Travel Blog
Morning Links: Google and Travel, Ezra Pound’s Passport and More
by Michael Yessis | 03.26.09 | 9:33 AM ET
- Hugo Chavez claims Aeropostal Alas de Venezuela as “social property.”
- Win a trip to the Galapagos with Jeopardy’s Alex Trebek.
- How is Google changing the way we travel? Mike DiPaola looks into it.
- Pensioner says no to beach holidays, yes to war-zone tourism.
- Palms Springs invites banished “college-aged youngins” back for spring break via text message.
- Oliver Balch follows in the footsteps of Gabriela Mistra in Chile’s Elqui Valley.
- Zimbabwe seeks tourists, asks Western governments to reconsider travel warnings. (via BootsnAll Today)
- The current most emailed story at the New York Times: The Frugal Traveler’s take on how international travelers can stay in touch with family and friends back home cheaply.
- Have a look at Ezra Pound’s passport. (via Coudal)
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Yahoo! Buzz‘This is a Broad-Brush, End-of-the-World Fare Sale’
by Eva Holland | 03.25.09 | 2:00 PM ET
So says This Just In’s Sean O’Neill, who also dubs Southwest’s latest round of price cuts “the most amazing airfare sale since 2001.” He goes on: “This isn’t some flash-in-the-pan gimmick ... There are millions of these tickets out there, so it’s not a bait-and-switch.” Other airlines, including AirTran, American, Delta, and United, have matched Southwest’s cut-rate prices for travel throughout the spring and summer; check out the details, and book by April 6.
Tibetan Monks, In Nine-Part Harmony
by Julia Ross | 03.25.09 | 1:00 PM ET
Here’s a new way to express support for Tibet, if you’re so inclined: Pick up a copy of this CD, produced by the Grateful Dead’s Mickey Hart, of the Gyuto Monks Tantric Choir, chanting in multiple overtones at once (similar to the Tuvan throat singers). National Public Radio has a fascinating story about how the CD was produced, based on a rare 1960s recording of Tibetan monks in northern India made by religion scholar Huston Smith. NPR has a sample of Smith’s original recording online. Apparently the trained ear can discern up to nine harmonies sung by a single monk at one time; to me, the only word for it is “otherworldly.”
Proceeds from the CD support the New York-based Tibet House and the Tibetan Gyuto monastery-in-exile.
A ‘Twitcom’ from Southwest Airlines
by Rob Verger | 03.25.09 | 12:01 PM ET
This is priceless. Southwest Airlines’ blog, Nuts About Southwest, has posted what they call a “twitcom.” Here’s what they did: They created four characters, imagined a situation for them, and then, during an hour-long time window, Twitter followers submitted the lines the characters would speak. The incentive to participate came from the fact that Southwest picked one Twitterer in a raffle afterwards, and will send that person to the Nashville Film Festival.
The result is a 6-minute skit, acted out by Southwest employees on the airline’s emerging media team. Video below. As it says in the posting, “Please don’t laugh at our acting skills.” But isn’t that all part of the fun?
The Great New York Nacho Fail
by David Farley | 03.25.09 | 10:58 AM ET
These aren’t nachos, I thought to myself as I stared at a plate rimmed with neatly placed tortilla chips, each one gently topped with chicken, blanketed in cheese, and, for good measure, crowned by one single jalapeño slice. I might expect something like this if Jean-George Vongerichten put nachos on the menu at this eponymous eatery on Columbus Circle. But I was at a hole-in-the-wall eatery in Brooklyn bedecked with all the trappings of a salt-of-the-earth Mexican restaurant. Dressing up each chip as it were a microcosm of the usual mountain of nachos seemed unnecessary. And just plain wrong.
In the Budget Travel Game, Persistence Pays Off
by Eva Holland | 03.25.09 | 9:57 AM ET
I know, I know—awhile back I said that the real key to successful budget travel was to be informed. Well, here’s another absolutely critical element in the cheapskate traveler’s makeup: tenacity.
Last week I was contemplating a quick trip to Atlantic City, and while browsing hotel websites I came across a great web-only deal: $39 per night, for a premium room. But when I tried to book two nights—at $39 each, plus about $10 in taxes, coming to a tidy total of $88, right?—the total showed up as $114, with no explanation of where the extra $26 was coming from. Puzzled, I tried rebooking as “2 adults,” in case it was a hidden single supplement, but no dice. I tried opting for a standard room, also listed at $39, in case I was facing a hidden upgrade fee. Again, nothing changed.
Morning Links: Franz Kafka International Airport, Sonic Boom Trains and More
by Jerry V. Haines | 03.25.09 | 9:09 AM ET
- These trains are so fast they create sonic booms. Japanese engineers foresee 310 mph on the tracks by 2025.
- Pilot who prayed instead of taking emergency measures in fatal crash given a 10-year sentence.
- Christopher Elliott calls out five types of travelers he says are killing tourism. (If he hasn’t insulted you yet, you haven’t read far enough.)
- Grim days ahead for the world’s airlines, predicts the International Air Transport Association. But North American carriers might see a profit, due to better planning.
- On the other hand, North American hotels experienced the worst slump in prices during the last quarter of 2008.
- Video: Hold onto your Lada, it could become a collector’s item. Russian automaker enduring more than just bad jokes.
- With frightening shades of “the word that shall not be mentioned,” CNN.com has introduced the cringe-worthy, “nakations.” (Oh, wow: naked snow angels.)
- PBS’s NOVA contemplates the significance of Arctic ice melt in a documentary.
- In Brooklyn, you mess with people’s hot dogs at your own peril. (via roadfood.com)
- Video: We know it’s The Onion, yet Franz Kafka International Airport seems all too real.
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No Heart-Shaped Jacuzzis for Couples at the Frog Hotel
by Joanna Kakissis | 03.24.09 | 3:34 PM ET
Because even amphibians need a place to get away from it all. The Frog Hotel in Edinburgh is more like the Bates hotel in “Psycho” than some smooth-lovin’ honeymoon inn soundtracked by Barry White, said Robert Henderson, Scottish coordinator for the Community Service Volunteers’ Action Earth campaign. But dark, dirt-scented ambience, complete with a compost cafe full of bugs and and a tiny ramp leading to a sleeping area, is just what gets frogs in the mood to schmooze.
Henderson’s group is encouraging people to put Frog Hotels in their gardens and yards in the hopes of preserving biodiversity in urban areas. It could work out really well for the frogs unless one of the hotels ends up next to a chef fond of cuisses de grenouille.
Arthur Frommer Promises to Keep Digging up the Deals
by Eva Holland | 03.24.09 | 2:31 PM ET
The guidebook author/publisher-turned-blogger takes a hard look at the latest travel numbers and trends, and concludes that while overall travel is down, “nearly 90% of all Americans are continuing to travel. And when they do, they are seeking bargains and values beyond all else.” He goes on: “Though some have criticized this blog for its alleged over-emphasis on special deals and discounts, we’re going to continue to make those discoveries a hallmark of our content.”
Well, consider me a fan of that alleged over-emphasis—Frommer’s blog is a great source for must-act-fast cruise, flight and hotel deals, and sure enough, here’s his latest bargain find: a set of $750 round-trip flights from the U.S. to Australia and New Zealand.
For Sale: Three Airports in the U.K.
by Rob Verger | 03.24.09 | 1:30 PM ET
Want to buy a British airport?
Last week the United Kingdom’s Competition Commission ruled that BAA—the company that owns seven airports in the U.K.—is required to sell London’s Gatwick and Stansted airports and one of two airports in Scotland.
This, the Economist reports, could perhaps improve conditions at Heathrow, which sees 67 million people a year. Speaking of that congested airport, the Economist writes: “Ideally, an expanded Gatwick or, to a lesser extent, Stansted could relieve the pressure. But crowded Heathrow generates plenty of profit and Gatwick and Stansted are also owned by BAA, so reducing congestion is not the firm’s top priority. Splitting ownership of the airports should encourage competition between them.” (Read the Commission’s full report via their website.)
Meanwhile, in reaction to the news, the Times of London offers 10 ways to improve airports, and also has put together a video that shows unhappy conditions at different airports in the world, including a lonely bag left out in the rain in Madrid, nasty weather at Chicago O’Hare, and yes, the “Airport Auntie.”
Trip Drip
by Alexander Basek | 03.24.09 | 12:30 PM ET
I like to think of myself as pretty worldly when it comes to hotels and hotel design. I don’t mind sacrificing a little to stay someplace pretty, whether it be some space or comfort. But sometimes, hotel showers baffle me. I’m staying at the Moreno here in Buenos Aires this week and the shower looks amazing: rainfall showerhead, slatted wooden floor and just a small glass partition with no actual door to enclose it.
Functionally, it makes no sense. The water spritzes everywhere else but on the partition when you use it, and there’s no door to close to prevent that from happening. I’m a relatively clean guest, yet the hotel is actively encouraging me to make a mess. Plus, some of the shower water stays on those wooden boards overnight. If I were a groggy, first-thing-in-the-morning shower taker, they’d be slippery beams of death. This happens to me time and again: great looking shower, but it fails in the whole keeping water inside the shower area part. Do the hotels just not care?
I don’t mean to single out the Moreno; I like that shower, and if they want me to be a little messy, fine. In a nod to their understanding and patience, I promise I won’t eat a meatball sub over the room’s white cowskin rug.
Are We Ready to Honor Confederate History?
by Sophia Dembling | 03.24.09 | 11:32 AM ET
As a Yankee in the South, I’m used to the sensitivities still surrounding the Civil War, aka the War Between the States, aka (‘round these parts) the War of Northern Aggression.
But while visiting Civil War battlefields is standard historical tourism, I wonder if enough time has passed even now for the nation to join Southern states in other observances honoring Confederate history, as this Chicago Tribune article discusses. (And I didn’t realize April was Confederate History Month in Texas. It took an article in a Yankee paper to clue me in to that.)
But the Confederacy is part of our nation’s rich history. We don’t have to embrace it in its entirety to respect its place in our past. Maybe it is time to let it out into the light.
Promo Videos Gone Wrong: No Wonder Israel Didn’t Make the World Cup?
by Eva Holland | 03.24.09 | 10:31 AM ET
Here’s a pet peeve: when products that I would otherwise enjoy launch advertising campaigns that are so overwhelmingly gendered, there’s no doubt that the company in question has no interest in me, my matching X chromosomes—or my money. (See: beer ads, professional sports promos, and a certain outdoors-oriented travel magazine.)
Why, you might ask, would the brightest advertising minds deliberately cut 50 percent of the world’s population out of their calculations, by doing the marketing equivalent of hanging up a “No Girls Allowed” sign? I’m still figuring out an answer to that one. In the meantime, check out this Israeli tourism spot, and tell me this isn’t the beer ad of travel promos:
Morning Links: Walkable Cities, the Japanese ‘Sideways’ and More
by Michael Yessis | 03.24.09 | 8:22 AM ET
- How much danger do in-flight entertainment systems pose?
- A Nebraska town thinks the state’s old electric chair, aka “Old Sparky,” could make a great tourist attraction.
- Crushed! Daisann McLane on one of the most difficult cross-cultural hurdles to clear: differing perceptions of personal space.
- Forget Celebrity Travel Watch. It’s Celebrity Bookstore-Travel-Section-Browsing Watch with Maggie Gyllenhaal and Peter Sarsgaard.
- How walkable is your city? Check its Walk Score. (via Freakonomics)
- Odd travel promo of the day: “The Kaslo Hotel is giving Japanese-Canadians who have ties to the internment of hundreds of citizens during the Second World War a free two-night stay if they can spot themselves or a relative in one of two prominent photos at the hotel.”
- Here are Susan Fox’s Tourist of The Year awards. Christopher Elliott writes: “Names have been obscured to ‘protect the stupid.’”
- The eruption of Alaska’s Mount Redoubt “snarled” air traffic.
- The San Francisco Chronicle picks its best wine-tasting spots in Northern California.
- Napa wine country is the setting for the Japanese remake of “Sideways.” Why the location change from Santa Barbara? Says the remake’s director: “You can’t do a road trip in California without going over the Golden Gate Bridge.” Really? What about, say, the original “Sideways”?
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Rajaa Alsanea Talks Dentistry, ‘Girls of Riyadh’ and Life in Chicago
by Eva Holland | 03.23.09 | 4:09 PM ET
Remember Rajaa Alsanea? Her debut novel stirred up acclaim and controversy, and opened a window into the romantic lives of Saudi Arabia’s young women (being dubbed “Sex and the City, Saudi-style” as a result) a couple years back. The National caught up with the author to see what she’s been up to since, and it turns out Alsanea is studying endodontics, a dentistry specialty, in Chicago—and working on a second novel in her spare time.
She says of that project: “People will definitely have the feeling that I have grown up and matured. I have lived outside my country and experienced a different culture and all of this reflects on the person that I am today.” The thoughtful interview is worth a read in full. (Via The Book Bench)
