Thousands of travelers in Europe still don’t know if they’ll be home for Christmas as airports struggle to deal with a huge backlog of flights. Unusually heavy snowfall in Northern Europe led to cancellations in several countries. London’s Heathrow airport was hardest hit. BBC reports that the UK Army offered to help, but Heathrow refused.
The world’s busiest airport is only running at 30 percent capacity until at least 6a.m. Thursday, and extension of 24 hours beyond the original announcement. Since Heathrow is a hub for so many airlines, this is affecting many other airports.
A friend of mine here in Madrid had two flights to the UK canceled before she finally got on a plane that took her home. She was one of the lucky ones. Five thousand people had to camp out at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris, most of whom were headed to London.
So if you’re flying to, from, or within Europe, make sure to check your flight before heading to the airport.
London is certainly the talk of the industry. With the 2012 Olympic Games approaching and the wedding of the century around the corner, London hotels will be one of the most sought after commodity.
News from Luxury Society is that a new luxury hotel near the Tower of London is being planned, certain to add some competition to the luxury hotel market for the big events. The hotel is said to be ready in time for the London 2012 Olympic Games, and managed by Franklyn Hotels & Resorts, which already operates luxury London hotels The Cadogan and Durley House.
The hotel, which currently is unnamed, will occupy a 1922 building that played host to the inaugural meeting of the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1946.
We want to know: Would you choose to stay at a hotel simply for its historical significance?
England is a land of countless half-forgotten legends and secret hidden places.
In Underground England: Travels Beneath our Cities and Countryside, Stephen Smith explores these places, worming his way through damp caves and exploring haunted tunnels under crumbling castles. While he starts with natural caves, of which England is blessed with more than its fair share, he soon veers off into man-made places, trying to puzzle out the history hidden beneath a mass of legend.
Smith discovers that the Green and Pleasant Land is in fact the Damp and Dark Honeycomb. Stately homes have secret rooms under the stairs to hide once-illegal Catholic priests. Cold War governments created massive bunkers to save themselves (but not us) from their folly. And there are follies of a different sort–fake grottoes created by the rich and bored, like that of the infamous Hell Fire Club, which Smith reveals as far more notorious than nefarious. Eccentric Englishmen indulging their whims.
A bit like Smith himself. He’s obsessed with anything subterranean, anything weird or hidden. Burrowing under England with him is like being cornered for hours at a country pub by an uncommonly interesting local wit. Even his language fits the bill–a mixture of double entendres, pop culture references, and bizarre words. Lots of bizarre words. Appurtenances? I knew that one. Demesne? No problem. But to deckle? Prelapsarian? Thank God for the Oxford English Dictionary! I respect a man who can teach me two obscure words in the first six pages without slowing down the prose. And he doesn’t let up for the next 284.
You won’t find much on London’s underworld, however. Its wartime shelters, abandoned Tube stations, and vanished rivers are covered in Smith’s earlier book Underground London. If it’s anywhere near as good as Underground England, I’m buying it. Smith offers us a true glory hole (in the mining sense of the word). A brave traveler could make a whole under-the-road trip out of the contents of this book.
If you were just let out of solitary confinement after having wandered the globe, where would you go? Now, let’s make it complicated: what if you were one of the most controversial figures on the planet?
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is now out on bail, and for now, he’s staying in the United Kingdom. But, there’s some doubt on how long he’ll be there, since the charges on which he’s being held may not be crimes there (though they are in Sweden, which is the country that wants him).
Well, he’s been granted bail, which means he’s out of solitary confinement but that his ability to travel is still constrained. If he winds up free of the charges against him in Sweden, Assange will probably want to hit the road for a bit and enjoy his newfound mobility … and Gadling is ready with some options.
Here are five travel alternatives for Julian Assange if he beats the rap (please forward this to Assange if you know him):
1. Washington, D.C.: given that he gets a lot of material from our nation’s capital, he could double it up as a work/pleasure trip. Nothing beats multitasking!
2. Reykjavik: Iceland has its own problems; I strongly suspect they don’t give a damn about any emotional or historical baggage that Assange will stuff into an IcelandAir overhead compartment.
3. Pyongyang: The U.S. State Department isn’t particularly active there, which means Assange will be able to vacation in relative peace. Even better, he could go to the Majong Bathing Resort and relax on the beach for a bit.
4. Back in time: since Assange’s lawyer claimed he was being “held in Orwellian conditions,” maybe he should revisit 1984 to see just how accurate the claim is.
5. Stockholm: nothing is as satisfying as delivering a big ol’ F*** YOU in person to the people who wanted to detain you.
Assange can’t really go anywhere until his next court appearance, which is on January 11, 2011. So, he’ll be in the London area for a while especially with curfews and a daily 6 PM check-in at the police station (I wonder if there’s a badge for that on FourSquare …).
Ah, Lady Gaga, what would we do without your telephone hats and nude suits?
Now the famous wax museum Madame Tussauds has unveiled Lady Gaga models at eight of their branches: London, New York, Las Vegas, Hollywood, Amsterdam, Berlin, Shanghai, and Hong Kong.
The figure at the London branch has the crazy suit shown here: a telephone hat designed by Philip Treacy and a midnight-blue Armani suit. Keeping up with Amsterdam’s debauched reputation, the museum there has a Lady gaga in a nude body suit, white jacket, and a rather phallic-looking purple hairdo. The other outfits are equally outrageous.
Hopefully her penchant for crazy clothes will continue, but not so much that she’ll have to be stripped by flight attendants like she was in March.