May 25, 2007
As long as the Chinese yuan stays absurdly low in price, a trip to China -- in any price category -- is one of the great bargains of travel
Jim and Mary Patterson (those aren't their real names) paid an astonishing $999 per person for their visit to five Chinese cities in ten days, including round-trip air. Too frightened to sign up for a bargain-priced wonder, William and Ellen Cartwright paid some $4,000 per person for round-trip air and 14 nights in six Chinese cities.Yet once in China, both couples walked the same stretch of the Great Wall, attended the same show of Chinese acrobats in Shanghai, walked on the same ancient brick floors of the Forbidden City and the Summer Palace, strolled around Tiananmen Square, beamed at Chinese kindergarten children in the same sort of elementary school in Suzhou, even ate in the same mammoth restaurant with singers and orchestra, to which nearly every tour group is brought in Beijing.
To the extent that their tours differed, it was in the number of passengers (30 for the cheap tours, fifteen-or-so for the expensive ones) that formed each group, and the hotels in which they were housed. But since most hotels in China are modern and less than 15 years old, the difference between them is not in the comfort of the rooms but in the elegance of the public areas -- and thus utterly unimportant.
How little can you pay? Try the following two options for starters:
$999-$1,599 for 12 days, from China Focus: The unchallenged price leader to China is the remarkable China Focus, of San Francisco (tel. 800/868-7244; www.chinafocustravel.com), whose 12-day stay in five cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Ji'nan, Tai Shan, Qufu, and Suzhou) is so great a value for the price -- it also includes round-trip air on Air China. The only condition to these rates is that you make payment by personal check or money order, not via credit card (plastic requires an extra $200 charge). The firm's Chinese-American management is so reliable that I've never received a complaint about China Focus (but rather constant passenger compliments). When: Departures through December.
$999-$1,469 for 9 days, from Champion Holidays: The east-coast runner-up to China Focus, charging slightly more, is New York's Champion Holidays (tel. 800/868-7658; www.china-discovery.com), offering departures at the above prices from Los Angeles (and from New York for an additional $100-$120). You receive round-trip air (Air China or Japan Airlines), seven nights in China (Beijing, Suzhou, Wuxi and Shanghai) at good first class hotels. When: departures through February 2008.
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May 24, 2007
Three little-known websites can take you on a better trip
Nearly every user of Frommers.com is aware of the big airfare and hotel booking engines on the internet. But three websites of much lesser renown can be just as important to your travel planning.Viator.com (www.viator.com) lists thousands of sights, tours and attractions in important cities and islands all over the world, and then lets you book them prior to leaving home, avoiding long lines at the destination or being shut out during busy holiday periods. Includes everything from London's giant ferris wheel (the London Eye) to golf courses in Hawaii, always at the same price as you'd pay on the spot.
Theme Park Insider (www.themeparkinsider.com) provides impartial theme park advice on when to go, what rides to take, safety issues, and hotel reviews -- it's well worth visiting. Click on "Park Reviews" for outspoken comments on more than 60 theme parks, from Universal Studios to Tokyo DisneySea. In addition to staff reviews, readers rate attractions and parks.
Roadfood (www.roadfood.com) steers you to that sumptuous diner where waitresses call you "Honey" and the apple pie tastes like grandma's. Though fast-food joints have taken over the interstates, RoadFood helps you find affordable, non-franchise restaurants with tasty, home-cooked food. About 1,000 restaurants are listed for the United States (also see www.dinercity.com for photos and addresses of classic diners).
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Labels: websites
Does travel make you glad -- or ill?
You may have seen a recent Reuters dispatch about Japanese tourists who were made mentally ill by their visits to Paris, either because they were treated discourteously by French shopkeepers or because their exposure to a different way of life was psychologically unsettling. Travel can of course affect the mind, but I believe the effects of travel are usually far more positive and pleasant. Travel teaches that all people all over the world are basically alike. Travel shows us that people grow when they encounter new lifestyles. It teaches that more than a single answer exists for human problems. And by going to places where no one even thinks about America, it teaches us humility. I'm willing to bet that the overwhelming percentage of Japanese tourists to Paris are exhilarated by the experience.Add a comment about this post.
Labels: health
Some British hotels are hurting just as much as we are
Determined to stay at a hotel on your next trip to London? The drop in the dollar against the pound is bad news not simply for the American traveler but for the British hotels that cater, among others, to Americans. And some of those hotels are therefore frantically discounting their rates to Americans in order to hold on to that important segment of their business. If you will go to www.londontown.com, you'll immediately see that many important London hotels are discounting their rates by as much as 40 and 50 percent for Americans, which more than overcomes the current adverse exchange rate. Add a comment about this post.
Bargain of the day: Catalonia
Where: Spain's Catalonia
When: September-November departures
I call $1,695 plus airfare a sensible price for 15 days of hiking, biking and rafting in Spain's Catalonia region. Canada's tremendously popular GAP Adventures (booked mainly by Americans) offers a variety of travel styles, from the more tour-like Comfort and Original vacations to the gnarlier Active and Overland trips. Drawbacks: the quoted prices are not as inclusive as some others (there are lots of on-the-ground costs in the fine print, often including most meals).
Contact: 800/708-7761; www.gapadventures.com
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When: September-November departures
I call $1,695 plus airfare a sensible price for 15 days of hiking, biking and rafting in Spain's Catalonia region. Canada's tremendously popular GAP Adventures (booked mainly by Americans) offers a variety of travel styles, from the more tour-like Comfort and Original vacations to the gnarlier Active and Overland trips. Drawbacks: the quoted prices are not as inclusive as some others (there are lots of on-the-ground costs in the fine print, often including most meals).
Contact: 800/708-7761; www.gapadventures.com
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May 23, 2007
The decision to request a Yellowstone Association guide is particularly smart
She didn't wear the Stetson hat and distinctive green-and-brown uniform of a park Ranger. Her only I.D. was a metal name tag pinned to her jacket. But the guide from the Yellowstone Association (www.yellowstoneassociation.org) who met us for breakfast at the Lake Yellowstone Hotel, and then spent the entire day escorting us by van and on foot through a vast swath of the Yellowstone wilderness, was as highly motivated, well-informed, and delightful, as any member of the National Parks Service. Nearly every major U.S. National Park has a non-profit "association" which assists in the education of park visitors. Yosemite, for instance, has one, and Yellowstone has a particularly impressive one offering a wide range of "Lodging and Learning" programs -- "Trails through Yellowstone," "Yellowstone for Families," "Springtime in Wonderland," "Autumn in Wonderland," and several more -- that combine three or four nights of lodging and meals, in-park transportation by van, and expert instruction by naturalists, biologists and geologists, who can bring about understanding of the complex wildlife, geysers and hot springs in America's oldest national park.
Their full-time services, and the room and board you also receive in park cabins with private bath, can run as low as $150 a day per adult and $90 a day per child.
On our recent trip to Yellowstone, my wife Roberta and I opted for one of the Yelllowstone Association's one-day "Ed-Ventures" -- an intense eight hours spent wildlife-watching and hiking/walking among the thermal geology and unique scenery of this American wonderland in Wyoming. The "Ed-Venture" charge is $395 for up to seven people, and if you are lucky enough to have several others scheduled for the day of your "Ed-Venture", the entire experience -- including transportation and the constant services and lecture-commentary of a Yellowstone Association guide -- can amount to less than $60 a person.
There are, of course, numerous free-of-charge walking tours of 45 minutes or so that park Rangers also offer at different sites in Yellowstone, and we greatly enjoyed these quick interludes operated by idealistic park service employees. And there are some Ranger-led tours of up to six hours, for a modest fee. But the ability of the Rangers to conduct longer tours using transport has been severely reduced in recent years by cut-backs in appropriations mandated by Congress. And what once was free, no longer is. Fortunately, the Yellowstone Association, staffed in part by former Rangers, has taken up the challenge. Call 307/344-5566 to register for "Lodging & Learning"; call 307/344-2294 to register for a personal Ed-Venture. And for more elaborate group programs, operated by the Association, call 307/344-2591.
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Labels: outdoor, parks, yellowstone
Three things you may not have heard about travel
New travel tools, or old ones that haven't received much public attention in the past, are constantly emerging in travel -- and can often be of great value. For instance:
1) Wikitravel: Just as Wikipedia tries to create a universal encyclopedia written by its readers, www.wikitravel.com tries to create a universal travel guide written by its readers, a storehouse of information on every travel destination however minor. So far, this free-of-charge electronic travel guide doesn't come close to competing with the infinitely-better Frommer's guidebooks or website ("wiki" suffers from skimpy hotel selections, deadly writing style, and major pricing errors), but it occasionally contains historical or geographical information that might assist the planning of your trip. It's something to watch.
2) The Duke Diet & Fitness Center: Among all the weight-reducing spas of the United States, this university-associated weight-loss facility in Durham, North Carolina, is surely the most serious and effective of all. Unlike health spas that promote trendy and exotic diets of the sort that you can't possibly maintain once you've returned home, Duke serves a tasty and familiar assortment of traditional American foods, but in extremely small portions, and participants learn how to conduct life on 1100 calories a day, losing weight and later keeping it off. Don't confuse Duke's Diet and Fitness Center ("DFC") with the more extreme (and totally separate) "Rice House" meant for seriously obese people who need to lose a hundred and more pounds quickly for various medical purposes and therefore go on a diet consisting almost entirely of rice. DFC serves tasty (if miniscule) meals, as I can personally attest (I lost 15 pounds in 10 days there). Go to: www.dukedietcenter.org.
3) Required Visas for St. Petersburg: Because a growing number of cruiseships sail the waters of northern Europe in summer and stop at St. Petersburg, Russia, it's important to reveal that Russia doesn't automatically permit passengers on such ships to disembark in the famous capital of Peter the Great. Rather, they will need a Russian visa (a document requiring at least a month to obtain) unless they have signed on for a group sightseeing excursion organized by the cruiseship -- the only example I know of a mandatory purchase of that sort. For the American who would rather wander around the city on their own (visiting the Hermitage and the Nevsky Prospekt at their leisure, and not as part of a group), it's necessary to take the steps to obtain a Russian visa or else simply pass up that superior method of seeing a great city.
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1) Wikitravel: Just as Wikipedia tries to create a universal encyclopedia written by its readers, www.wikitravel.com tries to create a universal travel guide written by its readers, a storehouse of information on every travel destination however minor. So far, this free-of-charge electronic travel guide doesn't come close to competing with the infinitely-better Frommer's guidebooks or website ("wiki" suffers from skimpy hotel selections, deadly writing style, and major pricing errors), but it occasionally contains historical or geographical information that might assist the planning of your trip. It's something to watch.
2) The Duke Diet & Fitness Center: Among all the weight-reducing spas of the United States, this university-associated weight-loss facility in Durham, North Carolina, is surely the most serious and effective of all. Unlike health spas that promote trendy and exotic diets of the sort that you can't possibly maintain once you've returned home, Duke serves a tasty and familiar assortment of traditional American foods, but in extremely small portions, and participants learn how to conduct life on 1100 calories a day, losing weight and later keeping it off. Don't confuse Duke's Diet and Fitness Center ("DFC") with the more extreme (and totally separate) "Rice House" meant for seriously obese people who need to lose a hundred and more pounds quickly for various medical purposes and therefore go on a diet consisting almost entirely of rice. DFC serves tasty (if miniscule) meals, as I can personally attest (I lost 15 pounds in 10 days there). Go to: www.dukedietcenter.org.
3) Required Visas for St. Petersburg: Because a growing number of cruiseships sail the waters of northern Europe in summer and stop at St. Petersburg, Russia, it's important to reveal that Russia doesn't automatically permit passengers on such ships to disembark in the famous capital of Peter the Great. Rather, they will need a Russian visa (a document requiring at least a month to obtain) unless they have signed on for a group sightseeing excursion organized by the cruiseship -- the only example I know of a mandatory purchase of that sort. For the American who would rather wander around the city on their own (visiting the Hermitage and the Nevsky Prospekt at their leisure, and not as part of a group), it's necessary to take the steps to obtain a Russian visa or else simply pass up that superior method of seeing a great city.
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Bargain of the day: Borneo
Where: Borneo
When: Trips depart from July 2007-June 2008
Borneo for $1,336 plus airfare! For less than $2,000 per person total (once you include the trans-Pacific airfare), you have 17 days of jungles, orangutans, caverns and river trips in Borneo, including all internal flights, guides and lodging from hotels to rainforest lodges and a longhouse stay with tribal headhunters. The tour operator is the long-established Adventure Center, which maintains low prices on all seven continents by contracting with expert local outfitters and specialist operators. Most trips are priced without airfare, though they can arrange it.
Contact: tel. 800/228-8747; www.adventurecenter.com
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When: Trips depart from July 2007-June 2008
Borneo for $1,336 plus airfare! For less than $2,000 per person total (once you include the trans-Pacific airfare), you have 17 days of jungles, orangutans, caverns and river trips in Borneo, including all internal flights, guides and lodging from hotels to rainforest lodges and a longhouse stay with tribal headhunters. The tour operator is the long-established Adventure Center, which maintains low prices on all seven continents by contracting with expert local outfitters and specialist operators. Most trips are priced without airfare, though they can arrange it.
Contact: tel. 800/228-8747; www.adventurecenter.com
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America on 4 miles an hour
When my wife and I made our first cruise of the Mississippi River aboard the giant, modern paddle-wheel boat called The American Queen, I loved the experience and she hated it. I loved sitting on a deck reading Mark Twain and watching the shore inch past at four miles an hour. I loved the Dixieland music, the southern specialties for dinner, the laid-back repose of the most relaxing cruise on earth. She wanted something more active. (Luckily, it was she who had chosen this cruise, not me). All this way by way of announcing that the American Queen has now resumed making cruises of the Mississippi, and they all start in New Orleans. Go to www.majesticamericaline.com, and select the ship by name for more information.
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Labels: cruise, mississippi river
May 22, 2007
Meet dogma, a frank philosophy
During a recent trip to Miami, Florida, I ate a hot dog whose creators claim it will become the next fast food sensation of the United States. The stand at which it's sold is called Dogma -- sub-titled "A Frank Philosophy." Unlike the usual soft and bland boiled hot dog, this one is grilled, and it's hard and sometimes somewhat spicy, and served on a carraway-seeded roll, all for $2.45, a meal in itself. You cover it with up to four toppings, including chopped onions. The current Dogma hotstand is at 7030 Biscayne Boulevard, in Miami, but a new and bigger one has followed in the heart of South Beach at 1500 Washington Avenue, near the famous Lincoln Road. If you're in Miami Beach, you might want to enjoy an historic opportunity of witnessing a business that may one day challenge McDonalds.
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Don't scoff at short European tours
I recently returned from the shortest vacation trip I have ever made to Europe, one that spent only six nights there. And I want to report that if that's the most time you have for a trip, as it was for me, the experience can be perfectly fine. We stayed in one location, Stockholm, Sweden. We went to sleep for about three hours immediately on arrival, we paced ourselves during the next two days, napping whenever we could. And with jet lag controlled in that manner, we had a perfectly fine vacation, without feeling short-changed for time. This coming fall and winter, airfares to Europe will again be at their lowest level, and all sorts of tour operators will be offering packages that spend no more than six nights in the Old World. My advice is: try it.Add a comment about this post.
Labels: sweden
Why do so many Americans opt for zany, Las Vegas weddings?
Periodically, I've asked why it is that so many Americans fly to Las Vegas for the explicit purpose of getting married in a happy-go-lucky, comical ceremony conducted by a minister dressed to resemble Elvis Presley or Rodney Dangerfield. Hundreds of such weddings take place each month in Sin City, and I've wondered why anyone in their right minds would seek out such an experience.While saving money is itself a reason for choosing to marry in Las Vegas (some chapels there charge as little as $75 for the license and ceremony), why the zany part? After receiving many unsatisfying explanations from readers, I have finally had a letter that comes close to achieving the right tone. It is printed below, without change:
"My wife and I are in our mid-30s and were married at the Little White Wedding Chapel in the fall of 2003. As we waited in the lobby for the preacher, I noticed a picture of Lorenzo Lamas on the wall claiming he was married here, so I knew we were in the right place. We had paid an extra $150 for a tacky Elvis impersonator to host the ceremony.
"He showed up in a yellow velour jacket and sang a bad version of "Viva Las Vegas" after the wedding. We then went outside and had our picture taken with the King and that wedding picture is now framed and hangs on our bedroom wall. After the wedding we treated ourselves to the $17.50 self-service buffet at the Bellagio for our 'reception'.
"Getting married in Las Vegas was the perfect solution for us. My wife had been married and divorced before so she felt no need to go through the stress, hassle, and expense of another wedding. I, being a typical guy and nonreligious, had no need whatever to get married in a church or have an expensive reception. She was thrilled at the idea of a $200, completely stress-free wedding.
"We probably saved over $20,000. We took the unspent cash and used it for a down payment on a house. We get much more use out of that house then we would have paying for our friends to get drunk at an open bar and gorging themselves.
"My wife is my perfect soul mate and getting married at a tasteless chapel in Las Vegas in no way lessoned or cheapened our love for each other. It was a fun-loving, upbeat, humorous experience that is what a wedding should be."
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May 21, 2007
An entire apartment, for a prolonged length of time, may be the solution to Europe's high costs
Most of the European websites for finding hotels -- I'm talking about www.venere.com, www.octopustravel.com, and www.eurocheapo.com -- also list apartments for rent in major European cities, and those apartments can be had for less than a hotel room costs, if they are rented for one or two weeks. With Europe as expensive as it is now, because of currency developments, it may be that such apartment rentals will henceforth provide the means for Americans to live at affordable costs. We may have to lessen the number of European cities we visit in the course of a trip, in favor of longer apartment stays in fewer cities. If you're willing or able to do that, then you'll want to click the "apartment" button on the websites just mentioned.Add a comment about this post.
Labels: accommodations
Bargain of the day: New Orleans
Where: New Orleans
When: summer
Tragically neglected by most Americans, this national treasure at the mouth of the Mississippi is as compelling as ever, its hotels, restaurants, sights and chief musical venues almost all restored to their former quality. Since its tourism is well below normal levels, the city's summer rates are moderate and appealing, and numerous travel companies offer air-and-land bargains. American Airlines Vacations flying to New Orleans from numerous cities, is currently charging under $375 per person for round-trip air from many U.S. locations and two nights at a fine, French Quarter hotel. In addition to enjoying the vacation itself, we Americans fulfill a moral duty by assisting the recovery of New Orleans with our tourist dollars.
Contact: tel. 800/321-2121; www.aavacations.com.
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When: summer
Tragically neglected by most Americans, this national treasure at the mouth of the Mississippi is as compelling as ever, its hotels, restaurants, sights and chief musical venues almost all restored to their former quality. Since its tourism is well below normal levels, the city's summer rates are moderate and appealing, and numerous travel companies offer air-and-land bargains. American Airlines Vacations flying to New Orleans from numerous cities, is currently charging under $375 per person for round-trip air from many U.S. locations and two nights at a fine, French Quarter hotel. In addition to enjoying the vacation itself, we Americans fulfill a moral duty by assisting the recovery of New Orleans with our tourist dollars.
Contact: tel. 800/321-2121; www.aavacations.com.
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Labels: deals, new orleans
Footscape for the healthy and footloose
As more and more travelers look for active holidays on which they enjoy healthy exercise, more and more tour operators are looking for ways to cut the cost of that kind of vacation. The solution found by a British company called Footscape (www.footscape.co.uk) is to offer so-called self-guided walking tours. Although you receive pre-reserved accommodations for every night, and your luggage is transported from place to place, you are otherwise on your own. There is no guide, and you walk only with the people you've chosen, on itineraries for which you receive careful walking instructions. The area of Footscape's concentration is Dorset, on the Channel coast of England, and the price is almost always below $1,000 for a week-long holiday.
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Labels: hiking
May 20, 2007
Upstarts are flying the Atlantic -- go directly to their websites
Though everyone has become accustomed to flying the low-cost, upstart airlines of America on flights within the country -- and I'm referring to companies like Southwest Airlines, JetBlue and Airtran -- fewer Americans are aware that various low-cost, upstart airlines of Europe are now flying across the Atlantic. An Italian company called Eurofly (www.euroflyusa.com) flies at low-cost between New York City and cities in Italy. A carrier called Air Plus Comet (www.airpluscomet.com) flies to Spain. Condor Airlines (www8.condor.com) goes to Germany from Orlando and Las Vegas. Martinair (www.martinair.com) flies from Florida to Holland. Britain's Flyglobespan (www.flyglobespan.com) flies from Orlando to Edinburgh. Because their flights aren't always listed by the big airfare search engines, you'd do well to access the airlines' own websites when you next consider a trans-Atlantic trip.Add a comment about this post.
Fifty years ago, 
Arthur Frommer is generally acknowledged to be the nation's foremost travel authority. He is the founder of the
