Destination: Europe
French Museums to Offer Free Admission
by Michael Yessis | 10.24.07 | 2:05 PM ET
France’s culture minister Christine Albanel announced that 14 museums in the country will offer free admission during the first six months of 2008. The most famous museums in Paris—the Louvre, the Musee d’Orsay and the Centre Pompidou—will also take part on a limited basis, according to the AFP. It’s all welcome news for budget travelers, particularly those who have grown accustomed to free museums in Washington D.C., Britain and elsewere in Europe. Albanel said it’s part of an effort to “inspire desire—desire for artistic experiences and culture—in people who are not familiar with these places.”
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Yahoo! BuzzWhere in the World Are You, Justin Glow?
by World Hum | 10.22.07 | 11:42 AM ET
The subject of our latest nearly up-to-the-minute interview with a traveler somewhere in the world: Justin Glow, the lead blogger at Gadling. His response landed in our inbox this morning.
Where in the world are you?
Five Reasons Belgium Should Continue to Exist
by Alexander Basek | 10.18.07 | 3:19 PM ET
It's been suggested that the plucky -- and it's almost always described as plucky -- European nation should split in two. Alexander Basek comes to its defense.
Searching for Authenticity In Florence
by Joanna Kakissis | 10.18.07 | 8:51 AM ET
When the gesticulating Italian selling printed artifacts said “baper” instead of “paper,” Shashi Tharoor couldn’t resist asking the follow-up question: “Where are you from?” “Florence,” the Italian replied defensively. “But before that?” pressed Tharoor. “Jordan,” the salesman replied. “Originally.” Tharoor, an author and former under-secretary general of the United Nations, explored authenticity in the age of globalization in a clever essay in Financial Times. He traveled to the historic Renaissance city—“with its self-conscious air of serving as a citadel of centuries of Italian civilization”—to find a Jordanian man selling traditional Florentine handicraft, a couple of Bangladeshi waiters who spoke Italian with a Sylheti accent, and a Japanese woman who worked at the fabled Farmacia of Santa Maria Novella. “Perhaps our sense of what is and is not authentic needs to change as well in our mixed-up world,” Tharoor writes.
Venice Launches Locals-Only Vaporetto
by Eva Holland | 10.18.07 | 7:37 AM ET
The Mayor of Venice announced that a new route, Line 3, will be added to the existing vaporetto system. The addition to the city’s water buses will follow the Grand Canal from Piazzale Roma to Piazza San Marco—mirroring the existing Line 1, but open only to residents and, at one euro per ride, costing six times less than a regular fare.
New Immigration Museum in Paris Confronts, Celebrates a Changing French Society
by Eva Holland | 10.17.07 | 11:55 AM ET
The Museum of Immigration History in Paris seeks to tackle one of the most incendiary subjects in France, and, according to a story in The Globe and Mail, its creators certainly don’t see themselves in an impartial role. “Ever since the word ‘immigrant’ appeared in our vocabulary in the late 19th century, it has had a negative connotation—connoting a menace, an inassimilable foreigner, a potential criminal, a polygamist and now a terrorist,” Gérard Noiriel, one of the curators, told the Globe. “Our job is to change that point of view.”
Monet, Twombly and the Price of Art Vandalism
by Eva Holland | 10.16.07 | 9:03 AM ET
Talk about an art lover. A woman who kissed a Cy Twombly painting worth close to $3 million—leaving a red lipstick smear that restorers have been unable to remove—went on trial in Avignon last week, charged with “voluntarily damaging a work of art.” The defendant, who described the kiss as an “act of love,” faces a hefty fine and a mandatory class on good citizenship.
515 Years Later, Columbus Controversy Endures
by Eva Holland | 10.11.07 | 6:57 AM ET
In fourteen hundred and ninety-two…the Pinzons sailed the ocean blue? If descendants of Martin and Vicente Pinzon have their way, Christopher Columbus could be sharing some of the credit for his 15th century “discovery” of America. The two brothers piloted the Nina and the Pinta alongside the Santa Maria on the famous voyage, but have been largely forgotten today. “I’d like the name to get recognized,” Bob Pinzon told the AP. “I think Columbus got too much credit.”
Faro, Sweden: Through a Remote Island, Brightly
by Joanna Kakissis | 10.10.07 | 4:38 PM ET
I’m a sucker for quirky, remote places that revel in their magical weirdness. So after reading Danielle Pergament’s fabulous New York Times piece on Ingmar Bergman‘s home island of Faro, Sweden, I’m already dreaming of a Storybook Hollow wonderland of verdant fields, giant mushrooms, wild strawberry fields and a cast of enchanted characters. “Like Bergman, Faro is remote,” writes Pergament. “Getting to the island, off the eastern coast of Sweden, takes a plane, a train or a bus, a car and two ferries. Which is exactly what made it so appealing to the reclusive Bergman.”
Women’s Travel E-Mail Roundtable, Part Four: Being a Woman—Wherever
by Catherine Watson | 10.09.07 | 12:00 PM 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.
Extreme Eating in East Berlin With the Stasi
by Michael Yessis | 10.08.07 | 11:11 AM ET
Bless Tom Perrotta for trying to eat local on the road, but after reading his extraordinary tale from a long-ago visit to East Berlin, I can understand why he’s hesitant to do so anymore. The author of “Election” and “Little Children” recalls that after a few beers with some locals, including two uniformed East German soldiers, he was urged to try Hackepeter, a combination of raw beef, chopped onions and raw egg. The food, he writes in the New York Times Magazine, was “quite tasty.” It was what happened afterwards that scared him.
English Adventurer to Arrive Home After 13-Year, Self-Powered Journey
by Joanna Kakissis | 10.05.07 | 12:17 PM ET
After spending well over a decade traveling the globe by foot, skate, bike, paddle and crawl, 40-year-old English eco-adventurer Jason Lewis is expected to arrive in Greenwich on Saturday morning, completing his quest to journey around the world under his own power. Lewis, once a self-employed cleaner, traveled across five continents, two oceans and one sea before reaching the English Channel last Sunday.
‘The Condé Nast Traveler Book of Unforgettable Journeys’
by Tyler D. Johnson | 10.05.07 | 10:23 AM ET
A new anthology gathers some of the most memorable stories from the magazine's 20-year history. Tyler D. Johnson says it contains the humor and wisdom only travel can deliver.
Travels in Greece After the Fires: The Good, Bad and Ugly
by Joanna Kakissis | 10.03.07 | 11:29 AM ET
While Greeks living in parts of the Peloponnese and Evia scorched by this summer’s devastating fires are bracing themselves for massive floods this fall and the prospect that some forests will take at least two decades to grow back, tourists heading to Greece after the fires have remained remarkably bullish.
Are ‘Climate Tourists’ Wreaking Havoc on Fragile Land?
by Joanna Kakissis | 10.03.07 | 10:45 AM ET
Glaciers and sub-zero temperatures have long kept most tourists away from Greenland. But as global warming changes the face of the Arctic—picture glaciers splintering into icebergs and long-buried islands revealed from the melted ice—a new crowd of eco-travelers is heading to Greenland and other previously ice-bound countries to see the ice before it’s all gone, the Wall Street Journal reports. They’re called climate tourists, and they’re stuck in the irony of our environmentally troubled times: “Any trip by train, plane or cruise ship pumps carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and potentially contributes to the warming of the planet,” writes the Journal’s Gautnam Naik.