Countries
Luxembourg is a land of medieval castles and forested hiking trails. Photo from Luxembourg National Tourist Office.
I always like to call attention to enterprising travel marketing ideas, and a group of five hotels in the Ardennes region of northern Luxembourg have banded together to come up with a good one.
If you stay in any of their hotels, you can walk, bike or ride a motorbike between them, and the hotels will transport your luggage for you — much like a guided group walking tour would do, except you do it on your own (at less expense).
The five hotels form a rough loop about seven to 13 miles (12 to 22 km.) apart, so you can easily put together a five-day walking plan or perhaps a three-day biking trip, using any combination of the five hotels. There are about 70 miles (120 km.) of hiking paths in the… Continue reading
The Polish town of Wieliczka has a subterranean salt mine that houses a cathedral complete with chandeliers made of salt. Photo from Flickr.
I spent yesterday in New York City at VEMEX (Visit Europe Media Exchange), where a throng of travel writers met with dozens of representatives of European travel destinations, tour agencies, railways, river cruises and rental cars.
Representatives were allotted 15 minutes to update each writer on what was new, compelling and noteworthy about their destinations or companies, with writers busily scribbling unreadable notes and — more helpfully — pocketing cleverly packaged thumb drives that they could later plug into their computers with all the salient information.
And there was information aplenty, providing a good indication of what types of visitors and customers they’re seeking and how they hope to attract them.
I can guarantee you that baby boomer travelers — who tend to favor… Continue reading
Flooding after the typhoon hit the Philippines. Photo from the Brisbane Times.
Here’s a chance to really help the people of the Philippines devastated by Typhoon Haiyan, beyond sending money for relief aid.
Projects Abroad, which offers volunteer tourism opportunities in countries around the globe, is putting out a special call for volunteers to help in the wake of the disaster that struck the Philippines last week and left thousands of survivors homeless and communities lying in ruins.
Projects Abroad’s Disaster Relief project will focus on areas in the northern part of Cebu Island including Bogo City, Tabogan and San Remigio, all hit hard by the typhoon.
Volunteers are needed to help restore schools and childcare centers and look after local children while their parents are working to clean up the rubble left behind. Government aid may not arrive for weeks, so volunteer help is critical to bridge the… Continue reading
Baby boomer travelers looking to relocate in the European Union during retirement (or before) without going through pesky residency and visa requirements can now achieve instant EU citizenship: for a price.
According to a story by Thomas Steinmetz in Global Travel Industry News, the Mediterranean island nation of Malta has just approved a plan to sell Maltese EU passports — and citizenship — for a mere 650,000 euros (about U.S. $875,000), which would allow you to live anywhere within the European Union.
France? Mais oui!
Spain? No problema!
Germany? Machen Sie sich’s bequem!
The Netherlands? Een glas bier, alstublieft! (Well, I don’t know much Dutch)
Personally, I love Malta (see my earlier post on it) as well, so if I had that kind of cash it would be a tough choice. There are 28 EU countries altogether, and citizenship in one permits residency in any other.… Continue reading
Thailand’s Koh Tapu island (also known as James Bond Island) will look familiar to many baby boomers.
Count the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) in on the global trend of trying to appeal to baby boomer travelers to visit its shores. More than 70 million potential visitors with money to spend cannot be ignored.
TAT has launched a campaign in American TV, print, and online ads as well as enhanced social media outreach to convince boomers to journey to the land of colorful temples and palaces, flower markets, kick boxing, and, of course, some of the world’s best food.
Prime beaches, certainly, are part of the mix, but Thai Tourism officials are stressing that there’s a lot more to Thailand than sun and sand (which, after all, the Caribbean provides in much greater proximity).
There are elephants to ride, tribal villages and ancient ruins to visit, rivers and klongs (canals)… Continue reading
Pastoruri glacier in the Peruvian Andes is fast disappearing, revealing ancient rocks below the ice.
The effects of climate change on glaciers, coral reefs and other natural phenomena around the globe are well documented: disappearing ice in Antarctica and Greenland, disappearing habitats for Arctic polar bears, disappearing marine life from coral reefs off Australia and other tropical waters around the globe being among the best known (and most alarming) examples.
But I wasn’t aware until I read this great piece from Reuters (via skift.com) that glaciers are also disappearing from the Peruvian Andes, or that Peru had the greatest concentration of tropical glaciers in the world, which are highly vulnerable to climate change.
The main gist of the article is that Peruvians who depend on tourist visits to one fast-shrinking glacier, the Pastoruri, are facing threats to their livelihood that mirror the threats to the glacier itself, which has lost… Continue reading
Bicycling in Holland is the best way to see the countryside and get some exercise, too — but without hills to climb. Photo from Netherlands Board of Tourism.
Is there a better place in the world for baby boomers to take to bicycles than The Netherlands?
The country is mostly flat. It’s also incredibly scenic. Distances are short. There are bike paths everywhere. And just about everyone else is on a bike, too.
Here are some amazing stats:
* Holland has 18 million bicycles — 1.5 million more than inhabitants. And 84 percent of the Dutch population owns at least one bike.
*Holland has some 18,000 miles (29,000 kilometers) of cycling paths and nearly 3,000 miles (4,700 kilometers) of roads have special lanes for cyclists.
* There are at least a dozen different types of bicycles in Holland, according to the Netherlands Board of Tourism. You’ve heard of mountain bikes,… Continue reading
A stony-faced Queen’s Guard.
An Australian publication recently nominated candidates for the four worst tourists of the past few years. (To my knowledge, none are baby boomer travelers.)
Here are the four, with names omitted to protect the innocent:
1. Everyone who has been to London has no doubt seen the Queen’s Guards who march and stand stony-faced in front of Buckingham Palace, and I’m sure there have been a number of tourists over the years who have tried to make them laugh, smile, or even give the slightest reaction. And it never works — or almost never. In 2009, one young man from Colombia was so obnoxious in mimicking a guardsman’s gait as he marched solemnly along that the guardsman broke ranks and went over to give the tourist an angry shove from behind. And really, who could blame him?
2. Halfway around the world, three British tourists,… Continue reading
One of the scenic reasons why Fijians — and visitors — may be happy. Photo by Clark Norton
Tourism Fiji recently announced a new branding campaign based on the claim that the Pacific island nation is the happiest place on earth.
The new Tourism Fiji slogan is “Fiji — where happiness finds you.” Tourism Fiji CEO Rick Hamilton noted the irony that while the “whole world is continually looking for happiness, actually it’s Fijians, the people who are trying the least, who have it the most.”
The new branding is based on a 2011 survey called the WinGallup Global Barometer of Happiness. The Fijian survey was conducted for WinGallup by the Tebbutt Research Group, while different groups surveyed 57 other nations around the world.
In Fiji, almost nine out of ten people said they were happy, compared to just 53 percent of the entire global sample who said they… Continue reading
Need a knee replacement? The medical tourist may combine surgery with a visit to the Taj Mahal.
Yes, we were once the hip generation — and we’re still pretty hip, if you ask me — but now many of us baby boomers are in the market for hip replacements. Not to mention knee replacements, heart bypasses, various forms of cosmetic surgery, and a host of other major medical procedures.
Alas, it goes with the territory of getting a little older, a little wizened, but…still wanting to remain as active and vibrant as possible for as long as possible.
And that’s where medical tourism comes in. In yesterday’s post I talked about the growth of medical tourism — traveling to other countries to have surgeries and other medical procedures done at a small fraction of what they would cost in the United States. And, as a byproduct of that less… Continue reading
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