Steve Wynn's $4.2B Casino Opens in Macau
Posted on 08/19/2016, 4:00 AM
Six years ago, when Las Vegas resort impresario Steve Wynn embarked on a new project in Macau, China, times were better there. But gaming income in the tiny principality have been plunging—it dropped 34 percent to $29 billion last year, and this year, it is projected to dwindle by another 13 percent. Chinese tourists, the chief market in Cotai, Macau, have been staying away in droves, and even ...
How to Pack 100 Items in a Carry-On
Posted on 08/18/2016, 4:30 PM
Watch as this industrious former Bond Girl (Die Another Day) named Rachel Grant shows us how to neatly pack more than 100 things—including a full rail of 23 hanging outfits—into a single piece of hand luggage. She's a maestro at rolling, rubber-banding, plastic-bagging, and re-bottling toiletries—and the final result, we're told, weighed no more than 17.6 pounds (8kg). It helped that nearly e...
Is it OK to Pee in the Pool?
Posted on 08/17/2016, 5:15 PM
And now, this. Surely your summer excursions have taken you to a swimming pool somewhere around the globe. Maybe you heard about the recent outbreak of Cryptosporidiosis, or "crypto," in Ohio that sickened more than 100 swimmers over the summer holidays. Maybe you're traveling to a water slide park or a fancy resort soon and you've always been curious about the cleanliness of the water. Th...
Chimp Study: Travel Makes You Smarter
Posted on 08/17/2016, 5:00 PM
Findings published last month in the journal eLife indicate that travel broadens the mind and makes you more innovative. A seven-year experiment in the field among 70 animals in Uganda by researchers at the University of Neuchâtel and the University of Geneva showed that chimpanzees—which share an immense amount of DNA in common with us—were far more likely to come up with creative solutions...
Senators Demand Answers from Delta, Southwest
Posted on 08/17/2016, 4:45 PM
In the past month alone, service on two major U.S. airlines ground to a halt because of computer glitches. Now, some Senators demand to know why the country's airlines are falling apart and can't cope with their self-created problems. “Now that four air carriers control approximately 85 percent of domestic capacity," they wrote jointly in a letter, "all it takes is one airline to experience ...
Best Hotel Loyalty Programs for 2016 Are Named
Posted on 08/17/2016, 4:00 AM
How easy it is to earn a free stay from a hotel chain? U.S. News has released its annual appraisal of the best and worst hotel loyalty programs—and the previous winner has been dethroned. The publication evaluated "18 leading programs using an unbiased methodology that analyzes network size, property diversity and the ease of earning a free night, among other factors" and came up with a l...
There's a New Low-Cost Shuttle in Texas
Posted on 08/17/2016, 4:00 AM
There's good budget travel news in Texas, one of the tricker American states for tourists to see without a rental car. Now rolling this week: Shofur, which is serves 12 daily routes between Houston, Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, and Waco. Like the low-cost bus services in the East (Bolt Bus, Megabus), the vehicles of Shofur have free on-board Wi-Fi, power outlets, and one-way fares that s...
New Alabama Memorial to Racist Lynchings
Posted on 08/17/2016, 4:00 AM
It's been a long road, but the state of Alabama will receive major acknowledgment of its role in some of America's most painful historical moments. Equal Justice Initiative, a Montgomery-based legal rights organization, unveiled formal plans for a six-acre complex overlooking the city that will include a national memorial, The Memorial to Peace and Justice. The design calls for a forest of 801 ...
Ticket to New Harry Potter Play Costs $10,768
Posted on 08/16/2016, 4:00 AM
London's newest tourist attraction is Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, a two-part sequel to the Harry Potter books. Bizarrely for the most popular character franchise of all time, author J.K. Rowling, whose judgment is usually so unerring, decided it should first be not a film, which everyone can enjoy, but a play, which only 1,400 people at a time can see. Worse, the play is in two parts, re...
Rare Michael Jackson Icons Move to Vegas
Posted on 08/16/2016, 4:00 AM
Michael Jackson may be gone, but he has found new live as a tourist attraction. The Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas has convinced the estate of Michael Jackson to loan it some of its most important mementos to promote the Michael Jackson ONE show by Cirque du Soleil—its second Jackson-themed show, after its Immortal World Tour, to pack houses. The original, 10-foot-tall statue of...
