Vacation Experiences That Only Money Can Buy - Bespoke Luxury Travel, From $100,000 and Up

New York Times ^ | July 11, 2014 | PAUL SULLIVAN

[Second Amendment First]

James Barber yearned to travel to exotic places when he was a boy reading National Geographic. Now 71 and a successful business owner, he is able to indulge that love in far-flung destinations during trips created exclusively for him and his family.

There was the trip to Egypt, Jordan and Italy in the months before the Arab Spring in 2010 that included private cooking classes in Jordan, gladiator school for his grandchildren in Rome and an armed guard in Egypt to keep everyone safe. He loved the one to Thailand where his grandchildren got to hold tiger cubs in their laps and he leash-walked a full-grown tiger, raised from birth by monks.

“We were out in the woods and we saw an antelope,” Mr. Barber said. “The tiger got stiff and followed him with his eyes. Then he relaxed and went on walking. The monk turned to me and said, ‘Man is the only animal that kills for sport; the tiger’s belly is full.'  ”

While such experiences might cost the equivalent of several years of mortgage payments for an average family, Mr. Barber says it is worth the price for a couple of weeks away.

Photo During Mr. Barber's trip to Borneo, an orangutan took his hand and started walking with him. Credit Louise Barber “It is expensive, but I love the flexibility,” he said. “If I organized the trip on my own, I’d miss a lot of things.”

These are trips that only money can buy. Like other areas of life, from education to housing to retirement savings, travel is something where the truly wealthy are pulling away not just from average Americans but also from the merely rich. And they are driving demand for the most exclusive trips.

[Second Amendment First]

The New York Times: fighting for the little people while promoting multi million dollar mansions and $100,000 vacations.

[AnAmericanInEngland]

My job takes me to Monaco, The Nurburgring and Abu Dhabi, among other places, and they pay me to go..... whybwould i ever pay 100k tontravel the world? :)

then again I’m working to keep guys happy that are paying millions of bucks to drive cars without a chance of winning....so I guess someone’s gotta foot the bill.

[GeronL]

$100,000? Luxury?

Obama wouldn’t go on vacation unless it was a few million bucks.

[GeronL]

‘Man is the only animal that kills for sport; the tiger’s belly is full.

I dunno, some dogs kill small animals when they aren't hungry

[Flash Bazbeaux]

He loved the one to Thailand where his grandchildren got to hold tiger cubs in their laps and he leash-walked a full-grown tiger, raised from birth by monks. “We were out in the woods and we saw an antelope,” Mr. Barber said. “The tiger got stiff and followed him with his eyes. Then he relaxed and went on walking. The monk turned to me and said, ‘Man is the only animal that kills for sport; the tiger’s belly is full.'  ” The Tiger Monks are a well-known, and not entirely reputable tourist fixture in Thailand. You could get there for well under $3,000.00 from wherever you might happen to be reading this, and most of that would be airfare.

[BobL]

I have NOTHING TO PROVE with wild animals.

I RESPECT them to the point of understanding that as tame and as nice as they may act at any moment, they can turn on me in a flash, and that’s the end of my time on the planet. Whether it’s the deepest jungle in Africa, or Baltimore, I simply WILL NOT tempt them. I give them their space because there are plenty of other things for me to do where my odds for survival are much higher.