This World Traveler

United - Making Travel More Difficult.

2008-06-21T09:17:00.004-04:00

Yesterday, United dropped a bomb and brought back fare restrictions that most airlines got rid of decades ago for domestic travel, the minimum stay. It used to be, and for international travel still is, that the cheapest round trip ticket would require a minimum stay of a day or two or sometimes a whole weekend. However, in the fight for domestic business travel, most airlines removed these restrictions a long time ago.

United appears to be among the first to bring them back, in the hope of domestic business travel becoming more profitable for the airline. Will it work? Good question. Given the climate of record high fuel prices, it's an understandable risk as every airline seems to be racing to be the first to bring back fee x or fee y. The problem is that there are other airlines, like JetBlue and Southwest which don't seem too eager to reintroduce all the fees. If this kind of rule isn't matched by more airlines that cater to business travelers, I think we'll either see United drop the rule before it gets implemented or many businesses shift to other airlines in a relatively short time.

It should be noticed that United raised pricing, again on its lowest price tickets - an increase of between 1 and 90 dollars each way as well.

How did my cruise end up costing so much?

2008-06-17T12:56:00.004-04:00

Ever wonder how that cruise at $999 a person suddenly ends up costing you closer to 1100 dollars per person? Part of the explanation has to do with taxes of course, but a growing reason is the dreaded fuel surcharge - a relatively recent appearance on most cruises' price lists. One which Royal Caribbean and its affiliated cruise lines "enhanced" today to as much as $15 per person per day.

In November, the relatively high price of oil led the major cruise lines to start charging fuel surcharges for their cruises. The surcharges were reasonable, to start. $5.00 per passenger per day for the first and second passenger was the standard across most cruise lines. Third and Fourth passengers didn't pay the additional charge. The only major exception was the cash-strapped Norwegian Cruise Lines which started at 7 dollars, and a two dollar per day charge for the third and fourth passenger.

The cruise lines are saying that it's because of high fuel prices and there's no doubt that this is a contributing factor to rising costs. But it's also a little shameless. For many cruise lines, especially from the Carnival lines, the pricing on cruises have remained roughly the same for 20 years when you adjust for inflation. Rather than actually raising rates, they've opted to raise fees for the most part instead.

There are two main reasons for a surcharge rather than a rate increase. First, most cruises are booked through Travel Agencies who get paid commission on the reservations. A surcharge is generally not something that compensates a sales agent. This means that any money the cruise line can generate from a fuel surcharge would go directly and wholly to the bottom line.

The second reason? A fuel surcharge is a surcharge to the fare. Cruise lines are now tacking on fees that range as high as 10% of the cruise fare per person without having to advertise a higher price. Yet, the pricing is higher by a significant amount.

And today, for good measure, Royal Caribbean announced that it would be increasing its fuel surcharges again effective June 30. On Royal Caribbean and Celebrity, the per day surcharge rate increases from eight to ten dollars per passenger. Third and fourth passengers will now pay a five dollar per day surcharge, up from three dollars. Their new niche cruiseline, Azamara Cruises, doesn't charge surcharges for third and fourth passengers on their sailings, but will charge a $15 per person per day, which is a doubling of their previous eight dollar a day surcharge.

Well, that was a nice break.

2008-06-17T12:47:00.002-04:00

Alright, so I moved, I lost interest, blah blah blah. It's hard sometimes to maintain a steady posting schedule on a blog. My move to New York City, training for an upcoming bike tour... there's just been so much going on, that writing about travel wasn't on my list of things to do. Well, I'm back, and I hope you'll be back too.

Welcome back.

Carnival Caves on Fees, Avoids Lawsuit?

2008-04-01T11:23:00.005-04:00

Carnival Corporation caved on its plan to retroactively charge people for fuel surcharges today, according to USA Today. This move saves the company a lot of future trouble and allows them to back out gracefully of a bad faith $40 million windfall the company had basically extorted out of their consumers.

Here's the back story. On November 7, Carnival announced a $5 per passenger per day fuel surcharge to cover the rising cost of fuel. This is a common way for travel providers to hide a fare increase without having to share the increased fare with travel agents who are often paid commission. What made this particular fuel surcharge so awful, was that Carnival applied the fee retroactively. If the traveler has yet to sail, but has a cabin booked, extra charges of up to $140 per cabin applied. The only exception was for people who were already paid in full by the day before the announcement was made. Thousands of travelers lost, Carnival Corporation won to the tune of $40 million. Royal Caribbean soon followed, reaping $21 million of their own.

Other cruise lines jumped on the surcharge bandwagon, but did so for new bookings only. (Disney Cruise Line is the only major cruise provider not to charge a fuel surcharge.) The move, as you imagine, was not only highly unpopular, but also borderline illegal. After multiple complaints, both Carnival Corporation and Royal Caribbean were being investigated for unfair business practices with the Florida Attorney General.

Royal Caribbean quickly backed off as the investigations started to happen, refunding all retroactive charges. (Fuel surcharges booked after the November start date still apply.) However, Carnival hung tough until today, more confident that the terms of their Contract of Carriage would allow their surcharges to stand. Or maybe they were more confident in the large political donations given to Governor Charlie Crist's campaign in 2006, while he was Attorney General.

It turns out, Carnival approached the then Attorney General about this proposed Fuel Surcharge and got the thumbs up from the Crist machine. Two weeks later, two Carnival subsidiaries - Princess and Holland America Line - sent a check to the Florida Republican party for $125,000 according to the Orlando Sentinel.

Once this came out, rumors had been swirling in the industry that Carnival was about to cave, and today they did - now avoiding both a class-action lawsuit from angry travelers, but also potential pursuit of some real serious action by the Florida Attorney General. But is this story over? Or will it start sticking to Florida's Governor? Stranger things have happened.

North Korea Opens Its First Hostel... in Berlin

2008-03-25T14:07:00.003-04:00

Where you sleep when you visit Berlin may just have become political again. According to Bloomberg News, the North Korean government is taking some of its unused embassy space, left over from when their operations were much larger in the former East German capital, and turning a section of their building into a Hostel.

Expected to open in May, Cityhostel Berlin will include a Korean restaurant and a Grand Piano apparently. The cost per night? 20 Euros a night (or roughly $31) for a bed. That's actually on the high end of competitive for Berlin, where even in high season, dorm beds generally run for about 14 or 15 Euros a night. But they don't get the added benefit of funding one of the world's most repressive and horrifying regimes in the process.

Sometimes it makes sense to consider where your travel dollar is going. A lot of hostels in the developing world can make you wonder if the money you are spending is going to the community around you, or going back to the owner's home country. In this case, where the money is being headed is most definitely worth consideration. After all, in this Korean restaurant it might be worth considering that eating Kimchi in this hostel isn't keeping North Koreans from eating tree bark to stay alive, even if the money is going to North Korea.

Putting the Scare in US Airways

2008-03-25T00:16:00.002-04:00

It's been a difficult couple of days for US Airways. Already burdened with a not-so-good reputation, two unrelated events definitely didn't help matters today, giving the beleaguered carrier another black eye, or two.

First, a piece of a wing fell off a US Airways flight, cracking a passenger's window. The 757 lost about eight square feet of wing in mid-air while en route to Philadelphia. There was some minor damage to the tube, a cracked window, but ultimately nothing terribly serious - although extremely scary. The flight didn't even cut itself short, electing not to divert to BWI. There were no injuries, although at least one passenger did lose her cookies in fright, according to some news reports.

However, the other piece of scary news involves a pilot mistaking his cockpit for a firing range, accidentally shooting a gun while landing in Charlotte this Saturday. Seriously. Nobody injured here and pilots are allowed to carry arms, thanks to some panic legislation in the wake of 9/11. There was no danger to the aircraft as a result of the discharge, according to officials, but the A319 has been taken out of service, at least temporarily.

Does this mean US Airways is unsafe? No, of course not. These are both freak accidents. But having them happen so close together is more than a little unsettling. For the nervous flier, it's not a good sign and just another reason to avoid an airline that doesn't generally have a lot to attract fliers with to start.

The South Shore Line

2008-03-24T20:53:00.002-04:00

Lately, I've been thinking about trains a lot. It might have a lot to do with the fact that I've been reading a lot of Paul Theroux lately. It might also have to do with my impending move to New York City and giving up my car. This means that most of my short to medium trips will suddenly take place on rails rather than tires. I've always loved the train. We lived near the Amtrak rails to Detroit, and the city I lived in revolved around the South Shore Line.

The commuter railroad which runs between South Bend and Chicago is enjoying a renaissance and is now the 10th largest Commuter Rail system in the country, despite having only one rail line. Each year five million passengers take a seat on the silver Japanese rail cars. But when I was younger, the South Shore was a different animal, wheezing on life support and way past its prime.

I remember riding the rails with my mother to the South Side of Chicago when she went to work. We'd grab a donut next to the old station in downtown Michigan City, where the train still rides down the middle of the street. We'd hop in the very old Orange cars, vintage 1910 Pullman, for a slow ride. The train cars had stickers on them that said "The Little Train That Could." This was no joke, these train cars were built to last but after 70 years of daily use, the fact that they functioned at all was a bit of a miracle. I remember summer days, sitting on the ripped up horsehair seats, springs sometimes pushing through the cushion. I remember walking to what seemed like a mail car at the time during hot days, standing by the door that the conductors would leave open, so that there was a chance to cool off when the air conditioners would invariably break down.

For commuters, the South Shore was a nightmare. People avoided it in droves and on several occasions in the 1980's, it almost shut down, eventually being sold to a quasi-public company in Indiana for one dollar in 1989. As the government finally started to step in and help the railroad survive - which even in its worst years was getting nearly a million passengers to and from Chicago - new shiny steel cars that worked were introduced. The magic lessened for me, but its never disappeared. Almost every visit home involves a ride on the South Shore. There's always an odd duck to observe in the car, something strange to see out the window along the industrial remnants of Lake and Cook Counties. The train is special. And for me, it always will be.

This Week In Link: Best of the Web

2008-03-23T08:00:00.001-04:00

Hard times. All over the place. Beat of Hawaii talks about Aloha Airlines becoming the latest airline to enter, or in their case re-enter, bankruptcy. But how bad is the economy when brothels have to shut down? The oldest one in Hamburg is shuttering, Gadling has the scoop.

Flying with bad weather? The potential to have a completely FUBAR'd schedule is there. One of my favorite blogs, Cranky Flier, gives you a guide to making it work.

And with JetBlue introducing more legroom for premium prices, Gridskipper has twelve things that they would totally pay extra for.

Flashback: NCAA Tournament 2002

2008-03-21T01:21:00.003-04:00

"How about some scores?" came from the front seat as the old man I was driving suddenly woke up. Ohio in the dead of night, the Turnpike at 85 miles per hour and I was reduced to trying to find a crackling sports talk station for this guy as we raced back to Michigan. I was simply struggling to stay awake and not crash into a fiery end along I-90.

We were on our way home from Washington D.C. after a disappointing basketball game. One that cut our stay in the city short by a couple nights. What had seemed so promising became grating, annoying and disappointing. But then again, for 63 other teams each year in March - the same feelings and emotions are felt, however differently. I'm a Michigan State fan, and our quest to hit the Final Four for the fourth straight year ended quickly with a loss to some sub-standard state school that was trying to make a cinderella run.

I watched that game in the closest thing to a sports bar that I could find in downtown Washington D.C., sitting next to a bunch of office workers who were slipping out early to get soused while watching hour after hour of College Basketball. Drinking and watching this game was a bit of chance for me. I was working as an audio engineer for a radio station doing a live broadcast from the tournament. We were the voice of the Michigan State Spartans. The deal was that if we won, we got to stay in D.C. for the weekend. If we lost, we had to get back to Michigan... immediately. After our pre-pre-pre-game show was taken care of, I watched the first half from my room. The game seemed charmed. We didn't play well, but the other team couldn't find the basket to save their life. It was something like 30-14 at half time.

I found a bar and decided it was Miller Time. This was the reason I didn't take up the offer to get the ticket for the full weekend. $50 to see six basketball games is a great deal, but without beer to drink at the game (College games are dry,) what's the point? Halfway through the first beer, it was evident the tide had turned for good. The Spartans found themselves behind and dead in the water, getting outscored by 30 points in the second half, and heading home early. Which meant that my drive back home was just beginning. Washington D.C. was fun for the 14 hours I got to visit the city. Walking around the MCI Center, looking for a restaurant late at night in Chinatown.

My driving partner knew the deal. With the station manager refusing to pay for a second night in the hotel, we had to get out post haste. Yet, he hung around - all afternoon - talking and talking and talking. He gets to the room and its another hour before he's ready to go. It's 4pm, D.C. rush hour is in full gear and I just know it's going to suck.

It took three hours to get out of the D.C. area because that's how fast traffic moves there. It was nearly 10 when we stopped in Maryland for gas, just off the Pennsylvania Turnpike. I was motivated to get home, and get to bed. I blasted music to keep myself awake, as my elderly partner snored. Every half hour or so he would startle awake and demand sports scores. And I would oblige. Wearing my adrenaline out trying to find sports scores that wouldn't come on until he had passed out again to my right. So annoyed and in such a rush, I never stopped for gas again until Toledo, Ohio. Well over 400 miles. After a full tank fill-up, I realized that we got off the highway at the right moment, I had .15 gallons of gas left in the tank.

We got home at 5AM to save my manager 200 dollars. Then the other shoe dropped, the University was picking up the hotel tab all along.

Jet Blue's Dirty Little Secret

2008-03-20T15:51:00.003-04:00

The airline known for free TV and Blue potato chips has a dirty little secret. For smart travelers, it's capped its most expensive flights for $250 each way. You just have to know how to look, and be a part of their frequent flyer program.

JetBlue has a pretty average to poor frequent flyer program. TrueBlue doesn't let you keep any points earned longer than 12 months after you've earned them. Unless you have their American Express card, in which case, they don't expire at all. It's a great way to limit award availability on their flights.

The benefit to the program is that earning free flights isn't too difficult. Four roundtrip coast to coast flights and a short one way flight and you've got a free round trip ticket. For someone who flies a moderate amount, awards are acheivable. But this month, they just got more achievable.

Early this March, JetBlue quietly rolled out the chance to purchase points. At least for now, the pricing is reasonable. $50 gets you 10 points, and their website doesn't seem to indicate a limit in points to purchase. This means for $500, you can buy a round trip ticket anywhere that JetBlue flies. Although this won't be cheaper than most JetBlue tickets that are currently available, it can save you quite a bit on some routes.

For example: booking a ticket from JFK to Las Vegas April 4 to April 6 would cost you as much as $648.50 round trip, or 100 JetBlue points. Which you can buy for $500. Obviously, some caveats apply. Before you spend money on points, make sure you can get the flights you want with points... and don't expect this deal to last too long. Generally, these kind of frequent flier "enhancements" are there to primarily benefit the company. When the airline notices lots of 100 point purchases, bets are that limits on point purchases will suddenly materialize.

Cranky Flier has some great info on the other JetBlue news of the week, paying extra for extra legroom.

On Travel Writing...

2008-03-19T00:49:00.002-04:00

Lately, I've had a hard time updating this blog. Not that there hasn't been plenty to talk about in the travel world, it's just that there hasn't been much inspiration to share news, tips, tidbits, stories. Probably because this blog is as much an exercise in writing for me as anything else. Writing was a profession for a short time, and it always feel good to shake the rust of the keyboard every few months.

Travel is a passion for me. I don't travel as much as I would like and often I feel as if I'm rehashing the same story over and over again. At the same time, too many travel tips make me feel like the pages of "Budget Travel" which I keep trying to read, and keep finding other things to do instead. A lot of travel blogs either follow this mold, or just snark at everything. Yeah, travel can be uncomfortable - but when the focus of your creative energies is how American Airlines Business Class is more uncomfortable than prison somehow, maybe time has come to channel energy elsewhere. The truth is, there's no passion to write, if I don't think that I'm working towards writing well.

Lately, I've been all about Paul Theroux. The name that's all over the Travel Narrative section at every book store I've visited has been something I've dreaded until I actually picked up "The Great Railway Bazaar." What have I missed? Finally, another writer who understands that travel is a pain in the ass. But it's the best kind of pain in the ass. Sort of like when you bruise your tailbone during a great day of skiing. Yeah, the pain hurts, sometimes well after you're off the slope. But it's a fair trade - because without the pain, there's no high from that chance meeting, that great conversation, that fabulous run down the slope. More than the destination, travel is about the journey - both within yourself and within the confines of your train, bus, hiking boots or plane. Theroux gets that. Most travel magazines don't.

This week, I had the opportunity to attend a presentation from a random Caribbean island tourist board. They were there to sell me on the island. They didn't. It's hard to sell something that there's no tangible connection to. They understood the product, the place, but they didn't share any kind of touching connection that they've made with this island.

"Great beaches," they said.

OK, I have great beaches here. Clothing Optional beaches, even. What makes these beaches special?

*Crickets*

Travel and vacations are more than the individual parts. A good trip has its own soul that reveals itself to you along the way. It's something that most people don't communicate. That most people don't share. There's passion and excitement in the journey. That is what's worth sharing.

1 Picture = 1000 Words: Travel Show

2008-03-18T01:18:00.001-04:00

Travel Shows are interesting places. People that look like nothing you'd see in foreign places do nothing you'd ever easily see outside of a brochure, or perhaps a resort's "authentic cultural experience." These dancers were at the Puerto Rican tourism booth last month.

Whither Travel Agents?

2008-03-17T00:18:00.003-04:00

Planning a trip used to be so easy. Twenty years ago, it meant a trip to the local travel agent and having an expert to find the best prices and options for you was worth a lot. Today it is a completely different game. There are more options, more products and more services to choose from than ever before. Planning a trip can still be as easy as booking a flight or a cruise and just going, but with all these different possibilities, sometimes it helps to have help. Travel Agents can be a huge difference between a trip that is a royal pain, and one that is a dream. But there are different kinds of travel agents that specialize in different things.

Generally, this can be grouped into three levels of service: Full Service, Discount Service, and Self Service. Each service serves a different kind of traveler, and has its place in the industry. Knowing which one to use puts you well on the way of getting the trip of your dreams for the right price.

1. Full Service
The Full Service Travel Agent, is the travel agency that has always been around. Small staffs of experts in the field help you negotiate through what can be a difficult set of options. If a trip requires multiple visas, a combination of hard to find airfare, train trips or remote hotel stays, this is the agent to use. Although the traditional agent you use might not have the full knowledge base necessary to walk through a complicated itinerary right away, the traditional agent knows how to navigate through the industry to find the best options relatively quickly. The traditional agent will do research, will have glossy brochures and will put together the nice itinerary package, but at a price.

Full Service travel agents work on commission and often charge additional fees for their time. This is a fair trade. Good full service agents share knowledge to smooth out future voyages for their clients and it can be a time consuming process for them. Because full service travel agents work with fewer clients and rely on developing relationships for their businesses, full service agents cost more money.

2. Discount Travel Agencies
Open up any major Sunday newspaper in the United States and the advertisements for low price travel agencies crowd the Travel sections. Although many of these agencies have a chop-shop mentality, they can actually be a good deal. With the low price, comes less service though. These agencies are good for land packages and cruises especially, and these agencies tend to focus on one or two specific features of the travel world, rather than a full range of services. For example, the agent might sell cruises but not airfare, or land packages but not car rental.

The discount agent might be a better expert on specific aspects of the travel world than the full service agent - but the discount agent is there to sell that cruise, not provide hand holding. Discount agencies operate on volume, so doing research before the phone call is important, and after the sale service generally takes a back seat. It might feel cheap, but that is because it is cheap. In many cases, these agencies are discounting up to 85% of the commission that they would otherwise earn on the booking that is being past their way. So, the same booking that makes the Full Service agency 160 dollars, might only make the discount agency 30 dollars. Small margins also tend to mean change and cancellation fees, so be aware of what the commitment is before booking that cruise.

The discount agent is the best agent to talk to for cruises, provided the booking is simple. Some cruise lines, like NCL and Carnival, will not allow advertised discounts, but call a discount agent, and that 1000 dollar price could suddenly be 900 or 925 dollars.

3. Self Service
The internet has opened up a whole new level of travel professionals, the traveler themselves. Thanks to sites like Sidestep and FareCompare, the lowest airfare is available to you with a few clicks of a mouse. Self service is best for ticketing airfare because it's rare (although not impossible) for a travel agent to have a lower rate. Most airlines no longer pay commission for flights booked through agencies, so those agencies tack on extra booking fees that can range from $25 to $60 per ticket. Hotels and Car Rentals can be the same as well.

Some limited service will be given to the Self Service traveler from the Travel Providers themselves, but when using the internet, the phrase "on your own" is especially true. Buyer beware is the rule, and mistakes can be very costly. For example, a misspelled name on an air ticket could basically be a loss of that ticket. So nervous travelers should go full service. The extra money is worth the piece of mind. Also, avoid booking cruises on your own. Discount agencies can get you a better deal and better service with just a few phone calls.

With all the options available to today's traveler, it's no longer a "One Agent Fits All" travel world out there. Choosing the right kind of agent to help with the preparations can make a huge difference both in price and piece of mind.

Passport Rules Change Again

2008-03-06T08:44:00.001-05:00

Passport Rules are changing again. Thanks to some heavy lobbying by the cruise industry, and also a history of long delays for passport processing, the State Department has quietly announced on its website, that passports will not be required for land and sea crossings until at least June 1, 2009. Passports are currently required for all international flights, however.

When the new passport rules were set into action a few years ago, we were all supposed to travel internationally with passports by 2007. Thanks initially to chronic government understaffing and Hurricane Katrina (the national Passport Processing center is in New Orleans), huge delays in passport processing forced the delay of implementing these rules. Finally last year, the first steps were implemented, requiring passports for all international travel by plane. Originally, all land crossings were to require passports by January 31 of this year and cruises would be exempt until the summer. But with some confusing language on the State Department website, both land crossings and cruises were kept exempt from the new passport rules until "a later date."

Most people in the travel industry were still expecting that date to be sometime this summer. Turns out the industry was right about summer, just wrong about the year. Travelers can still use a birth certificate and photo ID for another year. With the Passport Agency having added hundreds of new workers and able to handle an influx of applications better, the people responsible for pushing these rules back further lie completely in the hands of the cruise industry, in my opinion. Which doesn't make much sense to me. If the reason for this is security, why put off extra security for a form of travel where a security lapse could cause hundreds or thousands of deaths, like on a cruise ship? Maybe it's because the possession of a passport doesn't really make anyone more safe. It's just another rule and another layer of red tape to get the right to travel.

Hertz goes Green, kinda.

2008-03-06T01:01:00.003-05:00

The ecological impact of travel is becoming a hot topic these days, and not just with the granola munching, tree hugging set. With climate change becoming an omnipresent topic in almost everything these days, many travel providers are taking note and taking steps to ensure a product that might offer less impact on the environment. One company taking baby steps to ensure a greener traveling experience is Hertz.

True, you can still drive a Hummer with the car rental behemoth, but the Prius and just about every other hybrid is on the menu too. In fact, according to a release by the company in 2007, over 40% of their fleet is capable of getting great gas mileage in excess of 34 miles per gallon. A full two-thirds of the fleet gets at least 28 miles per gallon. On the whole, that's pretty environmentally friendly. And given the current price for oil, pocketbook friendly too.

Hertz has also introduced "The Green Collection." A fleet of over 35,000 cars that get a minimum of 28 miles per gallon and over 10% of these vehicles are hybrid cars, including the popular Prius. At the New York Times Travel Show, in late February, Elliot Friedman, Hertz' Division Vice President for the Travel Industry was there to crow about how much of a success it has been, saying that since it's inception, the Green Collection has been extremely popular, so much so that the program is still expanding, and doing so rapidly. "We're looking to buy just about any hybrid car that we can get our hands on," Friedman said during a panel on Ecotourism at the Travel Show.

Part of the program's success may have something to do with a guarantee. If you rent a Prius, you'll get a Prius. Too often, rental car agencies "upgrade" clients to cars that may not be what's needed. The 45 mpg Kia might have been on the reservation sheet, but all that's on the lot at arrival is the 20 mpg Pontiac. This will not happen with Hertz' Green Collection. You get what you pay for, period. In another nice touch, $1 from every rental in the collection will go to the conservation of National Parks.

Does this mean that Hertz is going green? Yes and no. Hertz is committed to increasing overall fleet mileage, but within categories and "buckets," according to Friedman. In other words, in an abstract sense, yes. But Friedman says there is no overall goal to improve efficiency of its vehicles by a certain amount. Friedman talked about how there are still a lot of people that want their H2 when traveling and Hertz doesn't want to alienate those people either. The Green Collection isn't exactly omnipresent either, available only at 50 airports across the United States and it does cost more than other rentals within the company, but it is a start - possibly to something bigger.

Pan Am R.I.P.... again.

2008-03-03T10:37:00.004-05:00

No, this post does not take place in 1999. Over the weekend, Pan Am airlines shut down, again. The airline that shut its two routes down at the end of February was a far cry from the high flying airline that became ubiquitous in airports around the world. Instead of having an international bent, Pan Am "Clipper Connection" was a service of Boston-Maine Airways and flew to Trenton, NJ, Portsmouth, NH and Bedford, MA. At one point, it also flew to other exotic locations like Gary, IN and Sanford, FL.

Even though Pan Am Mark II was nothing like its legendary predecessor, it is sad to see the name disappear. It's also sad to see another smaller airport lose its last regularly scheduled air service, as Trenton Mercer Airport (TTN) now sits without an airline, after Delta Connection (Big Sky) stopped serving the airport last year.

With the price of fuel getting higher and higher, we will likely see the end of other airlines this year. At least one of the big American airlines - United, Delta, Continental and Northwest - will dissolve into another, and other low cost carriers like JetBlue, Frontier and Skybus are facing some serious challenges on the financial front. As air travel starts to get more expensive, and the airlines networks start to contract somewhat, is this the end of the golden age of cheap travel? I hope not. I still have lots of places I want to jet off to. 2008 could be a watershed year for the industry, though, and the next few months will be ones to watch both on and off the tarmac.

NCL ship says Good Bye Hawaii, Hello Europe!

2008-02-28T17:43:00.004-05:00

Just as NCL has started cutting back its cruise service in one market, Norwegian is expanding its profile in another lucrative market, the Mediterranean. The Norwegian Jade (one of the former Hawaii based Pride ships) will not be sailing back to the Caribbean this winter as originally planned.

Instead, they will keep the ship in the Mediterranean throughout the winter, offering longer 12 night sailing options that will explore the Eastern Mediterranean, including Turkey and Egypt. Given the cool weather that hits the Western Med in the winter time, this is the cheap way to be the only major cruise line in the US to offer year round European cruising.

The ship which was designed for warm weather cruising in the Pacific will not be refitted to make the ship more user friendly for European winters. This limits what NCL can offer in the winter time as without a dome for the main pool area, the outdoor space would likely become mostly unusable throughout the bulk of a Western Mediterranean cruise in December and January. With an average high temperature around 50 in Istanbul in January, but warmer around Egypt, it still could be a very chilly winter for the pleasure cruiser, but probably a better situation than a sailing concentrated in Italy and France where high temperatures would rarely crack the 50 degree mark.

Depending on how the Jade is marketed, this could be a very smart move for a struggling cruise line. They would have a growing Mediterranean market basically to itself for a large chunk of the year, if these cruises are marketed to American cruisers. If NCL chooses to market to a European audience, they could find themselves in a bit more trouble, as there are plenty of cruises for Europeans in the Mediterranean year round and the NCL product is likely to be very different than the European standard which could be very problematic. Although this isn't a slam dunk for anyone, much less NCL which has consistently eluded success in the Hawaii market where it holds a virtual monopoly on the market, NCL does stand a very good chance in grabbing and holding market share in the European market.

US Airways: Devaluing Miles, Adding Fees

2008-02-27T14:44:00.003-05:00

US Airways has given you another couple reasons to fly with someone else. Like United Airlines did earlier this month, the Phoenix based carrier is adding a fee of $25 to check a second bag on their flights. Unlike United, however, no consideration to the consumer was ever provided. Also, they've recently announced a big downgrade to their frequent flier program, by cutting the miles earned on shorthaul flights.

With United, if you paid the highest class of ticket, you can check a second bag for free. Elite frequent fliers also are exempt from the baggage fee and the new baggage policy only applies to domestic flights. Although this is a clear case of wanting to maximize revenue based on higher fuel costs, the conditions of the fee seems reasonable compared to how US Airways is applying it.

With US, you will pay the same fee - regardless of the ticket price. International flights? You pay the fee. Elite and first class passengers are exempt, but given the recent frequent flier enhancement on earning miles, it is getting a lot harder for road warriors to acheive that elite status by eliminating the 500 mile minimum award for flying with them. Cranky Flier has good insight on both this change and the new baggage fee.

Will other airlines follow suit? It's possible, but probably with some more customer friendly provisions attached. Given its recent enhancements, and poor baggage handling history, US Airways is quickly becoming an airline to avoid, providing Ultra Low Cost airline service at legacy prices.

Norovirus and Holland America:

2008-02-26T13:02:00.004-05:00

Over 100 passengers were sick at sea on the latest cruise on the Holland America Ryndam. And it isn't because of the waves, but the dreaded norovirus. News goes in cycles and it seems like two years ago, you couldn't swing a cat without hearing about the latest virus attack on a cruise ship. The news isn't as prevalent these days, but these outbreaks still happen and on a regular basis. The Ryndam herself has had four confirmed outbreaks since early 2007 of the nasty stomach bug. So why do they hit cruises so hard? There are a few reasons that these problems hit cruises, and one big way to help you avoid getting sick at sea.

Norovirus and other illnesses have "epidemic" effects on cruise ships for pretty simple reasons. The biggest reason: thousands of people share the same limited space for days at a time. The sickness is probably shared just as often at restaurants, hotels and other public places. But people generally aren't together for long periods on an airplane. The longest flights last 14 or 15 hours. In many cases, people who stay at hotels and eat at restaurants have different destinations and when sick see different doctors in different parts of the world. On a cruise, people eat in the same dining room, they are served by the same people, and see the same doctors when they are sick. Norovirus becomes an epidemic on a ship because the same doctors are able to spot the outbreak as it happens.

Is the virus lying dormant on the ship? Maybe, but that's less likely than most would think. When a norovirus is suspected, the ship is literally coated in anti-viral disinfectant. Cruise lines are aggressive in getting rid of these illnesses, because in a competitive world nobody wants have the buzz of being "Stomach Flu Cruise Line." Some passengers tell stories of how when a virus is suspected on the ship, they take away any shared items on the table. Salt and pepper shakers? Gone. The waiter will salt your dish for you to taste. Passengers are quarantined to their cabin for long portions of the cruise as to avoid infecting other passengers. Once in port, the ship is often held in port longer to disinfect cabins and public areas thoroughly before the next passengers are allowed on the ship.

If this clouds your opinion of whether to cruise or not, don't let it affect your decision. Stomach flu happens everywhere. The truth about norovirus is that it's annoying and makes you sick, but it won't kill you. It generally doesn't have any lasting effect beyond a couple unpleasant days of bowing to the porcelain gods and dehydrating the sick. But it can be avoided. The best way to fight it? Hygiene. Washing hands regularly. Using the hand sanitizer provided before and after visiting the dining rooms. Sometimes the bug still gets through, but its a fair bet that those who are careful about cleaning will stay healthy.

1 Picture = 1000 Words - Asbury Park

2008-02-26T12:22:00.001-05:00

My time in Asbury Park is rapidly drawing to a close. I really like living here, and I really like being so close to the ocean... but the apartment, the commute and being so far out in the suburbs is making it impractical for me. This picture is a photo that I took and played with shortly after I moved to the city two years ago.

Caluclating your Tourist Footprint

2008-02-25T15:07:00.006-05:00

Forbidden destinations for Americans have been all over the news recently. Cuba's had a change in leadership at the very top. North Korea is opening up Pyongyang to the New York Philharmonic. These countries which, like many others, have had a genuinely poor record of human rights and afford their population a significant lack of freedom. Although the governments are oppressive and generally undemocratic, the allure of these relatively undiscovered and truly and completely foreign lands is undeniable. Although these countries are difficult (and generally illegal) to visit, it is possible, provided the cash and the willingness to jump through a few hoops are there.

But is it right to spend your money in these places? Will your hard-earned dollars go to feeding the masses? Or will it just strengthen the ruling cadre in Country X? There's an ethical equation involved here.

"Ecological Footprint" is a term that is bandied about a lot these days. Referring to the sustainability of your lifestyle or action, determining a "footprint" can be a good guide to determining whether the positives outweigh the negatives in a certain situation. The time may have come to look at the "Tourist Footprint" that travelers leave after a visit.

The "Tourist Footprint" is probably difficult to calculate. One visit may not accumulate to much in the broad scheme of things but it might lead to a number of different things. So when making plans for the next exotic destination, there are some things worth considering.

1. Who Does the Trip Benefit?
Some countries have strict rules for travel. By limiting the contact a tourist has with ordinary citizens, there are limits to where that dollar goes. Most of the money spent probably goes straight to a government that might be repressive to its people, or discriminates against people in a way that might not jibe with your points of view. The few hundred dollars that one person might spend may not amount to a whole lot, all things considering, but it is the principle. Better to miss out on a rare experience than support something awful in the process.

2. Where Does the Money Go?
When staying at a new destination, does the money stay in the economy? Or does it line the pockets of someone overseas? For example, in Managua, Nicaragua, you can stay at the Intercontinental Hotel or you might decide to stay at the Backpacker's Inn Hostel. Beyond the obvious differences, the money spent in the hotel is most likely not going to anyone in Managua. The hotel is owned by El Salvadorans and the American chain is getting their slice of the pie. Chances are the only Nicaraguans lining their pockets directly from the money you are spending have a last name of Ortega.

On the other hand, the Backpacker's Inn is a small family style hostel run by a person who funnels profits of his hostel into various development projects in the Managua area. There are also plenty of nice, locally owned and operated hotels and guest houses too.

3. What about the Culture?
So what about the culture? This is probably a more esoteric measure. The more someplace gets frequented by tourism, the more a culture caters to it... even if the taste of that culture moves on to something less colloquial and more cosmopolitan. There's a trade off here. The more other people visit another area, the less unique that culture becomes. As our world has grown smaller, the differences between many places shrink and shrink. In many ways, a day in Chicago isn't different than a day in New York. This wasn't the case forty years ago. But cross pollenation has made us more the same, even if there still are differences to celebrate.

Learning is a part of travel. But teaching is too. What a tourist learns about a new culture, he often teaches as much about his own to the people he meets on the road. That thought alone keeps me from reverting to the Ugly American role when things get a bit hairy somewhere.

All in all, this is an easy lesson to learn and even easier to forget. Actions have consequences, positive and negative. By figuring out the "tourist footprint," it is a lot easier to remember that even on vacation, everything has an effect. Personally, I feel that being conscious of it only makes the travel experience more rewarding.

This Week in Links : Best of the Web

2008-02-24T15:36:00.003-05:00

Knife Tricks got a chance to check out the new Berlin Hauptbahnhof. He doesn't like it. I really hope I'll get a chance to see it myself, not having seen it since 2003 when it was still under construction and mostly under wraps.

With Fidel Castro calling it quits in Cuba, Go Girlfriend wondered about the future of travel there. Fidel says, don't plan on it.

That plane ride? Might be bad for your lungs. Gadling has the scoop.

We talked about Virgin Atlantic's new biofuel effort here earlier, Salon's Ask The Pilot talks about the ecological impact of flying.

Virgin Atlantic trades Jet Fuel for Tanning Lotion

2008-02-24T12:30:00.003-05:00

Virgin Atlantic has long been my favorite airline that I never fly. I have to admit, I'm a sucker for the "cool" branding of certain products, and gimmicks that make a company look and feel bigger than they might actually be. Richard Branson's Virgin Atlantic is a classic example of this. When he offered to fly Concorde after Air France and British Airways retired it, I hoped his quest would be a success (it wasn't.) I secretly cheer on the Virgin Galactic project, even though I don't wanna be anywhere near that Spaceship thing. And now, I'm quietly excited as Branson pioneers the use of Bio-Fuels in his jets.

Earlier today, Virgin Atlantic performed a test flight where they replaced Jet fuel with a mixture of Coconut and other oils. Apparently the flight went well, although they aren't sure if the trip ended up acheiving its goal of reducing a jumbo jet's carbon footprint. They won't know for some days. But it probably will help keep the price of flying down, if the project turns out to be a success. And for the average traveler, this is just as important as being more ecologically sensitive.

You can always grow more coconuts, but eventually we're going to run out of oil. Biofuels have helped keep the cost of fuel down in a number of places, because it has reduced reliance on oil production. For example, in Brazil, they have energy independence, meeting most of their traditional petroleum needs at home, and now with half of the cars in the state running off fuel from sugar cane. And the Sugar Cane Fuel (Alcool) runs half the price of regular gas. Biofuels are a real legitimate intermediate step in fighting climate change, and also in keeping energy costs down. And probably necessary to keep the idea of cheap travel alive in the next 30 years.

Amtrak - Everyone's Favorite Whipping Boy

2008-02-22T19:02:00.002-05:00

A couple weeks ago, the President submitted his budget to Congress. Among the thousands of programs to be funded in the proposal, there's a $900 million dollar request for Amtrak.

That sure sounds like a lot of money for a struggling railroad. Problem is, it's about half what the railroad actually needs. And the proposal is almost 50% less than the 1.3 billion that Congress was able to force through last year. The national passenger railroad has never been profitable and probably never will be. But, as critics like to conveniently ignore, there are good solid reasons why.

When the Amtrak consolidation started in the 1970s, big railroads like Santa Fe and Union Pacific started threatening to shut its passenger services down and concentrating on the much more profitable rail routes. The federal government bailed out these railroads by allowing the services to be spun off into a quasi-public service. What a sweet deal for the railroads. No longer beholden to the governments that helped them put their rail operations in place, the old railroads gave up their passenger rights to Amtrak and gets to charge the carrier rent for using its track.

In the meantime, Amtrak doesn't have the funding to maintain its rolling stock, and having to rely on other railroad's track doesn't allow the railroad to improve its on time performance or average speed from stop to stop. Couple this with much of its funding from state and federal government becoming reliant on running unprofitable routes on a regular basis.

Something finally gave in the last year or two, with the train line basically threatening to shut down most of its operations without increased funding, Congress gave in, authorizing 1.3 billion last year, enough to actually allow Amtrak to start working on capital projects and might mean long proposed high speed rail lines between places like Chicago and Detroit may actually inch closer to reality.

Better times may be on the way for Amtrak. If the President gets his way, Amtrak will be returning to its traditional role of being the red-headed whipping boy model of government malfeasance with subpar performance and quality. However, the Senate is aiming to give Amtrak 2 billion dollars in funding. A mere pittance when you consider that the budget is measured in trillions these days. But that 2 billion would be well spent to update its rolling stock and improve the portions of track that it does own in the Northeast.

1 Picture = 1000 Words, Reykjavik

2008-02-19T10:00:00.002-05:00

Bjork sings Birthday with the Sugarcubes, Laugardalshoell Nov 17, 2006.

I've always loved Bjork, but never had the chance to see her in concert. Then I heard about the Sugarcubes Reunion taking place in Iceland. Thanks to Icelandair offering great deals on packages, my friend Eric and I took a weekend in Reykjavik. The highlights included Bjork, almost getting beat down by a Soccer Hooligan, and lots of expensive beer during blizzards. And that's what I did on my November vacation!