Tag Archives: Washington

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

WEST AFRICA JOURNAL: Detouring ’round Dallas

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American Airlines Boeing 757 "on final" in San Diego

Okay, flights are rerouted. San Diego up to Los Angeles via American Eagle, then from LAX into Washington Dulles.

If all goes well, not only will I arrive in DC tomorrow, but a good four hours earlier than originally scheduled.

Props to the reservations folks at American Airlines for coming through in the face of a monstrous storm that’s destined to play havoc with tens of thousands of travelers tomorrow. Mine really worked hard to make it happen for me, and I got her supervisor on the phone and told her so.

My comments go into her permanent file. I hope it leads to some extra cash going into her pocket.

Meanwhile, I’m back on track to Senegal and the Gambia.

Remember that Disney commercial of a few years back? The little brother and sister are sitting in bed, all wide-eyed and eager about their big trip to Disneyworld the next day. When the mother comes in and tells them to go to bed, the little boy replies:

“We’re too excited to sleep!”

That’s me, right now. I may not close my eyes again until somewhere over the Atlantic on Wednesday night. The pilot may be able to illuminate his flight path with the red glow from my eyes.

Do I care? Not a bit!

Trouble near and far

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In Mexico, the abduction of 22 Mexican tourists has sets off alarms nationwide, while Washington is set to issue a terror alert for Americans traveling in Europe. But all may not be as it appears.

So which do you want first, the bad news or the scary news?

The bad news comes from just south of the border, where authorities are trying to find 22 tourists reported to have been kidnapped in the Mexican seaside city of Acapulco.

Read about the kidnapping in this Los Angeles Times story.

The scary news is coming out of Washington. The New York Times is reporting that the State Department will issue an alert Sunday, urging Americans traveling in Europe to be on their guard against possible terrorist attacks.

Specifically, the warning raises the possibility of commando-style terror attacks within European cities, modeled after the 2008 Mumbai attacks in India.

There, small teams of heavily-armed gunmen, taking orders via cell phone from a shadowy terrorist leader in neighboring Pakistan, stormed two luxury hotels, a popular restaurant, a hospital, a crowded train station and a Jewish community center — setting fires, hurling grenades and firing AK-47s as they went.

The current plots, also said to have originated in Pakistan, are believed to target Britain, France and Germany, but authorities across Europe are raising their alert levels, as well.


Read the New York Times story here.

Let’s take the Mexico report first. The little gray hairs on the back of my neck tell me there’s something fishy about this one.

According to the LA Times, the 22 missing tourists were a group of men who were abducted while looking for lodging.

First, when tourists travel in a group, even in Mexico, they usually consist of both men and women. Second, Acapulco has been a major tourist destination for decades, and Mexican travelers know how to make reservations as well as anyone else.

Anything is possible, but for a group of guys to suddenly show up in a busy tourist venue like 22 Biblical Josephs, looking for room in the inn during the off-season, simply does not compute.

And third, spontaneous abductions of a group this size are about as common as an honest politician.

“Oye, muchachos! There’s a groups of hombres wandering around, looking for a place to stay! Let’s go kidnap them, compas!”

Possible? Yes. Likely? Not really. Somebody knew these guys were coming.

I can’t help but wonder if the person who reported this incident to the authorities described the victims as “tourists” because he didn’t wanted to say what they were really up to. There may be a lot more to this story than we know so far.

The European situation is another matter altogether, especially with the threat said to be coming out of Pakistan.

Al Qaeda is operating more or less with a free hand in the lawless northern regions of Pakistan, but they’re not the only player in the terrorist game. They may not even be the biggest threat right now.

The Mumbai attacks were organized — and pulled off with gruseome effect — by a homegrown Pakistani terrorist set called Lashkar-e-Taiba.

Like al Qaeda, they are considered to be Islamic extremists. And like al Qaeda, they’re not playing. Even after Mumbai, few Americans are really aware of them, but Indians can tell you all about them.

Their beef is more regional than global, and at the heart of it is Kashmir. India has it, Pakistan wants it.

Could it be that these guys want to make an al Qaeda-sized splash somewhere in the world?

We’ll see what State has to say on Sunday.

Coast-to-Coast on Amtrak

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Our newest guest columnist looks back over his most recent cross-country rail trip, and lays down some solid advice.

By WALT BARANGER
It took three trains and about 63 hours, but I made it to Connecticut from Los Angeles by rail. What a terrific way to span the continent.

As you can see from my somewhat disjointed  Quicktime video, there’s quite a variety of scenery. The brown tinge on some shots comes from the brown-tinted windows that are used on all Amtrak cars.

Amtrak gets high marks for meals. The signature steak is usually a safe bet, as is the vegetarian pasta (the recipe for which I obtained from Amtrak’s chef). Breakfast is highlighted by a generous portion of French toast and properly prepared grits that lack the dreadful gummy consistency of most hotel grits. The scrambled eggs are apparently cooked in a square mold, and the breakfast quesadilla lacked queso (cheese). Some trains, such as the Washington Limited, serve brunch. All meals are included with sleeping car accommodations.

The diner uses communal seating, so unless you are a party of four, you’ll be sitting with at least one stranger.

Freight railroads own most of the tracks used by Amtrak. The BNSF track between Los Angeles and Chicago was smooth and consistent, but the CSX track between Chicago and Washington was only a small cut above Indian Railways between New Delhi and Mumbai; at one point I was thrown off my feet. Washington, D.C., to Connecticut is smooth, too, except for the Hell’s Gate Bridge over the East River in New York City. Spectacular view of Manhattan, but a very rough ride.

For $600 including meals and roomette, the trip was a bargain and compares favorably with hotels. Next time, I’ll schedule a layover for a day or two in Chicago (Union Station is adjacent to the downtown Loop) and I might also suggest a layover in New Mexico.

Booking a roomette is the cheapest way to get a sleeper compartment, but roomette passengers use communal showers and toilets. That’s fine for me, but my wife prefers a more spacious bedroom with a private toilet/shower stall.

Walt’s Secrets
If traveling between Chicago and New York, the direct Lake Shore Limited is more expensive than traveling via Washington and changing trains to New York. The two routes take roughly the same amount of time, but roomettes and bedrooms can be much cheaper via Washington — $200 or more each way. Simply an issue of supply and demand.

Never book Bedroom A. It’s smaller than the others, and the price is the same.

Never book Roomette 2. It’s directly opposite Roomette 1, where the car attendant lives. You’ll hear noises at all hours of the day and night. Roomette 4 is perfect: near the bathroom, not too close to the car attendant but close enough to give a shout, and close to the stairs that lead downstairs to the exit.

On some trains, the crew car — a sleeper where the train crew lives — will have spare roomettes for passengers. This can be good or bad: Bad because it’s the first (or last) car of the train and is the farthest from the diner. Good because the communal toilet/showers are virtually unused during the day and there is very little foot traffic through the car.

Book early. Amtrak has a generous refund policy, but sleepers sell out many weeks or months in advance and Amtrak has no spare cars to add in case of a sellout. Six months in advance for summer travel is not too early.

Walt on the Southwest Chief

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By WALT BARANGER

SOMEWHERE EAST OF LOS ANGELES — I’ve been trying to coax Greg onto a long-distance Amtrak train, but in the meantime, I’m heading back to Connecticut from Los Angeles by train.

Just sick of air travel.

A roomette — all meal included — is $601 with the AAA discount and advance purchase. When I figured in the cost of the flight home, the extra night in a hotel to get a flight to the East Coast and the meals, the marginal cost of the trip drops to around $250 or $300.

I’m on day two of a four-day route: L.A. – Chicago – Washington – Connecticut.

I’ve already caught some steam-train action and woke up yesterday to snow in New Mexico.

Today we’re just approaching Kansas City (Missouri or Kansas, take your pick) and breakfasted on grits, a decent veggie omelet and cranberry juice. Amtrak’s food ain’t what it was 20 years ago!

More as we approach Chicago this afternoon…