Category Archives: See the World

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the IBIT TRAVEL DIGEST 3.21.12

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A roundup of the good, the bad and the bizarre from the world’s best travel media.

Amsterdam canal houseboat

Canal houseboat in Amsterdam | ©IBIT G. Gross

VIVA MEXICO
For all the negative talk about crime and violence related to its ongoing drug war, Mexico endures as a travel destination.

Travel Weekly reports that Carnival Cruises Lines, which has already sunk some $100 million into improvements for Mexican seaports, is looking at investing in two new ones — Calica on the Caribbean coast and Puerto Cortés in Baja California Sur.

No dollar signs yet, but the fact that Carnival would be interested at all says a lot, as does the fact that Carnival CEO Gerry Cahill was down south last week to meet with Mexican president Felipe Calderon and tourism minister Gloria Guevara.

So too does this little tidbit from TW: In a story about how Spring Break travel has picked up in 2012, they point to Student City, an online travel agency that caters to high school and college kids. According to Student City, its top two destinations were Cancun and Puerto Vallarta, both on the Mexican Riviera. Panama City, FL was third.

SUMMER AIRFARES — INTO THE STRATOSPHERE?
That’s definitely how it looks to the folks at USA Today, who checked the situation with aviation and travel experts.

What do you want first, the bad news or the very bad news?

Airliners may not have to pull up to the local gas station to fill their tanks the way you and I do, but when it comes to fuel prices, the oil companies don’t cut the airlines any more slack than they do for us. So whatever causes the cost of a barrel of crude oil to jump hits everyone hard.

Even the airlines’ ability to buy options on jet fuel, a tactic pioneered by Southwest Airlines and copied by many other airlines since, doesn’t help as much as it used to.

Bottom line: Airfare prices already are higher than they were a year ago, and the pain is only going to increase once the summer “high season” arrives. You need to plan accordingly, and the US Today story has a few tips that may help.

VACATION — WHO GETS IT AND WHO DOESN’T
Embedded in a story from CNN Travel about Swiss voters rejecting a proposal for six weeks of paid vacation a year (like their neighbors in Germany) is a survey of 20 countries from Expedia, listing them in order of the amount of vacation time employees receive, how many of those days are actually taken and how many go unused.

France, to no one’s surprise, was at the top. The United States, again no surprise, was near the bottom. What may be unexpected is that nations with some of the strongest economies in Europe, as well as some of the weakest, rank among the highest for vacation days offered and actually used.



And now, here’s this week’s Digest:

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AIR
from the New York Times
The FAA finally decides to consider adding to its list of consumer electronics devices approved for in-flight use.


from eTurboNews
The 2012 London Olympics are only a few months away. Can London’s five airports handle a crush of visitors flying in? The heads of four British airlines seem to have their doubts.

from Travel Weekly
They’re coming to America…or at least trying to. Gol, Brazil’s low-fare airline, wants to fly Boeing 737s from Miami to Sao Paulo, with a stop in Caracas, Venezuela.

from the New York Times
How to avoid the worst seat on the airplane.

from Travel Weekly
There’s First Class, and then there’s this: Etihad, the national flag carrier of the United Arab Emirates, is installing chefs to prepare in-flight meals for their First Class passengers.

from Travel Weekly
Remember People Express, the low-fare airline back in the 1980s that bowled people over with some ridiculously cheap fares — while putting them through some even more ridiculous hassles — until Continental swallowed them up? They may be coming back.

from TNOOZ
Have you ever played with Google Flight Search? It’s only been online for six months. Simultaneously shows air routes and airfares across the United States…and now, internationally.

LAND
from 
Frommer’s Travel
Want to get the feel of a place from a local’s perspective? Take a walking tour. Here’s what you’ll see if you hit the bricks in the Montmartre section of Paris. SLIDESHOW

from Smarter Travel
There are more than 900 World Heritage Sites identified around the globe by the United Nations, all of them worth seeing. The folks at Smarter Travel pick 11 must-sees. See if you agree. SLIDESHOW

from the Los Angeles Times
Ever have trouble with those balky remote controls for the television in your hotel room? Now there’s an app that will let you operate the hotel TV right from your smartphone. Unless, of course, you own a Blackberry.

SEA
from Travel Weekly
Is it just me, or is the cruise industry taking a beating this year? Princess Cruises cuts short one Caribbean cruise and cancels two more due to engine troubles aboard Caribbean Princess. Oh well, maybe things will be better next year: Princess is among the cruise lines now accepting bookings for 2013.

from Cruise Critic
A head-to-head comparison of the ten most popular mega-ships and their features — cabins, dining options, entertainment. Which one most appeals to you?

from 
CNN Travel
The inside view of ten of the most popular North American cruise ports. One’s in Alaska, while the rest are scattered around the Caribbean. Avoid the crowds and pick up some local flavor.

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AFRICA
from 
Reuters via Yahoo!
Is Britain trying to block access of Africa’s largest airline to Europe?

from 
Capital FM (Kenya) via allAfrica.com
An innovative attempt to promote tourism to Kenya through music. Plans underway to create a musical stage production on Kenyan cultural attractions, with the country’s different languages as a centerpiece.

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AMERICAS/CARIBBEAN
from 
BBC Travel
Southern, sleepy, set-in-its-ways Savannah, GA is suddenly becoming a hot zone of sophisticated art, music, dining and shopping.

from the 
Los Angeles Times
There’s a lot more to Peru than just Machu Picchu, and the LAT’s Chris Reynolds shows you the what and the where in Cuzco.

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ASIA/PACIFIC
from eTurboNews
One unexpected aftershock from Japan’s 2011 earthquake/tsunami/nuclear disaster — a lot more Japanese tourists vacationing in Taiwan.

from BBC Travel
A mini-guide to a mini-country with a lot going on: Singapore.

from the 
Los Angeles Times
A veteran traveler digs through the multiple cultural layers of the Malaysian city of Malacca.

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EUROPE
from The Guardian (London UK)
Berlin has some of the world’s most cutting-edge architecture, and through this self-guided walking tour, you can check out a lot of it.

from The Guardian (London UK)

The three most beautiful words in the English language when joined together: Paris…wine…free. Free wine tastings of some of France’s best bottled offerings through June.

from The Guardian (London UK)
When you’re ready to party hard, head for Spain. A rundown on where and when to go. Who needs sleep, anyway?

from Rick Steves via USA Today
New things to see and do in France and Spain for 2012.

Edited by P.A.Rice

Q&A: Edward “Eddie” Bergman

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The executive director of the Africa Travel Association has a wide-ranging telephone interview with IBIT about the promises and challenges of African tourism, including the re-emergence of Zimbabwe as a destination.

For six years, Edward Bergman has headed the Africa Travel Association. The son of South African emigrés, he now devotes much of his life to bringing others to the Mother Continent in ways that benefit the host as well as the visitor.

Just ahead of the association’s annual US-Africa Tourism Seminar in Washington DC, he looks at where African tourism is today and where it may be going.

Q. What would you say have been the most important developments in African tourism during your tenure with the Africa Travel Association?

A. Certainly the increase in air access. You didn’t have American airlines flying into Africa. Now you have two. Ethiopian Airlines having 10 (Boeing 787) Dreamliners, that’s a very historical thing. You didn’t have Arik Air that was serving the Nigerian market. Arik has potential to re-create the old Air Afrique routes. They could be a one-stop shop for going to any country they serve in West Africa once that happens.

The (2010 FIFA) World Cup in South Africa. That showed the world that Africa could compete. South Africa made it clear that it wasn’t a South African World Cup but an African World Cup. That really was very big.

Nobody imagined six years years ago that we’d have an African-American president who had family in Africa. It’s a major thing for Africa and for African tourism.

Q. Travelers are always looking for the undiscovered gem. What or where would you say is Africa’s undiscovered gem at present?

A. If I was to predict, I would say destinations such as Libya will become hot. I’m told the cultural tourism product there is spectacular. We were actually looking at having a meeting in Libya before things changed paths. We were actually being encouraged by many people, including Americans.

I think Central Africa could become very interesting. All this depends on safety and security.

West Africa has huge potential, once people can travel more easily with respect to visas.

Q. What are the prospects of getting better air connections to Africa from the US West Coast?

A. We know that a large number of travelers going to Africa are coming from the West Coast. South African Airways has developed a partnership with JetBlue. That may be the direction in which the airlines are going. Code-sharing.

Q. In travel industry trade shows around the United States, the emphasis is almost entirely on safari travel. Doesn’t Africa have more to offer than just wildlife?

A. We haven’t exclusively focused on safaris. ATA has always stood for diversified tourism products. Cultural tourism, heritage tourism, culinary tourism, going to Africa and meeting the people — this is why more people are traveling to Africa. The things we’ve been talking about all these years are coming to light. All of a sudden, it’s cool to go to Rwanda. Who would’ve thought that 14 years ago?

As for the trade shows in the United States, more of the African exhibitors are coming from the private sectors. In Europe, they tend to come more from the governments of the African countries. They’re not investing in the US market. That leaves a gap that the private sector is filling, and the majority of the private sector exhibitors are selling safari tourism products.

Q. What do you see as some of the areas of greatest potential for African tourism?

A. Cruise tourism. The cruise industry is very interested in West Africa; I think we’re going to see some interesting developments there. It needs a set price to make it affordable. Also, the African countries that serve as cruise destinations have to be very firm in making sure that these cruises deliver real benefit to their countries and not just to the cruise lines.

Convention tourism. There are a lot of organizations, a lot of African-American organizations, that could bring their conventions to Africa. I don’t think there’s that much taking place currently. There’s great potential in that.

How about youth tourism? Wouldn’t it be wonderful for African-American youth to travel to Africa while they’re in high school? Educational trips involving multiple countries. I think the cruise industry has some real potential there. Again, the keys would be doing it in a way that was not pricey and in a way that benefits Africa.

Then there’s the Internet. It’s old news to us, but it’s not old news in Africa. As the Internet becomes faster in Africa, it’s going to help the industry. Lodges are being rated on TripAdvisor. You can book stays on Expedia. African tour operators can market themselves directly.

Q.The annual ATA World Congress is going to be held this year at Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe. What do you see as the major issues in African travel to be discussed this year?

I think culinary tourism is something we need to talk about. We’re going to try to find a way to put this on the agenda, to find ways for African countries to showcase their food. In Victoria Falls, where we’re holding the congress this spring, you can have the African experience. But other than that, once you get outside the capital city of Harare, the hotels are serving Western food and that food is often being flown in and that just doesn’t make any sense.

When you go to Africa, you shouldn’t be having frozen fish that’s imported.

We need to look at striking a good balance between cultural and environmental tourism.

We really need to look at Zimbabwe itself, the difference between the perception of the country that we’re given by the Western media and the reality on the ground. It’s a lot different than one fears it is. They will be participating in the seminar on Friday. We also will be organizing a road show for Zimbabwe.

Tourism has always been important to the Zimbabwean economy. Now that things are settling politically, there seems to be this renewed interest, especially from the West. There’s a definite commitment to bringing back the US visitors. The US ambassador in Zimbabwe is a very strong proponent of the tourism industry in Zimbabwe and has given very strong support for this congress.

Q. What are some of the potential and challenges you see in further developing African tourism?

A. I would say East Africa…as infrastructure grows, tourism will grow. New regions within countries need to be explored (for their tourism potential).

From the US, we still do not have direct flight service to East Africa. One has to go through Europe or South Africa. There’s no direct flight to Kenya or Tanzania. There’s a market for that. The question is when that will happen.

From the US market, I also think that West Africa has great potential. It all depends on how political events play out, especially in Senegal, which was doing well (prior to the current presidential election) and has the potential to do very, very well.

(African) countries need to do more marketing and promotion in the United States, especially when it comes to event tourism. There’s great potential for that in the US market.

Q. Where do you see the Africa Travel Association headed in the next few years?

A. ATA needs to be seen as an organization that belongs to Africa politically. Some still see ATA as an American organization. We’ve worked very closely with the African Union Commission, for infrastructure, energy and now, tourism. We recently signed a (memorandum of understanding) that declares ATA as a partner with the AU…that outlines the beginnings of a roadmap in promoting tourism.

The next step is to move our political headquarters to Africa. We would like to see the ATA headquarters in Ethiopia, where the African Union has its headquarters. It then becomes an African regional organization

Edited by P.A.Rice

the IBIT TRAVEL DIGEST 3.11.12

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A roundup of the good, the bad and the bizarre from the world’s best travel media. ​

© Christina Deridder | Dreamstime.com

KENYA: GOING BEYOND BUSH AND BEACH TOURISM
I’ve been saying for awhile now that there’s a lot more to Africa than just exotic wildlife. It looks as if the folks in charge of Kenya’s tourism agree.

According to media reports out of Nairobi, the Kenya Tourism Board is abandoning its focus on beach and safaris. Now, they’re looking to diversify their approach, touting the East African nation as a destination for multiple forms of upscale travel — among them cultural tourism, eco-tourism and sports travel.

Kenya also is looking to raise its profile as a prime African location for MICE — traveltradespeak for meetings, incentives, conventions and exhibitions.

(South Africa is the Mother Continent’s current leader for MICE tourism. Looks as if Kenya wants to break off a chunk of that lucrative market for themselves.)

All this is being done with an eye toward drawing more tourism from Europe and the KTB started pushing this updated concept of Kenyan tourism at the International Travel Bourse show last weekend in Berlin.

Kenya continues to draw international visitors despite its military clashes with al Shabab militias from neighboring Somalia.

For more on this story, check out this report from theNairobi Star.

“LOVE BOAT” TO THE BONEYARD
According to USA Today, the cruise ship that served as the floating set for the TV series “The Love Boat” ‐ and may well have helped launch the modern cruise industry as we now know it — is sailing toward an inglorious end.

The vessel formerly known as the Pacific Princess, has been sold to a demolition company in Turkey, where she’ll be cut up for scrap.

Apparently, she’s been laid up at a dock in Genoa, Italy for nearly a decade.

You can read the USA Today story here.

Those old enough to remember the show also will recall how huge we thought the ship was. In reality, she only held a maximum of about 600 passengers. Today’s mega-cruisers can hold more than that on one deck.

And now, here’s this week’s Digest:

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AIR
from the New York Times
Is there any way to make airplane food taste good? The airlines are trying everything — and I do mean everything.

from the New York Times
A couple of Sea World penguins get the celebrity treatment aboard a Delta flight. Not only do penguins fly, but in this case, they flew First Class. The humans loved it. VIDEO

from USA Today
The skies haven’t been that friendly of late for babies and parents. In one instance, TSA screeners denied boarding to a nursing mother. In another, JetBlue booted an entire family off a flight after their toddler went to DEFCON-5 with her tantrum.
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LAND
from the New York Times
From how to save money on whale-watching in Hawaii to why your next pair of contact lenses should come from Thailand. A roundup of tips from the recent NY Times Travel Show.

from Budget Travel
A vacation rental site adds insurance to protect vacation home renters from nasty surprises.

from Frommer’s
Buy fragile things when you travel? Here’s how to pack them to survive the trip home. SLIDESHOW

SEA
from USA Today
The Costa Allegra, the container ship-turned-cruise ship that went adrift in pirate-infested waters off the East African coast after an engine fire, has probably sailed her last cruise. Her owners, Carnival Cruise Lines, say she will be sold or scrapped.

from USA Today
Another bit of fallout from the loss of the Costa Allegra — beleaguered Costa is cancelling its Red Sea cruises this year. The ship that was to be used in the Red Sea, the Costa Voyager, is being shifted to take Allegra’s place.

from USA Today
Carnival Destiny, the first of Carnival’s mega-sized cruise ships, is going to get one of the biggest makeovers ever done on a cruiser. By the time she re-emerges, even her name will be different.

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AFRICA
from Capital FM (Kenya) via allAfrica.com
Buoyed by what is sees as an improving global economy, British Airways is adding flight between London and the Kenyan capital, Nairobi.

from The Chronicle (Ghana) via allAfrica.com
Aviation officials in Ghana say their citizens are being subjected to artificially high airfares, antiquated equipment and disrespectful treatment by flight attendants aboard foreign airlines. Accra is threatening retaliation if the foreign carriers don’t “come correct.”

from This Day (Nigeria) via allAfrica.com
Four years ago, Lagos welcomed the arrival of the first yacht hotel anywhere in Africa. Four years later, the Sunborn Yacht Hotel is a floating white elephant, yet to welcome a paying guest. PICS and VIDEO

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AMERICAS/CARIBBEAN
from The Associated Press via The Grio
In New York’s Harlem, the phenomenon of gospel tourism is increasingly filling the pews of dwindling black congregations with white European tourists. It’s proving to be a mixed blessing.

from Budget Travel
How well do you know New Orleans? Test your knowledge of the NOLA with this quiz.

from the San Francisco Chronicle
Mention the Amazon and the first place you’re likely to think of is Brazil. Add Peru to that list. Especially if the prospect of exploring the Amazon via a small luxury cruise appeals to you.
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ASIA/PACIFIC
​from Voice of America
One year after being rocked by a devastating earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster, Japan is still trying to get tourists to come back.

from the Los Angeles Times
In Vietnam, the city of Hanoi is making a name for itself among international travelers looking for the best in Vietnamese cuisine.

from the Los Angeles Times
Another sign of growing affluence in China — a domestic wine industry.

from Your Singapore
Remember when Singapore was known for its staid, ultra-conservative lifestyle? The St. James Power Station is an old coal-fired powerplant converted into the ultimate nightlife venue — ten different bars and live music venues under one roof. (Wikipedia lists 11.) So much for staid.

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EUROPE
from TravPr.com
“Paris pour les femmes” means Paris for women. A European tour company is offering luxury tours of Paris—exclusively for women.

​from The Guardian (London UK)
“Foodie” may be a dirty word these days among the travelerati, but if you’ve got a thing for both rustic Italian countryside and great Italian food, there are some places to stay in rural Italy that can satisfy both cravings.

from The Guardian (London UK)
And speaking of Italy, virtually every hotel in Venice is on an island, but this one has an island pretty much to itself, well away from the tourist mobs.

​​

Your Key to the World

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passport

March 10 is officially Passport Day across the United States, the day our State Department uses to encourage every American citizen to apply for a US passport.

One of the best tour guides I’ve ever seen is a young man named David Li, who works for a Seattle-based tour company called China Spree. He takes special care to remind his American charges to safeguard their passports.

“A man without a passport,” he said, “is a man without a country.”

KEEP READING

Travel and The Four Agreements

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A collection of ancient Toltec wisdom holds some good advice for modern-day travelers.

One of the most popular examples of New Age books ever written is a collection of Toltec philosophy by Don Miguel Ruiz called The Four Agreements. It was written to be a guide for people’s lives, but it just as easily could serve as helpful advice when we travel.

The four agreements are:

  1. Be impeccable with your word.
  2. Don’t take anything personally.
  3. Don’t make assumptions.
  4. Always do your best.

Let’s look at these one by one and see how they apply to travel.

Be impeccable with your word.
Ruiz is talking here not about diction but integrity. This one especially applies when you’re traveling with others.

If everybody’s supposed to meet at the airport at a certain time, be there on time. Better yet, be there a little early. If everybody agrees to share expenses, make sure you have your share, ready and in full, at every step.

It makes for a much smoother trip, with a lot less needless drama. What’s more,folks are much more likely to see you as a good travel companion if they feel they can count on you, which makes it more likely that’ll you’ll be invited on future trips.

Don’t take anything personally
Things go wrong sometimes when you travel. Bad weather turns flight schedules into cole slaw. You arrive at your destination but your luggage lands elsewhere. The tour bus throws a fan belt.

None of these things should be viewed as if they’re part of some conspiracy to give you a hard time. In fact, if it’s happening to you, there’s a good chance it’s simultaneously happening to many others.

Keep your cool, know your rights as a passenger, and calmly sort things out.

Here’s a prime example. Airlines deliberately oversell flights in the belief that there will be no-shows; when everyone actually does show, chaos inevitably follows. And if no one volunteers to take a later flight, the last passenger to check in for the oversold flight will be the first to be “bumped” from it.

If that’s you, your original travel plans are going to change, whether you like it or not.

This isn’t happening because the gate agents don’t like you or “your kind.” It’s not being done to cause you grief or cost you money (in fact, the airline could end up having to pay you). Getting loud and personal with the gate agent won’t get you on that airplane.

On the other hand, it could get you a personal escort. From the police. Out of the airport.

Don’t make assumptions
It would be nice to think that your travel agent always knows what he or she is doing. It also would be dangerous.

You need to make sure that your travel documents are correct. If the name on your ticket doesn’t match exactly the way it appears on your driver’s license or passport, you won’t be boarding.

One IBIT reader in Vancouver recently showed up for a flight to Sydney, Australia with her luggage, assured by her travel agent that airlines allow up to two checked bags free on international flights. And most do.

Had she checked Air Canada’s Web site first, she would’ve seen what the agent should’ve known, namely that the airline had cut its baggage allowance last fall to one bag. After that, it’s $70 per bag…each way.

How do you say “ouch!” in Canadian? Oh yeah…ouch!

When it comes to travel, you’ve got to stay on top of things yourself. That’s just the way it is.

Always do your best
This one speaks more to the attitude you bring to a trip.

Yes, you want to make sure that you’re on top of your travel plans, that you’re on time, that you honor your commitments and so on. But beyond all that, you want to go into your trip in a relaxed, upbeat, positive frame of mind, ready to deal with the minor ups-and-downs that come with any trip.

Have you ever traveled with someone who whined, complained, griped and moaned about every little thing that was less than perfect? Someone to whom nothing was good enough, or as good as it was back home, who disparaged and criticized everything and everyone around them (except themselves, of course)?

Does that sound like anybody with whom you’d want to go around the block, much less around the world, even once?

Do yourself and your host country a favor: When you pack for a trip, leave the diva at home.

Adapting The Four Agreements into “rules of the road” for the 21st century could make for a lot more enjoyable and less strssful journeys.

A Dreamliner of Africa

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Boeing 787 Dreamliner of Ethiopian Airlines

Image courtesy of Boeing

One of Africa’s premier airlines is the first on the Mother Continent to acquire Boeing’s new 787 Dreamliner. The implications for African travel are enormous.

While US-based airlines wait to get their hands on the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, the world’s newest jumbo jet is already changing the game in Africa.

Ethiopian Airlines is the first African carrier to put Boeing’s new state-of-the-art airplane into regular service on the Mother Continent. The first arrived last December and Ethiopian has nine more on order.

This comes as Ethiopian becomes the 26th member of the Star Alliance, the world’s largest airline alliance.

Both of these developments carry huge implications for American travelers with an interest in Africa.

Let’s start with Boeing’s shiny new toy. The Dreamliner is likely to have a much greater impact on African tourism than the Airbus A380 super-jumbo jet, at least in the near term.

Simply put, the 787 is more Africa-ready than the A380. Here’s why.

With the A380, Airbus took the position that “bigger is better,” creating the world’s first fully double-decked airliner, capable of flying as many as 800 travelers at a time.

Big plane equals more seats and (in theory, at least) cheaper seats.

Boeing chose range and fuel economy over size, limiting the Dreamliner to fewer than 300 passengers and marrying its two highly fuel-efficient engines to an aircraft made mostly of lightweight composites instead of metal.

That gives the Dreamliner a maximum range of nearly 9,500 miles, which puts virtually all of Africa within easy reach from virtually all of North America.

As an example, the 6,200 miles between Los Angeles and Dakar, Senegal would be nothing for this airplane.

This means that airlines like Ethiopian, Nigeria’s Arik Air and Kenya Airways, both of which have 787s on order, will be able to reach European and American destinations in one hop, without pilots nervously watching their fuel gauges.

Until more Africans start traveling by air, the 787′s extended range serves the Mother Continent better than the A380′s size. And with most of Africa’s international airports lacking the facilities or the runways to comfortably handle the massive A380, the Dreamliner literally is a better fit.

Where Africa-bound Americans are concerned, Ethiopian’s presence in the Star Alliance is just as important, especially if you happen to be a member of United Air Lines’ or US Airways’ frequent-flyer mileage program.

Star Alliance is now the only airline alliance in the world with three African airlines as members — Ethiopian, South African Airways and Egyptair. You now can put your United or USAir miles toward an Africa flight on any one of them.

Kenya Airways is a member of the SkyTeam alliance, which means you can use your Delta frequent-flyer miles with them.

Meanwhile, Arik Air was accepted late last year as a member by the International Air Transport Association, which sets safety standards and represents most of the world’s airlines. That clears the way for Arik to join an alliance.

oneworld is now the only one of the Big Three alliances without an African partner. Arik Air membership in oneworld would enable travelers holding miles on American Airlines or British Airways to snag code-share flights to West Africa via Arik.

Don’t be surprised, then, if oneworld puts the moves on Arik Air to partner with them.

What’s more, international airlines can and do form code-sharing partnerships outside of the alliances. South African Airways, for instance, has already hooked up with JetBlue.

Expect to see more connections like this, and soon.

Without the 787′s ultra-long reach, we wouldn’t even be having this conversation. With this new long-range airliner coming into African hands, a whole world of new opportunity now opens up for them — and for the world’s travelers who are increasingly turning their eyes to Africa.

ALSO CHECK OUT:
Know your alliance, Part 1 Part 2
New wings over Africa, Part 1 Part 2
Dreamliner sighting
Delta does Africa

WORLD TRAVEL and the MAINSTREAM FEAR MACHINE

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© Shutter1970 | Dreamstime.com

Relying on print and especially television news for our knowledge of the world has made too many of us fearful of venturing beyond our own shores.

When you talk to people who’ve never traveled outside the United States, you realize after awhile that a lot of people can actually afford to travel, but don’t. Why? Because they’re afraid.

Travel’s a lot less hazardous today than it was for Vikings in their longboats, the Polynesians in their outrigger canoes, or the Portuguese mariners under Henry the Navigator. But some folks still react to the idea of international travel as if they feared sailing off the edge of a flat world.

And if you really want to see that fear on full display, just broach the idea of visiting Africa.

Too primitive, they say. Too backward, too poor, too politically unstable, too dangerous. Nothing to do there but go on safaris, sleep in the bush, and hope you don’t end up as a Breakfast Jack for some hungry lion.

The fears we have of venturing into foreign lands are very real, but where did those fears come from? We weren’t born with them. Who taught Americans to be afraid of people who don’t look, speak, live or express their spiritual side the same way they do?

And who taught so many African-Americans to be fearful of Africa and suspicious of Africans?

It certainly doesn’t come from any first-hand, intimate knowledge of the wider world. It’s well-documented that Americans:

  • Get less vacation time than the people of any other developed nation.
  • Use less of the vacation time they get than the people of any other developed nation.
  • Travel less than the people of any other developed nation.
  • As a population hold fewer passports than almost any other developed country, about 30 percent.

So where is all this fear — and inevitably, loathing — come from? You need look no further than American mass media — film, television and especially what passes these days for TV news.

I call it the Mainstream Fear Machine.

The reality is that a great many Americans learn of the world outside the United States from what they see on television, mainly on network and cable TV news shows, which far too often seems to consists of camera crews bouncing from one crisis to the next, offering little context and even less perspective.

As long as it yields spectacular, sensational images, that’s good enough.

Most newspapers long ago stopped sending journalists to cover the world in depth, especially those parts of the world with which Americans are least familiar. Their audience wasn’t interested, they said.

Likewise, schools generally make only the most cursory, half-hearted attempts to teach kids anything about the rest of the world.

None of this is new, and it certainly didn’t start with 9/11. The Mainstream Fear Machine is as old as America itself. The World Trade Center attacks just prompted it to crank up the volume.

Try this experiment with anyone you know who’s never been to the Mother Continent. Tell them to close their eyes and describe the images they see when they hear a certain word. Then say “Africa.”

Odds are, your test subject will come back at you with one or more of the following:

  • A lion, a hippo, an elephant or a giraffe. A herd of water buffalo or wildebeest.
  • A wide-eyed young boy with an AK-47 assault rifle almost as big as he is, slung over one shoulder.
  • Angry mobs in the streets, throwing rocks. Barricades made of burning tires. Burning American flags.
  • Swaggering, grinning dictators.
  • Somalia. Blackhawk Down.
  • Skeletal, malnourished, wide-eyed babies, languishing in the arms of their equally starving mothers.
  • Muslim terrorists.
  • Nelson Mandela.

Anyone who has been to even a handful of Africa’s 54 countries can tell you there’s so much more to the Mother Continent than that​.

Thriving urban centers. Hustling entrepreneurs. The second most prolific film-making nation in the world (Nigeria). The most creative music scene on the planet. World-class art, fashion, cuisine. And some of the warmest, friendliest, most loving people on Earth.

Odds are, your test subject won’t know any of that, but that’s not his fault. What most of us know of Africa, and most of the world, we learned from the Mainstream Fear Machine, whose message is simple and readily understood:

The world is a scary place, full of scary people who envy you and hate you and want to hurt you.

A lot of black Americans especially worry about the way they’ll be treated abroad simply because they are black Americans.

Wherever I’ve gone in Europe, the Americas, Asia, Africa, my most cherished memories are of people. Their friendship, their kindness, their willingness to share a little of themselves and their culture with you.

The young Japanese students who led me to a terrific little jazz club in Tokyo, just for the chance to try out their classroom English.

The Mexican shopkeeper who gave me a miniature stone carving of a giant Toltec head.

The Amsterdam tram operator who gave me directions, then took me there on his tram without charge.

The Gambian hotel worker who, upon meeting me, invited me into his home for the naming ceremony for his newborn son.

Are there people out there who fit the fearful descriptions? Most definitely. Does that description fit the entire world, especially the non-European parts of of it? Absolutely not.

But you’ll never know that until you break the grip of the Mainstream Fear Machine and start to know that world and its people for yourself.

 

Edited by P.A. Rice

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IBIT TRAVEL DIGEST 3.4.12

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A roundup of the good, the bad and the bizarre from the world’s best travel media. ​

Refugee camp, DR Congo

©Sam D'cruz | Dreamstime.com

REFUGEE TOURISM…REALLY?
Yes, really.

There’s a private tour company in Rwanda, New Dawn Associates, that includes in its offerings a tour of the Humure refugee camp, composed of Rwandan refugees who had fled into neighboring Tanzania to escape the genocide and civil war of the mid-1990s, later to be pushed back into arid wildlands inside Rwandan territory.

According to their Web site, Humure is “a refugee community with a very rich history and culture, and very entrepreneurial and hospitable attitudes…Visitors are invited to participate in the daily lives and cultural customs.”

For me, though, this was the capper: “Home stays will also become available soon.”

That’s right. For whatever amount of money New Dawn Associates is charging for this tour, you too can play African refugee for a day or more.

New Dawn Associates says on its site that they work in partnership that includes local authorities and the “Humure tourism cooperative,” adding that the community’s share of the profits from this venture is 70 percent.

Being a guy who tries to give folks the benefit of the doubt, I’m not quite sure how I feel about this. But in an editorial for The New Times of Rwanda, writer Sunny Ntayombya has no such hesitation, calling it “disgusting and morally questionable.”

You can read the entire New Times editorial here.

Is this altruism at its best or exploitation at its worst? Click on the Comments section below and have your say.

FALKLANDS FLAP
The continuing dispute between Britain and Argentina over the Falkland Islands has now spilled over into cruise travel.

According to Travel Weekly, two cruise ships recently were refused permission to dock at the Argentine port city of Ushuaia. Reason: They had previously made a port call on the Falklands, which the Argentines call the Malvinas.

You can read the entire Travel Weekly story here.

The islands are one of Britain’s last remaining colonies, since 1833, and Argentina has claimed sovereignty over them for almost as long.

When Argentina invaded in 1982, it led to a short but ruinous war between the two sides that killed more than a thousand men, cost the Royal Navy several ships and ultimately brought down the Argentine government.

​KEEP YOUR CAMERA COOL
The folks at Matador Network have some tips on how to protect your camera — and your shots — from extreme heat and sunlight.​

You can read those tips here.

The truth is that most of us blithely ignore those obscure manufacturers’ references to safe operating temperatures — and that little warning could cost you dearly.

When I took my then-new Canon G12 to the Gambia, it was February, but their winter sun was still fiercely bright and blazing hot, so much so that it fried the circuitry in my digital audio recorder. I had to periodically shut down the G12 and let it rest in the shade.

I ended up missing some great shots, but the alternative was to go the rest of the trip with a dead camera.

These days, some manufacturers are making cameras with light-colored or even all-white bodies. If you know you’re going to be spending a lot or all of your time in hot environments, you might consider getting one.

As an old-school shutterbug*, anything other than an all-black camera looks just too toylike to be taken seriously. After seeing the number that the Gambian sun did on my all-black gear, however, I may need to adjust my attitude.

(*Note that I refer to myself here as a “shutterbug” rather than a photographer. I’ve worked with real photographers. I know the difference.)



And now, here’s this week’s Digest:

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AIR
from USA Today
While American Airlines and its employee unions wage a very public feud over American’s bankruptcy petition, Frontier Airlines may be quietly going on the auction block. The only question is: Does anyone want it?

from USA Today
The flip side of airline mergers. The Southwest Airlines purchase of AirTran may be great for Southwest, but it’s leaving some cities feeling abandoned.

from Budget Travel
Want to get away from East Coast weather? Airlines putting on more flights to Hawaii.
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LAND
from TNOOZ
TripAdvisor partnering with a European hotel booking service to create third-party verification of customer reviews in an attempt to combat phony, bogus, “planted” customer views.

from Budget Travel via Yahoo!
Food etiquette for travelers. The do’s and don’ts when sitting down to table away from home.

SEA
from the USA Today
The parade of new cruise ships just doesn’t stop. Disney christens a new one in New York, Disney Fantasy, set to sail a year from now. Mariah Carey does the honors.

from USA Today
And speaking of new cruise ships, Royal Caribbean has got a whole new class of cruisers coming out, the Sunshine class. These are actually smaller than the floating behemoths of the Oasis class — but with a capacity of up to 4,100 passengers, they still won’t exactly be the SS Minnow.

from Travel Weekly​
What is Royal Caribbean’s Rhapsody of the Seas doing way the hell over in Singapore? A $54-million facelift, that’s what.

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AFRICA
from TNOOZ
Online hotel reservation systems aren’t exactly flocking to West Africa, so one entrepreneur is creating his own. It follows a trend of Africans creating their own homegrown version of popular online commercial services.

from The Independent (Uganda) via allAfrica.com
Uganda creates new Tourism Police force, with an eye toward crime prevention and building on the country’s newfound momentum as a tourist destination.

from the BuaNews (South Africa) via allAfrica.com
It’s starting to look as if the 2010 FIFA World Cup wasn’t a fluke. With some 200 international conferences booked over the next five years, South Africa is becoming a major world destination for major events.

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AMERICAS/CARIBBEAN
from Budget Travel
Want to go spring breaking in Mexico, but the State Department’s latest Mexico travel warning is making you nervous? State is now coming back with a list of Mexican cities where things are cool enough not to rate an advisory.

from the New York Times
Austin, the official state capital of Texas and the unofficial state capital of non-Texan counterculture, shows all the signs of going upscale.

from the Los Angeles Times
Whitney Houston’s body isn’t even cold in the ground yet, but the Beverly Hills hotel where she died is already on the Hollywood tour-bus circuit.
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from The Guardian (London UK)
Is climate change threatening a Canadian winter sports tradition with extinction?

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ASIA/PACIFIC
​from the Los Angeles Times
In central Java in predominantly Muslim Indonesia, near one of the few cities in the world still ruled by a sultan, stands the imposing Buddhist temple of Borobudur.

from the New York Times
The seaside village of Kep in coastal Cambodia is lovely, laid back and delightfully light on tourist crowds — for now. ​

from the Los Angeles Times
Remember the insane surfing-under-fire scene from the Vietnam war movie “Apocalypse Now?” In Da Nang these days, the war’s long gone, but the good surf is still there.

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EUROPE
from The Guardian (London UK)
After several years’ hiatus, the classic Routemaster double-decker bus is back on the streets of London. This interactive guide will introduce you to the newest edition of a London icon. Meanwhile, this Los Angeles Times story tells the tale of their disappearance and return.

​from The Guardian (London UK)
The hidden shopping arcades of Paris. Your wallet may wish they had remained hidden.

Edited by P.A. Rice

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A Dreamliner come true for San Diego

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JAL 787 old livery 3
AWA1994
Boeing's 787 Dreamliner Surpasses 500 Customer Orders in under Three Years
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JAL 787 new livery
http://www.dreamstime.com/-image12461199
First 787 Flight Test Aerial Photos FA251247K64839-03

Aircraft images courtesy of Boeing. Tokyo images from Dreamstime.com.

Boeing’s new state-of-the-art 787 is making it possible for Japan Air Lines to launch non-stop flights this year from San Diego to Tokyo.

For the first time in its history, San Diego will have a direct, regularly scheduled air link to the other side of the Pacific Ocean.

According to published media reports, Japan Air Lines plans to begin with four nonstop flights per week between Lindbergh Field (SAN) and Tokyo’s Narita International Airport (NRT) in December. By March 2013, the flights would be daily.

The outbound flight to Tokyo will be JAL Flight 065, leaving Lindbergh Field at noon and touching down at Narita at 4:55 p.m. and following day. The return, JL066, will take off from NRT at 5:30 p.m. and touch down in SAN at 10:30 the following morning.

(NOTE: If you’ve ever wondered if there was a rhyme-and-reason to airline flight numbers, there is. Westbound and southbound flights usually get odd numbers, while northbound and eastbound flights get evens.)

For San Diego residents, that means no more having to drag themselves up to Los Angeles to fly out of LAX on their Asian trips, something that will make a lot of San Diego-based travelers very happy.

What makes all this possible is the aircraft JAL plans to use on this route, Boeing’s new 787 Dreamliner. Indeed, the opening of the SAN-NRT route is a clear example of the kind of impact Boeing envisioned for its new state-of-the-art jet.

Japan Air Lines logo

Its fuel-efficient engines and relatively light weight — made possible by using carbon fiber for the fuselage and deliberately limiting the plane to fewer than 300 passengers — give it the range to make the trans-Pacific hop without need of a refueling stop.

Boeing’s tales of woe in developing the 787, which led to its debut being three years late, have been well-documented, and the financial fallout from those delays isn’t over yet. But now that it’s finally entering service, you can see the kind of impact it’s going to have on air travel, just as the Boeing designers doggedly insisted that it would.

DEJA VU OF A RISING SUN
If it’s true that life is a circle, then the traveler’s circle may sometimes take him over oceans. That was how I felt when I heard that Japan Air Lines was coming to San Diego.

The year was 1976. The Vietnam war had been over for barely a year. And I was taking the first major international trip of my life, a 10-day summer swing through Tokyo, Hong Kong and Bangkok.

The first leg of that trip was flown from LAX to Tokyo Haneda airport aboard a Boeing 747 from Japan Air Lines.

It was my first time on a jumbo jet, my first time out of sight of land for longer than 20 minutes, my first time aboard an airliner owned and operated by someone other than Americans.

It also would be my first experience in a land where I not only didn’t speak the language, but couldn’t even guess at what the signs said. And it would be the first time my mere presence ever drew long looks, stares and nervous giggles by virtue of being a black American.

There were other firsts. My first attempt to use chopsticks. My first encounters with sushi and sake.

Those ten days would produce a lot of memories, but it all started aboard that JAL 747, complete with its red rising sun logos adorning the wingtips.

Now, all these years later, JAL connects San Diego to Tokyo. The circle closes…and also reopens.

The JAL flights will be operated on a code-share basis with American Airlines. JAL also reportedly is looking to hook up with JetBlue.

If that happens, you’ll not only be able to connect to Japan through San Diego via JetBlue, but check your bags all the way through to Tokyo when you check in for your JetBlue flight. Sweet.

All this represents a major step up in class for San Diego, whose limited airport space and single, relatively short runway has led most of the world’s major airlines to treat California’s second most populous city like the proverbial redheaded stepchild.

Having an airline like JAL use San Diego to open a new Asian air route could cause other airlines to change how they view the city and its airport.

It also represents the start of what could be a major comeback for JAL, which was Japan’s premier airline back in the 1970s, but lost much ground thereafter to ANA, All Nippon Airways.

It probably stung the JAL leadership more than a little that ANA was the first airline in the world to begin flying the Dreamliner in commercial service last fall. But with 10 Dreamliners on order and announcing multiple new routes, JAL seems hell-bent on catching up.

And it starts in San Diego.

ALSO CHECK OUT:
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XL Airways France

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Another French airline is making its way across the Atlantic to give both US and European air carriers a little competition on the Paris route.

​I happen to like Air France quite a lot, but they have a new competitor for the affections of American air travelers. It’s called XL Airways France.

It’s actually been around since 1995 as STAR Airlines, mainly flying from France to destinations in the Caribbean, the Middle East and Africa. It changed its name to XL Airways France in 2006, survived a bankruptcy, and now it’s here.

XL showed up briefly in the US market for the first time last year, when it began flying Airbus jumbo jets from Las Vegas to Paris. Starting in May, it’ll be flying to Paris CDG from JFK in New York and San Francisco, as well as Vegas.​

It’ll be vying with US air behemoths like United, American and Delta airlines, as well Air France, British Airways and a host of other European carriers, to carve out a slice of the US-France travel market.

It’s not exactly a large outfit, but that may be to its advantage if it helps to hold down costs, and thus ticket prices. Their fleet consists of exactly nine airplanes — six Airbus A330s and three Boeing 737s.

No details yet on schedules or airfares. As soon as that becomes available, I’ll let you know.

Meanwhile, if you’ve flown XL Airways in the past, what was the experience like? Would you fly with it again? Leave me a comment and let me know!

Edited by P.A.Rice

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