Tourists In Venice Shocked By €100 Coffee Bill

by Reena Ganga on

It’s no secret that Europe is an expensive travel destination, but sometimes even Europeans are shocked to discover just how pricey their homeland can be.

A group of tourists from Rome got a nasty shock after enjoying a caffeine fix at a café in Venice. The travelers had taken a seat outdoors at the well-known Caffe Lavena in St. Mark’s Square where they drank four coffees and three liqueurs as they listened to live chamber music. However, things turned sour when the bill arrived, showing the group of seven owed €100 (about $134) for their drinks. The frustrated tourists say they didn’t realize that a €6/person music surcharge would be added to their check, resulting in a bill €42 higher than they were expecting.The café defended themselves by saying that all the prices were clearly listed in their menu, including the music surcharge and the €6 cost of a coffee.

This isn’t the first time tourists in Italy have been outraged by an unexpectedly high bill. Earlier this year, a group of British tourists were blindsided by a €16 charge for gelato at an ice cream shop in Rome – the story garnered so much attention it prompted the city’s mayor to apologize for the incident. And a few years back, a restaurant in Rome was actually shut down after it charged a Japanese couple €695 ($930) for a meal. Their receipt listed pasta dishes costing €200 and an obligatory tip of €115.50.

Have you ever been ripped off during your travels?

Glass Eyes, Diamonds And Other Strange Things Travelers Leave Behind

by Reena Ganga on

Most passengers don’t even wait for the seat belt light to go off before jumping up from their seats and getting ready to disembark the plane, so it’s no surprise that in the hurry belongings often get left behind.

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You’re probably imagining that most of the forgotten items involve things commonly stowed in the seat back compartment, such as passports, books and cell phones — and you wouldn’t be wrong. But it seems many of our fellow travelers are also flying with some pretty strange cargo, at least according to a study by booking site Skyscanner, which rounded up the most bizarre things left behind by passengers on planes.

Some of the oddities forgotten on flights include underwear, handcuffs and bags of diamonds — all the kinds of things that would certainly have you questioning who you’re sitting next to. Animals also made the list, with parrots, frogs, falcons and even eggs forgotten by their owners. Other items we’re not sure how the owners walked off without include prosthetic legs and glass eyes.

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However planes aren’t the only place where travelers experience forgetfulness. Airport security is an all too easy spot to misplace belongings and while many fliers forget their belts and keys, others leave behind false teeth, wigs and adult toys. London City Airport said these made the list of strangest things left in the terminal, along with an artificial skull, signed blank check book and yet another bag of diamonds.

Hotels have also seen their fair share of wacky objects forgotten in rooms, including a showjumping horse, a life size cardboard cutout of a comedian and a wok (apparently the guest had filled the toilet with charcoal in the hopes of turning it into a barbeque).

R.I.P. Elmore Leonard, The ‘Dickens Of Detroit’

by Bill Burke on

Elmore Leonard, the “Dickens of Detroit,” died this morning at 87. A prolific novelist and screenwriter, Leonard may have captured and defined the soul of his home city better than any travel writer.

When he began writing westerns in the 1950s, he could have relocated to Los Angeles. When his films began to attract major stars, he could have given up the hard-scrabble city for cushier surroundings. Yet Leonard stayed put.

He was born in New Orleans, but his family relocated to Detroit by the time he was nine. He attended school in the Motor City, later graduated from the University of Detroit, and started his writing career there in a spartan basement workspace. Many of his 46 novels were set there. When his character Jack Ryan (of Highland Park) served papers to a rock band live onstage, it was at the Masonic Temple of Detroit – 500 Temple St. When a scene in the film “Out of Sight” called for a boxing gym, Leonard took us to the Kronk Gym at 5555 McGraw St.

While he’d paint images of dusty western towns quite removed from Detroit, the city was never far from those saloons and open plains of 1950s Hollywood. It informed the snappy dialogue of his seedy characters and the urban feel of his tightly written work. The balance of black humor and danger he found in Detroit became a trademark of his work. It was evident in his films (“Get Shorty,” “Jackie Brown,” “3:10 to Yuma,”) and even his most recent work, the FX series, “Justified.”

Just last year he said that despite the poverty of the area, he couldn’t leave -– and he never did. He had been hospitalized after suffering a stroke earlier this month, but returned to his Bloomfield Village home where he died.

To see the scope of Leonard’s Detroit, check out the map below.
View Elmore Leonard’s Detroit in a larger map

10 Strangest Things That Have Washed Up On The Jersey Shore

by Elizabeth Seward on

A boat made news when it ran ashore on an Atlantic City beach this week. But this isn’t the first surprising thing to wash up on the Jersey Shore, and it’s hardly the strangest. Here are ten weird things that have washed up on the Jersey Shore.

1. Dead Dolphins: Dolphins continue to wash ashore, sparking discussion about what’s killing them off. Most recently, four dolphins turned up on the South Jersey shore.

2. Syringes: 36 syringes washed up on an Island Beach State Park beach this summer. And lots of other syringes have been found in the sand around here before.

3. Rockets: When a rocket warhead was found on an Atlantic City beach last summer, newscasters informed viewers that discovering rockets on the beach is relatively normal.

4. Seals: Five seals washed up on the shore in Atlantic City on the same day last spring.

5. Sharks: A dead hammerhead shark drifted ashore in Atlantic City last year.6. A Shoe With A Human Foot Inside: This washed ashore south of Atlantic City earlier this month.

7. Mystery Flesh: Chunks of flesh or organs from an unknown creature appeared on a New Jersey beach in 2009.

8. Whales: A whale that had been dead for a while washed up on the Ocean City beach in 2012.

9. Love Letters: A collection of World War II love letters floated onto a beach in Atlantic Highlands after Hurricane Sandy.

10. Tampon Applicators: Check out this 1981 newspaper clipping warning beachgoers in New Jersey about tampon applicators that washed up by the hundreds.

First Same-Sex Marriage in New Zealand Takes Place on a Flight

by Elizabeth Seward on


New Zealand recently legalized same-sex marriage and in celebration, Air New Zealand launched a contest that would grant a couple a sky-high wedding ceremony aboard one of their flights. This video documents the wedding of the two women who won the contest, making theirs the first same-sex marriage in New Zealand.

This isn’t the first mile-high marriage; it isn’t even the first in-flight same-sex marriage. In 2010, a captain diverted a flight into Canadian airspace so a same-sex couple on board could wed. Two same-sex marriage ceremonies took place on a SAS flight in 2010. And in 2008, a couple was married while on top of a plane.

But weddings aren’t the only out of place events that occur in air. A woman recently began to give birth on a plane. Coincidentally, something somewhat similar happened to a friend of mine who went into labor during her layover at LAX. I guess you never know when you’ll get a little extra in-flight entertainment.