1988.   My wife and I were married a year before and we took 2-3 weeks (don't remember) in Germany.   Only had a reservation for the first few nights and, from there, we winged it.   Most memorable was driving across East Germany and staying in East Berlin a year before the wall fell.   I remember it as magical.

4 minutes ago, OneMoreFarang said:

I am not really sooooo old. ????

I chose that picture for a reason. Because it represents (for me) the time before mobile phones became popular but not really old like the phone you show in your picture. I.e. around 1990 people still used those rotary phones and some like i.e. my parents, used it only for important calls like i.e. to a doctor. Chitchat was something people did in person and not on the phone.

Mobile smart phones are one of the reasons now is the best time ever to be living.

I can listen to music wherever I am, am never lost, not to mention, movies and communications.

3 minutes ago, BritManToo said:

Mobile smart phones is one of the reasons now is the best time ever to be living in.

I can listen to music wherever I am, and am never lost, not to mention, movies and communications.

Sure, smart phones have advantages. But I also listened to music a long time before those phones. And I used maps to make sure I don't get lost. And if I was not sure then I asked real people on the street to help me find the way.

When I think about the time when people on the streets, in vehicles and in restaurants actually looked at each other and not at tiny screens I definitely prefer those times.

 

9 minutes ago, tjintx said:

1988.   My wife and I were married a year before and we took 2-3 weeks (don't remember) in Germany.   Only had a reservation for the first few nights and, from there, we winged it.   Most memorable was driving across East Germany and staying in East Berlin a year before the war fell.   I remember it as magical.

You certainly had an exiting wife. Because East Berlin was far away from magical.

 

3 minutes ago, OneMoreFarang said:

Sure, smart phones have advantages. But I also listened to music a long time before those phones. And I used maps to make sure I don't get lost. And if I was not sure then I asked real people on the street to help me find the way.

When I think about the time when people on the streets, in vehicles and in restaurants actually looked at each other and not at tiny screens I definitely prefer those times.

I've always preferred to avoid other people, whenever possible.

As for maps, try using one when lost in the jungle, it doesn't work.

8 minutes ago, OneMoreFarang said:

And I used maps to make sure I don't get lost. And if I was not sure then I asked real people on the street to help me find the way.

Good luck with that in the Kingdom, maps fine, do love a map myself, enjoy the tangibilty and awkwardness of it on my lap in the car, really!! but asking on the street..................................... most Thais who don't know and invariably they don't or can't articulate how to, will send you anywhere so as not to lose face................

1966 and can I go to Redondo Beach as well ?

2010.

I would then spend every available baht I made on crypto (as it came on to the market). 

 

2 hours ago, BritManToo said:

I'd imagine it would be mainly boredom with the occasional bouts of extreme fear, illness and hardship thrown in. No music, no movies, no TV shows, no books, no women = no thanks.

And here I was thinking they had books and music back in the 1800's. Silly me. And no women either? Wow! I wonder how they reproduced?

21 minutes ago, BritManToo said:

I've always preferred to avoid other people, whenever possible.

As for maps, try using one when lost in the jungle, it doesn't work.

And do you think it's a good idea to rely on a smart phone in the jungle?

Personally I don't go to any jungle where I need help to get out again.

22 minutes ago, BritManToo said:

As for maps, try using one when lost in the jungle, it doesn't work.

Try getting a signal on your phone or a GPS under three canopy layers of thick jungle. That doesn't work either.

For me, maps give one that sense of adventure, even if is only a domestic trip, you can't beat an ordinance survey map in the UK in my opinion and even today, kids use them as part of the Duke and Edinburgh awards, but Sat navs/google maps etc, sure stick em on the dash for run of the mill stuff and research...........................and back to the thread proper.............................. I'd love to have experienced life in the first half of the 20th Century in Thailand if the Kingdom if any of the looped stills on the playlist in Mad Dogs in Chiang Mai   are anything to go by.......................................

4 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Indeed. I was always bemused by the young tourists that had to check in with mummy as soon as they arrived, especially the ones that spent the entire train trip from Swampy to city center on the phone and not looking at the view outside the train. One wonders why they bothered leaving home in the first place.

Used to be that we enjoyed not being in contact for a few weeks, other than by letters.

 

In the next war, will they be calling mummy from the battlefield?

Letters?  Letters?
I dint write any stinkin letters when I was in the war back in 1971!

March 15th 1977 (providing i had the memory) so i could avoid meeting and marrying a hoar of a first wife 

4 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Indeed. I was always bemused by the young tourists that had to check in with mummy as soon as they arrived, especially the ones that spent the entire train trip from Swampy to city center on the phone and not looking at the view outside the train. One wonders why they bothered leaving home in the first place.

Used to be that we enjoyed not being in contact for a few weeks, other than by letters.

 

In the next war, will they be calling mummy from the battlefield?

When I left home to travel in 1986 India, Napal, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, I left an Itinerary with my Dad and collected Post restante letters at all the cities from him. 

Anytime pre internet.  It heralded the death of adventure and the requirement to actually communicate with denizens or fellow travellers around an evening meal or drink.

21 hours ago, OneMoreFarang said:

Personally I think the arrival of telephones was not really a problem. I.e. when I was the first time on a holiday in Thailand I didn't call anybody - that was way too expensive. A postcard, which often arrived after the return, was enough. And nobody panicked because they didn't have any news from you for a couple of month.

There were, of course, evil people then, but I think it's much worse now and, yes, the cheap cost of communication created a monster.

Why in Satans name would you ask?

There's no such thing as a Time Machine /No time Tavel.

I'd go back to 2009... HaHa-55. I had a very good job, good money, traveled often enough and 'really' thought I could be there for 10-15 more years. ????

1 hour ago, brianthainess said:

When I left home to travel in 1986 India, Napal, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia, I left an Itinerary with my Dad and collected Post restante letters at all the cities from him. 

Ah yes , when 4 of us went overland , 15 countries in 15 weeks Post restante was always a good stop , 1970 , what a life changer. I still have here The Dorking Advertiser with our photo along with the '62 Bedford Dormobile on the front page.

57 minutes ago, digger70 said:

Why in Satans name would you ask?

There's no such thing as a Time Machine /No time Tavel.

Do you dream from time to time? Do you like it?

 

2 hours ago, ColeBOzbourne said:

Try getting a signal on your phone or a GPS under three canopy layers of thick jungle. That doesn't work either.

Works perfectly,

Didn't with the first GPS enabled phones, but for the last 5 years no problem at all.

2 hours ago, OneMoreFarang said:

And do you think it's a good idea to rely on a smart phone in the jungle?

Personally I don't go to any jungle where I need help to get out again.

A few years back I was trail running/MTBing in the mountains around Chiang Mai nearly every day.

The trails were always a little hard to follow with many choices.

It was always good to have phone mapping for the odd time I wasn't sure where I was.

AD1   Then I really could do what the Romans did!

2 hours ago, ColeBOzbourne said:

And here I was thinking they had books and music back in the 1800's. Silly me. And no women either? Wow! I wonder how they reproduced?

Sorry, I was talking about the suggested adventures on early 1800s sailing boats.

Can you imagine 3 weeks in open sea on a probably all male boat?

Hope you like weevils in your hard tack and salted beef.

 

Music and books were expensive luxury items in the early 1800s.

When listening to music, would you choose your cousin playing piano, or a full orchestra?

Piano's weren't cheap, and neither was a trip to the opera house.

 

So many people make foolish posts about the past without really thinking, the past was a dirty and dangerous place, lives were often short and brutal, I doubt many of us would last a week in the early 1800s without pleading to return to now.

When 'God' said "let there be light"

34 minutes ago, BritManToo said:

So many people make foolish posts about the past without really thinking

...while others get cranky and rude over a hypothetical question in a light-hearted thread that was meant to be entertaining.

3 minutes ago, ColeBOzbourne said:

...while others get cranky and rude over a hypothetical question in a light-hearted thread that was meant to be entertaining.

I'm not cranky or rude, just pointing out we've never had it so good.

The only thing that's worse today, is our aging bodies.

I think I'd like to go back to around 1967, when I was promoted to the first 11 football team in a senior division, and was getting paid for playing the sport that I loved.

 

I was fitter than ever, and in the off-season I enjoyed many parties and good times, but still kept up a training routine.

 

I was an electrical apprentice and loved my job, as I was learning new things all of the time..........don't think I have ever matched those times again, although the years I worked for American Express in New Zealand were also extremely exciting, but that's a different story and a different year and more!

2 hours ago, OneMoreFarang said:

Do you dream from time to time? Do you like it?

 

Nah ,Not Cr@p .