Travel Blog: News and Briefs
Chinese Noodles Predate Marco Polo
by Jim Benning | 10.13.05 | 12:23 PM ET
It’s not often that explorer (and travel writer) Marco Polo makes the news these days, so we couldn’t pass up the chance to mention it here. It seems that Mr. Polo was not responsible for introducing the noodle to China, as some historians have contended. In northwestern China, scientists have discovered a container with 4,000-year-old, delicate yellow noodles. (And you thought the leftover macaroni in your fridge was stale.)
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Yahoo! BuzzThe Airbus A380: ‘The Mother Load’
by Jim Benning | 10.12.05 | 12:17 PM ET
Last April, the Airbus A380—the world’s largest airliner that can shuttle a whopping 550-plus passengers—took its maiden flight. P. J. O’Rourke, for one, was not happy with the public’s response. “What a poor, dull response to a miracle of engineering,” he writes in a feature about the new jet in the November issue of The Atlantic Monthly. “The A380 is a Lourdes apparition at the departure ramp. Consider just two of its marvels: Its takeoff weight is 1.235 million pounds. And it takes off…However, the only expressions of awe over the A380’s specifications that I’ve heard have been awful predictions of the crowding inside.” Those fears, he writes, “tend to be somewhat exaggerated.”
Developers Announce Plan for Sexual Theme Park
by Michael Yessis | 10.12.05 | 11:56 AM ET
Its home will be in London, near Piccadilly Circus. “Backers say the London Academy of Sex and Relationships, due to open next spring, will not be a sleazy sex museum, but an educational multimedia attraction that will teach visitors to become better lovers and provide valuable information about disease and sexual problems,” according to an AP report.
Sites for Solo Women Travelers
by Jim Benning | 10.11.05 | 5:34 PM ET
USA Today just published an overview of Web sites aimed at solo women travelers, noting: “Most of the sites were founded by women for women, and many seek to create a safe environment that allows women to form bonds of friendship while seeing the world.” Among the sites featured: Tango Diva, Sacred Journeys and Adventurous Wench.
Experts: Hep A and B Vaccines Good for Life
by Jim Benning | 10.11.05 | 3:24 PM ET
There’s good news for those of us who’ve suffered through a series of shots to prevent Hepatitis A and B: A panel of experts recently concluded that the vaccines should be good for life. Reports Reuters: “A single course of hepatitis A and B vaccine is enough to protect most healthy travelers from contracting these infections, and current evidence suggests this protection is lifelong, a team of travel medicine experts concludes.”
Getting Married? Forget Registering for a Toaster. How About Airline Tickets?
by Jim Benning | 10.11.05 | 3:06 PM ET
We generally aren’t in the business of hyping press releases, but this one is too good to pass up: Continental Airlines claims to be the first airline to offer a gift registry, allowing customers to receive gift contributions toward the purchase of an airline ticket. A release on Yahoo.com has more details. It’s hard to believe it has taken so long for an airline to offer such a thing. I can only imagine more airlines will follow suit.
Update: Lorrie Heasley, ‘The Fockers’ and the United States Constitution
by Michael Yessis | 10.09.05 | 6:08 PM ET
Michelle O’Donnell puts Tuesday’s T-shirt incident aboard Southwest Airlines flight 219 into legal context in today’s New York Times, asking some constitutional law experts about the rights of passengers to wear “offensive” attire and the rights of airlines to kick passengers off their planes.
Southwest Airlines Boots Passenger for ‘Fockers’ Shirt
by Jim Benning | 10.06.05 | 11:32 AM ET
We all know the days when flying was considered glamorous and jet travelers dressed to the nines are long gone. But just how long gone? On Tuesday, passenger Lorrie Heasley was booted off a Southwest Airlines flight in Reno after passengers complained about her T-shirt. It featured pictures of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice and carried a slightly different version of the film title, “Meet the Fockers.”
The Oddities of Travel on Television
by Jim Benning | 10.06.05 | 11:18 AM ET
San Antonio Current looks at travel programming on TV—from Anthony Bourdain’s “No Reservations” to a show about 20-something travelers called “5 Takes”—and finds “new highs and lows.” Writes Elaine Wolff: “The wilderness may be largely settled in the 21st century, but cable and satellite television is a vast territory populated by hungry media executives clamoring for programming to which ad revenue can be tethered, and specialty channels such as Travel face a bigger challenge than their polygamous brethren: How do you put a fresh face on 24 hours worth of globetrotting? The answer seems to be leave no demographic or formula unturned.”
Pork for Salmon on Alaska Airlines Plane
by Michael Yessis | 10.05.05 | 9:41 AM ET
The money that paid for the fish on an Alaska Airlines plane—a “Salmon-Thirty-Salmon”—comes from a $500,000 United States government grant to support the salmon industry, reports ABC News. Critics of congressional pork are having a field day across the web. Rightly so.
New .travel Domain Debuts, Controversy Ensues
by Michael Yessis | 10.05.05 | 4:33 AM ET
Tralliance Corp. began accepting registration for .travel domain names yesterday, but only to the “global travel and tourism community,” the AP’s Anick Jesdanun reports. Translation: No individual travelers allowed, unless they’re selling travel services.
Bali, Terrorism and the Economics of Fear
by Jim Benning | 10.03.05 | 11:23 AM ET
We recently pointed to a USA Today story noting that terrorist attacks don’t have the crippling economic effects they once did. So what will come of Saturday’s bombings in Bali, which killed 26 people? An article in Forbes online suggests tourism will rebound relatively quickly. “Although Saturday’s blasts will mean a sharp fall in Bali’s tourist arrivals, analysts said the experiences of other target cities suggest its beaches will be packed again within a year or two,” the article states. That’s good news for Bali and bad news for terrorists.
Supreme Court Justice Travel Watch: Sandra Day O’Connor, Anthony Kennedy
by Michael Yessis | 09.29.05 | 4:06 AM ET
It seems that at least two of the current Supremes love to travel. Soon-to-be-retired Justice Sandra Day O’Connor told Associated Press reporter Gina Holland Wednesday that, once Congress confirms her replacement, she’s looking forward to working on book projects and traveling. “Just to see friends and take a trip or two would be nice,” said the 24-year-veteran of the court. Earlier this month, The New Yorker’s Jeffrey Toobin profiled one of O’Connor’s colleagues, Anthony Kennedy. Toobin met up with Kennedy in Salzburg, Austria where the Justice has rented an apartment for the last 15 summers with his wife, Mary.
Flight Attendants Take Aim at Jodie Foster’s “Flightplan”
by Michael Yessis | 09.29.05 | 12:11 AM ET
From Reuters: “Labor unions representing most of the nation’s 90,000 flight attendants have urged their members to boycott a new Jodie Foster film that portrays a flight attendant and a U.S. air marshal as terrorists. They said that casting cabin crew members as villains in the movie ‘Flightplan’ was irresponsible in light of heightened security concerns since the September 11, 2001 attacks, in which suicide hijackers used airliners as guided missiles.”
World Tourism Organization: 100 Million Chinese Travelers by 2020
by Michael Yessis | 09.27.05 | 4:54 AM ET
How significant is the number? Consider this: Chinese citizens were only freed by their government to travel for leisure in 1997, and last year only 29 million mainland Chinese citizens traveled abroad. Tom Miller of the China Economic Quarterly writes that the upcoming Chinese tourism boom is a mixed blessing for Europe’s tourism economy.
