Wikivoyage:Tourist office/Archives/2017/May

Getting to Gothenburg

I am going on a flight to Gothenburg, Sweden, on Friday morning. My plane leaves Helsinki-Vantaa Airport at 08:00 in the morning.

How much time should I allow to get on the plane? Is it enough to arrive at the airport at 06:20, which would leave me 1 hour 40 minutes to get on the plane? I'm not bringing any checked luggage, only hand luggage.

Once I get to Gothenburg, how do I get from Landvetter Airport to the city centre (Nils Ericsson Terminalen)? I assume there's a Flygbussarna service. Do I need to buy a ticket in advance? Is the ticket for a specific time or can I just go on any Flygbussarna bus travelling to the city centre? As I am going back on Sunday, do I need another Flygbussarna ticket to get back to Landvetter airport or can I use a return ticket (tur-och-retur biljett)? Can I pay for the tickets on the bus? Asked by: JIP (talk) 18:37, 23 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I can recommend the Flygbussarna from and to the airport, have used it myself. Good quality bus with free wi-fi. Stops only in a few places but those it does are convenient. You do not have to book ahead (although quicker and cheaper if you do), can pay at time of getting on the bus. I have no experience Helsink airport but usually 1 hour 40 min would be enough time for in European flights as long as not a peak time (i.e. Monday morning or start of a holiday week). --Traveler100 (talk) 18:51, 23 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

As a tip, assuming the weather is not too bad, getting around the centre using Styr & Ställ bicycle hire system is really convenient and cheap as long as you make sure to change bike before the 30 minute fee time limit is up; just a small upfront charge and reserve fund against your credit card. --Traveler100 (talk) 18:55, 23 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, but I'm not staying at Gothenburg, I'm continuing to Helsingborg by train. I've already bought the train tickets. JIP (talk) 19:03, 23 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It looks like the suitcase I'm bringing with me is over Flygbussarna's cabin baggage size limits, so it has to go in their cargo hold. That should be no problem going to Helsingborg, but coming back I have only about 12 minutes at Gothenburg Central station to transfer from the train to Flygbussarna, and even that only leaves me 2 hours to get on the plane to Stockholm and then back to Finland. Will this be enough time?

Also, on the train back from Helsingborg, the connection between Laholm and Halmstad is broken because of track repairs, so I have to go on a bus. I only have about 8 minutes time to get on the bus. Will this be enough? Halmlandstrafiken has already told me that the bus will be in direct connection with the train and there should be people in yellow vests to guide passengers on the bus.

I have done this once before when coming back from Austria to Finland last July, as the connection between Gloggnitz and Bruck an der Mur was also broken, and I had no trouble with it. As long as I manage to get on the bus it should be OK. JIP (talk) 21:53, 26 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

It looks like it's the way back that worries me. There's a train to Gothenburg from Helsingborg at 07:50 AM but it has track reparations between Laholm and Halstad, so I decided I can't risk that and booked a Swebus trip directly from Helsingborg to Gothenburg at 06:50 AM. That means I have to leave my hotel before 06:00 AM.

What will happen if I miss my connections entirely? When the worst comes to worst, I can risk booking another flight from Gothenburg to Helsinki and spending a hotel night in Gothenburg. I don't care if it costs me 200 € or 500 €. What I don't want to do, under any circumstances, is to end up in some minor Swedish town I've never heard of without any place to stay and without any means to get out of there. I'm sure if that happens, I'll die there. What is there to do, then? JIP (talk) 21:50, 27 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

In any case, I'm now safely back in Finland. I guess Swebus saved my trip. JIP (talk) 08:13, 1 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Top places to be visited in South Asia in the months of May and June

Looking for places to visit in South Asia. Any place would do just that it should be accompanied by a cool breeze and should provide good family experience. Thanks a lot for your time in advance =) 115.248.166.196 09:22, 27 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hello IP editor. I moved your query to the Tourist Office, which is generally a better place for inquiries of this nature. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 15:49, 27 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

115.248.166.196, I'm sorry no-one has replied. The only "hill station" I've been to in India was Srinagar, kind of too big to be called one, and that was in 1977, when it was safer to go to. I'm not sure what you know about hill stations in the region. Shimla, Gangtok and Darjeeling are three that seem interesting to me. Let us know where you go and how it was. Ikan Kekek (talk) 00:03, 12 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

ecotourism

how does ecotourism help in political empowerment of local people? Asked by: 43.251.173.182 09:54, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Is that a final paper topic? Since Wikivoyage is a travel guide, ecotourism is covered a bit, but we don't do a socio-political analysis of the phenomenon or its practice. And I won't send you to Wikipedia, because they won't write an essay for you on that kind of open-ended question, either. I would also caution you, in that your thesis contains an assumption: How do you know ecotourism helps to politically empower people other than the usual bunch of tour operators and those profiting from them, in the first place? Just because a tour is relatively green doesn't mean the profits from it are ipso facto evenly distributed to the members of the communities the tours visit. So I have a better idea for you: Why don't you do the study, without assuming anything, and then get back to us with your results in the form of a published paper or at least a blog post, with citations, that you link here? Ikan Kekek (talk) 10:01, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

In mature democracies, I doubt that it does. If I tour Scotland or New Zealand on a bicycle, pitching my tent at eco-friendly (and cheap) basic campsites, spending around $50 per day, how does this politically empower locals more than a similar trip done in a sports car staying at luxury hotels, spending $500 per day? AlasdairW (talk) 21:15, 11 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, but a side point: Ecotourism does not require you to spend less money. While spending much money will usually mean the locals can and will spend more on (un-eco) tourism infrastructure, having a local guide is completely compatible with ecotourism, and in case of Scotland and New Zealand, I suppose a guide on a bike could cost you(r group) the $500 a day. The ecotourist would also not fly in to spend a weekend at the destination, but stay for a longer time, thus spending that amount for more days (OK, more seldom, but still). --LPfi (talk) 07:20, 19 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Public transport tickets in Munich

I and my girlfriend are going to Munich, Germany for BoundCon from Wednesday 24 May to Monday 29 May. Our hotel is near the city centre, the event is in the Zenith building near Freimann.

We will be travelling as follows:

Wednesday: Munich Airport to the city centre
Thursday to Sunday: City centre to Freimann and back
Monday: City centre to Munich Airport

What sort of public transport tickets would be the best option for us? The tickets should preferably be valid for the entire day, at least from Thursday to Sunday, as the event opens in early afternoon and closes around midnight. Asked by: JIP (talk) 20:51, 7 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I've been to Munich, so I was going to take a stab at this, but then I looked at the Munich page, and under "Get around" in the "By public transportation" sub-section was information that is far more detailed than I could have provided. Check it out!

--Marvin The Paranoid (talk) 15:10, 21 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

We will be traveling by car from Baie Comeau, North to Labrador City, Canada in September and wanted to know how to borrow a free Satellite for this travel.

Asked by: 70.44.112.152 14:36, 18 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have an answer, but I hope you've checked out our article on Quebec Route 389. And if you do find out how, please add the information to the article (and any other tips you may have). I hope to do that trip some day. Ground Zero (talk) 01:55, 19 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If you're referring to the free satellite phones rented out by the government of Newfoundland and Labrador, sadly, you're out of luck: they're only for use within the province along the Trans-Labrador Highway. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 02:34, 19 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There may be a few companies renting satphones in Canada on a for-profit basis, but they look to be badly out-of-region; a web search finds roadpost.ca in Toronto, comm2000.ca in Leduc and canadasatellite.ca in Calgary. That'd mean incurring costs to ship the phone to you and back to the vendor. Beyond that? Dunno. K7L (talk) 03:15, 19 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

TDE in Baie Comeau provides satellite phone service. I've add their contact info to the article I linked. Ground Zero (talk) 10:54, 19 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

New Question

This was posted as a new article by User:41.79.197.28, but would seem to belong here: how long distance between ceel lahelay and lughaya

Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:23, 23 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If Google Maps is correct, there are several places in Somalia named Ceel Lalehay. One is in the northeastern part of Somalia and is about 710 km from Lughaya in a straight line, but Google Maps does not know about any route by road. The others are farther south and would be a greater distance. --69.159.60.50 23:06, 23 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]