Which Travel Destinations Should Be on Your Bucket List?

What's going on everybody. This is Island Hopper TV. And today we are going to talk about the very good news that has come out that if you travel internationally, when you reenter into the United States, you don't have to deal with testing requirements. So we're going to talk about that, but we're also going to talk about destinations that are open right now, heading into the latter part, the second half of 2022 for vaccinated and unvaccinated. I'm going to share with you the destinations that are at the top of my list. Assuming that you guys are not dealing with anything abnormal, then you should be able to travel, right? Especially if you've been waiting. And there's some places that have come up on the top of that list that I can recommend. So I'm going to first talk about open season for everyone. Places that have no restrictions, no matter your vaccination status, because that is what I think most people are really genuinely curious about because especially if they travel with groups, they might find one or two of their friends didn't go ahead and get the shot. So anyways, we'll talk about that first. Let's dive in here. Everyone who can see or watch this video right now, thanks to everyone who already liked it and comment in the comments. So I know you're out there and you can hear me loud and clear because we had an echo on the last one. Thank you to the three people who already hit the likes. This is St. John's. This is the Caribbean. Yes, the Caribbean is one of the places that I am recommending, but let's go ahead and talk about this first and foremost. So COVID-19 testing order rescinded the CDC order requiring persons to show a negative COVID-19 test or documentation of recovery from COVID-19 before boarding a flight to the United States is rescinded as of June 12th, 2022. So it is June 11th. That means that starting tomorrow, you guys coming back into the United States do not need a negative COVID test and that's big deal, especially for those of you who've traveled internationally. You know how big of a pain in the butt that really was. I know that when I went to Europe trying to get that shot at the air or trying to get that a test at the airport is just a pain in the butt coming back from Aruba, especially, uh, you know, just barely getting on the flight because it took so long for them to get the result. This is big news for people who travel internationally. Anyways, let's go ahead and dial this in. Uh, for those of you who are curious about Island Hopper TV, this is your first time here. We've got lots of videos for you guys to explore. Just walk around or check around the homepage. I just got back from Europe, but I'm getting ready to go again. Uh, looks like Canada and some other places are on my list. We'll see, uh, where I go after that, but maybe back to Europe. So I'm going to first dial this in here and talk about the list for non vaccinated. So if I just toggle this to the right, you can see a lot more green. Everything in the dark green are places you can go fully vaccinated without any requirements, no tests, no nothing, no quarantine. When you see something in the orange, like New Zealand, they require a test and a quarantine. You know, so people are like, boo, New Zealand. Although New Zealand is a great place, it's not going to be on this list because of that situation. No one wants to travel and then have to deal with all this riff raff, uh, when they get there. Right now, of course no one wants to get sick. I don't know a single person who's like, yeah, let's sign up to get sick. So people take their own necessary precautions of course. Uh, you know what I'm saying? So anyways, New Zealand, what's up man? Uh, Australia green, but if I toggle it to the left, it's in the purple or in the pink. So I'm not going to be able to put Australia, Canada, Brazil on this list. I love Australia, Canada, and Brazil, and they could easily be on this list, especially Australia and Canada, but they're not going to be on this list because they're purple, pink, whatever color you want to call that. Also Finland, uh, you know, they're also closed, but Hey, anyway, let's toggle it to the right and talk about these places. So the very first one that I'm going to recommend is Mexico. Mexico has been wide open this whole time and that really allowed me to get friendly with Mexico and explore all of the amazing places that Mexico has to offer. If you do choose to go to Mexico, I would recommend an arrival entry into Mexico at Guadalajara. You could go to Mexico city, you could go to Cancun, but you're going to deal with two to three hours of, uh, immigration processing, not the best place to do that. But if you do go to Guadalajara, you have Lake Chapala nearby. So Guadalajara entrance, you're in Mexico, then you can transit. You can go to Puerto Vallarta. It's also in Jalisco. I also recommend Baja California del Sur. And if you go all the way over to the Yucatan right here in Quintana Roo, you've got a Cancun, Playa del Carmen, Tulum, Cozumel. Mexico is a fun, awesome place to explore. The next one that I'm going to add to this list, uh, is going to be Costa Rica. I recently went down to Costa Rica and as I told you previously, we made a full on tour guide of Costa Rica that you guys can also check out. Uh, so just scrolled right down here, Central America, Costa Rica. You can look up Guatemala also, but we've got a few different travel guides for Costa Rica, El Salvador, et cetera. So do check those out. If you're taking my advice here and you plan on going over to Costa Rica. Now Costa Rica, it is a small country, but the roads are not the best. So it takes time getting around there. Some of the places that I do recommend checking out are going to be the Nicoya Peninsula. Uh, also this area around Capos, which is where Manuel Antonio is. And if you go over to the Caribbean side, I like Calita and I also like Porto Viejo, which is right here in the South near Panama, actually. So Costa Rica, Mexico, two places on the best destinations for travel in 2022. Let's move on to the next one. Now being that it's summer and they're wide open and there's no restriction. See if we just toggle back, no restrictions for the UK. That includes Ireland and Scotland. I'm going to say if you've thought about going to Scotland or Ireland, now might be a good time to consider those and add those up to the top of your list, especially with it being summer. So Scotland and Ireland wide open. Uh, England. Yeah, you could go to England, but, uh, I've been to England a couple of times. London is, uh, kind of chaotic, kind of chaotic. I like a little bit more peace and quiet. Dublin's awesome. Ireland's cool. Get a rental car, go around Scotland. Pretty cool place. I do say, I would say adding these two to your top of your list. Probably not a bad idea this time. Uh, right now when everything opens back up, these might not be your priorities, but they're open now. No problem. So shout out to Ireland and Scotland. Uh, next up is Turkey. Turkey is a destination that has been on my list for a long time and I know many places that are premier destinations here. You have Antal, Antal, oh my gosh, Antalya, uh, Antalya. Yeah, I think that's how you say it. Anyway, it's in the Southern part of Turkey. You'll see a lot of beaches around this area. Uh, so this is someplace you'll want to check out in the Southern part of Turkey on the Mediterranean, kind of connected to Cyprus. Okay. But if you go over here to Istanbul, this is a real premier city. This is a great historical place to check out. You have the East and the West, uh, of Istanbul, but this little water passageway that you have right here that pours into the black sea and connects to the Mediterranean. Really an interesting city of Istanbul, formerly known as Constantinople. So between those two places, I would say Turkey is definitely, uh, if you include Ankara in that, there's three towns you could check out. They obviously have Cappadocia, which is world famous for the balloons, but this whole area of Turkey, really an amazing place. And if you're over here, I would consider also including Greece or one or the other. I guess you could say that, but look at how many islands are right here. The thing is those are Greek islands. Some of them are Turkey, but most of those are actually Greek islands and these Greek islands are amazing. And Greece, no matter what your vaccination status, wide open, they don't have any restrictions to get in there. And now is a great time to get into Greece. That's just my opinion. Some people are going to agree. Some people are going to disagree. Um, someone says, do you have plans to visit Africa? Yes, I would like to get to Egypt. I would like to get to Morocco and South Africa and also Tanzania. So, uh, those are some places that are on my list for Africa. And then Mario says, what airline do you fly with? I like Delta. So I like the airline miles with one world airlines. And I also like United American airlines has some reasonable partnership airlines, but they don't do the rewards travel like Delta or United. So those are the two big ones. I would probably say that I stick with United is an okay airline in the United States, but outside of the United States with the one world Alliance or star Alliance, I should say, they actually have some of the best premier partner airlines. Next one I would add to the list. Now this one, it is open, but you have to do a test. No matter your status, you could see right here, Japan, Japan has finally opened and everyone's happy. It says most visitors from the United States, regardless of vaccination status need to provide a negative COVID-19 test result to enter Japan. But once you do that test, you're into Japan. And Japan is a very amazing place. You have Tokyo, you have Osaka, you have Kobe. So you have several of these big cities that you will want to check around and they have the bullet train for getting around there. Uh, typically when you'd go to Asia, you know, you would do Japan and then you would go to South Korea and then you might do Taiwan. But look at this. South Korea is difficult testing quarantine. Uh, so is Taiwan unfortunately. Uh, but you could do Vietnam, Thailand. Those look to be open. So Thailand obviously a great place to go. Uh, and Vietnam very affordable travel in Vietnam. If you're someone who's looking for affordable travel, you would definitely want to take a look at Vietnam. That's a place where your dollar just goes further by a long shot. Some people like to travel because they're budget travelers and Vietnam and Thailand are known for budget travel. But Vietnam really right now, Thailand has gotten actually more expensive. It's not terribly expensive. Hey, what's going on RC? And, um, so that's some places that I would consider taking a look at. And then the next one that I would say is a great time to consider going to, given the circumstances, India, India has come up on my list. Obviously I've always wanted to go to India. It's one of my, uh, premier destinations for food, uh, for culture, for, uh, just experience. Obviously there's a lot of interesting things that come from India, but it's 1.3 billion people there. So it's definitely a place to discover is one of those places you want to discover for the history. Like I said, for the food. Um, but India right now, unvaccinated travelers from the United States can enter India with a negative COVID-19 test. So you just got to do the test and then coming back, you don't have to do anything. But then if you're fully vaccinated, India is wide open. So there you go. So India probably a good time to consider going to India. If you've been putting it off, uh, another place that is on the list of places to check out Tanzania. So Tanzania, it says for unvaccinated, United States can enter Tanzania with a negative COVID-19 test. And then if you are fully vaccinated, you can enter into Tanzania without any restrictions. Now, why would you want to go to Tanzania? Well, they have Zanzibar, which is considered one of the most underrated, most beautiful tropical destinations in the world, but they also have very friendly people. It's generally considered safe and they have some of the best wildlife watching that you can find anywhere. So Tanzania is really a gateway to Africa and there's also Kenya right next door, but Tanzania seems to have it all, but it's the beaches right there, the friendly people. Uh, so do consider, uh, Tanzania right now. It's a great time to add that to your list. My friend is from Tanzania and it's such an amazingly beautiful place from the photos she showed me. Yes. Uh, my friend also who lives in France, she just recently got back from Tanzania and she said, Oh my gosh, you got to go to Zanzibar. She was, she was raving about Tanzania being a fantastic destination. The other places that you might want to consider if we zoom out here and we really dial it back out here, we have a, we'll go back to where can you go if you are not fully vaccinated? I'm an, I don't know your guys's situation, uh, but one place that everyone in anyone can get into. These are called the Balkans. The Balkans have become a very popular travel destination. This is going to include Crow. Uh, well you could include Slovenia in this, but for those of you who are friends or fans of Luka Donich, Luka Donich, yeah, that's his name. He's a basketball player for the Mavericks. You have Croatia, Slovenia, and then you have Bosnia, Herzegovina and you have Albania all the way down into Greece. Now this area is popular because it's affordable. It's up and coming. It's not one of those premier travel destinations that you can go to where everyone and their mom is trying to go over there right now. So if you go to Italy, for example, Italy is going to be much more crowded, much more hectic for travel. Italy's great, but if you just cross, I think this is what the Aegean is. This is the, no, this is the Adriatic Sea right here. If you just cross the Adriatic, you're right there and you've got some really amazing places around there that you can explore. Let's see if we can dial this in. Some of the islands around Croatia right here, right here, these islands. I flew over these islands when I was going from Venice to Santorini and I was like, one day I will go to Croatia. So this is called the Balkans, but been getting some really nice reviews. Um, Corliss says, did flight prices increase since the gas prices increased? Yes, I have noticed an increase in prices for flights and I've noticed an increase in Airbnbs and I've noticed an increase in hotels. That is why I am also putting those cheap destinations on there for affordability such as Mexico. You can still find affordable accommodation in Costa Rica. Also Turkey. Greece still has affordable accommodation. Vietnam, which we talked about before. Now if you're concerned about price and price really is an issue, you might overlook a United Kingdom and Ireland. Although I did talk about that, especially Ireland can be expensive. Surprisingly. I mean, it's kind of like, what the heck? Um, no, you don't need anything to get into the United States when you're coming back. You don't need a test, a negative test that starts tomorrow. So international travel is basically coming back online. Although we have a couple of things to pay attention to moving forward. But other places that I would say you can add to your list that I've really found to be interesting places are a United Arab Emirates, Dubai, but now it's not a good time in the summer. You'll probably want to wait until the fall. Same with Israel and Jordan. Jordan is really gotten amazing reviews from people who've been there. Another place that you might want to consider going if, uh, if you're interested and you got the deep pockets, this is a more expensive place. That's why I didn't mention it early. Switzerland. Switzerland is an amazing place, but most visitors from the United States, regardless of vaccination status can enter Switzerland. So no limitations. For some reason, the Netherlands is closed completely. Well, kind of completely other places that I would consider in the Caribbean. I know this is a lot of different places right now. At this point we've kind of gone over a lot, but some of the places that I've considered, uh, visiting here, Jamaica is on the list. I went to Dominican Republic recently. I went to Aruba. Um, down here they've got some other islands like Martinique that's open to just have to get a simple test. Uh, Turks and Caicos, the Bahamas, actually Turks and Caicos won't let you in unless you are vaccinated. So that's something. But Puerto Rico, very simple to get into Puerto Rico, although it's gotten expensive. So I would say just go to Dominican Republic, Dominican Republic's bigger, more options, not better food. I think Puerto Rico has better food. So we'll say, we'll say that about Puerto Rico. But I think Dominican Republic has better beaches just because there's so many options in Dominican Republic. If I could just zero this in here and show you exactly what I mean by that. Uh, you know, you have Punta Cana, but then you have Isla, uh, Isla Salwana probably the best Caribbean beach I've ever seen is right here on Isla Salwana. This one right here. Uh, is it that one? Um, yeah. And then they also have a beach that I did not go to, but it's in the North. So you have some beautiful beaches in the North right here. Let's see if I can find a Las Terrenas. They have some beaches around here. Uh, they're calling some of these the best in all the world. And so Dominican Republic definitely is a place to check out more affordable too. You get nice properties on the beach. Uh, good weather. Although right now we're coming into hurricane season. So keep that in mind. Thanks to the 12 people who hit the like button. Um, Mario says, have you ever done Costco travel before? No, I have not. I don't know much about it. I would say if I was to go outside of Marriott or Hilton or Hyatt, I would probably consider going with American express just because of the travel rewards. Someone said Belize is wide open. Yeah. I mean, Belize is definitely, I have not been to Belize, believe it or not. Uh, that is a place that's on my list. There's a couple of islands out here. I think they have Kai Cocker. I think I'm saying that correctly right here. That's a place I would like to check out. They have Belize city obviously. And then they have this, these little towns like San Pedro up and down here. Definitely a place to check out. I really enjoyed my time in Guatemala. I thought Guatemala was one of my favorite countries I've ever been to. Completely honest with you. I also enjoyed my time in El Salvador, El Salvador and Guatemala, both underrated travel destinations, but Guatemala in particular really stood out. I found the Mayan people to be very friendly, uh, peaceful, and interesting to learn from. You can learn a lot from the Mayans. So Guatemala was like one of the most culturally rich indigenous experiences I've ever had in the Americas. And there's quite, that's saying a lot, considering there's the Incas, there's Guatemala, or there's the Mayans, and then there's the Aztecs. And then North America has several different indigenous tribes that you can learn from also. So that's really cool about Guatemala, but glad to hear that, um, Belize is wide open. So anyways, let me know what you guys think are the best destinations given the current situation. Uh, South America right now, I guess if I was to say anything about South America, the places that come up for me, Ecuador. But when I, if I were to go to Ecuador, I would want to go to the Galapagos islands. So this is a place that at some point in time I'm going to have to get my happy bud over there to the Galapagos, but you could see one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, nine big islands. That doesn't include the small ones of the Galapagos. But for those of you who know anything about travel, the Galapagos islands are amazing. And in order to get there, you have to go through, uh, Ecuador. So most people I think go to Guayaquil or Quito and then they fly to the Galapagos. Uh, if I was to go to that side of the country or that side of the world, again, I would probably go to Peru. And then from Peru, I would definitely want to check out Cusco, which puts me in close proximity to Machu Picchu. But around here you have a few different towns like Arequipa, but Cusco. I mean, they're kind of spread out. Actually. I did go to Lima. Lima is okay, but Lima is more of a 24 to 48 hours. The best thing to do when you get to Lima is leave Lima. It's like one of those type of, it's nothing against Lima. It's just, it's just a city on the ocean. It's not like Cusco or Arequipa where it's going to like really kind of wow you. Um, Lima, it's like, you know, you go see the beach and you're like, Hey, there's a beach. And then you're like, well, let's go to the Andes. That's really what I would say. And then there's obviously Lake Titicaca for any of those who want to go, uh, have fun with the word of a, of a lake. Lake Titicaca has got you covered. That's that they actually share a border with Bolivia, but it's high altitude kind of desert. Um, and it's the Andes. I mean, on one side of the Andes is desert. The other side of the Andes is the Amazon. You know, so some really cool stuff to consider about that. Anyways, guys, thanks for watching and we will see you on the next one.