New website helps travelers find their next adventure

by Kraig Becker on

A new website promises to help adventure travelers find their next getaway, as well as discover new destinations they weren’t even aware of. The goal is to connect consumers with tour operators and guide services from around the globe, in an effort to make booking an adventurous holiday all the easier.

The recently launched Kumutu is the brainchild of CEO Ryan Off, who came up with the idea of an adventure travel aggregator after growing frustrated with other online options. The site already has more than 900 adventure travel companies already signed up, and they’re targeting to build that number to 20,000 by the year’s end. That means that consumers will have a wealth of options at their fingertips when it comes to booking their next trip, and online ratings and reviews will help us to decide if the option we are interested in is right for us.

As you would expect with similar websites, Kumutu offers you the option to search by activity, such as cycling, kayaking, mountaineering or by country, with nearly 60 destinations, including Antarctica, currently available. The approach is very straight forward, and easy to understand, with your options being presented in a quick, clean manner.

Perhaps the best way to search is by using the Kumutu map however. When this option is selected, you’re presented with a Google powered view of the world, with specific operators represented with a push-pin on the map. Clicking on a pin in the location of interest gives you a pop-up with a very brief description of the tours on offer. Clicking on the tour operators name will take you to a page that is specific to that company, with far more information about what they do and exactly what kinds of adventures they offer.

Kumutu is a nicely laid out and very easy to use travel aggregator, but we have seen a number of these types of sites pop up over the past year or two, and it is becoming increasingly difficult for them to stand out in the crowd. If they hit their goal of 20,000 tour operators by the end of the year however, Kumutu could become your one-stop shop for booking all of your future adventures.

Bucket List travel blog locks in on people, experiences

by Chris Owen on
This week, Princess Cruises reached the half-way point of it’s travel blog “50 Essential Experiences: The Travel Bucket List” with a post by Commodore Giuseppe Romano, senior captain of the Princess fleet. Different from others, this travel blog focuses on people, namely people who work for Princess Cruises and their personal, qualified experiences traveling the world.

Over the past 45 years, Princess ships have sailed to all seven continents with many of their employees logging thousands of sea and air miles visiting hundreds of places around the planet.

The 50 Essential Experiences blog asks of them: “You’ve seen it all. What places do I really need to have on my travel bucket list?”

For President and CEO Alan Buckelew it was about his time in Vietnam both as a soldier in 1969 and returning some 40 years later via cruise ship.

In A Soldier Returns…as a Tourist, Buckelew brings his experience right down to ground level, including the emotional, personal side of his travel back in time which could have gone a number of ways.

“I really hadn’t thought about how I would react to my return to Vietnam. However, I had expected a flood of memories to overtake me. But that didn’t happen. Faces did come to mind, but they weren’t of the young men with whom I had fought. Rather, they were their current portraits.”

Rooms Department Manager from the Kenai Princess Wilderness Lodge, Kristen Helgren took us to Santorini, Greece.

In her blog post, The Sounds of Santorini, Helgren adventures through some preconceived notions about Greece and takes us along on a journey to the cliffs of Santorini.

“As our ship maneuvered to drop anchor at Santorini, I got my first glimpse of the island’s iconic steep cliffs. Though I may have glimpsed what towered above me at that point, my attention was actually focused downward, as I contemplated the fact that we had just sailed into a giant, submerged volcanic crater, or caldera.”

Rob Roberts, Manager of Shore Excursions for Europe & Exotics takes us on My Grand Tour of ancient sites and great cities of the Mediterranean.

In a behind-the-scenes glimpse at what goes into the research and planning of shore excursions he notes

“I remember reading Mark Twain’s “The Innocents Abroad” in college, which chronicled his own Grand Tour by steamship in 1867, and became one of his best-selling books of all time. To think that here I was, following in these grand footsteps as I helped to plan a similar experience for thousands of passengers”

In the most recent post, The Gift of the City of Lights, Commodore Romano goes into great detail, revealing a side of someone who lives at sea that is rarely seen. I met then Captain Romano several years ago when he presided over a renewal of wedding vows ceremony we enjoyed on board Star Princess. Knowing him then reading his post this week really drove home the notion that these are all real people, sharing their personal experiences with us. Romano tells of surprising his wife with a trip to Paris, a place she had dreamed of visiting one day.

“We boarded a flight from Miami to Paris under the guise that we were continuing on to Amsterdam. It wasn’t until we went to collect our luggage that I handed her a Fodor’s guide to Paris, her go-to book whenever the family joined me on board, and told her, “Happy Anniversary!” Knowing my sense of humor, she thought I was joking. But once she realized we were finally going to Paris, she was overjoyed”

These are just a few posts from this great blog that comes at us from a different angle than we see elsewhere. Reading about places you may not have been to or those you have visited many times, it is easy to see why they made the 50 Essential Experiences bucket list. If you have not been reading along, it’s not too late to catch up either. Sign up online and Princess will even email you when a new one comes out. With over a million hits so far and thousands of comments, this one is creating a lot of loyal readers and probably adding some destinations to more than a few bucket lists.

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Cruise Lines looking at new ports, carefully

by Chris Owen on

Cruise lines sometimes seem to get in a rut on where they send ships. Many ports vie for their attention but long-established relationships with the governments and port authorities of existing ports set the bar high, often out of reach for new would-be ports of call. Still, many repeat passengers want to see new ports and if one cruise line does not offer them and another does, that repeat passenger may jump ship and sail with a different line. While most travelers have still never been on their first very cruise, many have been on a bunch of them and as the industry matures, ports are becoming more important all the time.

In the olden days of maybe 10 years ago, Eastern or Western Caribbean sailings were what mainstream travelers thought when they heard the word “cruise”. But those “tried and true” itineraries are becoming more “been there, done that” all the time so these days new ports are in clear focus.

Cruise lines try new ports for other reasons as well though. Carnival Victory, for example, has called on Antiqua from time to time in the past.

Antigua was dropped from the ship’s itinerary last year, after six American tourists, who’d arrived on the vessel, were arrested after a dispute with a taxi driver in 2009. The company said at the time that its decision was unrelated to the arrests and it had been contemplating moving the ship away from Antigua for some time because it had not modified its Southern Caribbean itinerary in four years. St Maarten replaced Antigua.

This is a big deal to Antiqua. They want that ship and all the passengers and all their money and their reputation as a safe place to call back. In fact, at the Cruise Shipping Miami show earlier this month, Antigua officials met with representatives of Royal Caribbean and Norwegian cruise lines to increase calls at the island by any ship. When Carnival Cruise Lines announced that Carnival Valor would be making monthly calls to Antigua starting in February 2012, that was big news.

Ok so chalk that loss up to security concerns, much like Mazatlan Mexico has been experiencing. Once branded as being unsafe, it is difficult for ports to regain the confidence of cruise lines who rabidly go after security issues, making sure ports are safe to visit.

Industry-wide, new ports are being considered and itineraries for existing sailings altered for other reasons as well. Recent turmoil in the Middle East and North Africa caused temporary changes by a number of lines causing hundreds of itineraries to change. That, no one can predict.

One thing seems certain though: Cruise vacations are still gaining in popularity and not going away any time soon. Look for new ports on the horizon as the industry matures, security issues are addressed or resolved and passengers look for new off-the-ship experiences.

Flickr photo by CircumerroStock

The Ugly Truth: Gadling’s revolutionary new video series to launch in May

by Alex Robertson Textor on

With the goal of improving its cross-platform social media presence, Gadling proudly announces the Ugly Truth, a new video series hell-bent on capturing the viler dimensions of the travel blogger lifestyle.

The Ugly Truth series will revolutionize the sanitized travel show media with depictions of a host of things designed to provoke intense, visceral reactions from viewers.

There’s some great hardcore gross-out material, of course, and there are also plenty of examples of a newly-diagnosed condition referred to by doctors as TBRC (Travel Blogger Rage Syndrome).

“We’re excited to bring the more disgusting side of travel to the attention of Gadling’s audience,” says Gadling Editor-in-chief Grant Martin. “And really, who cares about boring travel news or how-to posts dealing with travel logistics, flight upgrade strategies, or museum discounts when you’ve got video footage of Meg Nesterov consumed by TBRC, beating a defenseless Turkish cat? Or a video of Jeremy Kressmann having eating one too many Big Macs in Thailand, losing his lunch in a tuk-tuk?”

Which Gadling writer chewed so much khat in East Africa last summer that he puked for days? We’ll tell you–better yet, we’ll show you.

Which Gadling writer had a torrid affair with the head of a major European national tourist board? We’ll show you that as well, with crystal-clear HD footage that leaves nothing–not even some unfortunate back acne–to the imagination.

There is also a mine of simply baffling, unclassifiable material on tap, like the dreamy sequence documenting the Gadling contributor so in love with the room’s décor at São Paulo’s Fasano that she arose from a nap to lick the edge of her desk.

Martin, again: “We’d really like to become the first place people turn to for disgusting travel videos, and we’re really pushing our stable of writers to take the lead by getting themselves into some truly gross situations. I can’t wait to see the enormous traffic these gems are going to get!”

And as for rumors that Martin’s recent TBRC episode involving an inefficient airport employee at Kastrup will appear in a The Ugly Truth episode to be released on June 17? “No comment.”

Check out the first installment of The Ugly Truth in early May.

Happy April Fools’ Day!

[Image: Flickr | Mike Burns]

Dubai tour company offers pirate hunting cruises off horn of Africa

by Justin Delaney on

After years of murders, kidnappings, and heists, the lawless sea near the horn of Africa seems to be getting worse. A Dubai firm is capitalizing on these pirate infested waters with a strange new form of pirate tourism. The tour company, Dubai based Seahunters LLC, sells both 7 and 14 day cruises embarking from Salalah, Oman and Abu Dhabi, UAE. Unlike the quintessential cruise, the cruisers do not board in hopes of devouring mid-morning nacho buffets or snorkeling with dolphins. These cruisers board in hopes of embarking on a hunting trip with the most taboo of target – humans.

Like any proper cruise, you can choose a type of stateroom with offers ranging from the humble sounding “standard inside” to the opulent “Hemingway suite.” The similarities to any other cruise end abruptly when you begin assembling your personal armory. With offerings such as the predictably yielding “bazooka package” and a “mercenary madness” kit, you can personalize your weapons cache almost endlessly. The “mercenary madness” package includes rental of a M107 .50 caliber sniper rifle, an AR 15 assault rifle, and an 18kt gold plated Desert Eagle pistol. Bow and arrows are also available for purists. Flamethrowers can be rented as well, though require a 3 day licensing course prior to departure.Ports of call include the otherworldly Socotra island known for its Dragon’s Blood trees, and Mogadishu – the most dangerous city on the planet.

With only 17 rooms, the pearl white yacht is sized to attract attention from opportunistic pirates while spending days drifting aimlessly through the Gulf of Aden. Seahunters does not guarantee that pirates will attempt to board the boat, but in the event that they do, the cruisers are free to defend themselves with their weapons. What this defense entails has been the target of several human rights organizations. Decrying this bizarre form of freelance privateering, many groups feel that baiting the pirates into the line of fire is an extreme example of human insensitivity and a case of morbid exploitation. Seahunters maintains that their program will provide substantial positive externalities such as safer waters due to a fearful pirate population.

A typical seven night cruise itinerary
Day 1 – Flight to Salalah Airport from Dubai, welcome dinner and concert
Day 2 – Boat departs
Day 3 – At sea
Day 4 – Mogadishu tank tour
Day 5 – At sea
Day 6 – The “Splendor of Socotra” tour on Socotra Island
Day 7 – At sea
Day 8 – Return to Salalah

flickr image via dvidshub