Destination: China
Go Forth And Run: Marathon Tours Taking Off
by Eva Holland | 11.14.07 | 11:25 AM ET
We recently blogged about urban running tours that allow devoted runners to take in some sights while getting their daily exercise fix. Now, an increasing number of travel agencies are promoting marathon packages—to destinations all over the world, writes Andy Riga in The Montreal Gazette. Want to run the Taj Mahal Marathon? Or the Rock ‘n’ Roll Arizona Marathon? Somewhere, according to Riga, there is a package tour that will get you there—though don’t expect they’ll guarantee a personal best time.
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Yahoo! BuzzPhoto: Hong Kong Skyline, With Plane
by Jim Benning | 11.08.07 | 12:36 PM ET
The (very cool) photo below was shot in Hong Kong recently during the filming of the next Batman film, “The Dark Knight.” That’s a C-130 cargo plane. As an interesting aside, all hasn’t gone smoothly with the filming. Reports the Guardian: “The trouble began when director Christopher Nolan requested that Hong Kong’s inhabitants leave their lights burning during the film’s night-time shoots in order to present the city in its full, illuminated glory. Letters were reportedly sent to 60 companies along the city’s waterfront area, while building managers were told to ask all residents to comply with the request.” Nolan was met with a collective shrug. According to reports, 80 percent of those asked ignored the request.
The Songstress of Kunming
by Jeffrey Tayler | 11.07.07 | 12:48 PM ET
In the southern Chinese city, an unexpected concert prompts Jeffrey Tayler to wonder about the passage of time and the fate of history
Twelve Books to Read Before Traveling to China
by Jim Benning | 11.05.07 | 12:04 PM ET
That’s right. Not two or three. Twelve. UC Irvine history professor Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom is often asked for reading suggestions by people traveling to China. So he put together a list of 12 books, choosing titles “with an eye toward liveliness, links of some sort to Beijing as a city or the Olympics as an event, and also stylistic and topical variety.” Wasserstrom knows a thing or two about China. He’s the author of the recently published China’s Brave New World—And Other Tales for Global Times. His full list appears on the History News Network. Among his more intriguing selections are:
Cancun to Times Square: How to Spot a Tourist Trap
by Julia Ross | 10.23.07 | 3:00 PM ET
How do you know a tourist trap when you see one? Aside from the double-decker buses and fanny packs, I’m usually alerted by a feeling I get: an overwhelming desire to flee mixed with befuddlement. The first time I visited San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf, I remember thinking: I don’t get it. Choosing the world’s top tourist traps is sure to elicit heated debate, but ForbesTraveler.com has weighed in with its own list, nicely illustrated with a slide show and story offering tips for alternative experiences. Skip Times Square in favor of Central Park’s Strawberry Fields, writer Chris Colin recommends, or try the Valley of the Kings instead of the Pyramids at Giza.
Travel in 2017: Start Learning Chinese and Changing Your Eating Habits
by Michael Yessis | 10.18.07 | 2:59 PM ET
The Freakonomics guys aren’t the only ones this week with an eye on the future of travel. Forbes delivered a special report about “The Future,” which features some provocative speculation on travel in the year 2017 from World Hum contributor Elisabeth Eaves. Among her predictions:
China’s Three Gorges: As Environmental Catastrophe Looms, Beauty Lingers
by Joanna Kakissis | 10.15.07 | 10:17 AM ET
We’ve been reading for some time that China is choking on epic pollution produced by its push for fast growth. One of the victims, of course, is the Three Gorges, the once-beautiful, mist-filled river passage through tall limestone and sandstone crags. Since 2003, China has dammed the Yangtze, the country’s largest river, to create a reservoir that is expected to fill by 2009. The dam is expected to produce 20 times as much electricity as the Hoover Dam and reduce China’s reliance on polluting coal—hopefully reducing the smog that regularly blots out the sun. Already more than 1,000 towns and villages are underwater, and an iconic landscape has changed. But it’s still a beautiful place of rain-slicked trees and bamboo bushes and slender waterfalls churning into a jade-colored river, writes Mary Beth Sheridan in The Washington Post.
Women’s Travel E-Mail Roundtable, Part Three: Arguments and Getting to the Heart of the Subject
by Liz Sinclair | 10.09.07 | 8:05 AM ET
All this week, four accomplished travelers -- Stephanie Elizondo Griest, Liz Sinclair, Terry Ward and Catherine Watson -- talk about the rewards and perils of hitting the road alone as a woman.
Six New Nonstop U.S.-China Flight Routes Awarded
by Michael Yessis | 09.25.07 | 4:13 PM ET
The six so-called U.S. legacy airlines—Delta, United, US Airways, Continental, American and Northwest—received approval from the U.S. Department of Transportation to begin flying new routes to China. U.S.-China routes are regulated by a bilateral agreement, and the two countries recently agreed to open up more routes, according to USA Today’s Ben Mutzabaugh. It’s yet another sign of China’s growing stature among travelers.
Related on World Hum:
* China Faces Pilot Shortage
* Driving the Silk Road—in a New $7,000 Chinese Car
Photo by Michael Yessis.
China Faces Pilot Shortage
by Michael Yessis | 09.10.07 | 8:59 AM ET
The country will need 9,000 pilots in the next few years to accommodate the rapid growth of its travel industry, and Reuters reports it will fall 2,000 short. Among the solutions: recruiting foreign pilots and more women. Says Gao Hongfeng, deputy head of the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China: We are “very happy to see that many women are so enthusiastic about this industry and want to become part of it. Airlines have opened their doors to this, and the regulator has too.”
Related on World Hum:
* China to Become World’s Top Tourism Destination by 2014
Photo by http2007, via Flickr (Creative Commons)
China Identifies 2,753 Menu Items For Name Changes
by Michael Yessis | 09.05.07 | 10:32 AM ET
The Chinese government advanced its campaign to rid the country of “Chinglish” in advance of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, highlighting 2,753 dishes and drinks—including the ever-popular “burnt lion’s head”—as “confusing, even ridiculous [English] translations.” The Chinglish Files has a link to the official government report.
Driving the Silk Road—in a New $7,000 Chinese Car
by Michael Yessis | 08.30.07 | 11:21 AM ET
The Wall Street Journal’s Gordon Fairclough took the old-China-meets-new-China story on the road, driving 1,700 miles along the ancient Silk Road in a Chery A1, a compact car developed by a government-owned automaker. He and three friends spent a week driving through Western China from Urumqi to Kashgar, a route that crosses the harsh Taklimakan Desert. The trip poses challenges, among them errant sheep and sandstorms—check out picture five in the accompanying slide show. In the end, Fairclough emerges with a great portrait of a China on the verge of developing a road-tripping culture.
Macau vs. Las Vegas: The Battle to be the ‘Capital of Excess’
by Michael Yessis | 08.29.07 | 11:36 AM ET
The gargantuan Venetian Macao Resort (pictured) opened yesterday with celebrations and excessive media coverage about the excesses of the new venture. It’s the largest casino in the world and it cost $2.4 billion to build. It’s the second-largest building in the world, after the Boeing manufacturing plant in Washington, according to the AP. If the Venetian Macao succeeds, Reuters reports, the annual gambling income of Macau—or Macao, if you’re so inclined—will rise to approximately $13.7 billion by 2010. That’s a staggering figure for a place that, as we posted earlier this year, surpassed Las Vegas in annual gambling revenue in 2006, $6.95 billion to $6.5 billion.
Passengers Flee Burning Plane in Japan
by Jim Benning | 08.20.07 | 12:57 PM ET
Wild scene today on the tarmac of an airport in Okinawa, Japan: A China Airlines Boeing 737-800 skidded to stop and caught fire, prompting passengers to evacuate down emergency slides and the pilot to jump from the cockpit window. The plane then “burst into a fireball,” according to the AP. Amazingly, all 165 people aboard reportedly escaped serious injury. The AP notes that the incident “is a setback to China Airlines, which in recent years appeared to have improved on a troubled safety record among international carrier.”
CNN.com: ‘China Offers More Than Just Wall, Olympics’
by Jim Benning | 08.14.07 | 10:54 AM ET
Yes, that enlightening headline tops an AP story on CNN.com today. Who knew? Let’s get Anderson Cooper suited up in his flak jacket and on that developing story.