EPISODE 010: CRUISES VS ALL-INCLUSIVE RESORTS

DRINK INFORMATION

Every episode we drink a different libation – so what are we drinking this episode?

Tom’s Drink – Craigellachie, 13 Years Old (By Dewar’s)

– An unpeated Scotch with a fruity nose

Ian’s Drink – “Beesness Time” (Flight of the Conchords Reference)

– Another one of Ian’s own concoctions. Half a teaspoon of fresh honey, one ounce of vodka, and 4-5 ounces of unsweetened lemon wine

TRANSCRIPT:

Ian Robertson
Hey Tom, that was a that was a little bit awkward. I spent 15 minutes in the wrong studio wondering where you were.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah. And I was being patient, I was gonna send you a chat saying, Hey, I thought we planned at this time and you weren’t there. That’s what you have too much going on to have two podcasting studios and you were in the wrong one.

Ian Robertson
Well, I’m just I’m just sitting there awkwardly just okay. I was thinking the same thing about you. I’m like, this isn’t like Tom to be late, like he’d send a message or something. But here we are, awkwardness and all.

Tom Kubiak
I’m glad you, I’m glad you sent me a message. Because otherwise we would have we would have both been twiddling our thumbs for two hours.

Ian Robertson
Both of us are too awkward or polite to actually send a message, Dude, where are you?

Tom Kubiak
Exactly.

Ian Robertson
Darn these social constructs of our modern society.

Tom Kubiak
How was your week?

Ian Robertson
Oh, it’s good. I’m celebrating.

Tom Kubiak
You’re celebrating what?

Ian Robertson
I am celebrating my first honey pull of the year.

Tom Kubiak
Oh, you know, you were telling me that you that you pulled some honey because you got a Flow Hive.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. And we were trying to decide if we should do like a whole podcast episode on it just because I was super excited about it. Yeah, it’s not a whole episodes worth. But I tell you what, I’m never going and everybody who listens who does bees is going to be like, How dare you, Sacrilege!

Tom Kubiak
I know. It is sacrilegious in the beekeeper community.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, but I’ll never go back. Really, I will never go I walked out to my hive. I didn’t have to take the super off. I didn’t have to bother my bees and crush them as I’m moving stuff. And okay, I opened the front stuck in a tube and honey came out.

Tom Kubiak
That is pretty appealing.

Ian Robertson
And then I turned it off. And I went inside with like two gallons of honey and the bees right back to work.

Tom Kubiak
And they and they start back. They refill the the frames.

Ian Robertson
Yep, it saves them work because they don’t need to build out any wax in the combs. Because the shape is already there. So they just fill it. Yeah. And so you just go out there and collect honey.

Tom Kubiak
Wow.

Ian Robertson
And it doesn’t bother the bees. Like it has a minimal kill rate to almost none, if any. Because basically you’re just shifting it with a little gear and all the honey comes out. There’s no mess. There’s no cleanup. I saved bees lives. They weren’t bothered by me. I stood there the whole time. There are some disadvantages, a little bit slow.

Tom Kubiak
How long did it take to pull that honey out?

Ian Robertson
It was probably a good 40 minutes.

Tom Kubiak
Okay. But I mean, considering if you were to pull out, you know, honey frames and run them through an extractor you’re talking about a whole afternoon’s worth of work and clean up and everything.

Ian Robertson
Oh, yeah. No, it was a huge time saver. But in celebration of that, I made myself a cocktail, which I don’t usually do.

Tom Kubiak
A bee’s knees?

Ian Robertson
No, actually, I don’t know what that is. But that sounds awesome.

Tom Kubiak
It is good.

Ian Robertson
This is, I call it Beesness time. If anybody has listened to Flight of the Conchords from the 90s it’s Beesness time.

Tom Kubiak
What is in your Beesness time?

Ian Robertson
You just like saying it, down to Beesness It has honey in it, just a little bit of honey. It has unsweetened lemon wine. Okay. Which again, very, very redneck. I just use it for stuff. I don’t know. I just made it one day, and then a little bit of vodka. And it’s delightful.

Tom Kubiak
Oh it sounds good actually.

Ian Robertson
Yeah it is delightful. It’s better if you shake it. I have ice in it tonight. But if you shake it, the honey gives it gives it this really cool foam at the top.

Tom Kubiak
Okay cool. Yeah, very cool. What kind of vodka are you using?

Ian Robertson
Whatever was on the counter. I am not a vodka connoisseur, because I’m going to be honest with you. I have seen people do vodka tastings, and I’ve hung out with Russians and they’re like this vodka is amazing. And I’m like, that tastes like alcohol. And this tastes like alcohol. Because they’re both potatoes.

Tom Kubiak
Or grain. Yeah.

Ian Robertson
And they’re both clear, or grain. Yeah, I’m like, just I don’t know, unless it’s like once or twice distilled and there’s like a distillation thing it all tastes the same to me.

Tom Kubiak
There are some I think we may even talk about this because I know we want to do an episode on alcohol making alcohol but there are some higher end vodkas, not even higher end, good quality vodkas that that you would notice the difference if you especially if it comes straight from the freezer, if you take a bottle of you know, crap alcohol and and take it out of the freezer and tried to try tasting it, you’ll you’ll notice it’s not it’s not good. But then if you do the same thing with Grey Goose or with Belvedere or something that’s higher, you’ll notice it’s better.

Ian Robertson
So I can I guess I can see that I thought the freezer would have made so you taste less of the of the actual material.

Tom Kubiak
No, the, well and actually, I think one of the goals of vodka. This is off our topic, definitely. But one of the goals of vodka is tastelessness, like you don’t want it to have tastes, but it still has a mouthfeel. And it’s still, it does in some cases, especially if they don’t distill it too many times it will retain some of the original elements of the whatever the you know, mash was that they used to do it, but you know, you’re more an expert on that than I am.

Ian Robertson
Well no, I mean, did I ever tell you about the once distilled vodka I got?

Tom Kubiak
No.

Ian Robertson
Some Russian friends of mine, they’re like, you’ll need to try this. And so I’m like, okay, it tasted..

Tom Kubiak
Did they make it in the bathtub? Or is it actually?

Ian Robertson
No, it was in a bottle like you buy it at the store. And even the guys like you Sure. I’m like, I guess I don’t know now. But it tasted terrible, because it was only once distilled. Yeah. So I kept it in my freezer. And this young couple came over, and I’m like, Hey, I’m gonna make you a drink. And I called it. I called it the chaperone. We pour vodka. And this is how Russians would actually drink it like old school ones. You pour a little bit of vodka in a shot glass. You pour some pepper on top.

Tom Kubiak
Oh, yeah.

Ian Robertson
And then you give them a big clove of garlic.

Tom Kubiak
Or a pickle, some people do pickles.

Ian Robertson
A pickle. Yeah. But the garlic added the, I wanted to call it the chaperone. Because nobody’s kissing nobody after this one.

Tom Kubiak
Usually, there’s gonna be at least a chair between you.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, exactly. There’s a lot of room in between them at that point. But he throws this huge clove of garlic. I gave him like, the biggest clove of garlic in the universe. And then he downs it. And that vodka was nasty. I thought he was gonna throw up.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, once distilled.

Ian Robertson
Of course, I challenged his manliness, you know, in front of his woman.

Tom Kubiak
Oh yeah that’s the thing. He has to drink it once you put it on the table.

Ian Robertson
It was gross.

Tom Kubiak
So, I’m excited to come, I gotta get over and check out your, your flow high. Because I’m wondering what’s going to happen to the area where the honey came out, like with crystallization or with? You know, is that going to be a problem?

Ian Robertson
So I wondered the same thing. And I have some friends who have the Flow Hive. And basically, as long as you keep it warm it shouldn’t crystallize and the bees keep it naturally warm. Okay. Where you run into an issue is when you take the Flow Hive off to put a regular super on for the winter.

Tom Kubiak
Oh, okay. Yeah.

Ian Robertson
And then it hardens in there. And there’s not much you can do after that, besides raise the temperature up to 95 degrees somehow. Let it sit there for a couple days. And then Honey will flow again.

Tom Kubiak
You know, put it in like a some kind of heating bath or something like that.

Ian Robertson
Yeah. And you don’t want to do that.

Tom Kubiak
How would you even do that?

Ian Robertson
You have to pull it right off the hive.

Tom Kubiak
Okay. Yeah.

Ian Robertson
Because the bees keep it warm. But, but there’s my excitement. We’re actually going to be talking not about this today. But we’re going to be talking about the advantages or disadvantages of going on an all inclusive vacation or on a cruise. Yeah, a lot of people don’t like that. But before we get into that, I just want to mention that we’re not going to talk about flow hives tonight. But what are you drinking? I can see it on your desk behind you.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, So I’m drinking a new Scotch I just bought today actually, Craigellachie, which is a 13 year old and it’s it’s actually part of the the Dewar’s family. So if you if you’ve ever heard a Dewar scotch, which is a blended scotch, this is one of the scotches that goes into their, into their mix, which I didn’t know when I bought it. But the reason I found it, I searched it out and bought a bottle was because it won the top place in the Scotch competition for 2023. And I just read an article about it. It’s one of the things that shows up in my in my news feed because I do I try to keep up on different scotches and because this one won, and it’s a relatively low price point, in fact, I got it for $44. So it’s a.

Ian Robertson
Are you serious?

Tom Kubiak
It’s a pretty it’s a pretty low. Yeah, pretty low price. So since it won..

Ian Robertson
For 750 ml?

Tom Kubiak
No, it’s really 750. Yeah, 750.

Ian Robertson
And it won?

Tom Kubiak
It won, yeah, placed first place in the in the world Scotch competition whiskey competition. So I’m kind of excited about it. So I poured myself a glass. I’m going to try it right now. And they did say it has in the tasting notes I read on it, it said pineapple, and I do get some of those tropical fruits in the nose. It’s got a syrupy mouthfeel which is is good actually.

Ian Robertson
Really?

Tom Kubiak
It’s pretty good. I like it. Yeah. In fact, another interesting thing about the Scotch is they they take barrels of the scotch, they break them up into two parts and they cask them differently, like one with bourbon and one with with oak, I think maybe bourbon barrels and then another and then they put them, or maybe Sherry, bourbon and Sherry. And then they combine the two back together again to make the final product. So it’s kind of a neat bottling finish 13 year which is another interesting thing. Normally they’re 12, 14, 16. This is a 13. So it’s pretty good.

Ian Robertson
So is it peaty at all, because I know you don’t like the peat.

Tom Kubiak
Nope, it’s the Speyside, Not peaty. It’s a little astringent. So I’m getting the, you know, the alcohol on the back of the tongue, but it’s not bad. Okay, I don’t know if I’m gonna make it my daily drinker, but I wanted to try it.

Ian Robertson
For $44 for 750 ml.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, for something that’s not, that’s a single malt and that actually has won some awards. And actually where, where I was looking. So there’s a pretty good size liquor store that has a really good selection in Albany and they actually on their website, they identify that they had it and where it where it is in the store because it’s not always easy to find. But they rated it their rating, which is linked to might be whiskey advocate was 98 points. That’s really high for a Scotch so yeah, I’d say. I don’t know if it’s 98 for me, but it’s it’s pretty good.

Ian Robertson
I’m gonna have to check that out. Yeah, I’m gonna have to Yeah, I have to get a bottle of that now.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, especially if you have somebody who likes scotch and they see it. It’s not a common Scotch you know, it’s not something that that that everybody would even know about.

Ian Robertson
Interesting. Well, thank you. That’s the that’s the most Ian bottle of scotch that you’ve you’ve had yet.

Tom Kubiak
That’s true.

Ian Robertson
Nice.

Tom Kubiak
I tracked it down.

Ian Robertson
At a at a liquor store connected to a sanitation company like me.

Tom Kubiak
Forgot about that liquor store.

Ian Robertson
I want to go back now.

Tom Kubiak
I gotta find it. I gotta find, come with you sometime.

Ian Robertson
Just go in there and stand there. It’s like the liquor version of deliverance.

Tom Kubiak
All inclusives or cruises. Which one are you?

Ian Robertson
So here’s the thing. We wanted to talk about this tonight. A lot of people don’t like either. A lot of people like to adventure. Like, I mean, you you’ve done both of those things, but you’re a camper guy now. Like to go out and camper and go into the woods. You know, a lot of people don’t like them. But if you’re gonna do one or the other, here’s the thing. I’ve never done an all inclusive. I don’t know what it’s like.

Tom Kubiak
Oh, we gotta get you to do an all inclusive with us, then you can compare.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, I guess I have preconceived ideas about it. Maybe you could help me with those. Okay, so here’s what I like about a cruise. I have a hotel that brings me places and has alcohol right there for me and shows. And then when I go to the place, I go to the place and I get back in my floating hotel and leave. That’s what I like about it.

Tom Kubiak
I would also say you are active vacationers. So you like to do things on vacation. You’d like to go places and see things.

Ian Robertson
I don’t like to vacation. I only go because my wife likes it.

Tom Kubiak
Well, your family does, your family drags you along with them.

Ian Robertson
I love my family. And for some reason, they want to bring me places that make me unhappy, which is anywhere but anywhere but my house. Like hey, you want to go on vacation? No. I’m like..

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, cuz because when you send us pictures, or even when we’ve been with you on vacation, we’re we’re doing things like we’re going places we’ve we line up things to do. And I think you know, my wife and I, we we used to be that way. But I think more now we are when we’re on vacation, we want to just not have to do anything like and just sit by the beach or sit by the pool. And, and so for us, so we’ve done lots of both. And when we first got married up until probably about, I’d say maybe five, six years ago, pre pandemic, we were cruising, you know, all the time. Yeah. And we did a lot of them, including with you guys. Yeah, we did a bunch. But since then we’ve switched to to all inclusive and we probably won’t go back.

Ian Robertson
So tell me why. Why did you go all inclusive? So first of all, if you haven’t done a cruise or an all inclusive, if you’re listening to this, a lot of people think well, it’s out of my price range, or this or that, when you add up the cost of the vacation.

Tom Kubiak
Agreed.

Ian Robertson
So I did the math one time if I wanted to go to Maine, which is about four hours from me, hotel, food, and pretty much nothing to do except maybe some free stuff. It actually ended up being more expensive than if we went on a cruise for that week. Yeah, it was pretty amazing. The price point is, and I imagine it’s the same for all inclusive.

Tom Kubiak
I think depending on the All Inclusive you choose. Yes, definitely.

Ian Robertson
Well, it obviously depends, I mean, if you’re going to go on a high end cruise and yeah. $20,000 week for you and one other person that’s not going to add up. But for the most part, a decent Cruise is a good value. I mean, there’s some disadvantages. Like there’s other people on the boat. That’s always a problem.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, yeah, true. Yeah. And on the sea days, well so we should start off by saying you know, you have for someone who has not been on a cruise, you have a lot of options on on a cruise, so you you have the option of you know what type of room you’re going to choose, where on the boat you want that room to be. When you’re in ports, you have the choice of doing nothing and just taking a taxi to the beach or something like that or walking around the shopping areas which usually are pretty close to the cruise port, or you have the choice of doing you know, some of the excursions so you can really have a vacation where you do little, you know, you just sit by the pool or go to the beach when you’re in a in a port or you do a lot, you’re running constantly. And and as you mentioned previously, you know on cruises there are shows, there are buffets, there are napkin folding instructions, there are our karaoke nights. You know, there’s always something to do even at midnight. There’s something to do on a cruise ship.

Ian Robertson
I will say. So we went on a cruise pre pandemic to Alaska. And I’ve been a lot of places. And that was my one of two vacations that actually in my lifetime said I would do that again. I like that. Again, I’m not a vacationer.

Tom Kubiak
I’ve heard other people say the same thing about Alaska.

Ian Robertson
I’m a weirdo. But yeah, but it’s amazing. The group of people that were on the boat was an older crowd, there was no rambunctiousness, there was no rudeness. It was really, really nice. The last vacation we went on was to the UK. And my wife has always wanted to see some of these areas we did. Scotland, Ireland, England, and it was amazing. But the group of people on the boat were completely different than the other group.

Tom Kubiak
Really, in what way?

Ian Robertson
So one lady was pushing somebody out of the way to get up the stairs to be the first on the bus.

Tom Kubiak
Wow.

Ian Robertson
And then there was like a mob of people she was pushing people in and she got pushed fell down the stairs. People are like, yeah, oh, man. I think it’s a pandemic changed people maybe a little bit like.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, it could be. That could be.

Ian Robertson
I don’t know, but we’ve been on cruises before and even like the party cruises, like you go down to the Caribbean, you kind of have to plan on a bunch of 20 Somethings partying at three o’clock in the morning. And you’re gonna see vomit somewhere. It’s just, it is what it is. You know, if you go to Alaska, UK, you know, you go to like one of those African cruises. You’re gonna have a more mild crowd of people usually a little bit older, the people there were just really, really stressed.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah. And your point about the pandemic changing people I think is accurate because look at what we’ve seen happen to airline flights, with people just becoming unreasonable and yelling at other guests. Or the stewardesses and the steward, it’s like that.

Ian Robertson
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, you can’t call them stewardesses.

Tom Kubiak
What are they called?

Ian Robertson
Listen, Austin Powers. attendants are flight attendants.

Tom Kubiak
Flight attendants, flight attendants. There you go.

Ian Robertson
Tom’s like that, that stewardess wouldn’t bring me my cigar or my whiskey.

Tom Kubiak
Just hand me my meal. Don’t look directly at me.

Ian Robertson
That girl’s husband better get on top of that to get her in line.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, no, I think the way people react is just it’s it’s unfortunate but it the people have changed. The pandemic has not brought out the best in humankind.

Ian Robertson
No. And maybe it’s not directly related to that. I just noticed..

Tom Kubiak
I think it’s an it’s an accelerant, it was an accelerant.

Ian Robertson
Accelerant, yeah, I think that’s a good description, an accelerant because it was of same kind of crowd but just totally different. Like my my daughter’s a young girl. Some lady pushed her out of the way to grab the last piece of bread and I didn’t I know I don’t go to the buffet on the boats, I hate buffets. I have a moral. I don’t like buffets. I just, it’s not my thing. It bothers me. But then it’s like there’s more food. And as she pushes my daughter out of the way grabs the last piece of bread and practically runs away. Here comes a guy. Oh, here’s some more bread. Yeah, yeah. It’s like it was weird. There was an elderly lady there stomping her foot because there was a line and I’m like, it’s a cruise ship. There’s there’s other people here and she’s like, Yeah, throwing a fit, it was weird. People are shoving each other getting getting hurt. The crew staff had to like calm people down. Wow. Like before that I’m like there was more people on the other boat and it was a lot calmer.

Tom Kubiak
Well, I think that that’s one of the considerations that has motivated us to stay away from cruising the past few years you know, because once the pandemic you know, got to the midpoint maybe and we started to travel again a little bit we talked we’ve talked about you know, should we go on a cruise because we did when we were younger we really liked going on cruises. Like we’d like the fact that you can go to multiple islands you know we’d like the the attention that you get on a cruise and and we also like the price point of cruises because they for as you mentioned before you can’t travel for the cost of what you can travel on a cruise. And where we live we can catch a bus down to New York City and get right on the cruise ship and so there’s no airline involved which also is appealing. But yeah, now it’s it’s different than that. As far as that’s concerned how people react you know, you don’t We don’t want to we don’t choose to be confined with 3000 people the way you used to be in the past. And also what we’ve heard is a lot of people who come back from cruisers end up sick and so we’ve seen, I can’t remember did that happen with you guys with England?

Ian Robertson
We’ve never gotten sick. No.

Tom Kubiak
Okay, good.

Ian Robertson
Never did.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, but a lot of other people, like with a reasonably high rate people end up getting sick after after cruises.

Ian Robertson
You want to know why? Because people are gross.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, people are gross.

Ian Robertson
So I’m a hypochondriac. Like I’m pretty sure I used all of the hand sanitizer on that ship.

Tom Kubiak
Remember, we were on that one cruise, the Washee Washee.

Ian Robertson
Washee Washee they still say that on Norwegian Cruise Lines, so we traveled Norwegian for the most part. I don’t. And if you look at the I have another point here too. If you look at Norwegian stocks, you’ll look at carnival stocks and a couple of others. There’s some stuff going on. There’s some reasons for some of the other stuff that we’ll talk about. But you go to the bathroom, nobody’s washing their hands. Yeah, everybody’s coughing, open mouth. There’s one guy sitting in front of me on the bus on the tour. He goes, says to his wife, I’m so sick. She goes, I’m feeling better. Oh, and He’s coughing open mouth, and he lays his seat back into my lap, basically. So my face is right next to his face. And he’s trying not to make eye contact. So I made very extensive, very deep eye contact.

Tom Kubiak
You stared him down.

Ian Robertson
And I just stared, because he’s like coughing, He’s coughing, and he’s sweating. And other people on their bus are like moving to other parts of the bus. So it’s just him and his wife, and him laying in my lap, because I can’t get up. And then this other lady, we’re going to go eat, and She coughs all over the back of my head. And I looked back at her. I didn’t say anything. But I looked back at her and she just kind of laughs and moves on. Yeah, my head.

Tom Kubiak
And that’s like.

Ian Robertson
That’s disgusting.

Tom Kubiak
That’s exactly why and you’re confined space. You’re touching handrails that 3000 other people have touched your..

Ian Robertson
They hadn’t washed after they went to the bathroom.

Tom Kubiak
Exactly. Yeah. So I think the, the, you know, the potential to get sick on a cruise is so much higher than than any other type of vacation right now. So that’s kind of what motivated us to say we’re going to stick for at least for the temporary time with all inclusives. But as we mentioned, it’s it’s hard to deny that cruises are good value. Especially if you if you buy them, right. So if you if you work, if you do your homework, and you compare prices, and you don’t just, you know pay the rack rate, you can get really good deals on on cruises that make that vacation very worth it.

Ian Robertson
But here’s a couple of things. So first of all, I’ve always had the best prices with cruises.com. So what I’ll do is I’ll..

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, cruises.com. We’ve used them too, very good. If they want to send us a free cruise. We’re totally open to it.

Ian Robertson
All right, cool. Well, no, maybe they’ll send you a free all inclusive.

Tom Kubiak
That’s true.

Ian Robertson
But I’ve always gone to cruises.com. And then I’ll call a couple of travel agents, and then I’ll try a couple other websites. And I just kind of stopped because every time I remember this one travel agents that I can’t I can’t get that cruise for me for that price. Yeah. And I get discounts. So we kind of went with them. But you know, the problem is, they’re trying to provide those, you use the term value value means okay, something may cost more, but it gives you a greater, a greater advantage or something better. So I found that the value isn’t isn’t there, they’re trying to keep the price the same. And even then people are still complaining about the prices, the quality has gone way down. They didn’t have enough staff to clean the rooms. They, I actually did a little. So how do I say this? I didn’t do a little experiment. But I found out that they were watering down the alcohol, which I’m okay with. Because you know what, you don’t want to have a bunch of drunk people there. But okay, so now I can only have two ounces at a time. So I have to sit there and drink my watered down two ounces, I can tell that it’s watered down. And there’s ways you can tell. Yeah, well, I mean, besides the obvious, but there’s other ways you can tell. I’m like they watered down the alcohol. And just it just wasn’t the same. Like I’m like I would have I would have paid more for higher to have higher quality food, a better drink, a better show, enough staff to clean the room. There was food on the floor all over and I’m just kind of like..

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, even last cruise we were on the there were, there were plates of food in the hallways for hours at a time. Like they never came and picked them up. So and I agree with you. Like I said, even before the pandemic, when we were going on cruises, we were noticing the quality going down. It’s funny because your first few cruises, you’re so impressed, you’re like this is so awesome. The food is great, like, and then as time goes on, you start to see the food is really not that good. It’s it’s made cheaply. Buffets are, are not that good. So anything that is going to be good, you have to pay extra for. So that’s where a lot of times those cruise lines get you is they have specialty restaurants where you’re charged an extra fee to go to them and there you get a decent meal. So I think you know, it’s still it’s it’s a good idea to try and it’s it’s a way to get into a vacation at a reasonable cost. But for us we like I said we transitioned to all inclusives and we have been very happy with that.

Ian Robertson
So tell me about that. Because I picture my.. Here’s what holds me back. We go to one spot. Yes. And I also read the news way too much. And there’s people dying at those places and..

Tom Kubiak
Once a while but it’s Yeah, I mean, maybe..

Ian Robertson
People you don’t know. So it doesn’t matter..

Tom Kubiak
Two or three bodies carried out per week. Like, it’s it’s not that bad. Not bad, maybe 2%. Okay, 2% chance of dying.

Ian Robertson
Yeah I can take that. So but then you’re just in one spot, is there enough to do around?

Tom Kubiak
So that’s a great question. And I think that has to do with the different style of vacationing that my wife and I have chose to do from this point forward. So there is less to do. So in even in the large, all inclusive resorts, which may have 1000 or more rooms, they do generally have a nightly show, there’s going to be activities during the day, there’s going to be a pool party, there’s going to be stuff like that, but it’s nowhere near what’s happening on a cruise, especially when you’re talking about port days where you are in the port and you can go on excursions and do things. It’s not like that. It’s just it’s more designed for laying around the pool or laying on the beach. There are watersports, you can rent a jetski, you can go you know, surf boarding or whatever, or wakeboarding or other different things on the beach. And a lot of times those things are included in the price of the all inclusive, but it’s generally more relaxation of vacation.

Ian Robertson
So this all sounds horrible. So..

Tom Kubiak
For you!

Ian Robertson
What’s the appeal of it?

Tom Kubiak
The appeal is laying on the beach and doing nothing. I know that’s not what you would choose to do. But that’s it. That is like the perfect vacation for for my wife and I, we bring a few books, we read, and we sit at the beach or sit at the pool and swim, my wife just loves being in the water. So she would literally go in the water at 9:30 in the morning and come out at four o’clock in the afternoon, like that, she’ll stay in there all day long if she possibly can.

Ian Robertson
She’ll be in the hospital with hydration issues later on. No and I do tease I know that a lot of people like that, like if you look at people’s social media feeds, that’s 90% of people’s vacations. Yeah, they’re like I’m sitting in a different spot with more sun. You know, I get I get that you know, you have some palm trees you’re looking around. There’s some ocean, you guys love reading, don’t you? Don’t you plow through like a bunch of books?

Tom Kubiak
I bring. Yeah, I have a Kindle. So I load my Kindle with all the books and I don’t generally read you know, fiction when I’m not on vacation. So I usually load up all the books that I’ve wanted to read or and I’m also on a biography kick. So I generally try to bring a biography or two and it’s just the perfect time. I love it.

Ian Robertson
Did I tell you that I’m writing a biography?

Tom Kubiak
You’re writing a biography?

Ian Robertson
Yeah, I’m writing an autobiography.

Tom Kubiak
Really? About you?

Ian Robertson
Well, yeah, that’s what an autobiography is about. Right? Do you want to know the title?

Tom Kubiak
I do.

Ian Robertson
I tried. Just gonna be a picture of me.

Tom Kubiak
I thought you were gonna say, Somehow I manage.

Ian Robertson
No, no, no, no, that would have been good too. But I’m just gonna it’s just gonna be, I tried and just me shrugging on the cover.

Tom Kubiak
That’s hilarious.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, it’s gonna be a very boring autobiography. I was born like any other human, naked, and I slept on my back.

Tom Kubiak
Chapter one. Too much information.

Ian Robertson
So if someone’s listening and they’re like, Alright, cool. Sitting on the beach, reading Ian’s autobiography sounds amazing. Like, what? It’s not like there’s, I mean, maybe there is, is there an allinclusive.com that they go to like cruises.com?

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, so well. That’s a good question. So there are a couple of websites that focus on that type of vacation. And when we were looking for different resorts, we found one, it’s called cheapcaribbean.com. And so on cheapcaribbean.com They have, doesn’t sound like one that I would use. But..

Ian Robertson
Don’t google it. Yeah.

Tom Kubiak
It’s a great, it’s like a consolidator, similar to cruises.com. So it has a list of all the resorts all over the place, you identify the area you want to go to, and then it will list the resorts in that area, but you know, and rank them by guest rating or quality of the hotel. So then what I would do is after I’ve identified the area that I want to go to, and maybe three or four of the resorts, then we typically would go to TripAdvisor and start reading reviews about them. And we typically look for a smaller all inclusive because we really don’t want to do anything we just we really don’t want the shows, we don’t, aren’t looking for the activities. We’re looking for a place to sit by the beach and some, a really good rating regarding the attention that the staff shows you. And so we found a couple of resorts that are that are really good. They tend to be small, but one that we’d like the best is called the Beloved. It’s a boutique hotel resort that’s owned by the Excellence Group which they have larger resorts, but this one just happens to be A small 100 room on the beach, a little bit north of Cancun and very, very quiet. So basically you, the staff learns your name as soon as you’re there, so everybody there knows you and says hello to you when you walk by. It’s a very high staff to guest ratio. So you know, you see the same people every day you know them if you go back they remember you. It’s really really a nice place.

Ian Robertson
You’re still not selling it to me, like..

Tom Kubiak
I love it.

Ian Robertson
There’s this place down the road from me that I used to go get sandwiches from and then they learned my name and I am like I can’t come here now.

Tom Kubiak
You want anonymity.

Ian Robertson
I haven’t been there in four years and every once in a while they’ll have like a special, I’m like oh that looks good. Too bad they know my name. That’s not a joke. I’m like that sounds terrible.

Tom Kubiak
I want, I mean don’t you, what about Cheers? You want everybody to know your name.

Ian Robertson
I’d be the guy that opens the door looks in and then walks right back out in the first episode. Nah, I’m good.

Tom Kubiak
No, sorry Norm.

Ian Robertson
I don’t want to know Norm’s name. That looked like hell. That was terrible.

Tom Kubiak
No, I love it. Like to me You show up, like this resort. We’ve been probably been there five times I think and we we show up, the tax, the they have a like a car that drives you back and forth to the airport. So we get to the resort. They’re taking our bags out and the the bellhop goes Mr. and Mrs. Kubiak, good to see you again. Like he remembers us from the last time we were there which is really a cool feeling, epics.

Ian Robertson
And then he haunts your dreams.

Tom Kubiak
But you know going back to the difference between a cruise and an all inclusive so the cruise you tend to be, you know, compacted with a whole bunch of other people and you’ve got these lines that you’re waiting in and you you know everywhere you go you’re you’re surrounded by people. An all inclusive is not like that. It’s it’s more, you know, your room is bigger than it would be on a cruise, obviously. And because the grounds of the resort are generally bigger, you’re you’re passing people, but it’s, you know, once every few minutes rather than you know, you’re in line.

Ian Robertson
So it sounds like most of these all inclusive. I think maybe that’s the limiting factor for me. Sounds like most of them are going to be like Mexico, Caribbean, maybe even Florida.

Tom Kubiak
They I think they typically are Yeah, maybe Greek islands, I think there are some of the Greek islands if you if you look in the Gulf states, like around Egypt or southern Israel, those areas too, would be all inclusive resort areas.

Ian Robertson
Okay, so now that would be cool. So I would like an all inclusive where you can go and stay in someplace cool, like Egypt and then maybe take a bus and go see some pyramids or something.

Tom Kubiak
And that’s true even with Mexico. So Chichen Itza is maybe about a two hour drive from Cancun. So lots of people take excursions to Chichen Itza or to Isla Mujeres, which is an island off the coast of Cancun or swim with the dolphins or other things, they do leave the resorts and do excursions. It’s just we don’t choose to do that. Yeah. And you guys are excursion people like you, you line up excursions when you’re traveling.

Ian Robertson
Christine is, my wife, she, she loves, again, I would not leave home, or my little cabin in the woods. Those are the only two places that I want to go at any time.

Tom Kubiak
But somehow you get talked into it.

Ian Robertson
No, I don’t get talked into it, I love my wife dearly. And it just, that’s where I go. I told her I’m like, next vacation, I’ll pay for you to go anywhere. Because then I can just sit at home with my dog and watch Star Trek. And then you can go see all the rest of the world.

Tom Kubiak
What’s the reaction?

Ian Robertson
She’s like.. Well, she laughs and then she thinks maybe, I’m like, it’s a win win for both of us.

Tom Kubiak
It has an appeal.

Ian Robertson
Because halfway through vacation it’s the same thing. Every time she goes, Are you having fun? I’m like, no, I let you know that ahead of time. I’m not gonna be having fun here.

Tom Kubiak
Told you.

Ian Robertson
Yeah I told you ahead of time. And then she starts she’s like, Oh, but now I feel bad. I’m like, why, I planned on not having fun. This is like, I don’t know. It’s like when somebody goes to a job they don’t like, you just, you just do it and you get it over with.

Tom Kubiak
You should write it out on a little card. I’m not having fun. Yeah. And then every time she asks you just show her the card.

Ian Robertson
Here’s a card, and I hate it. I hate it when like, I’m not making this up. I just don’t like vacationing because I’m like, I got stuff I want to do. Yeah, it’s just that one bill and then like people are like, Are you having fun, sir, I’m like who, why do we, do people need reassurance that they’re having fun on vacation? If you’re having fun, just have fun.

Tom Kubiak
I think they do. Well, some people put, they’re so stressed. I don’t know if this ever happens to you. But like I read the review boards and these people who are they’re asking questions about the trip so that they can they can plan out every minute of their trip and make sure that they squeeze every ounce of enjoyment and happiness and I’m not like that. Like I just want to get there and just do literally nothing like I don’t need to plan out what I’m gonna do. But some people have to do that.

Ian Robertson
Man, I’m building a desk and an end table for my daughter. And there’s some beautiful, almost almost vaulted, but not quite, maple in my garage right now, acclimating. And that is better than any cruise that I could ever imagine.

Tom Kubiak
Okay, gotta send me some pictures.

Ian Robertson
I’m like, you can say, Hey, let’s go to Hong Kong. And let’s have some fun, and I’m like, I got maple in my garage.

Tom Kubiak
You’re Nick Offerman.

Ian Robertson
I’m gonna build a desk. I’m okay with that. But no, I see. I see your point. But so I think the I think the debate on all inclusive versus cruise, I would still say all inclusive would probably be the way to go. Cruises still have their place. If you have a destination and you do want to be an active vacationer, cool. All Inclusive is probably the overall better option, especially if you just want to relax.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, definitely for relaxing. I definitely agree.

Ian Robertson
So on that note, Tom, I want to end on a new segment.

Tom Kubiak
Oh, is it going to involve me trying to guess noises again?

Ian Robertson
No, but now that you’ve complained about that it will next time. So this one is called, this is in honor of a podcast that you introduced me to, Stuff You Should Know.

Tom Kubiak
Awesome. Awesome, guys.

Ian Robertson
I do like those guys. They’re very, very intelligent. And I think they think they present the information in a relatively unbiased..

Tom Kubiak
Yeah. Oh, definitely.

Ian Robertson
You know, everybody, everybody has a bias. But so this is.

Tom Kubiak
This is a shout out to Josh and Chuck.

Ian Robertson
Hi Josh and Chuck, I’m sure you don’t listen to our shows since you’re like the number eight podcast in the nation. Theuy definitely, definitely don’t. But this one I’m going to call fun facts. Okay, so fun facts about bees. So since I’m celebrating doing my first honey pull of the year, even though it’s a little late, so a honeybee can fly approximately 15 miles an hour. That’s fast, man. That’s amazing. Yeah, that’s 20. So when you see people running away from bees, you can’t outrun a bee. So I’m gonna Well, I mean, I guess I could get out of their perimeter and make it less, less desirable for them. But I’ve run away from bees and..

Tom Kubiak
And I’ve also heard when you run from a bee, don’t run straight.

Ian Robertson
Run like you’re an idiot.

Tom Kubiak
And make sure somebody’s videotaping it.

Ian Robertson
You’re gonna die. Start zigzagging and waving your arms in the air. Might as well.

Tom Kubiak
I saw this viral video on YouTube the other day, this guy he’s like, they’re videotaping something and he’s like aww, there’s bees around me. There’s bees around me, and then this stinging him, and his girlfriend, she like, takes off running, screaming and he’s like, no, no, no, no. He’s like, You see him crouching down. He’s like, they’re not gonna bite me. They’re not gonna bite. And then they start stinging him and he goes crazy.

Ian Robertson
You know, there’s some misconceptions about what to do with a bee, like, even when a bear attacks. Like somebody’s like, Oh, if a black bear gets you play dead. I’m like, if a black bears, that’s for grizzly. You do that. If you do that. It’s like black bears gonna eat you.

Tom Kubiak
You don’t need to play dead, you’re gonna be dead.

Ian Robertson
Yeah it’s like the bees are like, oh, you know, crouch into a ball. I’m like, then they just sting your back instead of your stomach. I’m like, I don’t understand. But there you go. There’s a there’s a fun fact. Here’s another one.

Tom Kubiak
15 miles an hour.

Ian Robertson
15 miles. That’s one five. Honeybees are the only insect that produce food for humans, which is actually inaccurate. So I actually got this off of Idaho Honey Industry Association.

Tom Kubiak
They are the only insect that produces food for humans.

Ian Robertson
Which is wrong. And I wanted to mention that because you know what other insect produces honey, bumblebees.

Tom Kubiak
And bumblebees for, you can, they produce honey that can be taken from them? You probably can’t har.. you probably can’t take care of them or put them in a hive.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, yeah, you can’t you can’t cultivate them or anything like that.

Tom Kubiak
Cultivate them. That’s the word I was looking for.

Ian Robertson
That’s probably the wrong word. It’s not, they’re not a plant. But anyways, they, they don’t produce enough so they produce enough just for them just for survival. And that’s it..

Tom Kubiak
Interesting. But if you found a hive, you could steal their honey.

Ian Robertson
Hypothetically, yep. Interesting. Also, ants produce food, they produce other ants and you can eat them. So I’m gonna argue that fact, I’m gonna have to email them. And I don’t know why I went to the Idaho Honey Industry Association, but it seemed like an authority. Honey is the only food that includes all the substances necessary to sustain life including water. I actually looked that up and it’s true and not true. So it’s true. It contains proteins and carbohydrates and I think minimal amounts of fats. Okay, but it’s it’s mostly sugar. Okay. So you would basically die of malnutrition, but..

Tom Kubiak
But they’re saying it’s the it’s the food that contains, not necessarily has enough to..Okay.

Ian Robertson
Exactly.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, that makes sense.

Ian Robertson
And then one last thing, honey doesn’t go bad.

Tom Kubiak
That’s true.

Ian Robertson
Yep, they found honey in tombs of pharaohs that was still edible.

Tom Kubiak
Yeah, it’s, that’s pretty amazing. Even my first honey harvest and we still have some jars left from it and they crystallize over time, but even just putting them in the sun for, you know, an afternoon they’re back to back to liquid again.

Ian Robertson
Yep. And they also have, they’re antibacterial. Yeah, so veterinarians use it on animals all the time. So especially birds.

Tom Kubiak
I think humans I think you can as ,for human burns or cuts too, if you if you want to.

Ian Robertson
Yeah, I mean, it’s not the preferred method for humans. I don’t know why they use it on animals, but they like it on animals. But humans have used it for I don’t know, centuries. 1000s of years. Yeah, because they found Oh, if you got honey on a on a cut, it seemed to heal better. Yeah. And then there you go.

Tom Kubiak
That’s cool. Oh, interesting facts. Fun fact.

Ian Robertson
There you go.

Tom Kubiak
What about a joke? You got a good joke for me?

Ian Robertson
No I don’t, do you have one to take us out?

Tom Kubiak
I got one. And this is in honor of our next podcast that we do for the next episode about alcohol. What did the grape say when it got stepped on?

Ian Robertson
I don’t know.

Tom Kubiak
Nothing, but it let out a little wine. I gotta remember these for the kids that I hang out with.

Ian Robertson
No, no, you should just let them go. Just let them go, Tom.

Tom Kubiak
Thanks for hanging out with me.

Ian Robertson
You’re cracking up, you’re cracking yourself up. All right.

Tom Kubiak
I hope my jokes are better than you like them.

Ian Robertson
Alright, thanks a lot, Tom.

Tom Kubiak
Thanks, Ian.

Ian Robertson
Appreciate it.

Tom Kubiak
Talk to you soon.