Travel Blog
‘Sopranos’ Tourism Surges in Wake of Series End
by Michael Yessis | 06.22.07 | 11:57 AM ET
It’s been almost two weeks now since HBO’s immensely popular series “The Sopranos” ended in the booth of a New Jersey diner with an order of onion rings on the table, Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’” on the jukebox and an abrupt black screen. Now travelers are descending on that diner—actually an ice cream parlor in Bloomfield called Holsten’s, according to an AP story by Janet Frankston Lorin—looking to eat Tony Soprano’s last meal or to sit in that same booth. “The phone just rings constantly all day from people wanting to make reservations,” co-owner Chris Carley said. “They ask ‘Can we reserve the booth? Can we get a T-shirt?”’ Longer “Sopranos” bus tours in New York and New Jersey are also gaining popularity.
Email to friend
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Furl
Ma.gnolia
Mixx
Reddit
StumbleUpon
Yahoo! BuzzSearch Continues for Lonely Planet Travel Writer
by Jim Benning | 06.22.07 | 11:30 AM ET
The search continues for Clem Lindenmayer, the 47-year-old Australian travel writer who disappeared last month while hiking near Minya Konka in western China. ChinaTrekking.com has been keeping close tabs on the search, posting news of sightings of Western hikers, but it has no conclusive reports of Lindenmayer sightings. Lonely Planet’s Thorn Tree discussion is still active. JourneyEast.org, which notes an $800 reward for information leading to Lindenmayer, reports that his last e-mail was sent in early May from Kangding.
The Critics: ‘Chasing the Rising Sun’
by Jim Benning | 06.22.07 | 7:19 AM ET
The Los Angeles Times has a review of Chasing the Rising Sun, writer Ted Anthony’s account of his quest to find the origins of the classic folk song, “House of the Rising Sun.” It’s a quest, in part, to learn where and what The House in question was: Brothel? Gambling house? Prison? In addition to being a book about music and history, it’s also about travel.
Stonehenge Welcomes ‘Druids, Drummers, Pagans and Partygoers’
by Michael Yessis | 06.21.07 | 3:23 PM ET
They partied like it was 3,000 B.C. at Stonehenge today. It’s the summer solstice, and according to the AP, more than 20,000 people made the pilgrimage to the mysterious prehistoric monument on the Salisbury Plain. They’re giving it love, but we hope not too much.
Introducing the ‘Hank Aaron 755’ Airplane (and Other Sports-Star Tributes We’d Like to See)
by Michael Yessis | 06.21.07 | 2:29 PM ET
Delta Air Lines has honored one of its hometown heroes, Atlanta Braves baseball legend Hank Aaron, with the “Hank Aaron 755” plane—a craft featuring his likeness and the number corresponding to his soon-to-fall career home run record. Barry Bonds of the San Francisco Giants is on pace to surpass Aaron’s 755 home runs later this summer, but the 73-year-old hall of famer didn’t mention his challenger during the unveiling ceremony. “I am so thrilled to have an airplane named after me,” he said, according to an AP report. “This is something I never dreamed about. As my mother always said, you’ve come a long ways baby, and enjoy yourself.” As far as I can tell from the story and Delta’s press release, the Boeing 757 plane won’t see any changes beyond the new paint job. Too bad. What Delta really should have done to honor Hammerin’ Hank is purchased an Airbus A380 and outfitted it with 755 seats. Some other ways airlines may want to pay tribute to the world’s sports stars:
Touring Literary Los Angeles: City of Chandler, Bukowski and Fante
by Jim Benning | 06.21.07 | 12:53 PM ET
In some cities, like Dublin, visitors have little trouble finding a good literary tour. Los Angeles is not one of those cities, yet it has a compelling literary history. So I was happy to read Sunday’s Los Angeles Times story about a new tour of Los Angeles through the prism of novelist John Fante, focusing particularly on Fante’s old downtown haunts, including Bunker Hill. Fante isn’t as well known as L.A. novelists Raymond Chandler and Charles Bukowski (even though Fante’s classic novel Ask the Dust was recently made into a movie), so it would stand to reason, I thought, that the people behind the Fante tour were not your typical tour operators. I dialed up Richard Schave, co-founder of the recently formed tour company Esotouric (“bus adventures into the secret heart of L.A.”) to ask him about their adventures into L.A.‘s bookish heart. It turns out the Fante tour is just the beginning.
South Korea Develops ‘Five-Point Kimchi Scale’
by Michael Yessis | 06.21.07 | 11:41 AM ET
Do you like your kimchi mild, slightly hot, moderately hot, very hot or extremely hot? The South Korean Ministry of Agriculture recently announced it has developed a five-point kimchi scale—Foreign Policy’s Blake Hounshell likens the “kimchi alert system” to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s threat advisory system—to help Westerners figure out what type of kimchi best suits their palates. The system will also measure fermentation levels. It’s all part of an ongoing effort to promote kimchi as a global food.
In San Francisco, the Search Goes on for the Summer of Love
by Michael Yessis | 06.21.07 | 10:00 AM ET
It’s been 40 years since the famed Summer of Love, when San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury neighborhood became either the embodiment of brotherhood and sisterhood or, in the words of the Beatles’ George Harrison, full of “hideous, spotty little teenagers.” I tend to believe more in the latter characterization, not because I experienced it (or was even alive) in 1967 but because around the turn of the millennium, when I lived in San Francisco, I saw a lot of “spotty little teenagers” there and that colors my impression. Don’t get me wrong. I like the Haight, and I still go there often when I’m in San Francisco. It’s got an all-time great music store, Amoeba Music; an excellent and cheap pizza place, Fat Slice; and a fine bookstore, The Booksmith, among other things. But I never really felt that Summer of Love spirit.
From Worldwide Delays to Raw Sewage in the Cabin: Pick Your Travel Poison
by Jim Benning | 06.20.07 | 3:43 PM ET
Yikes. I can’t decide which is worse: United Airlines’ grounding of departing flights around the world for hours this morning because of a computer glitch; the seven-hour stranding ordeal yesterday for 400 unlucky Cathay Pacific passengers in San Francisco; or today’s news that raw sewage seeped out of a Continental Airlines jet toilet and right into the main cabin during a flight across the Atlantic last week. How bad was that one? Said one passenger: “I was forced to sit next to human excrement for seven hours.” Uh, is that covered in the passengers’ bill of rights?
Related on World Hum:
* Federal Passengers’ Bill of Rights One Step Closer to Law
* IRS Beats Airlines in Customer Satisfaction Survey
* Travel Writer on Airport Stranding in Texas: ‘My Head Was in Burma’
* How Not to Panic When Your Circling Plane Runs Low on Fuel
China to Build Highway to Mount Everest
by Michael Yessis | 06.20.07 | 2:54 PM ET
The highway will be paved and follow an existing 67-mile “rough path” on the Tibetan side of Mount Everest to the base camp at 17,060 feet. (So we assume all those yaks hauling equipment to the base camp on the Nepal side, recently dubbed the Himalayan version of Burning Man by Outside, won’t be put out of work any time soon.) But the questions raised by the development are many. Among them: What impact will it have on the base camp? What will the environmental impact of the road be? What effect will it have on China-Tibet relations? Is this development really a ploy for China to strengthen its claims to Tibet?
Weighing the Thrills and Ethics of ‘Shark Safaris’
by Terry Ward | 06.20.07 | 2:14 PM ET
I’m not one to go bungee jumping in New Zealand or canyoning in Costa Rica, yet presenting myself as great white bait in an underwater cage in South Africa has always held a certain appeal. I’ll admit it—I’m obsessed with sharks. And the chance to see the greatest predator of them all in a purportedly safe environment appeals to me in a totally primal way. I have, however, pondered the ethical questions that go along with cage diving. So I was interested to read about Joshua Hammer’s experience in Kleinbaai (two hours from Cape Town) in a detailed piece in the New York Times.
Leg Room Requirements Under Consideration for European Flights
by Michael Yessis | 06.20.07 | 12:07 PM ET
On behalf of all airline passengers who fly with their knees in their teeth, I say, “Hooray!” And: “What’s taking so long?” The European Aviation Safety Agency is considering imposing a minimum leg-room requirement on all planes registered in Europe. Acccording to an Agence France-Presse report, no distances between seats have been proposed, but one can hope it will become reality. The lack of space between seats, known in airline parlance as “pitch,” has become ridiculous, particularly when, like me, you’re six-foot-four and on a long-haul flight. The impetus for possible change, however, isn’t comfort. It’s safety. The EASA is worried about cases of deep vein thrombosis and the ability to evacuate planes within the mandated 90 seconds. (Via Elliot.org).
Related on World Hum:
* Dick Cheney, Long Flights and the Dangers of Deep Vein Thrombosis
* Flight Attendants’ Rep: ‘We’re Back to Pre-9/11 Passenger Attitudes’
The Future of Air Travel: ‘Flying the High-Tech Skies’
by Michael Yessis | 06.20.07 | 10:44 AM ET
The Washington D.C.-area public radio program The Kojo Nnamdi Show featured an interesting discussion yesterday about the technological future of flight and commercial air travel, covering “everything from your airline’s carbon ‘footprint’ to how you locate your luggage,” according to its Web site. Guests included Jim Mathews, Editor in Chief of Aviation Daily, and Steven Lott, Head of North American Communications at the International Air Transport Association.
Related on World Hum:
* The Future of Travel: “Will August 2006 be Remembered as the Point of No Return?”
* Don George on Leaving Lonely Planet and the Future of Travel
* Welcome to the Age of the ‘Aerotropolis’
Yosemite Visitor’s Death Prompts Half Dome Safety Review
by Jim Benning | 06.20.07 | 8:00 AM ET
Particularly fit and adventurous visitors to Yosemite National Park often make the 17.2-mile round-trip trek to the top of Half Dome. The final leg, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, is “a dizzying 400-foot climb up a ladder-like contraption made of cables and wooden steps.” And it was there, on Saturday, in good weather, that 37-year-old Japanese citizen Hirofumi Nohara slipped and fell over the dome’s edge to his death. He’s the third person to die on the dome in a year. But particularly noteworthy, the paper reports, “Since 1971 there have been nine falls, including Nohara, but only three of them were fatal, all within the past year.” Understandably, according to the paper, rangers are now taking a close look at safety on the dome.
Related on World Hum:
* Thou, Yosemite, Art His Goddess
* R.I.P. Colin Fletcher, ‘The Father of Modern-Day Backpacking’
Pico Iyer on Business Class: ‘A Gated Community in the Air’
by Jim Benning | 06.19.07 | 3:13 PM ET
I’m not sure I agree with Pico Iyer’s argument in today’s Los Angeles Times that exorbitantly priced business class seats reflect “the worst side of globalism, in compact form.” But Iyer does a fine job of exploring the frivolousness and waste involved in paying $10,000 for more leg room and in-flight entertainment options. “You don’t have to be a philanthropist to realize that by enduring slightly more human company for six hours, you could build nine homes in Burundi, each big enough to house 10 people with the money left over,” he writes. “And even if you want to keep the savings for yourself, with $9,000 extra you could take five weeklong, all-inclusive tours to Southeast Asia, for the price of just an afternoon’s greater comfort en route to London.”
Related on World Hum:
* IRS Beats Airlines in Customer Satisfaction Survey
* Are You a Member of the ‘Backpack Lunatic Fringe’?
* Q&A With Pico Iyer: On Travel and Travel Writing
