Travel Blog
Search Under Way for Adventurer Steve Fossett
by Jim Benning | 09.04.07 | 3:15 PM ET
Searchers are looking for a plane belonging to Steve Fossett, known widely as the first person to fly around the globe solo in a balloon. “Fossett took off in the single engine Bellanca at 8:45 a.m. Monday at a private airstrip in western Nevada and didn’t return as scheduled,” the AP reports. He reportedly didn’t file a flight plan.
Email to friend
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Furl
Ma.gnolia
Mixx
Reddit
StumbleUpon
Yahoo! Buzz‘On the Road’ Sites, Including a Mexico City Sanborns, Then and Now
by Jim Benning | 09.04.07 | 2:30 PM ET
Fifty years after the publication of “On the Road,” the Los Angeles Times’s Christopher Reynolds observes how a number of places depicted in the book have changed—or not—from Sausalito to New York City. Among the places he includes is Mexico City’s famed blue-tiled Sanborns (pictured).
Nepal Airlines Sacrifices Goats in Front of Troubled Plane
by Jim Benning | 09.04.07 | 1:35 PM ET
Two goats, to be exact. The airline did so in front of a troubled Boeing 757 in Kathmandu in order to appease the Hindu sky god Akash Bhairab, Reuters reports. Apparently the plane had been suffering from electrical problems.
Related on World Hum:
* FAA to Airlines: Speed Up the Boeing 737 Inspections
* Everest Base Camp: ‘The Himalayan Version of Burning Man’
Carbon Offsets: Serious Solution or Eco-Hype?
by Jim Benning | 09.04.07 | 12:53 PM ET
As we’ve noted before, more and more travelers are buying carbon offsets to counterbalance the effects of carbon emitted during their journeys. But just how much good does it do? On Sunday, the Los Angeles Times became the latest publication to take a critical look at carbon offsets, questioning their effectiveness. At the center of the paper’s report is the notion that the carbon offsets industry is “clouded by an approach to carbon accounting that makes it easy to claim reductions that didn’t occur.”
Marking 50 Years of Jack Kerouac’s ‘On the Road’
by Jim Benning | 09.04.07 | 11:58 AM ET
Tomorrow is the official 50th birthday of Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road,” a novel that has inspired countless wanderings. We can’t limit our tribute to a single day, so we’ll be celebrating the book all week with Kerouac-related features and blog items. For starters, we present The Distance Between Then and Now, Bill Belleville’s reflection on a pivotal road trip of his own. Fans of Sal Paradise can see where we think Kerouac’s fictional stand-in ranks by checking out our recent list of the 10 Greatest Fictional Travelers.
Related on World Hum
* The Distance Between Then and Now
* 10 Greatest Fictional Travelers
World Hum’s Most Read: August 2007
by World Hum | 09.01.07 | 3:01 AM ET
Our 10 most popular stories posted last month:
1) 10 Greatest Fictional Travelers
2) Environmentalists Protest Launch of Hawaii Superferry
3) Rick Steves: Reflections on Three Decades of World Travel
4) ‘European-Style’ Topless Swimming Pools in Las Vegas
5) Hurricane Dean Heading Toward Mexico’s Riviera Maya*
6) Three Travel Tips: Ways to Save Money in Europe
7) How I Scored a New U.S. Passport in One Day
8) Elliott: Five ‘Ridiculous’ Travel Rules That Should Be Abolished
9) Hurricane Dean Hits Mexican Coast Near Majahual
10) Ask Rolf: How Should I Document My Travels?
The World Hum Travel Zeitgeist: Surf, Sun and a Superferry
by Michael Yessis | 08.31.07 | 1:19 PM ET
The end of summer is almost upon us, and the world has gone a bit crazy. Bad weather, holy water, a sharp-toothed shark and the plight of the Hawaii Superferry are at the top of travelers’ minds this week. Here’s the Zeitgeist.
Most E-Mailed Travel Story
USA Today (current)
Holy Water Seized From Fliers at Lourdes Airport
Most Popular Travel Story
Iloho (current)
Budget Travel Costs for 94 Cities around the World
Most Read Weblog Post
World Hum (posted this week)
Environmentalists Protest Launch of Hawaii Superferry
Most Viewed Travel Story
Los Angeles Times (current)
Shark Attacks Surfer in Monterey Bay
Most Read Feature
World Hum (posted this week)
10 Greatest Fictional Travelers
Most Viewed Travel Story
Telegraph UK (current)
Frankfurt: The City in a Suit
Happy 50th Birthday, Malaysia
by Jim Benning | 08.31.07 | 12:49 PM ET
Notes From a Month in Colombia
by Jim Benning | 08.31.07 | 12:46 PM ET
World Hum contributor Emily Maloney writes about a visit to Colombia’s Lost City, not to mention a cocaine paste factory, in The Smart Set this week. She even takes a gander at the jacket drug kingpin Pablo Escobar was wearing when he was shot. Good times.
Related on World Hum:
* Drexel University Launches ‘The Smart Set’
Where in the World Are You, Jeremy David?
by World Hum | 08.31.07 | 10:13 AM ET
The subject of our latest nearly up-to-the-minute interview with a traveler somewhere in the world: Jeremy David from Choose My Adventure. His response landed in our inbox this morning.
World Hum: Where in the world are you?
FAA to Airlines: Speed Up the Boeing 737 Inspections
by Jim Benning | 08.30.07 | 3:30 PM ET
Newer model Boeing 737s—specifically, potentially dangerous bolts in the wings of the jets—are under scrutiny this week. Inspectors have linked an Aug. 20 explosion and fire on a China Airlines 737 on the tarmac in Japan—all 165 people aboard escaped unharmed—to a loose bolt that probably allowed fuel to leak and caused a fire to start. In response, the FAA first mandated inspections of 737s be completed within 24 days, but after loose bolts were discovered in four 737s this week, the FAA has ratcheted up the order, giving airlines just 10 days to complete the work.
R.I.P. Paul MacCready, ‘Father of Human-Powered Flight’
by Jim Benning | 08.30.07 | 12:41 PM ET
Paul MacCready, the engineer who designed the first plane to fly under only human power, has died at the age of 81. Reports the AP: “On Aug. 23, 1977, the MacCready-designed, lightweight Gossamer Condor made the first sustained, controlled flight powered solely by a human. The flight, pedal-powered by pilot Bryan Allen, lasted just 7 1/2 minutes but covered a figure-eight course with pylons a half-mile apart at the airport in Shafter, Calif.”
Hawaii Superferry Suspends All Service
by Jim Benning | 08.30.07 | 12:20 PM ET
The top of its Web site still proclaims, “We’re Ready to Go! All Aboard! It’s Time to Set Sail.” But Hawaii Superferry, the first-of-its-kind ferry service between three Hawaiian islands, isn’t setting sail today. After protesters blocked the ferry from entering a harbor on Kauai Monday and a state court temporarily barred the ferry from operating in Maui, the ferry has ceased all service, at least for the moment.
Manu Chao: Catching Up With the ‘Travelling Man’
by Ben Keene | 08.30.07 | 11:57 AM ET
Although its Sept. 4 release date narrowly misses an opportunity to be played on thousands of North American stereos over the approaching holiday weekend, Manu Chao‘s forthcoming album, La Radiolina, already has the attention of music journalists in the U.S. and Europe. Writing in The New Yorker, in a story headlined Travelling Man, Sasha Frere-Jones describes the fourth release by the Latin artist as his “most direct yet, presenting him as a sincere man motivated equally by affection and quiet fury,” emphasizing the populist nature of Chao’s polyglot pop. We’ve already given away our feelings about Chao: We recently named him one of our Seven Wonders of the Shrinking Planet.
Airport Security to Lourdes Pilgrim: Your Holy Water is a Security Threat
by Michael Yessis | 08.30.07 | 11:39 AM ET
Paola Saluzzi tried to carry eight small plastic bottles of water “in the shape of the little Madonna” from Lourdes on one of the Vatican’s new charter flights for pilgrims, but security inspectors at France’s Tarbes-Lourdes airport stopped her from bringing the liquid with the supposedly miraculous healing powers back to Rome. Reuters writes, “The real miracle would have been getting it past airport security.”
