Travel Blog: News and Briefs
A Traveler’s Account of Dengue Fever
by Jim Benning | 05.07.07 | 10:24 AM ET
Photo by ÇP, via Flickr (Creative Commons).
On the way home from a vacation in New Zealand, Pamela Ferdinand stopped off in the Cook Islands, including Aitutaki. It seemed like an idyllic way to cap off her South Pacific holiday. She didn’t know an outbreak of dengue fever was hitting the region; she knew all too well after she returned home. As she writes in Sunday’s Washington Post, “The next week I lay in torment at my home in Cambridge, Mass., alternately suffering chills and sweats with excruciating joint pain, bleeding under the skin and severe dehydration that landed me in the hospital for nearly a week.” She recounts her painful recovery—she lost seven pounds along the way—and offers a fine overview of the mosquito-borne illness.
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Yahoo! BuzzHappy 25th Anniversary Rough Guides
by Michael Yessis | 05.07.07 | 7:50 AM ET
They’re half the age of Arthur Frommer’s guides, and not quite as old as Lonely Planet, but for many travelers Rough Guides are equally influential and loved. Mark Ellingham started the company 25 years ago with a volume on Greece, and several British papers have put together packages celebrating his vision and his travels. The Times compiles a list of 25 wonders of the world, the Independent spends a day with Ellingham and the Guardian asks him and his long-time colleague, Martin Dunford, for their 25 all-time favorite travel experiences.
‘I Used Arthur Frommer’s ‘Europe on 5 Dollars a Day’’
by Michael Yessis | 05.04.07 | 3:05 PM ET
We recently noted the 50th anniversary of the classic travel guide, Arthur Frommer’s “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day.” USA Today’s Kitty Bean Yancey pays tribute today by taking a trip to Paris in search of answers to the questions, “[D]o his budget staples survive? And can a euro-trashed tourist find satisfaction there today?” Yancey also turns back the clock, sharing a terrific journal entry—and a great photo of her hitchhiking—she wrote in 1971 while traveling in Paris with the guidance of “5 Dollars.”
Restaurants ‘Nudge Diners’ in Campaign for Zagat Votes
by Michael Yessis | 05.04.07 | 8:26 AM ET
The Zagat guides took another punch this week. The New York Post’s Steve Cuozzo revealed that restaurant owners in New York are mounting e-mail campaigns to have diners vote for their restaurants, a practice allegedly forbidden by the Zagats. Yet, according to the Post, the Zagats don’t seem to be enforcing their rules.
Indians: Would Somebody Please Move the Boeing 737 in the Street?
by Jim Benning | 05.03.07 | 3:15 PM ET
A decommissioned Boeing 737 that was being towed through Mumbai five days ago has been abandoned on a busy street, the BBC reports. Apparently the driver reached an impasse in the road and simply took off, leaving the fuselage behind. It was reportedly being transported to a flight school with its wings and tail removed. While some are angry, others see the plane as an intriguing new tourist attraction. Here’s the real kicker: “The driver has not been seen since and no-one is assuming responsibility for the 737.”
The Rise of the Portable In-Flight Entertainment System
by Jim Benning | 05.03.07 | 9:20 AM ET
Airline passengers have been using laptop computers and portable DVD players to watch movies for some time now, but increasingly, airlines themselves have been offering portable viewing devices, especially on international flights. This week, American Airlines has upped the ante by offering first- and business-class passengers the latest gee-whiz portable devices on some domestic cross-country flights, USA Today reports. The devices feature a seven-inch touch-screen monitor, first-run movies and updated news. The huddled masses in economy class can also try out a modest version for a fee on a limited number of domestic flights. Such systems just might be the future of in-flight entertainment, particularly since, according to the paper, “they are cheaper than installing seatback entertainment systems.”
Related on World Hum:
* United Airlines Switches to Coke. Uh, Hooray?
* The End of the Middle Seat?
* Sports Bars Go Airborne: ‘We Definitely Sell a Lot More Liquor When Games Are On’
Photo courtesy of American Airlines.
Theme Parks Bound for Mumbai and Dubai
by Jim Benning | 05.02.07 | 3:24 PM ET
Here at the Planet Theme Park desk, it’s hard to keep up with all the projects in the works, but we try. In the latest news, a $100 million Bollywood theme park is planned for the Indian city of Mumbai—or Bombay if you’re a certain UK newspaper apparently still in denial about that whole name change thing that was so 1995.
United Airlines Switches to Coke. Uh, Hooray?
by Jim Benning | 05.02.07 | 10:57 AM ET
We’re not sure why, but it was widely reported yesterday that United Airlines is switching from Pepsi to Coke on its flights. “We look forward to the joint promotional activities that consumers and employees will be able to participate in and the economic benefits this new agreement brings to United,” an airline official was quoted as saying. Right. As a traveler—I mean, flying consumer—let me just say that I can’t wait to participate in those joint promotional activities. Perhaps I can do so while munching on the insipid, plastic-wrapped turkey-wasabi sandwiches—food units, if you prefer—that United is selling for five bucks in economy class. Oh, the economic benefits. Oh, the promotional possibilities.
Photo by mag3737 via Flickr, (Creative Commons).
The Fastest Cities in the World on Two Feet
by Jim Benning | 05.02.07 | 9:17 AM ET
Researchers who secretly studied pedestrians in 32 cities around the globe found that people in Singapore walk the most swiftly, covering 60 feet in 10.55 seconds. Copenhagen came next at 10.82 seconds, followed by Madrid, Guangzhou and Dublin. New Yorkers ranked 8th at 12 seconds flat. (Come on, New York, we know you can do better than that. Let’s get a move on.) Not surprisingly, technology is blamed at least in part for the increasingly frenetic pace of life. The radio show Marketplace notes a correlation between cities where people are walking faster than they did a decade ago and economic growth. The two cities where walking speeds have increased the most in the last decade: Singapore and Guangzhou, China.
Happy 50th Anniversary ‘Europe on 5 Dollars a Day’
by Michael Yessis | 05.02.07 | 7:33 AM ET
Arthur Frommer self-published “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day” 50 years ago, an event that still resonates among travelers. “On the 50th anniversary of the book’s publication,” the AP’s Beth J. Harpaz writes in a profile of the legendary guidebook, “Frommer is still being credited with helping to change leisure travel by showing average Americans that they could afford a trip to Europe.” Harpaz points out that Frommer’s approach—“a combination of wide-eyed wonder and getting the best value for your money”—has become typical, but at the time it was a radical shift.
The Dollar-Euro Exchange Rate Blues
by Jim Benning | 05.01.07 | 1:49 PM ET
Travelers are starting to sing it. With such a weak U.S. dollar in Europe—it’s at roughly $1.367 per euro—U.S. travel bookings for summer trips to Western Europe are down 2 to 3 percent, according to USA Today. But interestingly, some European hotels are finding inventive ways to lure exchange-wary Americans. “Luxury hotels such as the Merrion in Dublin, The Capital in London and the Esprit Saint-Germain in Paris offer specials that guarantee room rates in U.S. dollars, shifting the currency exchange risk to the hotel,” the paper reports. “And the Four Seasons hotels in Dublin, Lisbon and Geneva are offering a fourth night free during the peak summer season through Sept. 3.”
The New U.S. Passport: ‘It Is Like Being Given A Coloring Book That Your Brother Already Colored In’
by Michael Yessis | 05.01.07 | 9:41 AM ET
Reviews of the new U.S. passport are rolling in and we can all agree on one thing: It’s really, really patriotic. Should we expect anything less from a document called “American Icon”? “The short, 28-page version of the passport comes with 13 inspirational quotes, including six from United States presidents and one from a Mohawk Thanksgiving speech,” writes Neil MacFarquhar in the New York Times. “The pages, done in a pink-grey-blue palate, are rife with portraits of Americana ranging from a clipper ship to Mount Rushmore to a long-horn cattle drive.”
Call It Multiple Personality Packing Syndrome
by Jim Benning | 05.01.07 | 7:23 AM ET
Or MPPS for short. Perhaps you suffer from it: packing way too much for more than one personality that you may exhibit on your trip, from the no-nonsense traveler who favors sensible shoes to the strutting fashionista who wears only the latest from Prada or Jimmy Choo. Christine Schoefer, who comes clean about her packing problems in Sunday’s San Francisco Chronicle, doesn’t identify her condition as MPPS, but the symptoms she describes clearly identify her as a sufferer. “In my travel reveries, I am a mixture of Carrie Bradshaw, Edith Wharton and Bruce Chatwin,” she confesses.
World Hum’s Most Read: April 2007
by Michael Yessis | 05.01.07 | 6:12 AM ET
Our 10 most popular stories posted last month:
1) Passenger on Northwest Pilot: ‘He Was Having a Fit, Swearing Up a Storm’
2) It’s the Caribbean Cruise Anna Nicole Smith Tabloid Shore Excursion!
3) India’s ‘Spiritual Backbone’: Two End-to-End Explorations Down the Ganges River
4) French Train Clocks In At 357.2 MPH*
5) Selling Israel: A Land Rich in Holy Sites or Hot Babes in Tel Aviv?
6) Charles Dickens, Led Zeppelin Get Theme Park Treatment
7) ‘American Shaolin’: Interview with Matthew Polly
8) The Rise of the Trader Joe’s Pilgrimage
9) Deadly Dengue on the Rise in Mexico
10) Google ‘My Maps’ Debuts With Oral History of Route 66
Stalking the Best Boulangeries in Paris
by Jim Benning | 04.30.07 | 1:19 PM ET
I’ve never met a chocolate croissant I didn’t like, but even I, a mere croissant dilettante, recognize that some are better than others. Travel + Leisure offers a look at the best boulangeries in Paris, covering top spots for croissants, baguettes, sourdough loaves and other starchy treats. Maison Kayser in the Latin Quarter is one of the shops earning rave reviews. Among other qualities, their croissants have a “meltingly tender center,” the magazine maintains. Meanwhile, elsewhere in town, Boulangerie Bechu offers pain au chocolate orange, which the magazine calls “an addictive variation on the classic treat.”
Photo by stu_spivack via Flickr, (Creative Commons).
