Travel Blog: News and Briefs
Bob Dylan, the “Fockers” and Brinco Shoes: The Weblog Year in Review
by Michael Yessis | 12.23.05 | 2:15 PM ET
One way to drive traffic to a website is to write about sex. Or Paris Hilton. Or, as our travel gossip columnist Theodore Fez did here, both at the same time. But we’ve pored over our visitor statistics in recent days, and we’re happy to report that our item about that other Paris didn’t even rank near the top of our most read weblog items this year. The readers of this weblog usually turned out for more worldly items, like this one about Brinco shoes, the first footwear designed for the undocumented migrant market. It has consistently been one of our highest ranking items for the last month, and it recently broke into the top five for the year.
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Yahoo! BuzzPundits Weigh in on Televised “Planes in Trouble”
by Michael Yessis | 12.23.05 | 2:19 AM ET
Now that televised emergency plane landings are an official cable news trend, media pundits are being asked to measure their significance. “You could be really cynical and say that we’re all stupid and easily entertained but I think it says something about the power of stories in our culture,” Kelly McBride, a media ethicist at the Poynter Institute of journalism, told Reuters.
Gadling Gets a New Look
by Jim Benning | 12.22.05 | 2:24 PM ET
The good folks at Gadling travel blog have a cool new look, complete with powder blue edges and a fresh logo. I think it’s a big improvement, and it sounds like they do, too. “We’ve been dying to haul away that old greenish design,” Erik Olsen writes.
Hemingway Was a Regular on Chalk’s Ocean Airways
by Jim Benning | 12.22.05 | 1:23 AM ET
I hadn’t heard of Chalk’s Ocean Airways until this week, with the news that a twin-engine Mallard seaplane it operated crashed off Miami on Monday, killing at least 19 people on board. It turns out the company and its planes have a long, storied history. The Florida carrier claims to be the world’s oldest surviving airline, and according to a fine story in the Palm Beach Post, Ernest Hemingway was once a regular passenger on flights to the island of Bimini. The Post story opens with a description of a Mallard taking off.
Have Charlie Rose and Fareed Zakaria Found Utopia in the Dominican Republic?
by Jim Benning | 12.21.05 | 11:27 PM ET
Sometimes I stumble across travel tidbits in the oddest places. This morning, via Jim Romenesko, it was a New York Observer profile of Newsweek International editor Fareed Zakaria, whose writing I always enjoy, even if I don’t always agree with his politics. Zakaria, the story reports, was invited last year to take part in an odd vacation development project in the Dominican Republic that also involved musician Moby and talk show host Charlie Rose, among others.
Moby, Dave Navarro Book Trips to Space
by Michael Yessis | 12.21.05 | 5:42 AM ET
The two musicians have reportedly reserved tickets through Virgin Galactic, a commercial space venture being developed by Richard Branson.
In: Televised Emergency Plane Landings. Out: Televised Car Chases.
by Michael Yessis | 12.21.05 | 12:31 AM ET
This evening, the American cable television viewing public was once again riveted by an emergency plane landing. In September, it was a Jet Blue flight in Los Angeles. This time, a Midwest Airlines flight with landing gear problems and 86 passengers on board touched down at Boston’s Logan International Airport as cameras rolled. CNN has the story—and the landing footage.
Emirates and Qantas to Boeing: We’re Going to Need a Bigger Plane
by Michael Yessis | 12.21.05 | 12:10 AM ET
Boeing had already announced plans for its new 787 models, the first of which are scheduled to begin flying in 2008. Now Emirates Airlines, Qantas Airways Ltd. and other airlines are telling the Chicago-based aerospace giant that they’re interested in a stretch version of the plane, according to an Associated Press report today. If plans proceed for the proposed 787-10, it would carry about 300 passengers and have a range of roughly 8,900 miles.
Transit Strike Hits New York. (Insert Whistle Here.) “Taxi!”
by Jim Benning | 12.20.05 | 2:03 PM ET
Island Nation to U.S.: Give Back Our Only Jet!
by Jim Benning | 12.20.05 | 1:37 PM ET
This has to go down as one of the wildest travel-related stories of the year. The Pacific island nation of Nauru is asking the United States to return its only passenger jet—the Air Nauru 737—which it lost in court recently to a U.S. government credit agency. Without the plane, the island must charter jets so that its 10,000 residents are not isolated from the rest of the world. But that’s just the beginning. “Nauru lost the plane after a failed legal attempt to put the U.S. on trial in a bizarre case involving spies, terrorism and North Korean defectors,” the Australian reports.
Adam Gopnik, Blogger
by Michael Yessis | 12.19.05 | 9:53 PM ET
Farewell to L.A.‘s Ambassador Hotel
by Michael Yessis | 12.19.05 | 6:02 PM ET
Not too long ago I took a drive east along Wilshire Boulevard from Koreatown to downtown, a part of Los Angeles that many people seem to be avoiding these days. It’s just too painful for a lot of them, Ken Bernstein, director of preservation issues for the Los Angeles Conservancy, recently told the L.A. Downtown News. The reason: That’s where the demolition of the Ambassador Hotel, a Los Angeles landmark since 1921, is currently taking place.
Listening to ‘Layla’ in Tehran? Not on Radio or TV.
by Jim Benning | 12.19.05 | 3:08 PM ET
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has decreed that Western and indecent music cannot be played on the country’s radio and television stations. What artists will be affected? MSNBC.com reports: “Songs such as George Michael’s ‘Careless Whisper,’ Eric Clapton’s ‘Rush’ and ‘Hotel California’ by the Eagles regularly accompany Iranian TV programs, as do tunes by saxophonist Kenny G.” Needless to say, I’m with Ahmadinejad on banning Kenny G. Indecent, indeed. But Eric Clapton did some nice stuff back in his Cream days, and I’m afraid that’s where the ultraconservative leader and I must part ways.
Eating Fajitas in the Land of Snails
by Jim Benning | 12.19.05 | 1:37 PM ET
I was powerless in the face of my addiction. The moment I saw the Mexican restaurant in Lyon, France, I knew I had to eat there. I also knew the food would be awful. My story about it, Worlds Collide, appears in Sunday’s South Florida Sun-Sentinel.
Which is Larger: Greenland or Africa?
by Michael Yessis | 12.18.05 | 9:59 PM ET
The San Francisco Chronicle published its annual geography test today, or as its creator John Flinn calls it, a “geography / travel / interesting factoids-I-found-on-the-Internet quiz.” It’s 50 questions long, including the one in the headline above, and it’s quite challenging. If you’re stumped, the answers are here.
