SAS becomes first airline to host (same sex) mile high wedding

by McLean Robbins on

Think you’re being original when you plan your wedding at sea? Think again. What about getting married midair? A same-sex couple couple from Germany and a lesbian couple from Poland were married in a mile high wedding on an SAS-operated flight from Stockholm to New York, reported MSNBC yesterday.

Aleksandar Mijatovic and Shantu Bhattacherjee of Germany, then for Ewa Tomaszewicz and Gosia Rawińska of Poland tied the knot about 20 minutes after takeoff. Aftewards, guests enjoyed champagne and cake as well as a multi-course wedding dinner (and a traditional first dance). We’re glad there wasn’t turbulence.

More than 350,000 people voted in the social media contest that granted the two couples the in-flight “dream wedding” package.

SAS is owned by the governments of Norway, Denmark and Sweden. These countries were among the world’s first to legalize same sex marriage.

Is it tawdry to wonder if they joined the mile high club to kick off their honeymoons?

Bowermaster’s Adventures — Crossing the Atlantic with “Atlantic”

by Jon Bowermaster on

The Atlantic Ocean, 480 miles southwest of Lisbon – The seas have laid down to a meter in the past 24 hours and (for the moment) the sun is filtering through a gathering cloud layer. We have just sailed south of the Madeira Islands, destination (slowly) Puerto Rico. It should take another ten days or so.

Of all the places I’ve traveled this is my favorite place to be: In the blue heart of an ocean, surrounded by nothing but sea and horizon, eyes locked on that place where blue meets blue. It could be the center of the Pacific or Indian, the Arctic or Southern, any ocean will do. Today, it’s the Atlantic.

Thinking on my feet as I ran through the airport I grabbed a copy of Simon Winchester’s new book called simply … “Atlantic.” (Its subtitle elaborates: “Great Sea Battles, Heroic Discoveries, Titanic Storms and a Vast Ocean of a Million Stories.”)

When I first heard of the project – the biography of an ocean? – it sounded quixotic. Now that I’ve paged through it, surrounded on all sides by the very same ocean Winchester describes, I’d use the word “unique.”

It’s a challenging task to try and wrestle such a vast, constantly changing place into even 500 pages. There’s geography to consider, all that human exploration and exploitation, the development of trade and slave routes, dozens of wars and the commerce that inevitably followed, by sea and air. Thankfully towards the end of the book Winchester manages to devote about a tenth of his research to man’s impact on the Atlantic, starting with the raping of the cod fisheries off New Zealand right up to the way ocean acidification is today altering its equatorial reefs.”The oceans are under inadvertent attack, and as never before,” he writes. “Insofar as the Atlantic Ocean is the most used, traversed and plundered of all oceans, so it is the body of water that is currently most threatened.”

He admits the Pacific has been heavily hit by similar abuses, but is convinced the Atlantic is in “greater trouble,” in part because it is so much smaller than the Pacific, was the first to be explored, crossed by man and is by far the busiest. “It has become evidently the least pristine and most begrimed,” he concludes.

Winchester puts big responsibility for much of that grime on the trailings of jet planes and smokestacks of ships. One hundred million air passenger crisscross the Atlantic each year leaving behind jet trails of kerosene, a heavy contributor to the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. One stat is most telling: A fully loaded, 300 passenger Boeing 777 flying from London to New York spews 70 tons of carbon dioxide into the sky or about 2,000 pounds per person.

Ships leave behind a similar trail. Winchester quotes a 2007 report by BP and a German physics institute which says that the funnels of the world’s entire fleet of 70,000 fuel-burning cargo and passenger ships pour more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than is currently produced by all of the nations of Africa combined. Half of that commerce takes place along the coastlines of the Atlantic.

One downside to the carbon dioxide created by ships –sulfur-laden soot and other particles created by the fossil-fuel burning exhaust — is that it creates its own low-level clouds that linger in the atmosphere for weeks and months. They are so dense they can be seen from space, from which they are called simply “ship tracks.”

(The biggest container ship afloat? The Danish Emma Maersk, which weighs 170,000 tons and carries 15,000 containers.)

Cleaner fuels will help slow the pollution, as might giant sails (computer-controlled, already in the experimental stages). Yet for now, Winchester concludes, “the degradation of the air above our ocean … is just one more of the egregious examples of modern man’s weary disregard for a sea he once revered.”

I put the book down on that note, agreeing with most of his conclusions, actually wishing there’d been more specifics about future options for transport of both cargo and man across the seas. But it is a heavy task to biography an ocean; not everything can be included.

Standing on the rail of my ship, ignoring for the moment the contribution it too is making to the ship tracks, looking out at the horizon line – where from this vantage, everything still looks quite pristine — I wonder to myself even as we gain more and more knowledge about the ways man impacts the ocean, do we really think there will come a day when we stop taking it for granted.

Flickr image via Patrick McConahay

Gadling’s favorite destinations for 2011

by Alex Robertson Textor on

We travel a lot, to destinations both well-known and unfamiliar. In our defense, it is our job to travel like mad, to explore the world and then write about our discoveries.

Though most travel writers find something or other of interest in most places we visit, there are always those personal favorites that rise above the rest. This year, we decided to scribble our favorites down for you. Some of these spots we’re tipping for greater coverage in 2011, while others are simply tried-and-true favorites that we can’t stop raving about to our friends and the various publications that allow us to write for them. Over the course of this week, we’ll weigh in on our favorite hotels, airlines, gadgets, apps, and websites.

So, without further ado: Gadling’s favorite destinations for 2011.

Mike Barish. St. Kitts. I genuinely enjoy how locals and visitors frequent the same beach bars and restaurants. During evenings on the strip, I’d recognize staff members from my hotel doing the same thing I was doing: enjoying the ocean breeze with a cocktail and some jerk chicken.

Kraig Becker. Everest Base Camp, Nepal. For adventure travelers, a visit to Everest Base Camp is one of the best treks in the world. The 12-day hike isn’t just about the destination, however, as you walk in the shadow of the Himalaya each day, passing through sleepy mountain villages steeped in Sherpa culture along the way. The scenery, and altitude, is a breathtaking once-in-a-lifetime adventure.
Catherine Bodry: Ko Chang, Thailand and Sayulita, Mexico.

Joel Bullock: My favorite new roller coaster of 2010 is Carowinds’ Intimidator. Carowinds is located on the border of North and South Carolina in Charlotte in the heart of NASCAR country. It was only fitting that the park design a racing-themed roller coaster that bears the nickname of racing legend Dale Earnhadt. Intimidator is an exciting ride. It’s the tallest, fastest, and longest roller coaster in the South East.

David Downie: As a general trend, I revisit places that have fallen off the tourist maps, or that have been taken for granted, and delve deeper into favorite destinations such as Paris and Rome, which are infinitely rich and fascinating and satisfying. Cities: Paris (art, culture, walks, museums, food, wine), Rome (art, culture, walks, museums, food, wine), Genoa (food, wine, scenic beauty, history, magically restored architecture), Bologna (food, food, food and atmosphere and architecture), Helsinki (scenic beauty, atmosphere, seafood). Countryside destinations: Burgundy (wine, food, vineyard and mountain scenery), Massif Central (hikes, scenery), Drome-Provencal (ditto, plus truffles and wine), Tuscany (art, culture, museums, wine, food, vineyard and mountain scenery), Italian Riviera (ditto).

Don George. (1) Peru‘s Sacred Valley. I finally made it there this year and was enchanted by scenery, history, culture, people, cuisine. Machu Picchu is of course life-transformingly amazing but the other untouted ruins all around the valley are equally amazing. (2) Kyoto, Japan. The cobbled back quarters of this ancient city are as enchanting now as they were when I first visited 30 years ago. Tiny temples, impromptu shakuhachi concerts, apprentice geisha in full splendor. (3) Aitutaki, Cook Islands. Incredible island scenery, hospitable people, stunning lagoon, peaceful and laid-back lifestyle, thriving dance, carving, and textile arts scene.

Tom Johansmeyer. If you’re a cigar smoker, nothing beats Esteli, Nicaragua. On just about any budget, you can spend a few days down there. Make a few calls in advance, and you’ll have the opportunity to tour tobacco fields and cigar factories. Even if you aren’t a smoker, it’s amazing to see such craftsmanship in action.

Jeremy Kressmann. Hanoi, Vietnam for its great history and architecture, awesome cuisine, and intriguing Cold War sights. Secondly, Laos. The rugged north of the country has great hikes and the buzzing cultural capital of Luang Prabang is totally worthwhile.

Grant Martin. Bogotá. Forget what you’ve heard about kidnappings, drugs and danger, Bogotá is the new cosmopolitan capital of South America. With quaint, brick streets, a buzzing commercial district and a hip, young population, there’s not much to dislike about this place. Get there before the rest of North America figures it out.

Melanie Nayer. Shanghai. The city of old and new hit a turning point when it hosted the World Expo, and set the stage for Shanghai to become one of the most talked about–and visited–cities in the world.

Sean McLachlan. Ethiopia. Friendly people, rugged scenery, historic sites, and great coffee. What more could you want? Beautiful women, good food, adventure travel? Ethiopia has all that too.

Laurel Miller. Ecuador, especially Cotopaxi National Park (see above), because it’s stunningly beautiful, uncrowded, and there are loads of outdoor recreational opportunities. Ecuador is an amazingly diverse country, kind of like a mini-Peru but with very low-key tourism. There’s also great whitewater rafting/kayaking and mountaineering, fascinating indigenous culture, beautiful colonial cities, delicious regional foods, and the people are wonderful. There’s so much more to Ecuador than just the (admittedly spectacular) Galapagos.

Meg Nesterov. Bulgaria is cheap, creative, and easy to explore. Several of my most well-traveled friends already rave about it. Go now before tourism overexposes the country.

Heather Poole. Positano, Italy. It’s just so beautiful and the food is amazing. I’m a flight attendant and I have a four year-old son, as well as a husband who travels over 100,000 miles a year for business. Our life is like a game of tag. So when it comes to vacations all we want to do is relax. I love to be able to sit on a balcony and let the vacation come to me.

McLean Robbins. Telluride. It’s not new, but as ski towns go it feels non-commercial and relatively untouched. You’ll find truly friendly people (and your fair share of under-the-radar celebrities), but also the country’s best extreme skiing. And it looks like heaven when it snows!

Annie Scott. I’m big on Vienna. It’s a magical city that embodies everything I think of when I think of Europe: culture, history, cathedrals and class. I think the Swiss Riviera may be the most beautiful place I’ve ever been. Lake Geneva looks so pristine you could drink it, and the French influence gives everything from the dining to the shopping that elusive je ne sais quoi. Lastly, I had a marvelous trip this year in Zambia where the wildlife was rampant and the scenery was enchanting and unexpectedly dynamic: sweeping plains, dreamlike riverscapes and incredible trees. The thrill of being immersed in the bush is hard to match.

Alex Robertson Textor. Lima, Peru continues to pop. While the Inca Trail is old hat, Lima is emerging as a major destination on its own. Perhaps most notable is the Peruvian capital’s excellent restaurant scene, which is as disarmingly inexpensive as it is top-notch. I also have to mention green, rustic, jaw-droppingly beautiful Dominica as the Caribbean’s top adventure destination. Dominica has a number of fantastic eco-lodges that showcase the island’s natural beauty wonderfully and are priced reasonably.

Karen Walrond. As a diver, I love Cayman. Love it. Very touristy, but the diving is beyond anything I’ve seen, and i’ve been diving all over the world. And I’m partial to Grand Riviere in my homeland of Trinidad, which isn’t touristy at all. Between April and June, you can see Giant Leatherback turtles nesting in Grand Riviere.

[Image: Flickr | alepheli]

The Gadling budget travel manifesto

by Alex Robertson Textor on

Over the past two weeks we’ve upped our budget travel coverage here at Gadling. We’ve published stories on budget-friendly Caribbean destinations, budget-friendly European destinations, Thanksgiving hotel deals, hardcore budget travel suggestions, New York City budget travel tips, local budget travel secrets, cheap local fast food worldwide, great sites for planning budget-friendly European travel, and how to find affordable ski deals.

Our recent hyperactivity around budget travel is no accident. We want to improve Gadling’s standing as budget travel resource, as a go-to site for budget travel tips, information, and inspiration.

In order to give this new resolve some oomph, a Gadling budget travel manifesto is in order. The goal here is to intervene in a travel media landscape that sees luxury travel as the universal objective of all travelers by glorifying budget travel and budget travelers. Budget travel is exciting and sophisticated and it needs to be recognized as such.

The lure of aspirational travel

People love to read about expensive resorts and impossibly dear travel accessories because they’re exciting to contemplate. In this respect, they fulfill a function not a million miles from pornography. And like porn, they’re also a lot of fun. The problem is that just as pornography does not provide a good map for most human relations, aspirational travel does not offer a useable guide for most forms of travel. Worse yet, aspirational travel often comes to cloud impressions of travel and actually convince many, many people that travel is an endeavor that can only be engaged at unmanageably high price points.

The focus on aspirational travel in the travel media creates all sorts of strange situations. Reading through a typical American travel magazine or even the weekend travel section of big newspaper, one might believe that $500 per night is a reasonable mid-range rate for a night’s hotel accommodation. Honestly, this is outrageous. When push comes to shove, how many people can actually afford such rates?

Budget travel can mean many things. It can mean finding a deal on a hotel, cruise, or air journey. It can mean traveling with very little money and simply making do. It can mean organizing travel around friendship networks, or joining home exchange or couchsurfing membership programs. But however it might be defined, it doesn’t include hotel rooms that run $500 per night.

Budget travel is sophisticated travel

Here are three assertions about budget travel in general and in relation to luxury travel that might at first seem counterintuitive.

1. Budget travel enables better interaction with local culture than does luxury travel.

2. Budget travel is more sophisticated than luxury travel.

3. Budget travelers are more creative than luxury travelers.

I’ll anticipate a few knee-jerk criticisms and try to answer them here in advance. Obviously not all budget travelers are savvy. Many are in fact the opposite. But it is just as certain that many, many (most?) luxury travelers are not at all sophisticated–not truly and fully in the spirit of cultural engagement and courageous exploration.The first assertion here is probably the most self-evident. Budget travelers very often stay in modest accommodations run by locals or long-term expats in settings surrounded by locals. Unlike luxury travelers, who are typically cocooned in hermetically-sealed compounds radically separated from the surrounding locales and their residents, budget travelers have an easy time experiencing the richly local dimensions of their destinations.

Points two and three: Budget travelers work creatively to find interesting places to visit and build itineraries. Unlike many luxury travelers, they don’t particularly care about international brands, and don’t stop thinking about how to spend their time after they’ve booked a stay at a particular five-star chain hotel and exhausted the menu of in-house spa treatments. Budget travelers approach their travel with open minds about where they might stay and about which sorts of inexpensive accommodations might be on offer in particular locations.

Budget travel glamour

Budget travel is real travel. It’s often challenging and not always predictable, yet it’s also often far more glamorous than its reputation.

There is glamour in amassing tons of passport stamps on a dime, in accumulating personal top ten lists of the best dive bars in a particular city, and in getting your high culture quota in the standing-room only zone. There are joys in cheap apartment sublets, in couchsurfing, in volunteer tourism, in hitchhiking, in slow buses. There are pleasures in delicious and fresh local fast food.

But evidence of the glamour of budget travel is too often absent even within the tiny budget travel media, which often prioritizes an upwardly-mobile demographic and ignores countless very good budget accommodations in favor of stylish hotels with stratospheric nightly rates. This approach may be good for advertising revenue but it renders the very concept of budget travel unrecognizable. And in the process, the real glamour of budget travel is lost.

Gadling’s budget travel content

Moving forward here at Gadling, we are committed to providing better targeted budget travel advice in the form of hotel and restaurant tips, strategic booking suggestions, local secrets, and solid general information for getting the most for your money.

We want to hear from you. We want to know which budget travel questions you want answered and which types of budget-friendly advice you most need. How can Gadling best deliver the budget travel goods?

[Image: Flickr / cyclonebill]

Four United Kingdom cities show what rudeness is, Manchester meanest

by Tom Johansmeyer on

Sometimes, it can be pretty hard to face facts. Nobody wants to be called rude, and many destinations make great efforts to be perceived as welcoming. Well, forget what you see in the brochures and pretty PR pictures – some places are just tough.

Like the United Kingdom.

Now, I’ve hit London and several cities in Scotland. I had no problems at all. Then again, I’m from New York and grew up in Boston, two towns with reputations for rudeness over here. So, there’s a shot I just missed it. Thankfully, The Sun picks up the trail and shows us just how rude the people of Manchester, London, Glasgow and Bristol can be.

Why is The Sun picking on these three cities? Well, it’s pretty sad, really. A 77-year-old man lay unconscious on the street for close to five hours in freezing weather. Hundreds of people walked by and gave not a damn.

Of course, this could have happened in any major city, but The Sun decided to operate in its own back yard. Let’s take a look at what the newspaper learned by leaving a reporter out on the ground in below-freezing conditions:1. Manchester: The most sympathy the reporter got here was from one woman: “I thought you were dead. Your face didn’t look good.” Meanwhile, 15 people ignored him in 13 minutes. A builder asked his friend, “Is he homeless or p***ed?” but did nothing and several shoppers stared.

2. Glasgow: At the freezing mark, a philosophy student checked to see if the reporter was breathing. Was he rude? Not at all! In fact, Marc Deane, the concerned citizen who stopped, told The Sun, “”Some people don’t want to get involved in anything out of their routine. But it’s a small price to pay if somebody’s life is at stake.”

3. London: It took six people for someone to care to roll up and say something. The rest, according to The Sun, were severe: “One man gave barely a second glance and a grunt before walking on, still chatting on his mobile. Others just looked straight through our reporter.”

4. Bristol: Like Glasgow, Bristol knows how to treat a cold-weather victim. The reporter was “picked up off the ground almost as soon as he hit.” Bravo, Bristol![pho

[photo by Lara604 via Flickr]