Travel Blog
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.
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Yahoo! BuzzAre ‘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.
‘I Wanna Be Sedated’: One Woman’s Solution to Travel with Children
by Eva Holland | 10.02.07 | 8:30 AM ET
I’m not a parent, so I can’t fully appreciate the struggle of traveling with toddlers. But I was fascinated to read Emma Mahony’s story in the Times of London about drugging her son on a long-haul flight. Mahony, the mother of a young boy and infant twins, came across the idea at a social gathering of mothers of twins. She writes: “Before I joined an evening out with mothers of the local Wandsworth twins’ club, I was a virgin to the pharmaceutical names of sedatives. There, after a few glasses of wine, the subject of drugging toddlers to travel came up, and the stories began to flow.”
Board the Airbus 300—to Nowhere
by Michael Yessis | 10.02.07 | 8:01 AM ET
The plane never leaves the ground, and might only spin in circles if it tried—it only has one wing and a hint of a tail. Yet the $4 tickets are going fast. According to the Times of London, 99 percent of India’s population has never traveled on a plane, so retired Indian Airlines engineer Bahadur Chand Gupta has set up “virtual journeys” on an old Airbus 300 in Delhi.
10 Great Fictional Places, From Cicily, Alaska to Brokeback Mountain
by Jim Benning | 10.01.07 | 12:46 PM ET
In addition to featuring our list of the 10 Greatest Fictional Travelers, Sunday’s San Francisco Chronicle highlighted editors’ 10 favorite fictional places, “not because they are the most beautiful or Utopian (yawn), but because the description or script struck a chord that made us yearn to go there—just as good travel writing and videos should do for real destinations.” They came up with an intriguing mix from books, TV and movies, including Cicily, Alaska (from “Northern Exposure”); Brokeback Mountain (from Annie Proulx’s short story and Ang Lee’s film of the same name); and San Piedro Island, Washington (from the novel and film “Snow Falling on Cedars”). They note that they chose not to include Margaritaville. Why? Because it might have a hazardous pop top or two? For shame.
Related on World Hum:
* 10 Greatest Fictional Travlers
* How Did We Love Jack Kerouac This Week?
* Jimmy Buffett: Celebrating Changes in Latitudes
BBC Worldwide Buys Lonely Planet
by Jim Benning | 10.01.07 | 11:33 AM ET
Big news in the travel publishing world: BBC Worldwide has purchased indie guidebook publisher Lonely Planet. Founders Tony and Maureen Wheeler will retain a 25 percent stake in the company they founded more than three decades ago. Reuters puts the price of the deal at $203 million. Tony Wheeler said he believes the sale will help Lonely Planet stay competitive while allowing the publisher to remain true to its original values. While he and Maureen will now have more time to travel, it wasn’t easy for them to “sell out,” he said. In an audio interview, he told Australia’s ABC, “It’s been 34 years, it’s been our entire working life together…It’s been a long road…although we’re convinced it’s the right thing for the business…it’s a difficult thing to do.” I can’t say I’m terribly surprised.
Mapping ‘Where I’ve Been’: Hope for America’s Lost One-Fifth?
by Julia Ross | 10.01.07 | 10:43 AM ET
Call me an optimist, but after recently discovering the mapping application Where I’ve Been, I see a ray of hope for the one-fifth of Americans who can’t find their country on a world map. The interactive map widget—a big hit on Facebook and launched on MySpace earlier this month—lets users color-code countries under “Where I’ve Been,” “Where I’ve Lived” and “Where I Want To Go,” yielding a travel thumbprint, of sorts, that can be loaded onto Web pages or blogs.
World Hum’s Most Read: September 2007
by World Hum | 10.01.07 | 10:41 AM ET
Our 10 most popular stories posted last month:
1) Southwest Airlines Veers Into Fashion Controversy—Again
2) We Don’t (Really) Know Jack
3) Nine Great Ways to Get Thrown Off an Airplane
4) ‘Girls of Riyadh’: Saudi Arabia’s ‘Sex and the City’?
5) The Critics: ‘Into the Wild,’ the Movie
6) How To Road Trip Like Kerouac (and Stay Out of Trouble)
7) Given the Weak Dollar Overseas, Any Tips on Long-Term Travel?
8) Seven Travel Rules From a Brooding Teenager (pictured)
9) The Crackdown in Burma: One Chilling Photo
10) Dollar Sinks to Record Low in Europe
The World Hum Travel Zeitgeist: Of Passport Rules and Falling Leaves
by Michael Yessis | 09.28.07 | 5:11 PM ET
With the arrival of fall, travelers are planning leaf-centered sojourns and leafing through their passports to make sure they’re still valid. But that doesn’t mean they’ve forgotten about Burma. Here’s the Zeitgeist.
Most E-Mailed Travel Story
USA Today (current)
Starting Monday, New Passport Requirements Kick In
* If you’re a U.S. airline passenger headed to Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean or Bermuda, you’ll need your little blue book—again
Most Read Feature
World Hum (posted this week)
Gwendolyn Oxenham and Ryan White: ‘The Soccer Project’
Most Read Blog Post
World Hum (posted this week)
The Critics: ‘Into the Wild,’ the Movie
Most E-Mailed Travel Story
New York Times (current)
Down East in Maine, by the Pint or the Vat
Most Viewed Travel Story
Los Angeles Times (current)
The Hunt for Red October: Prime Spots to View Fall Foliage
* Great Smoky Mountains National Park makes the cut, and rightly so
“Hot This Week” Destination
Yahoo! (this week)
Santa Monica, California
Most Popular Page Tagged Travel
Del.icio.us (recent)
TripIt
Nepal Contemplates Nudity Ban on Everest
by Eva Holland | 09.28.07 | 11:39 AM ET
It looks as though Lakpa Tharke Sherpa, the first man to stand naked on the summit of Mount Everest, may also be the last. Mountaineering authorities in Nepal are calling for a ban on nudity, and on any other attempts to set obscene records like the one set by the Nepali climber last year. From the AP story: “Ang Tshering, president of Nepal Mountaineering Association, says the people who live at the foot of Everest worship the mountain as a god and mountaineering authorities have asked the government to ban disrespectful stunts.” Hard luck, ladies. If Nepal follows through, this could be one record that’s never matched by a woman.
Related on World Hum:
* ‘Climb Everest for a Discount Rate’
* Everest Base Camp: ‘The Himalayan Version of Burning Man’
Photo by star_trooper via Flickr, (Creative Commons).
The Crackdown in Burma: One Chilling Photo
by Jim Benning | 09.27.07 | 6:47 PM ET
This is one of those images that’s hard to shake off, taken today in Rangoon after soldiers opened fire on protesters, killing at least nine people. The blood-soaked sandals are the kind worn by the protesting Buddhist monks. The photo was made available by the Mandalay Gazette. As we noted earlier, the State Department just warned U.S. citizens to postpone travel to Burma.
Related on World Hum:
* U.S. State Department: Postpone Travel to Burma
* First Deaths Reported in Crackdown on Protesters in Burma
* As Defiant Monks Protest in Burma, Travel Debate Rages On
Photo: AP.
President Bush: Passenger Strandings ‘Just Not Right’
by Michael Yessis | 09.27.07 | 6:45 PM ET
The issue of airline passenger strandings now has the attention of the White House. According to the AP, President George W. Bush said today that “endless hours sitting in an airplane on a runway with no communication between a pilot and the airport is just not right,” and he asked Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters to meet with airlines to try to solve the problem.
Souvenirs Collecting Dust? Trade Up, Says Doug Lansky
by Julia Ross | 09.27.07 | 2:21 PM ET
We’ve all got them: African batiks, Hungarian tea sets, kitschy souvenirs from long ago travels that end up moldering on basement shelves. When writer Doug Lansky concluded his collection began to resemble “travel trophies” rather than meaningful mementos, he decided to trade up for more useful souvenirs, along the lines of a Japanese toilet and a Thai rickshaw. In a wonderful audio slide show posted on the Guardian’s Web site, Lansky recalls how he transformed his home in Sweden with accoutrements from across the globe.
U.S. State Department: Postpone Travel to Burma*
by Jim Benning | 09.27.07 | 1:45 PM ET
The U.S. State Department has issued a no-brainer announcement—our phrase, not theirs—on Burma: “U.S. citizens should defer non-essential travel to Burma at this time. American citizens resident [sic] in Burma should avoid all demonstrations and processions as they could turn violent with little or no warning.” Even without an ongoing military crackdown on protesting monks, of course, plenty of travelers argue against visiting the nation.
* Update, 2:56 p.m. ET: State television in Burma reports that nine people have been killed today in Rangoon, including eight protesters and a Japanese video journalist, as a military crackdown persists, according to the BBC. “Thursday’s protests followed reports of overnight raids on six monasteries,” according to the news agency. “Witnesses say soldiers smashed windows and doors and beat sleeping monks. Some escaped but hundreds were taken away in military trucks.”
Related on World Hum:
* First Deaths Reported in Crackdown on Protesters in Burma
* As Defiant Monks Protest in Burma, Travel Debate Rages On
Photo: AP.
Islamabad’s New Art Gallery: 28 Years in the Making
by Joanna Kakissis | 09.27.07 | 12:36 PM ET
Built in the 1960s, Islamabad is known for being clean, planned and, well, a little sterile—at least compared to the rest of colorful, crowded and unpredictable Pakistan. But the arrival of the National Art Gallery—which opened last month after 28 years of planning and construction—may liven up the capital, writes Carlotta Gall in The New York Times. Interestingly, the half-completed building was neglected for nearly a decade, until none other than Gen. Pervez Musharraf himself moved his offices into the neighborhood. Apparently he grew tired of looking at the thing and one day said, “What can you do with this eyesore?”
