4 reasons why you need a Travel Expert in your pocket

by Chris Owen on

This is the person you want to have on your side when planning travel. Not a Travel Agent, many of them are order takers who fill in the blanks on computer screens. Others try to be everything to everyone and that is just not possible.

Your Travel Expert specializes in one particular area of travel. It might be cruise vacations. They will know what cruise line will work best for you, keep on top of commodity-like cruise pricing and add a great deal of value to your vacation experience. It might be trips to Russia your Travel Expert specialized in. That person will know all there is to know, have been there a bunch of times (if not lived there) and probably speak a good amount of Russian. That’s the person I want helping me plan my vacation. Here are five reasons you need one of those people.

They know what to do in an emergency. You can bet that travelers on the ground in Egypt who have a Travel Expert on their side that knows the lay of the land are glad they do. Any travel agent with the right credentials can book a trip to Egypt. Someone who has visited there a lot or lived there will know specifically what you should do. You will be one of the people that made it out of the country while others lagged behind.

They will be honest with you. Any Travel Expert will tell you without hesitation if what you are looking for is not realistic. The last thing you want is a journey planned by a “yes” man who will say anything to get a sale. If you ever feel you are getting anywhere close to that situation you are not dealing with a Travel Expert. Look for your Travel Expert to speak at functions, teach classes, be involved with travel organizations and be easy to find publicly, like via Facebook, Twitter or a simple Google search.

They will insure a rich experience for you. That same knowledge that can give you an advantage if you had to evacuate a travel destination much more commonly works to enrich your travels. A Travel Expert knows people on the ground where you are going. Regardless of how you get there and what you want or need to see, its the people that will make the difference. A Travel Expert’s recommendation will get you in the door of places you might not ever see without his or her thumbs up.

They will encourage education. Everybody wants to talk about the fabulous places you will visit and things you will see. A Travel Expert will want to give you the knowledge over time that will allow you to appreciate what you will see and experience when you travel. In the olden days they would have given you a travel guide to read, maybe one printed by AAA, a leader in those sort of things. Today they will point you to sources like specific blogs, travel guide sites, and maybe send you a copy of the book they wrote.

You may end up paying one of these people for their expert advice. Be sure that advice comes gift-wrapped with that is called an Errors and Omissions insurance policy backing. That is insurance against loss if something goes horribly wrong directly due to advice you may have received from pretty much anyone in the travel business. Travel agents have it, so do Travel Experts who make a living selling their advice.

Photo: Wiki Commons

Soul Food: 4 New York places of worship to find an unforgettable meal

by Ori Epstein on

In a city that elevates certain chefs to god-like status and treats their restaurants as shrines for gastronomic worship, how about a more humbling dining experience in an actual house of worship? Several churches, places of worship and temples throughout New York are preparing and serving meals for anybody that drops by that are always delicious, unique, and either inexpensive or free.

The following are not places where you will be taking advantage of a charitable soup kitchen; nor are they places where you would expect to be preached at in exchange for the food. Rather, these are places that happily welcome anybody to share a meal in the spirit of creating community.

Sikh Cultural Society – Worldwide, every Sikh temple, or gurdwara, runs a communal dining hall providing free, vegetarian meals to all visitors, Sikh and non-Sikh alike. The Golden Temple in Amritsar, India demonstrates this most famously, and most spectacularly, marshalling an army of volunteers to serve upwards of 80,000 meals a day. The Sikh Cultural Society in Richmond Hill, Queens may operate on a far more modest scale, but is no different in its approach, providing conversation and tasty home-style Indian cooking with hospitality and camaraderie.
Norwegian Seamen’s Church – Once a month, this Manhattan church provides an all-you-can-eat smorgasbord of Nordic treats. With New York’s winters increasingly resembling an Arctic winter, tables overflowing with meatballs, potatoes, and smoked, pickled, and baked fish are especially welcoming. For all of New York’s culinary diversity, there is a definite dearth of Scandinavian restaurants, so why not try this cuisine with a group of friendly Norwegian expats?

Hindu Temple Society – On a quiet, residential street of aluminum-sided, Archie Bunkeresque homes in Flushing, Queens, incongruously sits one of the continent’s largest Hindu temples. In the main sanctuary dedicated to Lord Ganesh, worshippers cleanse and attend to the ornately carved deities. Meanwhile, in the temple’s unassuming basement, a crowded canteen serves some of the city’s most satisfying and inexpensive South Indian fare. Giant spicy dosas spilling over the paper plates, delicious deep-fried samosas, and deceptively flavorful lentil soups serve to remind even the most hardened carnivore that a meat free meal can be immensely enjoyable.

Hare Krishna Temple – Another basement, another filling vegetarian feast. Travelers have long known that Hare Krishna temples provide both budget-friendly and health-friendly meals. This sometimes vegan and always vegetarian downtown Brooklyn outpost features an impressive buffet and the neighborhood’s best lunch deal.

Free cruise contest roundup

by Chris Owen on

When it comes to travel values, cruise vacations rate high. Even with recent and predicted price increases as the economy improves, the semi all-inclusive nature of a cruise is pretty hard to beat. That’s good but free is better. Let’s take a look at what’s out there in the way of contests you can enter to win a fabulous cruise vacation.

Budget Travel is looking for the Worlds Best Cruiser and wants to send them on a free cruise. Have you taken more cruises than you can count? Do you live and breathe cruise vacations as a way of life? This one might be for you. Send your photos, videos and tips (the sort of thing a Worlds Best Cruiser would have) to starcruiser@budgettravel.com. The winner will be determined by an on line reader poll starting May 3, will win a free cruise and be featured on BudgetTravel.com and in the magazine’s December/January 2012 issue.

Carnival Cruise Lines is giving away a free cruise every month during their Didja Ever? promotion/way of life campaign that kicked off on New Years Eve when they dropped a ton of dream confetti on New York’s Times Square. As if a free cruise was not enough, they are also offering Facebook friends some other options like voting “I wanna do it” on Pick A Place On The Map And Go, Climb One Of The World’s Seven Summits or Go On Tour With A Band. The big question is “What have you always wanted to do?”Princess Cruises has The Travel Bucket List Contest that is looking for your most memorable travel experience. You can enter with a video or an essay with photos. Submit your story by February 7th for a chance to win a Princess Cruises dream vacation for you and one very lucky travel companion, including roundtrip airfare. Find out more when you visit and Like their Facebook page between now and February 7th (hurry up).

Holland America Line has a writing contest too. Sounds kind of stuffy but the end result is a free cruise so it makes the list. On their Transatlantic Writing Contest, they invite you to tell us about your own Holland America transatlantic crossing or that of a friend or relative who sailed an unforgettable Holland America transatlantic voyage. We are seeking compelling stories that are humorous, adventurous or heart-warming. The entrant whose story earns the most accolades from a panel of judges for its emotional impact, originality and creativity will win passage for two on a 9-day crossing from New York, NY to Rotterdam, The Netherlands, departing July 12, 2011, aboard the ms Rotterdam.

Flickr photo by pmarkham

Behind the scenes: Removing snow at O’Hare international airport

by Scott Carmichael on

Flying to or through an airport that gets hit with a lot of snow is a major hassle – if you managed to actually make it to the airport, you’ll probably end up spending a night in a hotel while your airline waits get its planes dug out of the snow.

But as much as we complain, an entire army of snow removal teams have to work behind the scenes to make the airport usable again – and we’ve collected some photos of those teams at work.

Chicago’s O’hare airport is used to snow – but a 20.6″ blizzard hit this week, canceling all flights and requiring the use of some pretty heavy equipment. A convoy of 20 trucks lines up to clear one runway, and needs up to 20 minutes to clear the entire stretch. Once the snow has been blown off the runway, it is collected in massive heated containers, and the water is dumped in the sewer system.

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A convoy of snow blowers and plows clears a runway with the Chicago skyline in the background.

Singapore Airlines Cargo 747 lands on a nice clean runway.

Not your average backyard snowblower!

[Photos by Scott Olson/Getty Images]

Wing Bowl 2011 eating competition and sex fest results in

by Chris Owen on

The Super Bowl may be this Sunday but first up was the 19th annual Wing Bowl 2011 in Philadelphia which just finished up and the results are in.

20,000 people packed the Wells Fargo Center in South Philadelphia tor radio station WIP’s Wing Bowl 19, a yearly tradition that includes a parade of floats rolling around the arena and a half-time cheesecake eating competition.

All in all, PJ Welihan’s from New Jersey cooked up 9,000 wings to last through two rounds of eating.

26 entrants began the competition but at the end of round on itcame down to only 2 men: 5-time returning champion “El Wingador” with 150 wings eaten; a 3 wing lead over 2-time defending champion “Super Squibb”. At the end of Round 2, the competition had tightened. El Wingador with a total of 237 wings eaten, Super Squibb with a total of 236 wings eaten. In the final round, Super Squibb pulled ahead to retain his crown for the third time, with a total of 255 wings to 254 wings.

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Photos courtesy cbslocal.com


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Called a “wing eating, drinking and sex fest” by myfoxphilly.com, the winner received more than $50,000 in prizes. Among the guest celebrities at the event was adult film legend Ron Jeremy. The event also draws scantily clad women and advertising for local adult entertainment clubs who host post-Wing Bowl entertainment events.

Like events like this but couldn’t make it to Wing Bowl? Maybe you can have one of your own with these tips from Food Network’s Non-Raunchy Kitchen Vixen Paula Deen: