When Your Vacation Escape Involves Literally Escaping: The New Tourist Attraction That’s Sweeping the Globe
Posted on 03/11/2015, 6:30 PM
The theater was shabby, with a disheveled group of marionettes hanging in a little stage at the front and wooden tiered seats so old and flimsy they looked like they’d fall apart if an audience member guffawed too hard. Dust coated many surfaces and the only contemporary items in the room—a massive digital wall clock and a mysterious, multi-colored wall panel of flashing lights—just added to the...
Special Globe, A Superb New Website for Families with Children With Disabilities, Debuts
Posted on 03/09/2015, 10:15 AM
Travel was an important, and much beloved, part of Meghan Harris’ life growing up. Her father was a professor, and he used his sabbaticals to show his family the world. Harris hoped to do the same when she started a family. But her first child, daughter Eliza, was born with Rett’s Syndrome, a chromosomal abnormality that is fatal to boys and causes development delays and mobility impairments i...
Savvy New Page-Turners On The Cultural Histories of Both Italy and France Are Must-Buys for Travelers
Posted on 03/02/2015, 7:30 PM
France and Italy: two countries that are consistently at the top of the most touristed countries list, year after year. But I would bet that a good 80% of those visiting know little about the culture and history of the places they’re visiting, beyond such basics as the fact that crepes come from Brittany and the Colosseum was built by the ancient Romans. Happily, two new—and pretty darn fascin...
A Modest Proposal: Why Not Simply Dock Those Giant New Cruise Ships to a Fixed Position in Their Port City, Never to Go to Sea?
Posted on 02/27/2015, 1:15 PM
The publicity machine of Royal Caribbean Cruises is currently churning out all sorts of exciting press releases about their brand-new, 5,500-passenger, mega-ship called the Harmony of the Seas, that will go into service in 2016. The humongous vessel will have every conceivable device to entertain its passengers: three lengthy water slides along its top deck. Six differ...
The Sometimes Hokey, But Still Potent, Charms of Monterey, California
Posted on 02/24/2015, 2:00 PM
The towns along the California coastline are somewhat like that line-up of starlets that was featured in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer’s “That’s Entertainment” movies. Each one is supernaturally gorgeous, and with a kicky spirit to boot. They’re blessed with golden beaches, towering cliffs, quirky boutiques and gourmet eateries. Big Sur has its overabundance of nature sites, a surfeit of celebrities (hey...
As Disney World Tickets Break $100, There Are Signs Disney Vacations Are Now Only for the Rich
Posted on 02/22/2015, 1:30 PM
Disney raises its prices every year in advance of the big school holidays, and this year, its price hike has broken a barrier that seems impossible. As of today, a single day at the Magic Kingdom in Orlando now costs $105 plus tax. That's a 6% hike over the previous rate. The per-day price goes down if you buy more than one day of tickets, but of course, the total amount paid goes higher, ...
A Major Celebration in San Diego Makes It the Californian City to Visit This Year
Posted on 02/19/2015, 3:00 PM
In 1909, San Diego was a little city with really big ambitions. It decided to throw a world’s fair in 1915 to celebrate the opening of the Panama Canal, which would make it the first U.S. city reached by ships after making the passage. San Diego would be the smallest city ever to host such an international event. And it would do so over the strong objections of neighboring San Francisco, which ...
Some Reflections—Both Hopeful and Dismal—on the Current State of the Cruise Industry
Posted on 02/18/2015, 5:45 PM
On Quantum of the Seas In the cruise ship world, January, February, and March are "wave season", the period of their heaviest advance sales when phones are ringing off the hook in vast offices of telephone reservationists. And as you'd expect, this has been an unusually successful "wave season" to date. With winter temperatures at unprecedented lows, large numbers of American...
Recent Wholesale Cancellation of Flights to Coastal U.S. Cities Has Caused a Great Many Would-Be Vacationers to Lose the Cost of Their Cruise
Posted on 02/18/2015, 5:30 PM
It happened all over America. People who had booked a cruise went to the airport, only to learn that their flight to the embarkation city had been cancelled--and no alternative flight was listed. A week or so ago, in some of the most bitter winter weather conditions on record, air transportation to the cities where cruises depart had simply disappeared. What to do? There w...
Consumer Choice Shrinks: Expedia, Having Just Gobbled up Travelocity, Is About Buy Orbitz, Too
Posted on 02/13/2015, 2:30 PM
As it is above, so it is below. Just as the airlines have been scooping each other up, swiftly reducing a field of 12 companies competing for American patronage to a field of only four, so have the online airfare bookers reduced themselves from a wealth of competition to a trio of giants. Last month, unnoticed by many, Expedia purchased Travelocity. For years, passengers looking for a che...
