Best airport dining for holiday travel

by Laurel Miller on

The holidays mean different things to different people, but one thing that’s fairly ubiquitous is airline travel. And with airports comes some pretty godawful, overpriced fast food and full-service restaurants. That’s why the team at Gadling (and a few well-traveled friends) gave their picks for the best airport dining at a variety of domestic airports.

From Cubano sandwiches to Nigerian fufu, there’s an eclectic mix of world cuisines, along with some regional and traditional American classics. Maybe layovers aren’t so bad, after all.

Dallas-Forth Worth Airport: Pappasito’s Cantina, Terminal A, Gate A28.
Tex-Mex made from scratch, salsa to tortillas.

Bush Intercontinental Airport, Houston: Real Food Co., Terminal C.
Four words: Texas barbecue. Huge portions.

Miami International Airport: La Carreta, Terminal D, 2nd Level.
Mmm, Cuban food. Artery-clogging goodness from a popular Miami chain.

Albuquerque International Sunport: La Hacienda Express, between Concourses A and B.
Cheap, delicious Southwestern cuisine. Tip: adovada breakfast burritos.

[Photo credit: Flickr user freebeets]Washington Dulles International Airport, Washington DC: Five Guys Burgers and Fries, Midfield Concourse, Gate B58.
Old school burgers don’t get much better than this, airport or no.

Logan International Airport, Boston: Legal’s Test Kitchen, Terminal A, between Gates 4 and 5.
Clam chowder like it’s meant to be.

Memphis International Airport: Jim Neely’s Interstate BBQ, near Gate B14.
Honest-to-god pit barbecue from this popular local chain.

Portland International Airport: Stanford’s Restaurant & Bar, on Main Concourse, behind Gates A, B, and C.
Steak, ribs, burgers, and a banging happy hour Sun-Fri, 3-6pm and 9-11pm.

Seattle-Tacoma International Airport: Anthony’s, Central Terminal.
Regional seafood, including Puget Sound oysters. Slurp with PacNW beer and wine (there’s also a full bar).

San Francisco International Airport: Ebisu Sushi, Terminal G Food Court.
A branch of the insanely popular, recently remodeled Sunset District original, which has been packing them in for over 20 years.

Raleigh-Durham International Airport: 42nd Street Oyster Bar, Terminal 2, near Gate C-1.
For over 70 years, the downtown location has been a Raleigh institution for its massive raw bar (one of the biggest in the Southeast), seafood, steaks, and Southern hospitality. The airport outpost is a “miniaturized version.”

Chicago O’Hare International Airport: Two new Rick Bayless restaurants, Terminals 1 and 3.
Bayless, the acclaimed chef/Mexican cuisine authority behind Chicago’s Frontera Grill, Topolobampo, and Xoco, will be opening two restaurants at O’Hare this fall, er, winter. The names of the small, casual eateries haven’t been announced yet; word is that one is an outpost of Frontera, and Bayless says the other will be a torteria, with a guacamole bar and “good margaritas.” Count on it.

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport: African food at the taxi driver’s cafeteria seven minutes walk outside of North baggage claim, Concourse E.
Look for dishes from Ethiopia, Somalia, and Nigeria.

Got a favorite food stop at a U.S. airport? We’d love to hear about it!

[Photo credits: Five Guys, Flickr user Adam Kuban; oysters, Flickr user VirtualErn]

High tech ski goggles incorporate GPS, LCD display, kitchen sink

by Kraig Becker on

There is a decidedly high tech movement afoot on the ski slopes this season. First, we saw stat tracking and social networking brought to the mountains courtesy of RFID tags embedded in lift tickets in Colorado and now we have a set of high tech goggles that incorporate GPS functionality, a tiny LCD display, and a multitude of other features that will keep you in the know while playing in the snow.

The new Transcend Goggles from Zeal Optics incorporate a GPS chip that keeps track of speed, distance traveled, vertical drop, direction and location. That data can be examined on the LCD screen, which is mounted in the lower right hand corner of the goggle frames. The screen also displays the current time, temperature, altitude, and so on. Data is stored in an on board memory chip and can be uploaded to your computer later in order to measure progress and performance gains. The GPS tracking can also plot your tracks on Google Maps as well.

The new goggles are available now and come in two flavors, with the style of lens being the only difference. The “basic” model includes polarized lenses and costs $399 while the $499 models offer polarized and photochromatic lens, which provide even more protection for your eyes on those sunny days on the slopes. Both models also include built in lithium batteries that are good for seven hours of use between charges.

While I haven’t had a chance to try these goggles personally, they do look like the would be a lot of fun to use. It is amazing how technology had pervaded so far into our favorite outdoor pursuits, but when it is used in a unique and interesting way, it can really be a useful enhancement to the experience. These goggles look like they fall solidly into that category.

Hotel booking tip: Hotwire + upgrade = deal

by Alex Robertson Textor on

There are many strategies for successfully booking hotel rooms on “opaque” booking sites. “Opaque” booking sites, for those unfamiliar with the term if not the thing itself, sell brand-name hotel rooms, among other goods, for discounted prices. The catch is that these hotels are never named in advance. The “opaque” booking sites help hotels fill their rooms at rates often far below hotel rack rates.

Some frequent travelers have developed a science out of gaming opaque booking sites. Better Bidding is one essential tool in this endeavor. It offers bidding tips and other information designed to allow users to figure out which description matches up with which anonymous hotel, thereby allowing customers to pick and choose a favored hotel.

Here’s a less crafty tip, one that can nonetheless be very helpful for finding a mid-range hotel bargain.

Twice in the past two months I’ve booked hotels in London and San Francisco on Hotwire. In both instances the hotel reservation was relatively speaking quite inexpensive: $99 for the London room and $110 for the San Francisco room.

Unfortunately, both bookings resulted in hotel rooms that were far from ideal.

In London, the Hilton London Docklands Riverside room booked through Hotwire ($99) was very cramped and not particularly well maintained. The bed was tiny and the view was of the traffic circle in front of the hotel. A £20 ($32) upgrade option gave us a recently renovated and much larger Deluxe room with a view of the foggy Thames. Our Hotwire-plus-upgrade rate ($131) turned out to be much less expensive than the lowest rack rate I found during research ($217).

In San Francisco, the room we booked through Hotwire at the Intercontinental San Francisco ($110) had two separate beds. We didn’t even take a look at it, instead inquiring about an upgrade. $30 per night later and we had a 17th floor corner king with sweeping views north and west. By our calculations, we saved almost $40 off the least expensive rack rate in the process.

(Image: Flickr / hotelkursaal&ausonia)

Vote for the new Seven Wonders of Nature

by Kraig Becker on

A few years back there was an organized effort to select a New Seven Wonders of the World, which resulted in a list of seven amazing places that joined the Great Pyramids on a modern list of spectacular destinations. Now, a similar effort is being made to select a New Seven Wonders of Nature as well.

The process began not long after naming the New Seven Wonders, with more than 440 locations, in 200 countries being nominated. That list was eventually whittled down to 77 locations for the second round of voting, which resulted in 28 finalists which are now being considered.

Amongst the finalist are such iconic places as The Amazon Rainforest in South America, the Grand Canyon in the U.S., and Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. Those locations are well known and are likely to earn a spot on the list, although there are a few destinations that are just as spectacular, but are lesser known to the genearl public. Those places include Milford Sound in New Zealand, the Mud Volcanoes of Azerbaijan, and Jeju Island in Korea.

The organizers of the competition have made it easy to cast your votes for the New Seven Wonders of Nature, but just in case you need a little help, they’ve created a video showing you just how to make your selections. Voting will continue in 2011, with the officiall annoucement expected to come on November 11. (11/11/11)

If I were pressed to make my choices, my Seven Wonders would include The Amazon, The Great Barrier Reef, The Galapagos Islands, The Grand Canyon, Kilimanjaro, Angel Falls, and Jeju Island. What are yours picks?

TSA pees on Tom Sawyer

by Andrew Evans on

Start with three key ingredients: Detroit, a bag of urine, and the TSA.

Add an agressive pat-down at security and what do you get? A disgruntled man on a plane, soaked in his own warm pee and a national news headline!

On Nov. 7th, a male passenger flying from DTW to Orlando, Florida was selected for additional security screening. A bladder cancer survivor, the passenger carried an urostomy bag under his clothes–a plastic bag attached to his abdomen for collecting urine. Despite repeated requests to exercise caution in their search, the agents broke the seal on the bag, spilling the passenger’s urine all over him.

Adding insult to injury of the American psyche, the poor guy’s name was Tom Sawyer (not making this up), a Michigan special education teacher who is currently learning the true power of the internet. Obviously, this guy is pissed–he’s already taken the issue to the White House and the Department of Homeland Security.

An official response is still unknown, but the current threat advisory level is yellow.