American Airlines Goes Its Own Way on Frequent Flyer Miles….For Now. And Travelers Should Be Grateful
Posted on 11/15/2014, 11:15 AM
Loyalty doesn’t always go both ways. That’s the sad truth that members of the frequent flyer programs for most of the major North American carriers found out this fall when two of the biggies—Delta and United—announced that they would be instituting major changes to their loyalty programs. To be fair, those changes brought them into line with the policies already being used by Southwest Airl...
Food, Travel and Marriage: Two Excellent New Memoirs Explore Journeys on the Silk Road and France
Posted on 11/08/2014, 12:00 PM
As a woman who was wooed and won by a man who laboured for three days preparing a lasagna — he made the pasta from scratch — I know, in a visceral way, that the connection between food and love is a potent one. Add well-seasoned prose and travel to the mix, and you have the makings for a compelling memoir. Or at least you do in the hands of Ann Mah and Jen Lin Liu, two accomplished author...
Winter's Coming and a Record-Breaking Number of Residents in the North Are Looking to Spend Several Weeks in Warmer Places. What are the Options?
Posted on 11/06/2014, 5:00 PM
With memories still fresh of an unusually frigid December through March of 2013-14, a larger than normal number of Americans in the northeastern and Midwestern states are frantically hoping to escape a similar ordeal in the coming months. But when they make their phone calls to hotels and the like in the south, they too often find that prices for the winter of 2014-15 have skyrock...
River Cruises are the Hottest Current Product in Travel, Selling Like Proverbial Hotcakes, But for an Experience that Scarcely Differs from One Cruiseline to the Other
Posted on 11/06/2014, 1:45 PM
Probably the most unusual recent event in travel was the announcement by the well-known Celebrity Cruises that it will soon add a river cruise to one of its familiar ocean cruises. Passengers will first spend a week-or-so sailing the Mediterranean and will then be delivered to a Riviera port for transfer to another one-week cruise on a river of France. Northing could better illustr...
Hailo Shuts Down: How Taxi Drivers Sabotaged a Golden Opportunity and Handed Uber and Lyft the Keys
Posted on 11/06/2014, 12:00 PM
Taxi, New York City, 2013 The cab-summoning app Hailo is dead. Yesterday, it suspended operations in North America, opting to concentrate its business in Europe and Asia. Media coverage has conflated the many e-hailing apps that enable travelers to call a car using their smartphones. Uber and Lyft, the two dominators, use a system of private cars, many unlicensed. They are ...
What to Expect When You're Expecting...And Expecting to Travel
Posted on 11/03/2014, 11:00 AM
The bachelor party and the “hen do” are thought of as the ultimate “last hurrahs” before the realities of adult life kick in. But I would argue that the newly popular “babymoon,” that last trip life partners take before the end of pregnancy, is a far more significant rite of passage. Because, as any parent can tell you, nothing changes your life more drastically than having a baby. But is ...
A Fresh Look at Some 15 Frequently-Posed Travel Questions, And Our Sometimes Infuriating Responses to Them
Posted on 11/01/2014, 9:45 PM
While most of the questions posed to this blog are quite unique. an almost equal number fall into several recognized and familiar categories--and these tend, on occasion, to be fairly controversial. Here they are, along with my responses to them--some of which you may strongly dispute: 1) Should parents travel with their very young children? My own answer is No. They--the children--wil...
Vancouver, Canada, Has Become a Popular Destination, A Multi-Ethnic City of Great Appeal, With Pleasures and Attractions That Well Deserve a Visit
Posted on 11/01/2014, 5:00 PM
Ever since passports were required of most U.S. citizens arriving in Canada by plane (that edict went into full effect in 2009), the experience of getting there has seemed more "foreign" than ever before. And when you fly there on Air Canada, listening to loudspeaker announcements that are always made both in English and French, the "foreign" nature of our neighbor to the north se...
Rustling Up a Good Time Playing Cowboy In Fort Worth: Why You May Want to Choose This Texan City for Your Next Long Weekend Away
Posted on 10/30/2014, 4:00 PM
The Texas most tourists see isn’t the rootin’, tootin’ West. Dallas and Houston are sedate-feeling cities of gleaming, Shanghai-like skyscrapers; Austin’s beat is more alt music than country; and San Antonio puts the emphasis on the “Mex” in Tex-Mex—perhaps the real meaning, today, of “Remember the Alamo”. Fort Worth, however, is the big city exception, a burg that wears its cowboy boots, 1...
Is Airbnb Good for America? Or Does it Worsen the Housing Shortage? New York's Attorney General Takes the Negative View—And May Prevent You from Using Airbnb
Posted on 10/28/2014, 11:30 AM
In a thick and detailed report given considerable publicity last month, the Attorney-General of New York State has declared war on the popular website service that seeks to obtain low-cost apartments for touristic visitors to big cities. And though his threat to prosecute Airbnb and its partners is limited, obviously, to New York State, his threats could eventually induce other...
