New App Deletes Photobombers From Snapshots
Posted on 10/12/2015, 4:15 PM
Software giant Adobe recently unveiled a new smartphone application that should appeal to amateur photographers on vacation. Called Monument Mode, it eliminates photobombers and other tourists from your photographs. Basically, it works like this: It can tell the difference between moving objects and stationary ones, and it records the stationary object—the tourist sight you're shooting—and di...
Everglades Airboats To Be Eliminated
Posted on 10/10/2015, 4:15 AM
For most of the twentieth century, airboats have been a staple of touring the Florida Everglades. New rules, though, are about the silence them once and for all. When the National Park Service acquired additional land for Everglades National Park in the late 1980s, the acquisition included some 110,000 acres where professional airboat pilots operated, many of them for tourists. It has been...
Foreign SIM Cards Come with Censorship
Posted on 10/05/2015, 9:00 AM
Bringing an unlocked, out-of-contract smartphone on vacation and buying a temporary local phone number remains far and away the cheapest way to use a mobile phone in Europe. Just be warned: If you use social networking apps, though, you may have to waste time jumping through hoops to circumvent child protection measures. That's because travelers who purchase SIM cards for lower-cost mobile ph...
Foreign SIM Cards Come with Censorship
Posted on 10/05/2015, 9:00 AM
Bringing an unlocked, out-of-contract smartphone on vacation and buying a temporary local phone number remains far and away the cheapest way to use a mobile phone in Europe. Just be warned: If you use social networking apps, though, you may have to waste time jumping through hoops to circumvent child protection measures. That's because travelers who purchase SIM cards for lower-cost mobile ph...
Et tu, Amtrak? Baggage Fees Coming to Rail
Posted on 10/01/2015, 2:00 PM
Amtrak is taking a page from the airlines. No, make that two pages. Starting today it will start charging for bags. And it's telling us this is for our own good. According to the railroad, passengers have been trying to bring too many large bags onboard. So it will now start enforcing a limit of two carry-on bags. Those who have more bags will incur a $20 fee for each. And if the bag weighs...
The Vatican Gets More Liberal...With Visitor Hours
Posted on 09/29/2015, 3:15 PM
I'm assuming we can thank Pope Francis, though this wasn't one of his bigger announcements. But quite quiety, several months ago, the Vatican extended its hours for half the year, on Fridays only. From May through July and again in September and October, on Fridays, the doors of the Vatican will open between 9am and 4pm and again for 7pm through 9:30pm visits. Visitors will be allowed into th...
HopStop Stops for Good
Posted on 09/27/2015, 5:15 PM
One of the greats is gone. I feel like I've lost a friend. No, I have lost a friend. Because unlike college buddies and work colleagues, Hopstop—the superb public transportation mapping service—never steered me wrong. Unfortunately, the app and website were bought by Apple in 2013, and in its great corporate wisdom, the massive company has decided to pull the plug on the little-map-that-c...
Paris Extends Shopping Hours in 12 Major Neighborhoods
Posted on 09/25/2015, 11:15 AM
Thanks to a recently passed bill, Parisian stores in such popular neighborhoods as the Marais, the Champs Elysees, and Montmartre will have the option to stay open on Sundays and up until midnight, a radical policy shift. And a controversial one: the Mayor of Paris has spoken out against the new rules, which overturn a 1906 law keeping Sunday a "day of rest" for the majority of workers; and a...
A Camera that Won't Work at Tourist Sights
Posted on 09/23/2015, 4:15 PM
Instagram is bigger than you thought. This morning, Facebook (which owns it) announced there are now 400 million active users—that's up 100 million since the start of 2015. Soon, nearly half a billion people will be recording their experiences that way. And look what that mentality has wrought. New, in things we don't need: An idea for a camera that won't let you take pictures of popular thin...
Kids Stay and Eat Free in San Diego
Posted on 09/23/2015, 2:00 PM
Once again, as it has done annually for a while, the city of San Diego, California, has worked with some of its biggest hotels, restaurants, and attractions to offer a slew of deals in which kids vacation for free with their families. This year, those promotions include free admission to the famous San Diego Zoo, the original SeaWorld, and on Hornblower Cruises tours of San Diego's deservedly...