Travel

Flights were delayed, passengers said they were queueing for more than an hour, and scores of passengers found themselves waiting in line at the time their planes were due to take off today. One traveller, Peter Merrill, said he and his wife, Katy, missed their 10.15am flight to Cairns. They had hoped to race through the domestic luggage check-in when their previous flight from Shanghai to Sydney was delayed by 90 minutes this morning and arrived at 9.30am. But that bid was dashed when they were greeted by spiralling queues at the luggage check-in. "We heard the final boarding call not long after we joined the queue," he said. "The next flight to Cairns is not until 1.25pm, but if that's all booked out then how are they going to get us all on the plane?" he asked. Keryn Chisholm, 33, said staff had announced over a loudspeaker that a new check-in system was causing "extended delays". Ms Chisholm was in the queue chaperoning her mother,
(Read the full post about ‘Qantas check-in anger’…)

For roughly a week, Spirit was charging a $5 “convenience” fee to all bookings except those made at Spirit’s airport locations. It seems the fee wasn’t so convenient after all, at least not for Spirit, because the airline dropped it early on July 22. Finally, some good news! Apparently the fee was hurting demand for tickets, and considering the policy affected nearly all of its customers, I would imagine the “hurt” was pretty painful. Whatever the case, Spirit gave up an easy $5 on most of its sales, so I imagine the fallout was significant. Is this a ray of hope for passengers? Possibly—it’s a glimmer at the very least, and a reminder that, to a certain extent, customers wield a fair amount of power over the airlines. Without customers, airlines like Spirit have no business, plain and simple. Sure, we need the airlines so we can travel where we’d like, but it doesn’t mean we have to swallow every new fee the industry tries to feed us. We can speak with our wallets. So I
(Read the full post about ‘Spirit drops short-lived $5 booking fee’…)

Obama canceled his trip to visit America’s wounded in Landstuhl, Germany. Now there’s no shortage of people questioning his patriotism and loyalty as an American citizen to the bravest of us all. Get off your high horses, America. Your own president hasn't visited Landstuhl once during this entire war. I don't think it was right for Obama to skip over this visit, no matter how "inappropriate" it would've been for a presidential candidate to have been perceived as using the opportunity as a backdrop for his campaign. There was nothing and no one stopping him from going in alone as an American citizen — without media or any of his people — and nothing did stop him from making phone calls to the wounded, which he did. He has also visited the wounded at Walter Reed in June. At the same time, if anyone is going to say Obama slapped Landstuhl’s wounded troops in the face or any such crap because he didn't visit the wounded, then
(Read the full post about ‘Obama Cancels Trip to Landstuhl and America Jumps on a High Horse’…)

If you are on a budget. This is the place for you. I chose the Huadu rather than the Hilton. You obviously get what you pay for, and this place was right up my alley. They could use a little work on cleaning their carpets, but other than that, it’s pretty tidy. They have a western style continental breakfast buffet. You eat there, and you are good ’till dinner. Taxi cabs are always available out front. They changed my dollars right at the front desk. most bell hops and other hotel employees speak pretty good English, (i think they are all learning to gear up for the Olympics). The lobby is spectacular, they have souvenir shops, business center, coffee shop, 2 restaurants, a bonified massage parlor,you can even book tours of the Forbidden City and the Great Wall right from the lobby. Now, with all the good, there was one bad thing that made me frown (in my opinion) There is a bar in the lobby as well, it opens after 9 PM. The beers are kind of steep in price, but there are also
(Read the full post about ‘Huadu Hotel Beijing’…)

Guess which airline issued the following statement: “Our program has always been one of the most generous in the industry, with lower award levels and more robust benefits than any other carrier. With the current state of the industry and impact of fuel prices on our bottom line, we’re forced to refine our program to make it viable for our airline while maintaining its strong value for our customers.” The above could have been the preface to any recent announcement that such-and-such airline was adding frequent flyer fees, increasing award levels, and generally devaluing their mileage program. As it happens, it’s attributed to Steve Jarvis, Alaska Airlines’ vice president of marketing, in today’s news release detailing a raft of upcoming changes to Alaska’s Mileage Plan, few of which will be welcomed by the airline’s customers. Effective November 1, the following program changes will take effect: 1. Award price changes The 20,000-mile coach award for travel booked online will
(Read the full post about ‘Alaska’s mileage program goes under the knife’…)

We stayed at this hotel for only one night to celebrate our annual “mommy daughter day,” but were very disappointed in the cleanliness of the hotel. The first room we were given had a broken light in the bathroom ceiling where there was dirt coming down from the ceiling into the bathroom. The second room had a line of goldfish crackers on the window sill, and the bathtub had hairs in it. We were given a third room and the desk clerk went with us to the room. The shower looked clean and the bedroom looked clean so we decided to stay. Unfortunately, when we went to use the bathroom there was still #2 remnents in the toilet…TOTALLY GROSS. It was obvious that the bathroom hadn’t been cleaned and they simply folded the toilet paper to make it look like it had been cleaned. My daughter liked the water park area, and it was passibly clean if you don’t mind chewed gum littering the sides of the pool. I would recommend pool shoes. The water park package was $179 mid week, with 4 water park
(Read the full post about ‘Sheraton Chicago Northwest Hotel Arlington Heights’…)

When Aloha and ATA folded this spring, prices for airfare to Hawaii skyrocketed. Since then, airfare has gone down a bit, but remained about $100 higher than spring fares. However, declining hotel demand has caused many properties to reduce rates and offer specials. If you’re hoping to go to Hawaii sometime this year:While fewer travelers are heading to Hawaii, there are also fewer flights between Hawaii and the mainland because of capacity cuts, so don’t expect fares to go down anytime soon. Fares look like they’ll hold steady in the late summer and fall, but increase by $200 or more over the holidays. If you’re flying from the West Coast, San Francisco seems to be the cheapest departure city. Prices from Oakland, where many Hawaii flights were cut, are much higher. Fares from Los Angeles and its secondary airports are also more expensive. Hotel bookings in Hawaii are down by up to 30 percent, particularly at the higher-end resorts, so look for accommodations deals before you book.
(Read the full post about ‘What’s the deal with prices for Hawaii travel?’…)

The Christchurch-to-Dubai Boeing 777-300ER service will start from February, and provide stops in Sydney and Bangkok, en route to the United Arab Emirates. Emirates New Zealand manager Chris Lethbridge said the Boeing would replace an Airbus A340-500 service from Christchurch, adding a further 106 seats per flight. Lethbridge said the decision to provide greater seating capacity was another sign of the airline's confidence in the Christchurch market. It planned to fill some of the extra seats via the introduction of a new destination from the original Christchurch-Sydney-Dubai schedule. "We feel that Thailand will add another attractive stopover option or full holiday destination for South Island travellers going abroad, as well as another source of tourists for New Zealand … ," Lethbridge said. "We feel the Boeing 777-300ER is more suited to the shorter legs, the other advan-tage is it will give another 10 to 15 tonnes of cargo space per flight." Other
(Read the full post about ‘Emirates wants to increase NZ capacity’…)

Airlines and hotels. They’re related businesses—two peas in the same pod. Both are travel-related services; both are commodities. It would seem logical to expect them to succeed and fail more or less in lockstep. They don’t. In fact, their fortunes have differed markedly in recent years. The executive summary of the airlines’ recent history is of depressed ticket prices due to discount carriers’ low fares and travelers’ price-sensitivity. That’s been good for consumers (cheap flights), but disastrous for the airlines (crushing financial losses). During that same period, the hotel chains have been steadily raising room rates—great for the hotels’ bottom lines, but an increasing drag on consumers’ wallets. Fast forward to today, and we find the airlines, rocked by the spike in fuel costs, desperately raising prices. When the dust clears, some analysts project that travelers will be paying as much as 40 percent more for their flights. The hotels have also been affected by
(Read the full post about ‘How high oil prices benefit travelers … really!’…)

Air travel is unromantic, however hard Hollywood might try to make it look that way, especially now that the nose cone of the Concorde is a museum piece. Unlike trains, which allow you to get used to a place, airplanes don't give you the time to do that. It’s <I>bang</I>, and then you are in the middle of nowhere. The only time one feels any form of attachment to an airplane is when one is on the ground waiting for someone to appear out of that airport foyer. Early in the Delhi morning, near the Indira Gandhi International airport, aircrafts float in the air in all their innocence, their underbellies milk white in the early sun. Their drone wakes up students in the nearby Jawaharlal Nehru University. But aircrafts are as drab as the interior of a Delhi Transport Corporation bus, unless one takes into consideration the airhostesses (and flight stewards). Passengers waiting for the security check invariably have glimpses of the privileged Captain, and the cabin
(Read the full post about ‘Wheel vs. Wing’…)