don't know what to choose first!

Once you've made your choices, the rest is easy . . . for us. My
recommendation is those places that ain't nuttin' like no other place
noway nohow:

Yellowstone
Grand Canyon
Death Valley

explore the nightlife

I'm a nightlife person. Spent this evening in a bar listening to a
Big Band. Will do so tomorrow listening to Shotgun Wedding HipHip
Symphony. Will be dancing at a club on Wednesday.

The level of dancing varies greatly around the country with hotspots
being San Francisco, Seattle, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Salt Lake City,
Minneapolis, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, Ithaca(!), Boston,
New York, Orlando, and Miami (please visit site at Left in sig).

maybe visiting a campus or university?

Stanford University is quite lovely.

I'd like to get a taste of everything. I know this will be
impossible in the given time,

It's not possible in several lifetimes.

so I'm trying to figure out which state will be the most suitable
for this purpose.

California is the most diverse in the nation. We have, within eighty
kilometres of where I sit, the largest Chinese, Filipino, and Afghani
communities (probably others, too) on the planet outside their home
countries. My direct neighbors on this block are Filipino, Chinese,
US Blacks, Nicaraguan, Argentine, and a few others.
__________________________________________________ ___________
A San Franciscan who's visited 49 of 50 US states
http://geocities.com/dancefest/ http://geocities.com/iconoc/
ICQ: http://wwp.mirabilis.com/19098103 IClast at SFbay Net

Miguel Cruz wrote:

Miguel Cruz WROTE!!! That means he's still alive. Whew!
__________________________________________________ ___________
A San Franciscan in 47.335 mile² San Francisco
http://geocities.com/dancefest/ http://geocities.com/iconoc/
ICQ: http://wwp.mirabilis.com/19098103 IClast at SFbay Net

wrote:
I agree, the South generally has best quality people.

I don't. My first visit to there was when it was The South with
constant oppression of Segregation infiltrating everything. Since I'm
not Black, I only observed, rather than experienced, the impact of
Jim Crow laws. My subsequent visits to The South caused me to write
THE NEW(!) SOUTH http://geocities.com/iconoc/Articles/TheSouth.html

Decades after what I first saw there, the vile images in my mind are
fresh. I've never been able to relate most of them because trying to
do so still tears me up. Yet, in recent weeks, I've been thinking of
finally assembling pixels to record them partly in the hope that the
act will be a bit therapeutic. Don't hold your breath, though.
__________________________________________________ __________
A San Franciscan in (where else?) San Francisco
http://geocities.com/dancefest/ http://geocities.com/iconoc/
ICQ: http://wwp.mirabilis.com/19098103 IClast at SFbay Net

Miguel Cruz wrote:
Other than stuff like the RSL, I thought that the word "club"
referred to dance clubs. Here I am showing my ignorance about
evening entertainment venues. What's a "night club" and how does
it differ from a bar?

Semantics and hyperbole.

In my youth, one went to a night club for dinner and dancing to the
house band. Each also had a feature act (often a semi-headliner as in
today's "lounges" in 'Vegas), a few showgirls in elaborate costumes
who danced and sang often with a boy singer/dancer; a Master of
Ceremonies who also served as a comic or a singer and a comic or
singer depending on the MC's skills; a dance act, and a "novelty" act
that could have been a juggler or a magician, etc. The shows opened
and closed with "production numbers" featuring the chorus girls.

Today, bars with recorded music and floors unsuitable for dancing
call themselves night clubs. Today, bars with musicians and no dance
floor call themselves night clubs. Today, restaurants with bars and
music (recorded or real) call themselves night clubs regardless of
whether they have a dance floor.

Where I was tonight (and most Mondays) http://www.jazzatpearls.com/
is an excellent restaurant with a bar and musicians but no dance
floor. It calls itself a night club. Where I'll be tomorrow (and most
First and Fourth Tuesdays) http://www.brunoslive.com/ used to have
good food (now it's all deep fried and, therefore, inedible for any
but the narrow-arteried obese) but it has good music.

En fin, Miguel, "night club" doesn't mean anything at all any more.

More about why I go to them is in the "Music" section at the bottom
of the SPECIAL EVENTS in San Francisco and environs page:
http://geocities.com/dancefest/Specials.html#t at the site at Left
in the sig.

More information than you wanted. Sorry. You pushed a button.
__________________________________________________ ______________
A San Franciscan who never says "No!" to an invitation to dance!
http://geocities.com/dancefest/ http://geocities.com/iconoc/
ICQ: http://wwp.mirabilis.com/19098103 IClast at SFbay Net

Well, as others have said, with your time and budget limitations, you
will have to decide on one particular area of the country to focus on.
One suggestion--fly into Washington D.C. and rent a car. In three weeks
you can make a fairly large circle encompassing some large cities
(Philadelphia, New York, Boston) and some more rural areas and scenic
areas as well as beaches, mostly in the Northeast, but you can hit a
few in the South in states like Virginia and North Carolina, for
example. You could then return your car back to D.C. and fly back out
of the same airport.
Airports in D.C. are Dulles and Reagan National, and also BWI (
Baltimore/Washington International) is close to that area. I would
think you could find appropriate flights in and out of any of those 3
airports.
Depending on how much you actually try to see, you could be on the road
a whole lot because the U.S. is a big country, but things are generally
closer together and more populated in the Northeast, so you might get a
chance to see more as opposed to the western part of the country, which
is absolutely beautiful, but you will be driving huge distances to get
from point A to point B, in most cases which will cut seriously into
your time limitation.
Best wishes.


--
Kbrandt854
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A lot of people have recommended college towns, and I agree, but don't
bother looking for hotels/motels/hostels. When you decide on a city,
contact the local college/university; almost all of them in the US will rent
you a dorm room during the summer, and for cheap. By the same token, they
can do that because the rooms are empty, so don't expect to meet a campus
full of students to party with.

As for beer, Americans esteem Heineken and they pay dearly for it, but most
don't know that everywhere else on the planet it's the bargain-basement
beer. Half a Euro in Rhodes last spring, and 75 Pesos in Mexico City just a
few weeks ago. These are store prices, not bar prices.

I'd not heard of the Green Tortoise thing, but did something similar out of
NYC years ago, and it was a lot of fun. If you decide on a trip with them,
you can moderate your airfare by buying a regular r/t to the US, then take a
low-cost line like Jet Blue or Southwest to get back to your departure point
for back home.

"Kbrandt854" wrote...
| Well, as others have said, with your time and budget limitations, you
| will have to decide on one particular area of the country to focus on.
| One suggestion--fly into Washington D.C. and rent a car. In three weeks
| you can make a fairly large circle encompassing some large cities
| (Philadelphia, New York, Boston) and some more rural areas and scenic
| areas as well as beaches, mostly in the Northeast, but you can hit a
| few in the South in states like Virginia and North Carolina, for
| example. You could then return your car back to D.C. and fly back out
| of the same airport.

They could fly into either NYC or Washington, DC, and see major
NE cities (DC... Baltimore... Philly... NYC... Boston) without renting
a car by traveling on Amtrak (assuming GWB doesn't pull the plug)
and local transit.

Once, I arrived at Washington-National, took the Metro to Union
Station, got on a train, stopping at Penn Station in NYC, took the
subway to Grand Central, and got on a Metro-North commuter line
to White Plains... all in the span of about 6 hours. [R]

Icono Clast wrote:
California is the most diverse in the nation. We have, within eighty
kilometres of where I sit, the largest Chinese, Filipino, and Afghani
communities (probably others, too) on the planet outside their home
countries.

A nitpick - I've heard this a lot but I don't see how it can be true. The
Chinese population of Singapore is 3.3 million.

miguel
--
Hit The Road! Photos from 32 countries on 5 continents: http://travel.u.nu

Henry 999 wrote:
Miguel Cruz wrote:
R. van Remortel wrote:
...maybe visiting a campus or university?

Someone else suggested this and I second the motion. You could have a lot of
fun if you are reasonably outgoing and rolled up to a big college town like
Madison or Ann Arbor some weekend. Start asking around on Friday afternoon
("we're from Holland, we're driving around the USA, we want to find a
genuine American university party") and within a few hours you should have
collected invitations to more parties than you can manage. More fun than
going to bars, and more real too.

Unfortunately, his timeframe, mid-July to early-August, is about the
quietest time of the year for "genuine American university parties". A
month later, though (or a couple of months earlier)...

I'd say just before finals is the quietest. I spent many a summer in Ann
Arbor and there was no shortage of parties. Granted, nothing like September,
but still enough to keep a weekend going.

miguel
--
Hit The Road! Photos from 32 countries on 5 continents: http://travel.u.nu

1) State most interesting to visit: California - no, make that Hawaii.
Er, wait a minute - maybe it's Alaska, or could be New York - heck,
visit them all. It's impossible to answer this - there's something
worth visiting in each state.

2) Legal to camp beside the road: In some states. Some will only
allow this at designated rest stops or on certain classes or road.

3) Renting a car: depends on how long you want to visit and how far
out of the big cities you want to go. Amtrak offers the equivalent of
a Eurail pass and I think some of the airlines do something similar, so
a car is not a necessity if you're just visiting larger urban areas.
If you want to go to someplace like Yellowstone or the Grand Canyon,
you'll probably need a car.

4) Beer: that's like trying to decide what state is most interesting.
It also depends on where you are and what is available to you. For
American-made beers, the Northwest (particularly the Portland, OR area)
has some truly great beers. Our run-of-the-mill "American lagers" will
probably not impress you much but ought to quench your thirst on a hot
summer day.

5) Girls: I don't know anymore - I'm married. Anyhow, it's a big
country - I'm sure you can find someone you like.
6) Clubs: Depends on where you are - some are happening, and some
aren't. Again, it's a big country.
7) Bars: Again, no uniformity. They can range from dives to upscale
lounges.
8) K-mart: Generally, like a wimpy version of a Carrefour. If you
miss it on your visit, don't feel too bad.