Ryan Lee - Travel With A Butterfly

We have had more than enough time to cover all the major tourist spots in Barcelona, so we decided why not visit some of the nearby towns in Barcelona to get a sense of a different experience?

The first and most obvious choice was Valencia, but not only have I already been there, we only had one day and we had to be back in Barcelona by the evening, so it was too far for a one day trip. There’s of course Figueres, where it is most famous for having Teatre-Museu Gala Salvador Dalí, a large museum designed by Dalí himself, but we wanted to visit a town rather than just a museum; we’ve seen way too many museums by this time (even though I personally really like Dalí a lot). There was also Sitges, famous for its seafront promenade, but again I have already been there and there wasn’t much to do anyway besides enjoying the bright happy promenade.

So, we settled on Girona. It was a small town located a little more than 30 minutes of train ride from Barcelona Sants, plus it’s most notable for being one of the filming locations for the hit TV show Game Of Thrones, where they filmed Braavos, Oldtown, and King’s Landing for Season 6 (source: barcelonayellow.com) Continue reading A Small Town Called Girona

Events

Web Summit 2019 – To Go Or Not To Go

ByRyan Lee

With the appellation as “The Largest Tech Conference in the World,” it was no surprise that Web Summit would be an eye opener for me. This post will talk about the overview of the event, my opinion of whether you should go and whether it’s worth going, and other misc. details such as transportation, food, and its night events.

In 2019, Web Summit was attended by slightly over 70,000 attendees. The event, as in recent years, has been held in Feira Internacional de Lisboa, a massive exhibition with five gigantic halls, and alongside it is the grand Altice Arena, hosting some of the most prominent speakers over the 4 day event. Some of the more attention grabbing names this year included Edward Snowden (who didn’t appear in person for obvious reasons), Jaden Smith, Ronaldinho, Tony Blair, Guo Ping – rotating chairman of Huawei, Brad Smith – president of Microsoft, and a whole lot more. Continue reading Web Summit 2019 – To Go Or Not To Go

Singapore

Going to the Best Restaurant and Former Best Bar in Asia – Singapore

ByRyan Lee

I will admit, the decision to go to Singapore wasn’t exactly mine, but I will spare you the details and just say that I had a pretty good time there. In fact, considering the flight fares and flight time to travel (seemed to have lessened to only 3 hours from original 4 hours!), it’s definitely worthy of a consideration of a destination to go to during long weekends. And I say this because my short time there definitely gave me a better impression of Singapore. You can read about my latest Singapore post on the Celebrating Singapore’s 50th Anniversary.

Anyway, I had the fortunate opportunity to visit not just the recently voted as best restaurant in Asia Odette, but during the same day I also managed to visit the #2 best bar in Asia, Manhattan bar as well! Let’s get into it and start with Accommodation. Continue reading Going to the Best Restaurant and Former Best Bar in Asia – Singapore

Travel

Travel Etiquette: Knowing Culture

ByRyan Lee

Sometimes when we go travel, we may become oblivious to some of the standard practices and society norms, which is understandable considering we are already consumed by new imageries and languages surrounding us; it is already quite overwhelming to intake. It’s too often that what we learned from home becomes a habit, and that we carry these behaviors into other countries which may irk the locals in unintended ways. I myself have committed such errors of course, and that’s why I recognise the importance of having this post. By the way, this will be an ongoing post whenever I come up with something more. Here are a couple of etiquettes you should be aware of when travelling to a new country:

Continue reading Travel Etiquette: Knowing Culture

Taiwan

Outskirts of Taipei – Keelung, Jiufen, Houtong Cat Village, Tamsui, Ruifang

ByRyan Lee

In my previous post on Nonstop Eating in Taipei, I again talked about all the different types of restaurants, food stalls, and nightlife places you could check out within the vicinity of the main areas of Taipei. But the real fun from this trip were during my moments when I was exploring the outskirts of Taipei – Keelung for the Keelung Squid Festival, Jiufen Old Street, Houtong Cat Village, Tamsui, and briefly Ruifang when coming back from Jiufen.

It’s quite nice to visit these areas, just because they offer a glimpse of a different side of Taipei that you don’t really get to see. Anyway, this post will be broken down into different sections by each area that I visited.

Continue reading Outskirts of Taipei – Keelung, Jiufen, Houtong Cat Village, Tamsui, Ruifang

Taiwan

Nonstop Eating in Taipei

ByRyan Lee

You know you’re really getting a sense and vibe of a city once you start exploring the outer parts of the city. For example, in Tokyo the first few times I would stick around the areas of Shibuya, Shinjuku, Roppongi… you know, all the main districts you have to first go as a tourist in Tokyo. Then once you’ve been there multiple times, you will want to start to explore other less popular areas. This usually happens with me around the 4th to 5th time I visit a city. Taipei was no exception – this time, besides just being around Taipei 101, I managed to go to Jiufen Old Street, Keelung, Tamsui, and Houtong Cat Village.

I’m not sure if I mentioned this in my previous blog posts, probably did, but I tend to be attracted to places closer to the seaside. That’s why some of my top favourite cities in the world that I’ve been to include Barcelona, Cape Town, Gold Coast, pretty much everywhere in Japan, the French Riviera etc. That’s why I would say that I actually enjoyed going to places like Keelung and Tamsui, where I was treated to beautiful, stunning sunsets that left an indelible memory for me (I realised how much of a sucker I am for sunsets, especially the sunsets that morphs the skies from your typical sky blue to delicious colors like pink, purple, gold that occur on a sporadical basis).

For this blog post, I will start off by naming the things I did in Taipei and breaking down by the usual sections – accommodations, foods, things to do, nightlife etc. then I will do each section by each area that I covered. I will share what I did, my opinions, fun anecdotes etc.

Edit: After writing this post, I realised just covering the main part of Taipei itself was way too long, so the upcoming/next post will focus on the outer skirts of Taipei like Keelung, Tamsui, Jiufen, Houtong, and Ruifang district. It’s out! Read more at Outskirts of Taipei.

Continue reading Nonstop Eating in Taipei

Japan

ITE – The Lesser Visited Places in Japan

ByRyan Lee

As iterated from the previous post, I went to an International Travel Expo in Hong Kong just one week ago. Took a lot of pamphlets and brochures, and wanted to share some resources that I got.

Niigata in Japan (70 minutes from Tokyo)

50 years ago Niigata was an important trade hub with the highest levels of culture and the largest population in Japan. The resonance of Jomon era pottery from 5000 years ago and modern day art.

Accommodations – Akakura Onsen Ski Resort, Akakura Kanko Resort Ski, Ikenotaira Onsen Ski Resort, Myoko Suginohara Ski Resort, Sekionsen Ski Resort, Lotte Arai Resort, Qupidvalley Ski Resort, Charmant Hiuchi Ski Resort, Naeba Ski Resort, Kagura Ski Resort, Kandatsu Kogen Ski Resort, Iwappara Ski Resort, Gala Yuzawa Ski Resort, Joetsu Kokusai Ski Resort, NASPA Ski Garden, Okutadami Maruyama Ski Resort, New Greenpia Tsunan Ski Resort Continue reading ITE – The Lesser Visited Places in Japan

Travel

International Travel Expo: Chiang Mai, Saipan, Sabah, Switzerland, Almaty, Nordic

ByRyan Lee

Just one week ago, I attended the International Travel Expo in Hong Kong. Due to my passion in travel, I pretty much grabbed every single brochure and pamphlet there was. Now I wanted to share some of the resources I got from this expo. We won’t go into details, just some websites and some references of different activities you can be doing at each place. Besides the cities in Switzerland, I hope the below cities are places that are less major cities and less visited by tourists.

Thailand

(Activity) Ran-Tong Elephant Save & Rescue Elephant Centre – www.bestelephantsanctuarychiangmai.com and email at [email protected]; different programs for you to interact with elephants

Continue reading International Travel Expo: Chiang Mai, Saipan, Sabah, Switzerland, Almaty, Nordic

Taiwan

Serendipity Moments in Taipei

ByRyan Lee

Just an hour away from Hong Kong, Taipei makes for an excellent weekend getaway for anyone who wants to escape from the materialistic, modern, and hectic culture of Hong Kong. Although they typically share the same weather, with horrid humidity and typhoons during the summer, their cultures are actually quite different. You will experience this just from listening to how each of them speak their languages. Hong Kong people when they speak Cantonese are much more rough and aggressive, whereas Taiwanese speak their Mandarin in a very gentle and polite manner. Their mannerisms and the way they walk reflect this too.

This trip around, I made it a point not to do any research on what to do or what to eat in Taipei. Influenced by my cousin in law’s quote about how we don’t get lost and discover anymore, and that we all end up doing the same thing as covered by blogs and Instagram, I decided to just go with the flow and discover any restaurants by chance. Continue reading Serendipity Moments in Taipei

Japan

Fukuoka, Aso, and Sea Hell in Beppu

ByRyan Lee

It’s been a couple years since I went to Fukuoka, Aso and Beppu. We joined one of those tour groups so I didn’t prepare any itinerary. As with most tour groups, there were a lot of bus riding, a lot of mediocre restaurants, and some OK hotels that we stayed in (so clearly this wasn’t my decision).

This will be purely a photo blog.

Dome shaped hotels in Aso Farm Village. They also have Dom shaped onsen Continue reading Fukuoka, Aso, and Sea Hell in Beppu