Nat Geo’s Six Places to Go

by Erik Olsen on

National Geographic Adventure is probably my favorite among outdoors magazines. Outside comes in a close second, and can often be better than NGA, but overall, I like the range of stories in the sister glossy to the famous yellow bordered geographic mag. If you haven’t checked out the December 2006/January 2007 issue, you should.

The editors provide an interesting list of countries that you should visit NOW. Among them are China, South Africa (especially the Samara Private Game Reserve), Morocco (I’ve done Marrakesh and think it’s a wonderful place to visit) and Canada (yes, you heard it, Canuck country). For the latter, they pitch an 11-day Canoe Arctic trip in the Barren Lands that, I confess, sounds absolutely killer. Actually, as always the whole issue is good, but to start off the new year, the list here is a great place to start.

Taking It Slow

by Erik Olsen on

In a really excellent column recently, Thomas Swick of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel travel section extols the virtues of slow travel. With the motto: “We travel to see the world, and we never see more than when we’re perfectly still,” Swick talks about the need to take a train or a boat where you’re going to catch the scenery, the vibe of a place. He recommends you OVERpack, so as to stay in place longer, to get to know it.

I like this. How often have you come across the traveler who boasts how he’s been to twenty places in ten days. Naw…don’t do that. Stay in ONE place for ten days, heck, for twenty days. A nice bit of advice for how to do the trqvel thing right. Here’s now Swick puts it:

“Travel for most Americans is what we do when we’re on vacation, and vacation, by definition, is a break from the marathon of our working lives. But because our vacations are so short, we often feel compelled to fill them with as much as possible, spend them in perpetual motion, which is never conducive to quiet appreciation.

Cop the Parisian Attitude

by Neil Woodburn on

Parisians are well known for their rudeness to tourists and other foreigners.

This has always been very frustrating, however, to the Regional Tourism Committee of Paris whose job it is to attract foreign visitors to the French capital. They’ve discovered over the years, however, that many tourists simply don’t want to go to Paris and be accosted by this legendary rudeness.

To combat this ugly PR nightmare, the Tourism Committee has launched an ad campaign in London to educate potential tourists about blending in with the locals and becoming rude themselves. The campaign, in conjunction with a rather funny website, teaches Francophobes a handful of common hand gestures and other non-verbal expressions that rude Parisians often employ on the streets. “You don’t need to speak French to understand Parisians or to blend into the crowd,” the website claims.

Although the website does not explain the psychology behind the campaign, I assume that the Tourism Committee hopes that enough vacationing Brits will now be able to fight fire with fire and flash back to the French the same rude gestures they’ve been tossing at us for years. With foreigners now in the know and parroting their tormentors, hopefully the French will ease up a bit out of embarrassment and modesty and we’ll all breathe a little easier walking down the Champs-Elysées.

One such example is the Gallic Shrug. According to the website, the Gallic Shrug is used to “deny knowledge, agreement or responsibility.”

To engage in such a reaction simply follow these steps.
1. Stick out your lower lip
2. Raise your eyebrows and shoulders simultaneously

Voilà! You’re French!

Literary Gadling: Goethe’s Spa Romance

by Iva Skoch on

As another tip in my irregular series of literary travel destinations, I suggest visiting Marianske Lazne (aka Marienbad, in German), a spa town in Western Bohemia (Czech Republic), which Johann Wolfgang Goethe used to frequent in the 1820’s.

Goethe, a German poet and novelist, most famous for “Faust”, used to come here to relax …although some sources say that he actually came here to get treated for syphilis. It is peculiar to imagine how a hot mineral bath would cure venereal disease, but even more peculiar is that people actually came to this disease-laden place to seek romance. It was here where the 73-year old Goethe fell in love with the 18-year old baroness, Ulrike von Levetzow. He wanted to marry her but , shockingly enough, she rejected him. Instead, he wrote the “Trilogy of Passion” for her.

Marianske Lazne, smaller and more authentic than Karlovy Vary, still has the feel of a town frequented by the royalty, although nowadays you are more likely to see a busload of German pensioners than beautiful baronesses. The town and its numerous spas have been restored and it is still a great place to sip mineral waters, take baths and, of course, munch on the famous spa wafers. Thankfully, more effective medication for STDs have been discovered.

Bacon Exhibit

by Erik Olsen on

I’m not a huge Francis Bacon fan, but his work just came up in a conversation I had, and I figured I’d alert any Bacon fans out there to this event: On Jan. 27, the Milwaukee Art Museum (aka: the MAM) will open “Francis Bacon in the 1950s,” an exhibit of more than 50 paintings and drawings from the Bacon’s formative period. The show includes the well-knwn (and certainly rather odd) “Figure With Meat.” Again, not quite my cup of tea, but Bacon was rather a genius, if somewhat crazy.