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More than 400 years old, this grape vine is reported to be the world's oldest.

This is the world’s oldest producing grape vine. Can you identify where it is located?

Hints:

  • in a European country
  • not in France or Italy
  • about 100 bottles of ceremonial wine are produced from it each year
  • it is the focus of the “Old Vine Festival”

Be the first to post your answer in comments.

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Is this a cruise ship that can fly?

Marina Bay Sands Singapore

Taking hotel swimming pools to a new level, a 200 meter high sky park with Olympic-sized infinity swimming pool opened on Thursday June 24 at the Marina Bay Sands Singapore.   This new landmark dominates the Singapore skyline and looks like a cruise ship in the sky, sitting on top of the three hotel towers of the Marina Bay Sands.

Guests swim in the sky at the Marina Bay Sands Singapore

Hotel guests  enjoy the view and the pool with their room.  Non-hotel guests can experience the view with a pre-purchased ticket for $20 Singapore dollars.

Back on ground level, Fuse serves cool martinis with live entertainment.  Shops abound.  Underground, the casino has more than 1600 slot machines and endless table games.  Visitors with an international passport get in free.  Singapore citizens and permanent residents have to pay $100 Singapore dollars to visit for 24 hours or $2000 Singapore dollars for annual casino privileges.

If you enjoy Vegas casinos, perhaps you should check this one out in Singapore.  It’s the second most expensive casino resort ever built.   Gambling aside, we’d stay here to hang out by the pool.

The Traveling Jones enjoy the view from the Sands Sky Park in Singapore.

What’s your favorite hotel pool?  Follow us on Twitter @TravelinJones

 
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This photo is a preview of this week’s destination discovery. Can you identify it?

Is this a cruise ship in the sky?

Hints:

  • opens to the public this Thursday, June 24th
  • 200 meters in the sky
  • designed by architect Moshe Safdie

Be the first to post your answer in comments.

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Earl Borgman enjoys exploring Sydney, Australia

Traveler Interview: Earl Borgman

 People enjoy traveling for a variety of reasons –to feed their curiosity, fill their need for adventure, or to meet other people. Both of Mrs. Jones parents enjoy traveling. In honor Father’s Day June 20, we interviewed her father, Earl Borgman:  farmer, community leader, and generally curious about the world.

Excluding time away for college and military service, Earl, 72, has lived in the same historic Victorian house on the family farm for his entire life. The farm – recognized in 2004 for a century in the Borgman family – is located between the small town of Wellington and the spot-in-the-road of Waterloo, Missouri about 40 miles east of Kansas City.

Whether exploring a city’s mass transit system, or driving cross country via the back roads or cruising on the Baltic Sea, Earl enjoys travel adventures.

Since he passed him love of exploration on to his daughter, we were curious to learn more about what stoked his passion for travel.  

The Jones: What inspires you to travel?

Earl:  Making “the great escape from every day”.  Travel provides an opportunity to expand my horizons and knowledge about our world.                 

Have you always enjoyed travel? What contributed to your love of travel?   

Earl: A trip to Idaho via the railroad in 1948. I was 10 years old.

What is your favorite destination?  Why?

Earl: A Baltic Sea Cruise: visiting nations that survived two world wars and more recently freed from communist rule.

What destination has surprised you the most, either good or bad

Earl: The Panama Canal: the quality of construction of nearly 100 years ago still functional and looking good, and how poor the country is today.

Why do you think that travel is important? 

Earl: Travel broadens one’s perspective of world cultures and values.

What “tip” have you learned from your travels that you’d share with others? 

Earl: Utilize your travel time and opportunity to greatest advantage…GO-GO-GO!

From your travels, do you have a practice or insight that makes your travel experiences more enjoyable?  

Earl: Always be open to initiating conversation with fellow travelers and/or staff or guides. Being one who enjoys “reaching out” to meet people and engage them in conversation seems to add so much enjoyment to travel….and makes one realize the world isn’t so large after all.

What do you enjoy about traveling?  Want to be featured in a future “traveler interview”?

Read More Traveler Interviews:                                 

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