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the IBIT Travel Digest 1.14.13

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The good, the bad and the bizarre in the world of travel

Southwest Airline Boeing 737

Southwest Airlines Boeing 737 landing in San Diego | © Greg Gross

LOOKING ELSEWHERE, LOOKING HOMEWARD
Last weekend’s Los Angeles Travel & Adventure Show in Long Beach was equal parts eye opener and reminder.

Japan, still pushing hard to rebuild its tourism after the earthquake/tsunami/radiation disaster of 2011, was the biggest country sponsor this year, with all kinds of intriguing offers, including one that never would’ve occurred to me — anime tourism.

Expect to hear more about that later on IBIT.

Turkey also had a major presence this year, as did Indonesia. Baja California destinations — from Cabo San Lucas at the peninsula’s southern tip to Tijuana, Rosarito Beach, Ensenada, Tecate and Mexicali, also were representing well, and that was good for this old Baja hand to see.

But the destination that reality hooked my attention this year was Malaysia.

How many of us ever seriously consider Malaysia as a place to visit? How many of even know where Malaysia is? Well, somebody knows, because it’s the tenth most popular tourism destination in the world.

And in this case, getting there might actually be half the fun. Its national air carrier, Malaysia Airlines, gets a five-star rating from Skytrax for its passenger service, one of only six airlines in the world to be rated that highly.

At the other end of the travel scale, and literally on the other side of the floor, there were a lot of exhibitors touting outdoor and adventure travel in places like California’s Sequoia country and Yosemite National Park. It reminded me that we have some world-class attractions right here at home that we too often take for granted.

IBIT says: Watch for more on all of this in the coming days.

DREAMLINER DIFFICULTIES
How’s this for a reality TV show: You’ve got this hot new jet, state of the art, but there are so many problems building it was three years late arriving. But now it’s finally here and flying all over the world and everything’s great and…

Wait, say what? Electrical fires? Fuel leaks?

Welcome to the very real world of Boeing and its new 787 Dreamliner.

The Federal Aviation Administration is ordering a safety review after those problems surfaced aboard Japan Air Lines 787s in recent days.

Such reports can’t help but make travelers nervous, especially those flying across oceans. However, this CNN report puts it all in perspective.

Bottom line: all new planes have teething problems. The Boeing 707 and 747 did back in the day, as do Airbus aircraft, most recently its A380 super-jumbo. When the problems arise, you jump on them, as the FAA is doing, fix them, keep an eye on them…and move on. We should do as well maintaining our cars.

Still, it does bear watching, which IBIT will be doing.

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TITANIC SAILS AGAIN?
Did you see the movie “Titanic” and come away wishing you could have sailed on that early 20th century luxury liner — minus the iceberg, of course?

Three years from now, you may get your chance.

The Associated Press is reporting that an Australian billionaire is planning to build a 21st century replica of the ill-fated vessel in a Chinese shipyard, combining old-school opulence with state-of-the-art construction, propulsion and navigation features that Capt. Edward John Smith could not have imagined back in 1912.

You can read the entire AP story, courtesy of USA Today, here.

The would-be builder hasn’t set a price tag for this project, but you know the old saying: “If you have to ask, you can’t afford it.”

And this guy apparently can.

Even so, other attempts to create a Titanic 2.0 have never left the proverbial drawing boards. If all goes well, however, the new and improved Titanic will hit the water sometime in 2016.

This time, hopefully, the water won’t hit back with a large, angry block of floating ice.

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BOEING 737 — SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEW
For nearly haf a century, while bigger, faster, more imposing-looking airliners have grabbed headlines and captured the imaginations of travelers, the stubby, unassuming little Boeing 737, like the one above, has quietly established itself as world’s the most widely used airliner.

Every five seconds, two of them are taking off or landing somewhere on the planet. Not bad for an aircraft which began life as basically a cut-down version of the Boeing 707.

Over the decades, a steady steam of modifications have made them bigger and more sophisticated. Now, Boeing is planning to take their winged bus even further with yet another large-scale makeover. The result, called the Boeing 737 Max, should be ready for service by 2017.

To the layman’s eye, it’ll still look the same 737 that first flew in 1967. But in many ways, as USA Today reports, it will be a brand-new airplane.

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And now, here’s The Digest:

AIR
from Christopher Elliott
The merger between American Airlines and USAir seems all but official. What does it hold in store for the traveling consumer?

from the Los Angeles Times
What flight attendants really think of you. Everything you’ve always wanted to know…or maybe never wanted to know.

from the Washington Post
Jet lag is hard enough on a body in any direction, but it’s actually harder on you flying east than west. What to do about it.

LAND
from Smarter Travel via USA Today
Ten overrated tourist traps — and ten better alternatives. Agree or disagree?

from the New York Times
You’d think famed travel author Paul Theroux has been just about everywhere, but his wish list of destinations is still massively long — and many of them are right here in America.

WATER
from USA Today
The steamboats are back on the Mississippi River this summer, and the competition could be fierce.

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AFRICA
from The Mirror (London UK)
For a real off-road mountain bike adventure, with gorgeous views thrown in as an extra, consider South Africa’s Table Mountain above Cape Town. Just mind the puff adders.

from The New Times (Rwanda) via allAfrica.com
What a concept: Rwanda sets new rules enabling African nationals outside of East Africa to obtain visas on arrival in Rwanda. A big step forward for African regional travel, perhaps?

from the Namibian (Namibia) via allAfrica.com
one of Africa’s great rivers, the Okavango, and the struggle to save it from pollution.

from Bulawayo 24 via allAfrica.com
A new 5-star hotel opens on the shores of Lake Victoria, just in time for the August general assembly of the UN World Tourism Organization in Zimbabwe.

AMERICAS
from the Los Angeles Times
In the United States, bus travel is often disparaged by many. In Brazil, it’s the way to go.

from The Guardian (London UK)
If you really want to “cowboy up” for less than an American dude ranch, do it vaquero style on a working cattle ranch in Mexico.

from SFGate
Scottsdale, AZ is more than golf clubs and baseball spring training. Save some love for some seriously gorgeous desert.

from SFGate
California’s Monterey County, long known for its beautiful seashore and iconic jazz festival, has quietly become a heavyweight in another arena: wine. Could the Napa Valley natives be getting restless?

ASIA/PACIFIC
from the Washington Post
A traditional guesthouse in rural Japan, where the highlight is Italian food prepared by an Australian chef.

from the Daily Mail (London UK)
When the Iron Curtain fell for good in the early 1990s, a lot of historic, unspoiled and intriguing Central Asia opened up to the world as new nations. One of them is Uzbekistan.

EUROPE
from The Lookout via Yahoo
Birth of an island? What was nothing more than a sand bar ten years ago has now appeared as a fully formed 34-acres island off the coast of northern Germany.

from the Los Angeles Times
Now free to be creative, Russian chefs are putting a modernized touch on tradition Russian cuisine.

RANT: Does America need a tourism czar?

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http://www.dreamstime.com/-image26963455

Our haphazard, unfocused, uncoordinated efforts to sell America to the world’s tourists won’t cut it in the 21st century. We have to do better.

President Barack Obama last year signed an executive order creating a task force to design a National Travel & Tourism Strategy. It was a follow-up to his 2010 signing of the Travel Promotion Act of 2009.

Believe it or not, it’s the first time in our history that the US government has set promoting foreign travel to America as a national priority, something that most of the world’s nations, from the poorest to the richest, have been doing for decades.

To American ears, the title “tourism minister” has a quaint, even comic ring to it. To the rest of the world, however, it’s no joke, and here’s why:

Some time last month, a man or woman packed a bag and boarded a plane, train, bus or a ship to travel from one country to another, maybe for business but more likely for pleasure. That person was the one billionth traveler of 2012, the first time the world has ever seen that many people traveling in one year.

Tourism worldwide generates about $1 trillion and hundreds of millions of jobs annually. It’s growing almost in defiance of the recession. Just about every nation on Earth wants as big a piece of that action as it can get, and they’re all working very hard at getting it.

The world’s top ten tourism destinations, in order, are France, the United States, China, Spain, Italy, the United Kingdom, Turkey, Germany, Mexico and Malaysia. The US is the only one of the ten that doesn’t have a Cabinet-level official devoted to promoting tourism.

Some may argue that America has done well enough at attracting tourists without needing one. “We’re Number Two! We’re Number Two!” What’s the problem with that? Let me count the ways.

  1. Our Economy American unemployment is unacceptably high. This country has been bleeding manufacturing and other blue-collar jobs for decades and those jobs are not coming back. At the same time, you will be hard-pressed to find another industry in the world generating more new business and new cash flow than tourism. Think this economy could use some new jobs?
  2. Our Pride Since when were Americans content to be Number Two in anything?

And yet we sort of muddle our way through the business of attracting more visitors — and their money — to this country.

New York City is America’s top travel destination, and last year, the Big Apple drew a record 52 million visitors. The fact that the City of New York runs 18 tourism offices around the world probably had something to do with that.

It’s great that New York can afford to run its own overseas promotional campaign, but why should it have to? And what about all our other great cities that can’t afford to run their own foreign offices?

The Travel Promotion Act of 2009 created something called the Office of Travel Promotion within the US Commerce Department. Show of digital hands: How many of you out there ever heard of the Office of Travel Promotion before this moment?

If I dig long and hard enough, I can probably find out who runs this office and what it’s doing on behalf of American tourism — but why should I have to? Why should anyone have to?

I could easily tell you who’s in charge of tourism in Denmark, Brazil, Singapore, Botswana, or more than a hundred other countries. All the government’s efforts to bring in more visitors flow with a single, concentrated focus through that person’s office.

Who holds that responsibility in the United States? Who is the face of American tourism in Washington? Thirteen years into the 21st century, I have no idea — and I’m betting you don’t, either.

The federal government’s attempts to push American tourism abroad hasn’t even taxied to the head of the runway yet and already, it’s a hot, disjointed mess — a board here, an office there, a task force over in the corner.

Who’s running this?

Somebody needs to take charge here, a Cabinet-level official with the clout to pull all these scattered efforts together, and a profile that guarantees direct access to the President and Congress when necessary.

A tourism secretary. A tourism minister. A tourism czar. The title itself doesn’t matter, but the need for it does. Because the global competition for those $1 trillion is heating up, and the rest of the world is not waiting around for Washington to get its act together.

the IBIT Travel Digest 12.23.12

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The good, the bad and the bizarre in the world of travel

Tongli, China's ancient Venice | ©IBIT/G. Gross

Tongli, China’s ancient Venice | ©IBIT/G. Gross

UP A LAZY ASIAN RIVER
River cruising has long been a travel staple in Europe and shows little sign of slowing down. But cruise lines and tour companies increasingly are looking to Asia as the Next Big Thing in cruising.

According to USA Today, Viking River Cruises, one of the biggest names in European river cruising, has already announced plans to offer river cruises in Myanmar and Thailand, starting in 2014.

Others aren’t waiting that long. Travel Daily News.Asia is reporting that Travel Indochina is already adding Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) and Laos to a river cruise itinerary that already includes Vietnam, Cambodia and Yangtze River cruises in China.

With increasing world interest in Asia and growing middle classes in Asian countries with money to spend and a desire to see more of their own homelands, Asian river cruising could be a hot market for years to come.

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PUTTING A STOP TO MOTION SICKNESS
So far, this is one of life’s ailments that has mercifully passed me by. But there are plenty of people who suffer with this — and “suffer” is the operative term.

At the least, it can seriously interfere with your ability to enjoy travel. At its worst, it may prevent you from traveling altogether.

We’ve all had our share of laughs about motion sickness. Even Hollywood films and cartoons have gotten in on the levity. But every time I see the airsickness bag on the airplane or see folks on cruise ships with that little scopolamine patch on their necks, I’m reminded that motion sickness is no joke.

It’s a physical misunderstanding. Your inner ear tells your brain, “We’re moving!” Your eyes are saying, “No, we’re not!” Your stomach wishes they’d both shut the hell up.

There’s no real cure for motion sickness, but there are ways you can deal with this, and the New York Times breaks it all down at length in this article.

Their suggestions may not rid you of this curse, but they might make life a little easier for you, or your kids.

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CHARGED UP
A lot of us travel with a lot of electronic gear — smartphones, iPods, tablets. They make us productive during those long flights, or at least keep us from dying of boredom.

But even if they’re fully charged when we leave for the airport, their batteries may be no match for that 10-hour or 12-hour transcontinental flight. And finding an available electrical outlet in a crowded terminal during an unexpected delay can be…well…challenging.

Which is why the Summit 3000 battery pack caught my attention. As Smarter Travel points out, it’s neither very light or really cheap, but if you need to keep your devices running in places where a plug isn’t handy, you may be glad you have this.

One especially cool feature is that it’s dual-voltage, which means you can use it overseas with no hassle; all you need is a plug adaptor for the country you’re in. And if you travel with electronic gear, odds are you already have some of those.

Still, it isn’t powerful enough to charge a laptop, which leaves my black MacBook feeling neglected and resentful.

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FLYING YOUR FELINE
Traveling with pets is always tricky, especially if the pet is a cat. It’s tough enough on the sensitive little critters, even without having to deal with the TSA — which actually lost one traveler’s cat in New York JFK airport.

There’s nothing we can do about the TSA, but there are things cat owners can do to make travel easier on their beloved felines, and the folks at Smarter Traveler lay out their suggestions in this slideshow.

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AND FINALLY…
If your Boeing and you want to test how well in-flight wifi works aboard your aircraft, what sort of exotic, sophisticated, state-of-the-art testing equipment do you use?

Why, potatoes, of course — 20,000 pounds of potatoes, right on the passenger seats.

And as proof that I’m neither crazy nor making this stuff up, check out this CNN story on Boeing’s wifi tests.

And please, no mashup jokes.

And now, here’s The Digest:

AIR
from Travel Weekly
Don’t look now, but your already miserable experience getting through airport security could get a lot worse two weeks into 2013. It’s all about your driver’s license and an eight-year-old federal law that gone unenforced — until now. IBIT will be exploring this in depth shortly.

from the Washington Post
Spas. Yoga. Luxury food. Fine dining. An international resort? You’ll increasingly find these high-end amenities in the last place you’d look for them — American airports.

from Christopher Elliot
Is the TSA doomed? A respected consumer writer says the powers that be have heard the traveling public’s gripes — and they’re paying attention.

from Smarter Travel
Seven ways to avoid airline baggage fees. SLIDESHOW

LAND
from the New York Times
Have you ever longed to explore ancient historic sites, without having to contend with mobs of tourists? Here are five spots around the world where your wish may come true…for now, anyway.

SEA
from Gadling
Cruise travel is rebounding from a rough year.

from Travel Weekly
Are the Viking River Cruises people building a navy or what? Already with ten new cruise ships on order for next year, they’ve already committed to eight more in 2014. That makes 24 new river cruisers in three years. But given Viking’s interest in Asia (see above), it makes perfect sense.

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AFRICA
from The New Times (Kenya) via allAfrica.com
The national airlines of Kenya and Rwanda hook up in a strategic partnership that eventually could stremaline regional air travel between eastern and central Africa.

from The Point (Gambia) via allAfrica.com
A village on a pristine coastal stretch of the Gambia becomes the anchor point of an ambitious experiment in ecotourism.

from Vanguard (Nigeria) via allAfrica.com
A state government in Nigeria wants to turn the site of the country’s first recorded plane crash into a tourist attraction. Uhhh…

AMERICAS
from The Guardian (London UK)
We think of New Orleans mostly as a grown-ups’ playground, but come Christmastime, it becomes a magical place for kids.

from SFGate.com
Good news from Mexico: There’s a hotel building boom underway in Cancun.

from the Washington Post
A foodie’s tour of Peru. SLIDESHOW

from the Sacramento Bee
Hollywood has its stars, but in California’s Anza-Borrego Desert, you’ll get an unrestricted view of the real ones.

ASIA/PACIFIC
from CNNgo
Riding waves of modernization, gentrification and newly made Chinese money, there’s never been a better time to visit Hong Kong. An insider’s look at one of the world’s perpetually energized destinations.

from CCTV (China)
China and Nepal sign a commitment to promote tourism between the two countries.

from the Jakarta Post (Indonesia)
Have you ever poured Thousand Island dressing on your salad and wondered if such a place actually exists? It does. It’s in Indonesia, and the governor of the nation’s capital, Jakarta, would love to see the Thousand Islands region become a tourist attraction.

EUROPE
from the New York Times
Walk through history in the ancient city of Toledo, a city holy to Catholics in Spain. Its religious importance saw it escape multiple wars almost untouched.

from The Guardian (London UK)
How Vienna waltzes through Christmas.

from The Guardian (London UK)
The world’s oldest monument was discovered only about a decade ago. It’s 11,000 years old. And it’s in Turkey.

from the Champaign/Urbana News-Gazette (IL)
For most travelers interested in Europe, Slovenia doesn’t register as a worthwhile destination. And that’s kind of a shame.

the IBIT Travel Digest 11.25.12

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The good, the bad and the bizarre from the world’s best travel media

Strasbourg Christmas lights stand

Shopping for Christmas lights, Strasbourg, France | @copy;IBIT/G. Gross

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UNEASY MIDEAST
The so-called “Arab Spring” may have brought political change to North Africa and the Middle East, but it’s bringing little good cheer to the travel industry. The ongoing turmoil in that part of the world continues to make it — justly or unjustly — a no-go zone in the eyes of many travelers.

Travel Weekly reports that between now and next April, Norwegian Cruise Line is dropping Egypt from its 10- and 11-day cruises, scheduling port calls in Istanbul, Crete and Naples in its place.

And NCL came to that decision before Egypt’s new president got involved in brokering a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza and then tangled with his own nation’s judiciary over sweeping new powers he claimed…for himself.

Bottom line: Many of the countries now being avoided by travelers and travel companies alike may be perfectly safe to visit, but it may be a good while yet before the traveling public perceives them that way.

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AMTRAK RIDING HIGH
Anyone who tells you Americans don’t take trains hasn’t been to a train station lately. IBIT has and I can tell you, they’re busy.

Amtrak’s business year officially closed out on Sept. 30, and it closed on all high notes, starting with this one: 31.2 million passengers for fiscal 2012.

Two things make that number important. First, it’s the highest ridership for Amtrak since it came into being in 1971. Second, it’s the ninth year in a row that Amtrak has set a new ridership mark.

While you’re at it, smoke this over: Between 2000 and 2012, Amtrak ridership has risen by 49 percent.

You’ll find the rest of Amtrak’s glowing figures in the corporation’s press release here.

A lot of airline CEOs would kill for numbers like these. Then again, the misery that is present-day air travel in the United States is a big reason why more people are turning to trains in the first place.

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AND FINALLY
You know those customer-satisfaction surveys by J.D. Power & Associates, the ones that companies always tout in TV commercials to show how wonderful they are? Here’s one you won’t be seeing anytime soon, from anybody.

With hotel business picking up, J.D. Power decided to survey hotel guests. Those guests put the hotel industry on blast. Low-end, high-end, no one was spared:

“Satisfaction with check-in/check-out; food and beverage; hotel services; and hotel facilities are at new lows since the 2006 study and satisfaction with guest room has declined within one point of its lowest level in the past seven years.”

If I’m that guy at Motel 6 and I hear that, I’m leaving the light on because I can’t sleep. How did this happen?

Here’s a clue, courtesy of Travel Weekly’s Arnie Weissmann: Most of the top hotels in the country aren’t owned by real “hotel people” anymore.

They’re owned by private equity companies, which specialize in boosting profits by cutting costs — mainly by cutting staff and lowering service levels — before selling off the business to someone else.

That may be necessary when you’ve got hotels full of empty rooms at the height of a recession, but to keep doing it after your customers start coming back? Not smart, as J.D. Power vice-president Stuart Greif gently points out:

“Hoteliers need to get back to the fundamentals and improve the overall guest experience. Charging guests more and providing less is not a winning combination.”

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And now, here’s The Digest:

AIR
from Travel Weekly
Qatar Airways joins oneworld, the world’s number two airline alliance. QA joins Malaysia Airlines and SriLankan Airlines as members-elect. It’s a big deal for Asian air travel and a big boost for oneworld, but the announcement is overshadowed by the ongoing beef between American Airines and its pilots.

from Travel Weekly
The Middle East may still be too hot politically for some travelers, but that’s not stopping three major Persian Gulf airlines from building alliances with European carriers.

from Travel Weekly
Southwest Airlines will start flying this spring from Florida to Puerto Rico. Officially, it’s a simple takeover of existing service from AirTran, which Southwest bought. But as its first air service outside the continental United States, it’s a big step.

LAND
from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Pickpockets in Spain, gypsy cabs in Rome and other avoidadable travel scams.

from Travel Weekly
JW Marriott opens the world’s tallest hotel in Dubai. How tall? About eight stories shorter than the Empire State Building in New York. Yep, that’s tall, all right.

from Independent Traveler.com
Lots of folks have tips on how best to travel with kids — but what about traveling with grandkids?

from NBC News
Honeymoons…with friends? Really? Yes, really.

SEA
from Cruise Critic
Cruising for grown-ups. Seven options for sailing without the kids.

from Travel Weekly
Norwegian Cruise Line is going all Grinch on Hawai’i. Seeing strong demand for its Hawaiian cruises, NCL is raising its Hawai’i cruise prices 10 percent starting Jan 1, 2013. Merry Christmas…

from Gadling
Travel insurance is one purchase a lot of cruise travelers try to do without. Don’t. But have a clear understanding of what travel insurance will and won’t do for you.

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AFRICA
from the Ethiopian Press Agency via allAfrica.com
Addis Ababa starting to become a destination for conference travel.

from The Herald (Zimbabwe) via allAfrica.com
The justly famed Victoria Falls are starting to get some serious competition as a tourist attraction from the Mana Pools. Chinese tourists in particular just love this spot.

from allAfrica.com
Citizen of Vietnam caught in Mozambique with a half-dozen rhino horns in his possession. Wonder how to say “You in a heap ‘a trouble, boy!” in Vietnamese?

from Inform Africa
An African looks at our Thanksgiving tradition, and wonders why African-Americans find anything to celebrate.

AMERICAS
from Travel Weekly
If you’re used to paying $51 in airport fees when flying into and out of Antigua, get ready to go a little deeper into your wallet from now on.

from the Los Angeles Times
The Hotel Chimayo de Santa Fe in Santa Fe, NM walks a fine line between respecting an impoverished local culture and providing a successful escape for its visitors.

from USA Today
If you’ve been frightened away from Mexico over the last several years, you can at least think about returning now. The most recent State Department travelers warning about Mexico exempts most of that country’s traditional tourist destinations.

ASIA/PACIFIC
from the New York Times
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia’s capital city, is obsessed with good food. For a traveler, that could be a very good thing, indeed.

from the New York Times
A short but worthwhile visit in the city we used to know as Calcutta. Nowadays, it goes by Kolkata.

from The Guardian (London UK)
With a sleek new mountain eco-resort not far from Shanghai in Zhejiang province, China hopes to lure environmentally conscious tourists — and perhaps simultaneously clean up its international image as one of the world’s major polluters.

from France 24
Are the people of Singapore real-world Vulcans a la Star Trek, utterly lacking in emotions (as well as pointy ears)? A US Gallup poll says yes. Even worse, a fair number of Singaporeans seem to agree. It seems they’re too busy making a living to have a life.

EUROPE
from The Guardian (London UK)
A look at the town of Vicenza, one of northern Italy’s under-appreciated jewels, and the creation of one of its most famous architects. A UN World Heritage Site that still manages to slip below the tourist radar.

Edited by P.A.Rice

Traveler’s bank…or cartel bank?

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Is a British bank that’s useful for travelers equally helpful to drug traffickers?

Whether as a saver, investor or traveler, it’s hard to know where to put your money these days.

I discovered a lot of things on my first trip to London a decade or so ago. One of them was this British bank called HSBC.

With automated teller machines in full effect worldwide, I really didn’t feel much like hassling with traveler’s checks anymore. It was so much easier to just go to the ATM in whatever country you happen to find yourself and draw out the cash you need — and at a better rate than you’d get from any currency exchange house.

But which bank could you use? Which one had the kind of global reach that would allow me to travel anywhere and get cash anywhere, with the same ATM card?

That’s when HSBC came into focus.

Founded in Hong Kong right around the time we were wrapping up our Civil War, HSBC today has a workforce of more than 270,000 people, a number roughly equal to every man woman and child living in Newark, NJ.

All told, the bank is sitting on total assets of more than $2 trillion — that’s right, trilion — making it the third largest bank in world.

And branches almost everywhere, except Africa. And the United States.

So when I found out a few years later that HSBC had opened a branch in Beverly Hills, I promptly went and opened an account. The following year, I was back in Europe, traveling between London and Paris and drawing cash as needed in both Britain and France without a care, courtesy of HSBC.

I could not have been happier. I even gave HSBC props on this very blog.

Fast-forward to the waning weeks of 2012. I’m scanning the European online press when I come across this in The Independent, a London newspaper:

“Financial watchdogs have demanded explanations from HSBC after it emerged that the bank is at the centre of an HM Revenue & Customs investigation over offshore accounts opened in Jersey, including some for criminals living in Britain.”

The reference to Jersey refers not to our state of New Jersey but to the place that gave the state its name, the island of Jersey in the English Channel. There’s more:

“…the tax authorities have obtained details of ‘every British client of HSBC in Jersey’ based on information provided by a whistleblower. It is reported that the 4,000 offshore account holders include a man once called London’s ‘number two crook,’ a well-known drug dealer living in Central America and bankers facing fraud allegations.”

As our British cousins like to say, bloody hell! Then there was this:

“HSBC is already preparing to pay $1.5bn of fines to American authorities after subsidiaries funnelled money for drug runners and Iran through the bank in breach of money-laundering laws.
The bank has admitted that it could face prosecution and that the final payment could be even higher.”

Even for the third largest bank in the world, $1.5 billion in fines is no joke. What the hell is going on here?

Turns out that HSBC’s Mexico branch has been helping drug cartels launder some of their $22-plus million a year in dirty money.

Feel free to look stunned, shocked and surprised.

The evidence is so damning that one of the bank’s top executives apologized at a US Senate committee hearing…and then resigned on the spot.

That gesture may save his personal honor, but may not spare HSBC from criminal prosecution in the United States. And all that came before the Jersey nonsense. By this time next year, HSBC could find itself “standing tall before The Man” on both sides of the Atlantic.

I don’t think even Johnnie Cochran could have gotten HSBC out of this one.

And these are the people I keep my little travel money with? Drug cartels? London gangsters? Iran?

Oh, HELL no.

So more than a decade after I thought I’d settled this issue, I’m once again hunting for a bank that will let me use its ATM card anywhere around the world, with few or (preferably) no fees. If I find one, I’ll pass on the info here. If you already know of one, please share it with the IBIT family in the form of a comment.

Either way, the moment I find one that looks right, IBIT will be done with HSBC.

UPDATE
Multiple financial news outlets are reporting that Washington will announce criminal and civil penalties against HSBC totaling $1.9 billion for permitting Mexican drug cartels to launder hundreds of millions of dollars in drug money.

Among the complaints were that HSBC allowed its Mexico division to operate a branch in the Cayman Islands which had no office and no employees, but had 50,000 client accounts and $2.1 billion in cash.

G.Gross
10 Dec 2012

Edited by P.A.Rice

The IBIT Travel Digest 10-22-12

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The good, the bad and the bizarre from the world’s best travel media

James Bond Island, Thailand

© Ihar Balaikin | Dreamstime.com

The latest James Bond movie, “Skyfall,” is now blowing up (almost literally) in theaters worldwide. 007 has been a lot of places for Queen and country these past 50 years — which locations were your favorites? London’s The Guardian offers up a slideshow of their must-sees. Does their list match yours?

The one that really set my imagination racing was Khow-Ping-Kan on Phang Nga Bay in Thailand, seen above. This was the climactic location for “The Man with the Golden Gun,” one of the lesser flicks in the Bond series. These days, a lot of people just call it “James Bond Island.”

A sight like this could make me happily forget all about Bangkok, at least for a day or two.

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In its ongoing efforts to swallow the Earth whole, Google has bought up the Frommer’s travel brands — all of them — for an undisclosed price. This after buying the Zagat restaurant review publishers.

What all that means for the traveling consumer remains somewhat unclear. It’s unlikely that what you see online or on book shelves from these two well-known travel publishing names will look or feel any different in the near term. But as we all know, things change.

Will Google insist on putting its stamp on its new travel possessions, or will it be content not to fix what wasn’t broken? Stay tuned.

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IBIT doesn’t offer a Travel Outrage of the Week feature. If it did, this might top the list.

There are reports out of San Francisco that the local Travelodge motel recently refused the credit cards of famed New Orleans funk band The Meters Experience on the grounds that they are black.

And no, that’s not a misprint, nor did you misread it.

You can read the entire story yourself at SFWeekly here. For a more detailed report on the incident, go to the NOLA.com story here.

It really shouldn’t make any difference, but it’s not as if we’re talking here about some garage band composed of a bunch of high school kids with delusions of grandeur. The Meters are a New Orleans institution known around the world. Its guitarist, Leo Nocentelli, is a nominee for the 2013 class of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame.

I have emailed the Wyndham Hotel Group, which owns the Travelodge chain, asking it for clarification and its side of the story. Whatever I get in response will be published here.

There’s no indication that the motel clerk or manager even tried to verify whether the credit cards were valid, a swift and simple process that hotels and motels conduct routinely with all hotel and motel arriving guests millions of times a day around the world. Instead, if the initial reports are correct, the Travelodge people took one look at these black musicians and said, “Forget about it!”

Why are we still having to deal with this kind of treatment in 2012?

ADDENDUM
I emailed Christine DaSilva, a spokeswoman for Wyndham Hotel Group, about this situation. Here’s a portion of what she had to say:

“Hi Greg,
Thanks for checking in with me – not everyone that’s written about this allegation has done that, and it’s greatly appreciated.

As you can imagine, we are deeply troubled by this allegation. We invite every individual regardless of ethnicity, culture, gender, sexual orientation or generation to experience our products and services, and we are troubled that the guests’ experience didn’t reflect our values.

“Please rest assured that we have been looking into this situation and are handling it directly with the franchised property’s owner as well as the guests.”

Sounds like Wyndham’s on the case. I suspect that a certain Travelodge property manager in San Francisco is going to be put in check…bigtime. And that’s exactly as it should be.

And now, here’s the rest of The Digest:

AIR
from ABC News
This is the sorry state to which US airport security has sunk: A list of the 20 airports in this country where a TSA inspector is most likely to steal something out your luggage. It sounds like the punchline of a bad joke, but it isn’t. The joke’s on us.

from SmarterTravel
Seven simple ways to get yourself kicked off an airplane. SLIDESHOW

from Travel+Leisure
If you’re flying out of any of these ten US airports, you’d be well-advised to a) get there early and b) not schedule your connecting flight too tightly. These Tardy Ten are notorious for flight delays.

LAND
from Travel Weekly
According to the numbers the US Travel Association fished out of the US Labor Department, travel has become a major source of new jobs in America. Guess you can’t outsource Disneyworld, can you? It’s also a growing source of cash. Foreign visitors dropped $82 billion in the US in the first half of 2012, an 11-percent increase over last year. So when you see that foreign tourist in your town, be nice. Be very nice.

from the New York Times
In Manhattan, home to some of the priciest hotels on Earth, a decent room for $150 or so a night constitutes a good deal. This guy tells you where and how to find seven of them.

from Travel Weekly
Which would you rather pay for at your hotel — your breakfast, access to the hotel gym or your in-room Internet access? US hotels are making the choice for you.

from Travel Weekly
At the San Francisco Airport Marriott Hotel, they really give a hoot. Lots of hoots, in fact. Nesting barn owls, it seems, love the place.

SEA
from Travel Weekly
Here’s an idea from Carnival Cruise Lines. Want to get your cabin early, have priority dinner seating aboard ship, be first in line to embark or debark? Easy. Just pay an extra $49.95 per cabin. And you thought the cruise industry wasn’t paying attention to the airlines and their add-on fees.

from Travel Weekly
Bermuda is starting to fall off the cruise ship industry’s radar. Royal Caribbean is the latest to cut back.

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AFRICA
from Travel Weekly
Egypt reopens a major stretch of the Nile River to cruise ships.

from Wilkinsons World
Sitting off the coast of Namibia, Shark Island today is a wildlife preserve and resort. But a century ago, it served a very different purpose. Long before the Nazis came into being, the Germans created the world’s first death camp on this island…to exterminate Africans.

AMERICAS
from Travel Weekly
Go to Mexico, get well? Mexican tourism officials are pushing the nation’s capital, Mexico City, as a medical tourism destination. Meanwhile, they’re also looking at giving small groups of visitors exclusive access to historic sites like Chichen Itza — for a fee, of course. Ever dreamed of having a pyramid all to yourself?

from the New York Times
In Portland, OR, the gritty old industrial area on the east side of Willamette River is going upscale. Check it out while it’s still both fun and relatively affordable. SLIDESHOW

from the Los Angeles Times
Before it was America’s 50th state, Hawaii was a sovereign state, an independent kingdom with its own royalty. The LAT’s Catherine Hamm shows you where to go to dive into the Hawaiian history your mainland teachers left out of their lessons.

ASIA
from Travel Weekly
Europe isn’t the only part of the world where river cruising is taking off. Aqua Expeditions, which operates Amazon River cruises in South America, has its sights fixed on the Mekong River in Southeast Asia.

from the Los Angeles Times
A generation ago, Da Nang was known to the world mainly as a gigantic US Marine base during the Vietnam war. Today, it’s Surf City East.

EUROPE
from Travel Weekly
The competition for the European river cruise market is heating up. After watching the Viking line add fresh new ships left and right, Uniworld is firing back with plans for two new ships of its own.

from the New York Times
The Belgian city of Antwerp, which first gained wealth and power as a 16th-century port city, is undergoing a revival.

from the New York Times
Wine lovers know all about Spain’s Rioja region, and for good reason. But there’s a lot more to Rioja than just great wines. There’s great food to go with them.

Edited by P.A.Rice

“Go ‘head on.”

1 Reply

Sometimes, I feel as if I’m traveling for those who never got the chance.

Two very “deep” black women recently made me stop and reflect on my travels. One was economist, author and commentator Julianne Malveaux. The other was fellow travel blogger Renee King.

Ms. Malveaux, in New Orleans for the Essence Music Festival, posted on Facebook about what she saw in the eyes of passing sisters while taking a walk along Bourbon Street:

“In the time I walked I was stunned by the number of sisters without joy in their eyes. Oh, they were looking good, and there was some laughter, but too many were walking down Bourbon like it was a death march (perhaps I exaggerate slightly), a duty, not a joyful experience.”

Meanwhile, my friend Renee wrote on her blog about a high school friend who, like her, dreamed of venturing beyond their native Alabama, but never left.

“She has settled comfortably into a life where she only gets to see the beauty of the Maasai through photographs gracing the pages of National Geographic.  She will only get to experience that moment through someone else’s vantage point and never realize the sheer joy of witnessing first hand, the completeness that traveling brings to a life.”

Their comments took me back to my senior year of high school in New Orleans, to a house on the corner of Magnolia and Amelia streets, where a crew of young hustlers used to hang out on the front steps, waiting for dark, when they would melt into the night. They were all varying degrees of high energy and boisterous swagger, but they had those same joyless eyes.

I was the schoolboy, always with an armload of textbooks, still struggling through a world they’d long ago abandoned.

Back then, I had delusions of being a sketch artist. One afternoon while passing by the crew, I dropped my sketchpad. One of them snatched it up and started thumbing through it.

“What’s that?” one asked. The Eiffel Tower, I told him.

“You been to Paris?” he asked suspiciously.

“No, but I wanna go one day,” I replied.

I told them about some of the places I’d already been and some of the ones where I wanted to go…and that’s when it happened. They actually invited the schoolboy to sit on their steps, anywhere I wanted.

Anywhere, that is, except the top step. That was reserved for their leader, their shotcaller, a sinewy, bare-chested kid with skin the color of burnt mahogany. He had a rough, uneven Afro, a gap-tooth smile and an easy laugh that rolled like a wave.

He also had a fist the size of a grapefruit with the density of granite, and it was clear that he’d already used it more than once.

“You really gonna go all them places?” he asked me with a steely look. I nodded and said yes.

He flashed those gapped teeth at me, threw back his head and laughed.

“Well, go ‘head on, podnuh! You go ‘head on!”

It became almost a weekly ritual after that, pouring out my bucket list on those steps while the crew looked over my drawings. Slidell, on the other side of Lake Pontchartrain, was as far as most of them had ever been, but there I sat, babbling on about all the places I wanted to see in the world someday.

I could’ve been talking about going to the moon.

I went on to college in Northern California. They never left the NOLA.

Four years later, back to visit family, I went by the old spot. The shotcaller was still there. Same gap-tooth smile, despite recently having been stabbed.

The rest of the crew? One by one, he ticked off their names. In jail. In hiding. Dead. My heart sank.

Then he asked me, “You been to any of them places yet?” Not yet, I told him.

“You still going, though, right?”

I promised him I would.

“Well, you go ‘head on, podnuh.” And he strolled off down the block.

I never saw him again. By now, he’s with the rest of his old crew. In jail. In hiding.

Or dead.

Sometimes when I travel, I imagine that they’re with me, seeing what I’m seeing, learning what I’m learning, their eyes wide, their minds ablaze.

Letting me sit with them and dream aloud about travel was their way of keeping me safe. I didn’t realize that then. I never got the chance to say thank you, or to show them the world beyond Magnolia and Amelia.

Edited by P.A.Rice

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State Dept. warning on Mexico

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Americans are being told to avoid non-essential travel to one northern Mexican state after arrests of alleged Mexican drug cartel leaders in the United States prompt fears of retaliation against US tourists.

The US State Department has issued an emergency warning to US citizens following the arrest in Oklahoma of high-ranking members of the infamous Mexican drug cartel known as los Zetas.

The warning was issued by State’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security the day after a raid by federal agents Tuesday on a horse ranch in Ruidoso, OK. Those arrested are suspected of using horse breeding and quarterhorse racing as part of a scheme to launder millions of dollars in Zetas drug money.

For more details on backstory behind this raid and the alleged money-laundering scheme, read this Washington Post story here.

This latest warning from State doesn’t mention los Zetas by name, saying only that:

“The U.S. Embassy alerts U.S. citizens traveling and residing in Mexico to the enhanced potential for violence related to today’s arrests of Transnational Criminal Organization (TCO) associates and family members residing in the United States.”

Once you know about the Ruidoso raid, as well as the background of los Zetas, it’s not too hard to figure out which “Transnational Criminal Organization” they’re talking about.

Los Zetas may control as many as 11 of Mexico’s 31 states, but their power base is believed to be in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, across the border from Laredo, TX. Even before Tuesday’s arrests, the State Department war advising Americans to avoid non-essential travel to or in Tamaulipas.

They renewed that warning yesterday.

The State Department has issued plenty of travel warnings about Mexico through most of this decade, but I can’t recall another time when State came this close to saying that American tourists and expats in Mexico could be specific targets of retaliation.

Arguably the most feared of all those cartels, los Zetas was formed back in 1999 by deserters from an elite Mexican army paratroop unit. Originally hired as highly paid bodyguards for an existing Mexican cartel, they soon went into the drug business for themselves, using their military skills to train gunmen, stage jailbreaks, even set up their own sophisticated communications network.

They are known above all for their willingness to massacre rivals and civilians alike. Their victims may well number in the thousands.

And if you’re wondering if they’ve ever sent gunmen across the border to conduct drug-related “hits” in the United States, the answer is yes.

As their original members have been depleted by government arrests and assassinations from rival cartels, they are believed to have reached across their southern border to recruit new members from los Kaibiles, a Guatemalan army special forces unit with a reputation for human rights violations.

There is no mention in the State Department warning of any specific, credible threat. I suspects it’s based more than anything on the reputation of los Zetas and their new Guatemalan partners for ultra-violence. Frankly, however, that might well be reason enough to issue it — and for Americans living or traveling south of the border to take it seriously.

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

IBIT TRAVEL Digest 2.26.12

Leave a reply

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

Juffureh, Gambia

Juffureh, Gambia | ©IBIT G. Gross

RETURN OF THE TRAVEL AGENT?
The Internet has given us all the ability to search out the lowest price on all things related to travel, so we really have no need for travel agents anymore, right?

Not necessarily.

An admittedly non-scientific side-by-side test by the New York Times matched the Web and a travel agent to see which produced the best deals — and the live-human travel agent came out on top.

Seasoned travelers know there’s nothing like having a knowledgeable travel agent in your corner when reservations fall through or unforeseen events blow up your travel plans. Now, it looks now as if the old-school travel agent might be able to hold their own when it comes to scoring travel bargains, as well.

FLYING LOW OVER ASIAN WATERS
The only thing I love more than traveling by sea is traveling cheaply by sea, which means I’m naturally drawn to ocean-going ferries, and Tripologist.com has come up with a trip that satisfies on both counts.

As close as Japan and South Korea are to one another, it would only make sense to visit both while you’re traveling in that part of the world. But a round-trip ticket for the two-hour flight between Tokyo and Seoul could cost you $500 and up, which is insane.

For almost $200 less, you could take a three-hour cruise on a high-speed hydrofoil between the two countries, and pass easily and cheaply from the ports to the anywhere in either country via their high-speed rail networks.

Two high-speed train rides, connected by a hydrofoil? That’s me, all right.

Tripologist breaks down the particulars here.

THE (AMAZING) RACE IS ON…AGAIN!
That’s right. CBS is coming back at you with its 20th segment of the world travel contest show, The Amazing Race. The format is the same, 11 teams of two competitors each. The prize is the same, $1 million.

Being the travel addict I am, I’d probably watch this, anyway, despite all the artificial drama and instigated conflict the show’s producers try so hard to generate. But this time around, I have extra incentives.

The first is that, once again, there are contestants from San Diego on the show. Or rather, there were. The two Asian golfing sisters were eliminated the first night. Poor girls, they barely got their passports open and they’re already gone.

The other is that I have reason to believe that the race is returning to Africa. I’d watch for that reason alone. Some may watch this show for the conniving and the cattiness, but for this traveler, it’s all about the destinations.

And now, here’s this week’s Digest:

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AIR
from Smarter Travel
The new rules requiring airlines to fully disclose the cost of a flight have prompted online travel agencies to limit their flexible options — in some cases, drastically. But there are still ways to use flexible search to your advantage.

from TIME
First, they were feeling up old ladies, frisking little girls and looting people’s luggage. Are TSA screeners now using their screening machines to ogle young women’s bodies? One woman says yes, and she’s suing.

from USA Today
The merger with United has caused Continental Airlines to disappear in all but name. Now, even that is going away. ​

from msnbc
Have one of those unbearably long flights coming up in Coach? Would rather not have a seatmate, maybe even prefer having a whole row all to yourself? That can be arranged.

LAND
from Framework Cycle & Fitness
Ready to really challenge your bike and yourself? Head north to Cape Breton in Nova Scotia, Canada and ride the Cabot Trail. This ride is no joke.

from The​ Times, London UK
Better driving by motorists would make things a lot safer for cyclists. What makes this statement remarkable is that, in London, at least, it’s the motorists who are saying it.

from the New York Times
The NYT’s Michelle Higgins tells us how to get elite status from the better hotel chains. The way the hotels are adding on surcharges these days, you almost owe it to yourself to do it.

​from Away.com
TV chef Anthony Bourdain shares his five top travel tips. This could cost him his Bad Boy membership card.

SEA
from the San Francisco Chronicle
The Costa Concordia disaster is giving folks in Venice second thoughts about how close they want these massive mega-ships passing by their fragile icon of Italian history.

from USA Today
Talks are underway that could bring a cruise to the capital city of Haiti for the first time in a quarter-century.

from Cruise Critic
Twenty-two passengers from the cruise ship Carnival Splendor robbed at gunpoint in Puerto Vallarta. This probably will trigger a massive response from the authorities to crime in the Mexican port, but it might be too late to save the Mexican Riviera.

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AFRICA
from CP-Africa
Is this the footprint of God?

from The Daily Observer (Gambia) via allAfrica.com
New Fajara Craft Market opens in Kotu, part of an ongoing redevelopment of the Fajara waterfront.

from the Business Daily (Kenya) via allAfrica.com
Tourism figures are up in Kenya despite worries over tourist kidnappings and conflict with Somalia’s al Shabaab religious extremist militia.

from The Citizen (Tanzania) via allAfrica.com
Mafia Island. In more ways than one, it’s not what you think. On land, lush, green, and largely unspoiled tropical landscape. Offshore, world-class diving and snorkeling.

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AMERICAS/CARIBBEAN
from State.gov
The State Department breaks down its travel warnings on Mexico, going state by state.

from the New York Times
This piece is all about how to spend a weekend in New Orleans. But if you approach this city in the right spirit, a weekend in “the NOLA” can last all year.

from USA Today
A new exhibit at a Phoenix museum shows there’s more to the Apache legacy than the legend of Geronimo.

from the San Francisco Chronicle
Hawaii’s lava flows are equally fascinating to scientists and tourists, but if you plan on taking in this breathtaking sight, a little caution is in order. Actually, make that a lot of caution.
​
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ASIA/PACIFIC
from Yomiuri Shimbun (Japan)
From giant paper floats to a private train heated in winter by a pot-bellied stove, Aomori prefecture puts Japanese culture on display.

​from the Japan Times
Tokyo’s famed Tsukiji fish market, which feeds this nation’s insatiable appetite for seafood, is a whirlwind of sights, sounds, aromas and characters. It’s also due to close in three years. So if you want to see a historic piece of daily Tokyo life, go soon.

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EUROPE
from the Guardian (London UK)
An interactive map showing the best bargain-priced restaurants around Britain, Scotland and Northern Ireland. You’ll want to keep this one in your “mobile.”

from the Guardian (London UK)
If you’re one of those people who think camping would be great if it weren’t out in the wilderness, Berlin has the hotel you’ve been waiting for. it’s called the Hüttenpalast. AUDIO SLIDESHOW

from the the Guardian (London UK)
Speaking of eateries, here’s one Parisian’s list of the ten best Paris bistros. I wouldn’t call any of these places a bargain, but they’re probably worth every euro.​

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MIDDLE EAST
from France 24
Iraqi town uses history and heritage to turn from terrorism to tourism.

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