Tag Archives: Mozambique

the IBIT Travel Digest 2.10.13

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

Hong Kong fireworks

Hong Kong fireworks — © Farang | Dreamstime.com

Wishing peace, health and prosperity to our IBIT friends in China and Chinatowns around the world as they ring in the Year of the Snake on this Lunar New Year.

EAT, DRINK AND GO TRAVEL
Every so often, I go back through old digests of mine to look for recurring themes — and if you’re a regular reader of the IBIT Travel Digest, there’s at least one you’ve spotted already. Nearly every digest, it seems, features at least one mention of food or drink.

So starting today, FOOD & DRINK gets its own section in the digest — and it kicks off with two subjects equally dear to my heart and my tastebuds.

New Orleans was a foodie town long before someone invented the term “foodie.” The word itself is out of favor these days among the blogerati (not that I give a damn), but the NOLA’S flare for flavor will never die.

From its beginnings, New Orleans cuisine has blended a mélange of influences — French, Spanish, Native American, African, Italian, Irish. Starting with the 1980s, though, a new taste fell into the city’s gumbo pot — the flavors of Vietnam.

San Diego was the first American city to receive South Vietnamese refugees en masse following the 1975 fall of Saigon, which made it the first to be exposed to Vietnamese dishes in a big way.It didn’t take long for pho and banh mi, with their fresh ingredients and vibrant mix of flavors, to become staples here.

And for you gumbo purists out there (and you know who you are): Yes, they do put in okra on request.

But while the Vietnamese cuisine tsunami was washing over San Diego, other refugees gravitated to the Gulf of Mexico to resume their lives as fishermen. Inevitably, many settled in New Orleans.

A city that already treated po’boys and gumbo as basic food groups had little trouble embracing pho soups and banh mi sandwiches. And among the Vietnamese and their descendants who grew up in the NOLA, the feeling seems to be mutual, as the New York Times recently discovered.

Today, within an easy drive from my house in San Diego are at least two Vietnamese restaurants whose menu is a mix of Vietnamese and New Orleans Creole dishes, run together by people from both locales. The nearest one features a daily special that includes half a banh mi and a bowl of gumbo.

But the best place to see the result of this marriage of cultures is in the Crescent City itself and you’ll see it below in the inaugural FOOD & DRINK section of the IBIT Travel Digest.

IBIT says: Bon appétit…or perhaps, chúc ngon miệng!

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WILL TRAVEL FOR JAZZ
Back at the turn of the 20th century, as Europe was plunging into the first of its two disastrous world wars, Paris witnessed the arrival of blacks from America, mostly soldiers, who brought with them a style of music Parisians had never heard before.

The Americans called it jazz, and Paris promptly fell in love with it. And as Jonathan Lorie discovered when he went roaming Ernest Hemingway’s old Parisian haunts for London’s The Guardian newspaper, the love still burns.

Jazz may be an American invention — perhaps the best of all American inventions — but there may be no better place to enjoy it than Paris. And as you’ll see in Lorie’s article, there are a lot of venues in the City of Light where you can enjoy it.

Lorie’s piece also links four other famed Jazz Age authors — F. Scott Fitzgerald, Dorothy Parker, Christopher Isherwood and Somerset Maugham — and their jazz hangouts from New York to Germany and even Sri Lanka.

But if all these folks were still around today, they all might leave their hearts in San Francisco. The reason is SFJAZZ, which opened late last month in the city’s Hayes Valley neighborhood.

It is the first concert hall in the United States — and maybe the world — built expressly for jazz. It features an auditorium, an ensemble room, rehearsal areas, a digital learning lab, and even a sidewalk cafe.

IBIT says: Hemingway would’ve dug it…once he got used to the no-smoking rule.

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AND FINALLY…
USA Today reports that Kate Hanni, head of the airline consumer organization FlyersRights.org, is stepping down as the group’s executive director, walking away from the outfit she founded in 2006.

You can read the entire USA Today story here.

She formed Flyers Rights after being stuck on the tarmac aboard an American Airlines flight in Austin, TX — for nearly nine hours — and getting little more than lip service from the airline. Her outspoken efforts since then led to federal regulations governing how the airlines handle flight delays.

Not surprisingly, Ms. Hanni didn’t make a lot of friends in the airline industry during her time with Flyers Rights, but she did prove that consumers who organize at the grassroots and speak truth to power can make a difference.

IBIT says: Thanks for all you did, Kate, and all you tried to do.

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And now, here’s The Digest:

AIR
from the Los Angeles Times
In the eternal hunt for airfare bargains, booking too early can be as costly as booking too late.

from Travel Weekly
You may soon be able to watch in-flight shows and movies on-demand on Southwest Airlines flights, streamed to your own personal electronic devices. That’s the good news. The bad news? You’ll be paying extra for it.

from Budget Travel
A survey of travel agents says that when it comes to booking their clients on connecting flights, Atlanta-Hartsfield is one of their most favorite airports. It’s also one of their least favorite airports. Am I confused? No. I’m just booking non-stops.

from Travel Weekly
Frequent-flier miles…from an airport? Starting in June, the parking, food, merchandise or airport hotel stay you buy at Dallas-Ft. Worth International (DFW) will count toward airline miles.

from FareCompare
When is a “free” airline ticket not really free at all? FareCompare’s Rick Seaney counts the ways, and there are five of them.

LAND
from Condé Nast Traveler
The world’s ten most beautiful train stations, according to CN Traveler, right on time as New York’s Grand Central Terminal marks its 100th anniversary. Some are classic, others ultra-modern, and some brilliantly mix old and new. SLIDESHOW

from Travel Weekly
For the third time since it first opened in 1981, San Francisco is set to expand its Moscone convention center.

SEA
from the New York Times
Lust and luxury aboard the Queen Mary 2. Just don’t call it a “cruise.” It’s just not done, you know…

from Travel Weekly
Kai Tak, Hong Kong’s old airport, where almost every landing seemed like an adventure, is returning to the travel business — this time as a gleaming $1 billion cruise ship terminal that can handle the largest vessels in the business, even Royal Caribbean’s behemoth Oasis-class ships.

FOOD & DRINK
from the New York Times
In New Orleans, they know their pho — and their yaka mein. If you don’t know either, read up. WARNING: Your mouth may involuntarily water while reading.

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AFRICA
from Travel Weekly
The Radisson hotel chain opens its first Radisson Blu hotel in Mozambique.

from TechZim (Zimbabwe)
New travel startup, Zimbabwe Bookers, aims to make finding hotel rooms easier for travelers in one of Africa’s growing tourist markets.

from Tanzania Daily News (Tanzania) via allAfrica.com
Tanzania draws up plans to aggressively promote tourism in overseas markets. Its top four markets — Britain, the United States, Germany and Italy.

from Angola Press via allAfrica.com
Angola’s environmental agency building bungalows, other facilities in the country’s national parks in a bid to boost ecotourism.

AMERICAS
from The Guardian (London UK)
When your mother takes you on a sailing excursion to Central America at the age of six, just the two of you — and it lasts for four years — school field trips may have a hard time holding your attention after that.

from the New York Times
A look at San Juan, Puerto Rico, starting with one of my favorite spots — Condado Lagoon. SLIDESHOW

from The Guardian (London UK)
Are you into “Girls?” I’m referring here to the HBO hit TV series, set in Brooklyn. A look at the neighborhoods that give the show its inspiration.

ASIA/PACIFIC
from the Washington Post
Singapore spent so many decades living with the reputation of being the straight-laced capital of Asia, that it’s hard to imagine this city-state having a quirky side. But it does have one. Yes, it does.

EUROPE
from France 24
When a man is tired of London, he is tired of…graffiti? The city’s Shoreditch neighborhood is becoming a mecca for lovers of street art.

Edited by P.A.Rice

the IBIT Travel Digest 12.9.12

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

HI-YO, PINOT GRIGIO!
Touring wineries and sampling their wares is a big business these days, worldwide. There are escorted winery tours by bus or van, and self-driven wine routes you can enjoy at your own pace by car or bicycle (although you definitely want to go easy on the sampling in both cases).

Napa Valley is even world-famous for its Wine Train, featuring world-cass wines and dinners to match.

It was only recently, however, that I learned that you can tour wineries on horseback. Fresh air and gorgeous surroundings, finished off with some equally gorgeous wines. You can do it either as a day trip or as part of a hotel or bed-and-breakfast stay.

In eastern Washington state and Oregon, up and down California wine country, from Mendocino County in the north to the Santa Ynez Valley and Temecula to the south, or as far off as Argentina and Australia, you can saddle up and get your drink on in the same outing.

I myself am not quite ready for this kind of outing; the only horse I ever rode was made of wood and went around in circles. But for those of you possessing both horse skills and a taste for the grape, this might be a vacation worth considering.

If this sounds like something you might like to look into for 2013, drop me an email at greg@imblacknitravel.com and I’ll send you the information directly.

Just remember to go easy on those samples, lest you get caught galloping under the influence.

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YOUR VOICE MATTERS
Have you ever wondered if all those online reviews people write about hotels actually make any difference? A study conducted at New York’s Cornell University suggests that the answer is a resounding “Yes!”

According to an article in Travel Weekly, the Cornell study showed that good or bad hotel reviews could affect not only room demand at that hotel, but could influence room rates by as much as 10 percent, up or down:

“The study found a direct link between the rise or fall of revenue per available room (RevPAR) and improvements or declines in the online reputation of a hotel, driven by ratings on sites such as TripAdvisor and Travelocity.“

To read the entire Travel Weekly story, click here.

Bottom line: Your opinion matters. The Web has given you, the consumer, a more powerful voice than you’ve ever had before. Treat it like the priceless asset it is.

BEST ON A BUDGET
As we know, travel media folks are a bit list-crazy, and never more so than at year’s end. One of the lists you’ll find over at Budget Travel is its 10 Best Budget Destinations for 2013.

Some of their 10 nominees — like Palm Springs, the Bahamas and the Loire Valley in France — are pleasant surprises, because you don’t expect those places to be cheap. Others are a surprise because you’ve never heard of them, like Boracay Island in the Philippines.

And then, there are the ones you’ve heard of, but would never expect to make the list in a million years.

This year’s shocker: Northern Ireland.

To check out the entire Budget Travel list, click here.
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AND FINALLY…
It looks as if Alec Baldwin may get the last laugh, after all.

Remember when the actor/bad boy was famously kicked off an American Airlines flight at LAX last year for refusing the turn off the game he was playing on his cell phone?

Well, almost a year to the day of that incident, the NY Times is reporting that the head of the Federal Communications Commission now says the airlines should allow its passengers freer use of their personal electronics on board aircraft.

FCC chairman Julius Genachowski said as much in a letter last Thursday to Michael Huerta, acting head of the Federal Aviation Administration:

“I write to urge the FAA to enable greater use of tablets, e-readers, and other portable electronic devices during flight, consistent with public safety.”

The magic words there are “during flight.”

Nothing yet from the FAA, which has the last word on the issue, but even that agency has appeared in the past to be leaning in that direction.

It’s been reported in the past, including here on IBT, how personal electronic devices that use radio signals, such as cellphones, have shown signs of interfering with a plane’s navigation controls. But word processing, gaming and other functions would seem to offer little such threat, if any.

Either way, with the FCC more or less getting behind the traveling consumer on this, it could be that we’ll finally see this issue solved for good in 2013.

Meanwhile, if the next TV commercial for a Capital One airline miles credit card features a grinning Alec Baldwin with what appear to be canary feathers in his mouth, you’ll know why.

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And now, here’s The Digest:

AIR
from USA Today
Wouldn’t you know it: The Boeing 787 Dreamliner has scarcely entered service, but technical issues are already starting to surface. In this case, fuel leaks.

from the New York Times
American Airlines pilots ratify a new contract with the airline. For travelers, that means no worries about Christmas holiday trip disruptions. For AA, it’s one step closer to a merger with US Airways.

from ABC News via Yahoo
How bad is internal airport theft by TSA agents? The feds are planting iPads and other consumer electronic devices with GPS tracking devices to see if any of them get stolen…and they are. DO NOT check your laptops, tablet computers or smartphones.

from the Huffington Post
Kate Hanni of FlyersRights says the airlines are sticking it to travelers this holiday season with deceptive pricing and hidden fees, especially baggage fees. Bah humbug!

from Agence France-Presse
A French court has cleared the former Continental Airlines and one of its engineers of criminal responsibility for a deadly 2000 crash of a Concorde supersonic airliner in Paris. Civil liability is still on the table, though.

LAND
from NBC News
Here we go again…a simple device small enough to hide in a Magic Marker can let thieves open the electronic door locks at several major hotel chains nationwide. We’ve reported this before. Yikes. The hotel chains know about it, but have yet to correct it. Double yikes.

from the New York Times
Do you love skiing so much that you wish you could do it all year round? Have some frequent -flier miles saved up? Because if you’re willing to travel, you could ski 12 months out of the year, including in a few places you might never expect.

from Budget Travel
There are lots of folks who prefer to travel by themselves, and across much of the world, solo travel is perfectly fine. But there are some places where it’s really better to go with a group. Here are eight of them. SLIDESHOW

from Travel Weekly
The Hyatt Regency in Chicago begins the second phase of a $110 million renovation.

from SFGate
Wanna get high? I mean really high, as in “those ants down there are actually people” high. Destinations to take you up, up and away.

SEA
from Travel Weekly
Plans by Royal Caribbean International to build a third Oasis of the Seas-class cruise ship may have run aground in Helsinki. The vessel would be built in Finland, but Finnish government is balking at financing the build.

from Travel Weekly
Apparently, not all the cruise lines are holding their noses at the European market. Norwegian Cruise Lines is hooking up with Gate 1 Travel to offer European combination cruise-land tour packages next year, starting with Italy. If they find a way to work affordable airfare into the package, this could be very interesting.

from USA Today
The luxury small-ship Windstar cruise line is offering some end-of-2012 deals on its Northern European cruises, including two-for-one sales.

from USA Today
The weather doesn’t just pick on the airlines. High winds in Cape Town, South Africa force a cruise ship to stay at the dock…for four days.

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AFRICA
from allAfrica.com
New air services in the works for Mozambique, including flights from the capital Maputo to an island resort.

from T. Rowe Price
Ghana, now in the process of peacefully holding a presiddential election, could be the next rising financial star on the Mother Continent. So say these guys, who see five new economic powerhouses on the African horizon — in the west, east and south.

AMERICAS
from The Guardian (London UK)
Good news for those who’ve traveled to Cuba or are planning to go: Thanks in part to an easing of government restrictions, the food is getting better. Much better.

from SFGate
Arizona has a world-famous wave. But leave the surfboard at home, because this one is solid layers of multicolored sandstone millions of years old in remote southwestern desert. This is one vacation that will make you work.

ASIA/PACIFIC
from CNN Travel
Singaporeans may have an international reputation as being cold fish emotionally, but they’re passionate when it comes to cooking in what some consider the capital of Asian cuisine — and for some remarkably low prices, they’ll show you how Singapore cooks.

from CNN Travel
The best places to shop in Beijing…and some cool places to shop in Shanghai.

EUROPE
from Girls’ Guide to Paris
Ah, Paris, how can I tour thee? Let me count the ways. By foot. By Metro. By tour bus. By bike. By…Segway? Oui, Segway.

from Context Travel
A 3.5-hour tour on foot and by Metro of the immigrant’s Paris.

from The Guardian (London UK)
An agritourism project is saving a fading village on the island of Cyprus — and giving travelers something to do other than party the night away in Larnaca.

from the Washington Post
The Louvre, arguably the world’s greatest art museum, is branching out, opens a satellite museum in an old French mining town. Good way to experience the Louvre’s treasures while avoiding the Paris mobs. You can almost hear the ghost of Louis XVI saying, “Damn, why didn’t I think of that!”

from Travel Weekly
If one of your travel dreams is to see the Colosseum in Rome, you probably shouldn’t put it off a whole lot longer. It’s literally crumbling.

Edited by P.A.Rice

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

the SUNDAY TRAVEL DIGEST 10.16.11

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

My Point Loma bodyguards | ©Greg Gross

CANADA SPEAKS BIKE
Cycling is a great way to experience a new city, and as the Los Angeles Times points out, two of the best cities to enjoy by bicycle are up in eastern Francophone Canada, Montreal and Quebec.

Given Montreal’s close cultural ties to France, it shouldn’t be a surprise that the capital of Canada’s Quebec province has followed the example of Paris and created a city bike rental program.

They call it Bixi — part-bike, part-taxi.

Pick up a bike from one outdoor Bixi station, drop it off at another.

The cost: roughly $5 an hour. The beauty: If you drop off the bike within a half-hour, it’s free. As in no charge. The bikes themselves are built to be smooth, comfortable, easy to ride and carry stuff.

The catch: The program doesn’t operate in winter (what, Canadians don’t like to pedal in snow?). Also, such programs almost never provide bike helmets with their bikes, so you’ll have to provide your own — and just on general principles, you really should.

As for Quebec, more about that later.

PAN AM: THE GOOD OLD DAYS?
One of this seasons’s most supremely hyped TV shows is “Pan Am,” a nostalgic look back at America’s flagship airline at the birth of jet travel.

To many travelers of a certain age, the show represents a look back at what “Pan Am’s” producers want to portray as the golden, glamorous age of air travel. However, from the other side of the Atlantic, the view is a bit different.

In particular, Simon Calder of London’s The Independent finds a lot more tarnish than gold. Not only were trans-Atlantic airfares much higher back then, but you had to book your flight literally months in advance.

Maybe the “good old days” really weren’t all that good, eh what? In any case, you won’t find Mr. Calder pining for them, and perhaps we shouldn’t, either.

WORLD’s HIGHEST PORTA-POTTIES?
USA Today is reporting that an environmental group in Nepal is installing portable toilets on Mount Everest, the world’s tallest mountain, as part of an effort to get the thousands of mountain climbers to assault the peak each year to help keep it clean.

Have we turned the world’s highest mountain into the world’s highest outhouse? Guess it’s not just the yellow snow you have to watch out for anymore. EWWWW!

AND FINALLY…
If you read blogs like this one, you probably already know why it’s good to travel. If you know folks who don’t, refer them to this short but on-point essay from Lonely Planet’s Tony Wheeler:

“The media feed us scare stories about those in other countries, but the reality is that most people in the world are searching for the same things we are – a better life, a better future for their children – and they’re only too ready to lend a hand to a fellow human being.”

In a world driven by politicians and media bent on naming and villifying the latest bogeyman of the month, that’s a good thing to remember.



And now, here’s this week’s Digest:

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AIR
from the New York Times
The NYT’s Susan Stellin offers up some suggestions and Web sites to help you refine your online airfare search. for one thing, look for sites that give you the FULL price of your ticket, including things like baggage fees.

from USA Today
Korean Air brings the Airbus A380 super-jumbo jet to LAX, with the fewest seats of any A380 now in service. They’re billing it as “the world’s most spacious A380.” If any of that extra space is in Coach, it might be worth the airfare.

from the Guardian (London UK) ​
London’s three main airports — Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted — to hit the saturation point in less than 20 years. Some travelers would tell you they’re there now.

LAND
from Frommer’s
Ten rail trips via Amtrak that are cheaper than driving.

from Leave Your Daily Hell
This travel blogger offers up a list of the cities that the world loves to hate. He loves every one of them, and tells you why you just might, also. One of them, quite naturally, is Los Angeles.

SEA
from USA Today
If you’re thinking about doing a cruise in 2012 and you want to get the best deals, you need to start planning — and booking — now.

from USA Today
Some signs of life on the Mexican Riviera: After pulling out due to security fears, Princess Cruises set to return to Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta in the fall of 2012 and spring 2013.

from Lonely Planet
The LP gang share their list of ten of the best places on the planet for a journey on the water.

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AFRICA
from the Independent (London UK)
Cape Verde, a nation comprised of ten small islands 300 miles off the West African coast, is the latest hotspot for Europeans seeking to escape the winter cold. Clear waters, pristine beaches and people whose motto is “No stress.” Yeah, I could do that.

from BBC Travel
The Tour d’Afrique makes the Tour de France look like a weekend cruise. Whether you ride it to win or just to experience the continent of Africa, you will be changed.

from ​allAfrica.com
Zambia and Zimbabwe will co-host the 2013 Genera Assembly of the UN World Tourism Organization. The venue will be Victoria Falls, the world’s largest natural waterfall, which straddles the border of the two countries.

from​ the Independent (London UK)
The 15-year civil war that devastated Mozambique until 1992 also devastated its wildlife. After nearly two decades of peace, both are now coming back strong.

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AMERICAS/CARIBBEAN
from the New York Times
Think of French-speaking eastern Canada and you’re likely to think of Montreal, a great city. But give some thought to Quebec, a beguiling blend of New World and Old Europe. And one of the best ways to see Quebec is by bike.

from the Los Angeles Times​
Not all the most beautiful fall foliage in North America is to be found back East. According to my friend Chris Reynolds, the small British Columbia enclave of Nelson can match New England color for color.

from the Le Massif de Charlevoix
And as long as we’re on the subject of Quebec, check out this cool-looking new rail trip, courtesy of my friend and fellow train enthusiast, Jools Octavius.

from the Daily Mail (London UK)
Just for a little variety — or maybe a lot — you might want to consider a different venue for next year’s Oktoberfest. Like, say, Brazil?

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ASIA/PACIFIC
from the Los Angeles Times
The world hasn’t quite run out of unspoiled tropical paradises, as witnessed by Malaysia’s Tioman Island. Development is minimal. Natural beauty is boundless. Just watch out for the falling coconuts.
​from the

from Vayama
Etiquette matters everywhere, but good etiquette really matters in Singapore. A comprehensive lists of do’s and dont’s, especially if you plan to do business in this island city-state.

from Rusty Compass
Vietnam is a wonderful place to visit, but mind your bag — especially your camera bag — in Saigon (aka Ho Chi Minh City). Snatch-and-grab thieves on passing motorbikes can rip you off and hurt you at the same time. VIDEO
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from Travel and Beyond
Where to get your eat on in Singapore, a foodie’s paradise. Second of two parts (the link to Part One is in the text).

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EUROPE
from BootsnAll
Seven things you should know about Germany’s perpetually changing capital, Berlin.

Malaria: Four more years, four more years…

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The world is close to putting an expiration date on one of Nature’s greatest killers, and one of the biggest barriers to Africa’s advancement.

April 25 is the fourth annual World Malaria Day. It’s sponsored by the United Nations’ World Health Organization.

Let’s be real. National “This” Day, World “That” Day? Most of the time, we don’t even look up.

For me, though, this one’s different.

I want to see more of “us” re-connecting with our African heritage. I want to see tourism revenue enable African nations to give their peoples a better life. For those things to happen, malaria has to go.

But while most of the cases, and the vast majority of the deaths, are on the Mother Continent, it’s not just about Africa. On any given day, about half the world’s population is exposed to malaria. That’s about 3 billion people.

Yes, with a “b.”

There are even places in Europe where you can be ambushed by this disease.

Medical science and health workers are throwing everything they have at this killer. Anti-malarial drugs, bed nets to ward off mosquitoes, improved repellents, a vaccine — even creating genetically altered mosquitoes that can’t spread malaria.

Okay, the whole Frankenbug thing creeps me out, but we’re actually having success without it.

In most of Latin America, where the most common form of malaria exists, the disease rates have been cut in half or more.

Even in Africa, where the deadliest version of malaria kills a child every 45 seconds (a few years ago, it was every 30 seconds), this is what we’ve seen in the last decade:

  • Mozambique has cut its number of malaria cases by a third in two years. That’s 2 million cases of malaria that didn’t happen.
  • On the island of Zanzibar, now a part of Tanzania, it’s down 77 percent.
  • Ethiopia, down 73 percent.

In Zambia, hospitals once overflowing with malaria patients now have rows of empty beds. Kenya is waiving taxes on chemically treat yarn so that local manufacturers can cheaply make more mosquito nets.

And Rwanda is actually on the verge of becoming malaria-free.

This isn’t like cancer, with no end in sight. The WHO’s official goal is to reduce malaria deaths to zero by 2015 — and this actually looks doable.

Not easy, but doable.

We may be on the verge of something historic, something life-changing for half the world’s population. We could actually see the end of malaria in our lifetimes. Everywhere.

And that would be worth celebrating, maybe even for more than one day.

GET INVOLVED…SPREAD THE WORD
World Health Organization
Roll Back Malaria
Nothing But Nets
Malaria No More

OUT THERE: Lola Akinmade

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One of an occasional series introducing black travelers and their Web sites

SITE: lolakinmade.com

This Nigerian-born freelance writer/photographer has been to 40-odd countries so far, but the destination of her dreams is no country at all.

If you check out her collection of pics on Flickr, you’ll notice that this young woman jumps a lot, which befits someone who’s touched down on six continents before celebrating her 40th birthday.

We should all have that much spring in our step.

But ever since she was a school girl in her native Nigeria, Lola Akinmade has known exactly where she wanted to go in life, right down to the spot that she wants to stand on, and she can tell you with precision where that spot is — 90° N.

You and I know that as the North Pole.

“It truly was and is a childhood dream I had; born when I was in social studies class learning geography in high school (secondary school) back in Nigeria. I always told my friends and family that I will get to the North Pole someday even though, at that time, I was in Nigeria and had never seen snow.”

Now 32, it’s almost as if she’s been living her life as a trail slowly but surely headed toward the top of the world — and she’s already a lot closer to it than most of us:

“I was born and grew up in Nigeria, then moved over to the US in my teens, where I studied and worked for 15+ years as a GIS/IT developer. Now I’m currently based in Sweden where I work as a freelance writer and photographer, am pitifully trying to learn Swedish, and married to a wonderful man.”

In much the manner of Jabari Smith, who’s trying to win an online contest for a shot at hosting his own travel show, Lola is trying to blog her way to the Pole, one vote at a time.

She’s in the running in a contest for travel writers sponsored by Quark Expeditions. The winner goes with on a cruise by icebreaker to the North Pole.

And naturally, she’d love to have your vote.

With 40-some countries under her belt, she’s done a fair amount of traveling already. But while her love of travel hasn’t changed, her philosophy toward it has. No longer does she take her journeys with the attitude that (s)he who dies with the most visa stamps in their passport wins:

“I used to be a country counter, striving to mark every single country off some checklist,” she says. “But now, I’m traveling slower, integrating better, and truly making time to get beneath each place I travel through.

Travel is a transformative process that forcefully pulls you out of your box, lays the raw world out in front of you, and challenges you to make sense of it all in a way that keeps you craving more transformation.”

That approach has given her some eye-opening perspectives on how blacks/Africans/women are perceived in the world:

“My reception has been extremely mixed – from absolute acceptance to outright rejection – and here are links to a few articles I’ve penned about dealing with stereotypes when traveling:

Breaking Down the Staredown

Traveling With an Open Mind

Breaking Down Stereotypes While Traveling

I try to isolate each experience, break it down, and pull out the positive lessons from it.”

For all her mixed receptions, though, Lola found some things that her universal in her dealings with new places and strange people:

“I was surprised to find just how far a simple smile and positive disposition goes. People want and need to be acknowledged through eye contact and smiles, regardless of race or background. They want to know that you really care about their situation and lives, no matter how drastically different it may be. Many doors have opened up this way because we all naturally feed off energy, and negative/pessimistic outlooks on life tend to limit interaction.

“In addition to my Christian beliefs and faith, travel has taught me to be truly kind and empathetic. To be quick to share, to serve, to be grateful, and to be positive. “

As far as the contest goes, Lola says she’s got a serious shot at it. How serious? She may be only a few votes from actually winning her dream shot at freezing herself to the bone.

And she’d really like your help to get there.

But when it comes to the travels of Lola Akinmade, the North Pole may prove to be only a warm-up, so to speak:

“There’s so much more to see, do, and experience &dmash; from Mongolia to Mozambique, Russia to Rwanda, Jordan to Japan. Guess I’ve got a ton more traveling to do.”

To vote for Lola Akinmade to go to the North Pole, go to Lola Goes North.

Every vote counts, and she’s counting on yours — and your friends’!

the SUNDAY TRAVEL DIGEST

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

Amsterdam water taxis | @copy; Greg Gross

SCAN THIS
Depending on how you look at it, the TSA’s latest efforts to protect air passengers from terrorism are either keeping them safer in the air, or violating their personal dignity and possibly exposing them to cancer on the ground.

There actually are two types of airport full-body scanners. The one that’s causing all the uproar is the X-ray backscatter machine. That’s the one that’s hitting your skin directly with radiation in the form of X-rays.

The radiation dosage is extremely low, hence the government’s insistence that the cancer risk is extremely low. The flip side of that argument is that you’re subjecting millions of people daily to that risk, and many of them repeatedly over the course of a month or a year.

Disclosure this summer that some branches of government had been surreptitiously retaining some of these full-body images — after telling the public that the scanners can’t and don’t do that — hasn’t done much for their credibility, either.

Imagine you’re an airline pilot or flight attendant. Would you want to go through a backscatter machine as many as 400 times a year?

By the way, did you know that you and everybody else aboard an airliner flying at altitude are subjected to low doses of radiation every time you fly?

You can learn about this via this transcript of a recent experts’ discussion on National Public Radio.

Of course, you could decline to be scanned, but that makes you a candidate for what the TSA, showing government’s gift for whimsical wording, calls an “enhanced pat-down,” of a sort most folks first experience as teenagers in the back seats of cars.

This has led to, among other things, a woman being forced to remove her prosthetic breast and a small child being strip searched, as you can see on this YouTube video.

And as you’ve heard a great deal in the news over the last week, not everybody is down with having strangers feeling them up, even in the name of security. TSA’s response is basically: “PHFFFT!”

The TSA has since relented and will now allow uniformed pilots to skip all of this, as long as they go through metals detectors and have two forms of identification. Cabin crew — so far, at least — no such luck.

Meanwhile, some Republican types in Congress are trying to get airports to take TSA out of the equation entirely and turn their screening over to private companies — and some airports are indeed looking into that. Even were that to happen, though, the private screeners would still be required to follow TSA security rules. So for you and I, the flying public, not much would change.

Bottom line: prepare to be groped and/or radiated for the foreseeable future. Or think seriously about taking trains.

And now, here’s this week’s Digest:

AFRICA
Ethiopian Airlines becomes the first African airlines to operate the Boeing 777, its most modern jumbo jet. Another step up in class for EA, and a piece of good new for Africa-bound travelers. It gives EA the ability to connect virtually any two major cities in the world, non-stop.

They also plan to be among the first to fly Boeing’s new 787 Dreamliner — provided Boeing can ever get the thing off the ground. Its delivery is now three years late.

from GotSaga
Ten things to enjoy in Capetown, South Africa — for free.

from the Guardian (London, UK)
A Guardian reader describes the many social roles played by the beaches in Maputo, the capital of Mozambique. They’re not just for tourists. The locals use them for everything from beach soccer to baptisms, and more. Sounds like my kind of beach.

AMERICAS
from AP Travel
Where do you find America’s most affordable fine dining? According to the folks at Zagat, it’s New Orleans.

from the New York Times
Argentina produces some of the best wines in the world. A lot of those wines come from the wineries in and around Mendoza, which welcomes visitors. You’ll need to rent a car to get around the 100 or so wineries that welcome visitors, but the experience may be more than worth it.

ASIA
from the Japan Times
Americans aren’t the only ones giving thanks in November. Instead of turkey, though, a Japanese meal of thanksgiving might include crab cooked wine.

from the Japan Times
Sapporo is more than just a popular brand of Japanese beer. It’s a city with a lot going for the visitor — good food, good fun and good transportation, all packaged in a city smaller and a lot easier to comprehend than Tokyo.


EUROPE
from Europe Up Close
Paris is a city of neighborhoods, 20 districts known as arrondissements. Each has its own personality and character. Some are packed with attractions, and some are where Paris really lives. Not sure which is right for you? This blog post offers an excellent guide.

from the New York Times
In the study of humanity, Man was considered to be advancing when he stopped living in caves. In southern Italy, they’re converting caves into hotels…and putting tourists into them. If you stick around long enough, everything comes back.

from AP via US Today Travel
Follow the path of Catholic faithful on a pilgrimage trail in Spain that dates back more than a thousand years. You’ll need a backpack, a good pair of comfortable hiking shoes — and if you want to do the whole thing, about six to eight weeks.