Destination: Europe
Woody Allen’s ‘Love Letter to Barcelona’
by Eva Holland | 08.14.08 | 10:51 AM ET
Woody Allen’s latest film, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, opens this weekend. The Globe and Mail’s Gayle MacDonald caught a sneak peek, then headed to the Spanish city to see whether Allen got his depiction of the Catalan capital right. Her verdict, after a few days spent wandering in Barcelona?
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Yahoo! BuzzTravel Headline of the Day: ‘Alcohol Linked to Rise in British Arrests Abroad’
by Eva Holland | 08.14.08 | 10:40 AM ET
This just in from the Guardian: Alcohol appears to have played a role in the recent arrests of many Brits on holiday. Drunkenness leading to bad behavior? Who’d have guessed?
Related on World Hum:
* British Couple Arrested for Having Sex on Beach in Dubai
Photo by emifaulk via Flickr (Creative Commons)
Unsentimental Journeys: Wrestling With Paul Theroux
by Bronwen Dickey | 08.13.08 | 11:53 AM ET
Bronwen Dickey considers "Ghost Train to the Eastern Star: 28,000 Miles in Search of the Great Railway Bazaar"
Sauna World Championships: Overlooked Olympic Event?
by Ben Keene | 08.12.08 | 11:17 AM ET
Those Games in Beijing you may have heard about overshadowed this year’s 10th annual Sauna World Championships in Heinola, Finland, but that doesn’t diminish the achievement of Bjarne Hermansson, who lasted an impressive 18 minutes and 15 seconds in the official sauna.
The Latest Inflatable Beach Prop: The Blow-Up Church
by Valerie Conners | 08.12.08 | 10:33 AM ET
Lord knows, finding time to worship on a beach vacation isn’t always easy. Cue a group of Italian priests and nuns who, with some gumption and an air pump, have brought church to the beach.
Enormous, Phallic Flower: A Belgian Spectacle
by Valerie Conners | 08.11.08 | 3:12 PM ET
As if chocolates, mussels and that darling Mannequin Pis weren’t big enough tourist draws, now visitors to Belgium are privy to the “giant strangely shaped penis”—an enormous (five-feet tall), stinky (think rotten meat or rancid cheese), phallus-shaped flower.
Shakespearean Theater Unearthed in London?
by Valerie Conners | 08.11.08 | 2:42 PM ET
Archaeologists in London announced that they unearthed the 16th-century remains of a playhouse believed to be “The Theater,” where many of the Bard’s early plays were originally performed and where he acted onstage with the theater troupe, Lord Chamberlain’s Men.
New Travel Book: ‘The Wild Places’
by Frank Bures | 08.07.08 | 10:41 AM ET
Author: Robert Macfarlane
Released in U.S.: June 2008
Travel genre: Wilderness travel
Territory covered: Britain, Ireland
‘The Monster of Florence’: Murder and the Pursuit of Truth
by Frank Bures | 08.07.08 | 10:18 AM ET
Douglas Preston's latest book, the true story of a serial killer in Italy, shows that the world is far from exhausted for those who want to travel deep. Frank Bures tells why.
Carry-On? Check. Passport? Check. Dancing Shoes? Er, Check.
by Valerie Conners | 08.06.08 | 5:09 PM ET
Think airport travel is nothing but security lines and baggage nightmares? Not in Paris’s airports, where dance lessons in terminals may soon become de riguer, reports the International Herald Tribune. Aeroports de France has announced that 15-minute dance lessons complete with music and vocal instruction are now offered on summer weekends. Heading to Cuba? Learn to salsa. Buenos Aires? Tango is on the menu, as well.
Unearthing David Bowie’s Berlin
by Elyse Franko | 08.06.08 | 1:42 PM ET
Those wishing to experience David Bowie’s Berlin will find that the city has changed quite a bit since the 1970’s, when Bowie—at the peak of his career—spent three years living there with Iggy Pop, recording the three albums in his Berlin Trilogy.
William Wordsworth: Poet, Travel Guidebook Writer
by Jim Benning | 08.05.08 | 10:35 AM ET
Yes, the Romantic poet dabbled in guidebook writing. In 1835, he published “A Guide Through the District of the Lakes in the North of England,” the very same region where he once wandered lonely as a cloud. That’s but one of the interesting bits in Slate’s list of the 10 oddest guidebooks ever published. Why, exactly, did Wordsworth write the book? Garrison Keillor suggests he had money problems. No word on whether writing the guidebook condemned Wordsworth to eternal damnation. I’m thinking his poetry just might have saved him that fate.
Related on World Hum:
* ‘The Worst Guidebook Writer Ever’?
* Q&A With Thomas Kohnstamm: The Firestorm Around ‘Do Travel Writers Go to Hell?’
Where Can You Find the Most Expensive Cup of Coffee in the World?
by Eva Holland | 08.04.08 | 10:51 AM ET
And the winner is ... Moscow, where the average cup apparently costs $10.19. Forbes brings us the full list, but I have to wonder about the methodology behind the survey. Are we talking cups of joe, or are we talking venti caramel mocha frappuccinos? It was the New York City listing that got me doubting: it landed in the middle of the pack, with the average cup costing $3.75—but when was the last time you paid nearly $4 for a regular coffee from a New York City deli?
Affairs to Remember—On-Screen and Off
by Eva Holland | 07.31.08 | 10:48 AM ET
From "Roman Holiday" to "Before Sunrise," Hollywood has understood the appeal of the overseas fling. Eva Holland explains the staying power of the big screen Euro-romance.
Shteyngart on ‘New Berlin’: It’s ‘Easily Europe’s Coolest Metropolis’
by Michael Yessis | 07.30.08 | 12:29 PM ET
Yet “it’s still okay to be excited by things” there, writes Absurdistan author Gary Shteyngart in a fine story in the latest Travel + Leisure.
Related on World Hum:
* Lou Reed’s ‘Berlin’: Do His Songs Still Resonate in the City That Inspired Them?
* Jan Morris in Berlin: ‘Ooh, That’s Nice!’