Travel Blog: News and Briefs
‘Eat, Pray, Love’ Update: Eating in Rome With Julia Roberts
by Eva Holland | 08.31.09 | 2:33 PM ET
The actress has been spotted at restaurants and markets around the city as filming for the first phase of Eat, Pray, Love gets under way. Meanwhile, since our last update, Billy Crudup, Viola Davis and (rumor has it) James Franco have all signed on to the project—fine additions to an already outstanding supporting cast.
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Yahoo! BuzzCanuck to American Travelers: Lose the Canadian Flag
by Eva Holland | 08.31.09 | 12:58 PM ET
Gadling’s Sean McLachlan has a message for fearful Americans headed overseas: “The world doesn’t hate you as much as you think it does.”
The Warm Bacon-y Wind of New York City
by Michael Yessis | 08.31.09 | 12:05 PM ET
Jason Logan walked New York City from tip to tip, chronicling the smells of his journey in a fantastic New York Times Op-Art piece. It looked great in print yesterday. Online, it’s better—and interactive. Click on TriBeCa and you’ll find out that while he was there Logan smelled, among other things, deep-fried something, faux-leather fanny pack and a warm bacon-y wind.
There’s great detail throughout. For instance, roll over the map and your cursor turns into a nose.
Revealed: Robert Frank’s Elevator Girl
by Michael Yessis | 08.31.09 | 11:09 AM ET
The previously unknown woman in Robert Frank’s photo “Elevator—Miami Beach,” the woman Jack Kerouac singled out in his introduction to Frank’s book, “The Americans,” has revealed herself. She’s Sharon Collins. At the time of the photo she was working the elevator at the Sherry Frontenac Hotel.
Kerouac described Collins as “That little ole lonely elevator girl looking up sighing in an elevator full of blurred demons.” In an interview with NPR this weekend, Collins said Kerouac’s description of her was “pretty close.”
He saw in me something that most people didn’t see. I have a big smile and a big laugh, and I’m usually pretty funny. So people see one thing in me. And I suspect Robert Frank and Jack Kerouac saw something that was deeper. That only people who were really close to me can see. It’s not necessarily loneliness, it’s ... dreaminess.
Here’s the iconic photo.
What We Loved This Week: Stockholm, ‘District 9’ and Bernstorffstraßenfest in Hamburg
by World Hum | 08.28.09 | 5:24 PM ET
Photo by Eva Holland Eva Holland
Stockholm. I was in town for an absurdly brief weekend visit—my first to Scandinavia—and I spent all the hours I could spare just wandering from island to island. Here’s one of my favorite shots:
If it’s August, it Must Be ‘Les Vacances’
by Eva Holland | 08.28.09 | 3:17 PM ET
We’ve all been there: wandering in a medieval town emptied of locals, or reading the note in our guidebook about business closures for the month of August—those pesky paid vacation days again. Global Post’s Teri Schultz takes a look at government-mandated vacation time over in Europe, and the lack thereof back in the States.
In Venice, Will Tourists Put up With the Advertising ‘Bombardment’?
by Michael Yessis | 08.28.09 | 2:06 PM ET
As Judith Martin writes, “Venice has always been frankly and happily commercial.” But it’s also taken pride in its beauty. Now that Venice is in a bad place financially, it’s turning more and more to commercial advertising that resides on and around the iconic places we all want to see when we visit. Martin’s piece in the Financial Times looks at the possible repercussions.
From Our Contributors: Vintage Hogs, Advice for Writers and The Introvert’s Corner
by World Hum | 08.28.09 | 1:37 PM ET
Some more link love for our contributors, who’ve been cropping up all over the web in recent days.
- In The Faster Times, David Farley reveals how his search for the Holy Foreskin resulted in a used-car curse.
- Alexander Basek visits Steve McQueen’s dirt bike, and other vintage motorcycles, in Miami, Oklahoma.
- Joanna Kakissis looks back at a lifetime of meze in Greece and the Dakotas—and provides some recipes, too.
- In the Oregonian, Frank Bures shares some advice for aspiring travel writers.
- Sophia Dembling, who confessed to her status as an introverted traveler and then provided some tips for her peers here on World Hum, is now blogging in The Introvert’s Corner over at Psychology Today.
New Orleans: The Tourists are Back
by Eva Holland | 08.28.09 | 11:43 AM ET
With the fourth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina being marked this weekend, and the re-building still ongoing, there’s some hopeful news for New Orleans: Tourism in the city is creeping steadily back towards pre-disaster levels. USA Today crunches the numbers.
Photo We Love: Obama on Holiday
by World Hum | 08.28.09 | 10:59 AM ET
REUTERS/Jason Reed President Obama, who clearly didn’t read Tom Swick’s open letter about his vacation plans, cycles on Martha’s Vineyard.
What’s Your Favorite B-List City?
by Eva Holland | 08.27.09 | 4:47 PM ET
Over at Flyover America, Sophia Dembling praises those lesser-known towns “that are on nobody’s bucket list” but pull out all the stops for potential visitors nonetheless. Her picks? Abilene, Texas, and Cheyenne, Wyoming. I’d add Vicksburg, Mississippi, to the list that’s growing in the comments.
Pulitzer Finalist Takes Road Trips to Wawa, Sheetz
by Michael Yessis | 08.27.09 | 2:08 PM ET
Hank Stuever spent part of his summer traveling to the competing convenience stores throughout the mid-Atlantic, “a local sort of road trip, a mini-mart epic.” His story about it is odd and kinda brilliant. He writes about Wawa vs. Sheetz:
It’s even a toss-up to which one gets stranger as the night wears on. They come into the Sheetz on Prince William Parkway in Dale City in the darkest of night, and poke-poke-poke at the made-to-order menus on the touch-screens. Touch the picture of the sandwich you want. Touch the picture of the kind of cheese. Now touch the pictures of lettuce, the pickles. Now touch the mustard, the ketchup. The touch-screen system is not merely there to impress you. “We used to do it where you fill out a paper form and leave it in the basket, but people got smart and realized the paper at the bottom of the basket comes first, so they’d stick theirs in at the bottom and then you get problems,” Stan Sheetz says.
Also: “You would be shocked how many people can’t read and write.”
I also love this comment on the piece from JOKR715: “Finally, a fluff piece I care about!”
‘The Island of California’ and Other Ancient Maps
by Eva Holland | 08.27.09 | 12:19 PM ET
Check out this roundup of unusual historical maps from Free.edu. I can’t decide which I like best: the ones with familiar places rendered unrecognizable, like the misnamed 17th-century “Modern and Completely Correct Map of the Entire World,” or the 1886 “Map of Venice”—which, to my eye, seems virtually identical to the handouts at the tourist office there today. (Via Kottke)
Photo We Love: Tomatina Warrior in Spain
by World Hum | 08.27.09 | 11:30 AM ET
REUTERS/Heino Kalis One happy man flashes a smile yesterday at the annual La Tomatina Festival in Buñol, Spain.
Travel Movie Watch: ‘2012’
by Eva Holland | 08.27.09 | 10:43 AM ET
I caught the trailer for “2012” on the big screen last night, and let me tell you, I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many global landmarks and tourist must-sees being smashed to bits in one three-minute clip. Go ahead, try to count ’em up:
Gives new meaning to “1,000 Places to See Before You Die,” doesn’t it? The flick hits theaters in November.
