Here's an idea that's been kicking around in my mind for a while: what if it's not that it takes such a tremendous amount of time to travel anywhere interesting in the universe, but that our perception of time is just too fast? Perhaps to an alien race a thousand (or million) years seems like a second. Wikipedia suggests that our perception of time does get (slightly) slower as we age [1], so maybe living significantly longer could do this to us as well. Finally, it seems that our perception of time is largely shaped by the Circadian rhythm; if life evolved somewhere with a much slower "cosmic clock" could that also cause a much slower time perception?
While our perception of time night be subjective, as you suggest, the distances involved are not. Even if it only feels like a few moments, the universe doesn't much care how we feel, or what we perceive.
Well, yes, obviously, but it would certainly affect how we (read: aliens) approach space travel psychologically, and thus to a certain extent its feasibility - a trip across the solar system could seem like a trip across the street.
[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_perception#Long-term