On the lake literally
Like Lopwell but with less meat
Not your average hotel stay.
Where on Garda are you? We were in Bardolino a few weeks ago. Hope the storm was typically short lived.
Manerba
Vegans and vegetarians outnumbered the lopwellians
Moving onto Lille for the second part of the trip and meeting up with my wife for the works party and meeting the grand fromage for the first time, he’s 6 ft 8 and similar wide , classic Canadian bear
An air hockey table has been drafted in for a Canada vs Europe tournament
Good morning, assembled minds of the slaughterhouse. I’m off to Portugal (Algarve) next week and wondered if anyone has reasonably recent experience of how cashless things are in that corner of the world? I will take some folding money obviously but was rather hoping not to have to take loads of it.
Pretty much everywhere takes cards/phone payments.
I used cash for tipping and for small purchases in small shops, so just like here.
If you are going to remote areas in might be different but they are well set up to part a tourist from their money!
Just posted this to my grandaughter who is traveling Europe.
Avoid “independent” ATMs, such as Euronet, Travelex, Moneybox, Cardpoint, and Cashzone. These cash machines are becoming more prevalent in Europe, popping up in many of the major tourist destinations.
These have extremely high fees and try to trick users with an outrageous exchange rate. It’s also common practice for these ATM’s to offer only large sums which try and force you to withdraw more than you need.
It’s probably too late for @Tons_of_fun this time, but I swear by my Caxton FX card
It’s basically a pre-pay card. So you can charge it up when you like (when the exchange rate is favourable), there’s a layer of abstraction between it and your main UK bank account, etc. etc.
And cash withdrawals in other countries are free, but that may not apply to the machines that charge everybody.
We were over there last September & rarely (if ever) needed to use cash. We use a Halifax Clarity card making sure that transactions (especially at ATMs) are made in Euros with Halifax taking care of the exchange at decent rates rather than fleecing us.
Whereabouts are you planning to be & how are you getting around?
Tavira and, to be honest, I’m not planning on moving around a great deal from there. I have a few days off and I’m going to bimble around the town, take the ferry to the beach and doss. If we feel like it, we might take the train back towards Faro but that’s a chunky, well rounded ‘if.’
Looks nice. We didn’t get East of Faro, spent the week either on beach or exploring West & North of Lagos.
I’ve never been but the ‘really not suitable for children’, ‘very quiet and relaxed’ and ‘limited clubs and nightlife’ spoke to me on a primal level.
I kinda love the assumption that we may be more advanced than the rest of the world
I’m forever haunted by just how astonishingly backward the Germans have been in particular when it comes to plastic not to ask.
I’ve never had any issues but YMMV.
I remember a night in Munich at a city centre restaurant a few years ago when we asked the restaurant to split the bill and allow everyone to make a payment, and it was the end of the world. They would only accept one payment on one card even though we were a group of 20 or so.
Those that didn’t have the cash on them were all running around to cash machines so we could chip in and pay the bill.
Bill splitting technology like Monzo use is very useful, but everyone in the group needs an account
Not reserved to Munich. Plenty of restaurants here won’t split large bills either.