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Travel news you can use
By Judy Newell
Travelers beware British Airways
British Airways has been a baggage nightmare for travelers since Christmas last year. Tens of thousands of bags have piled up at Heathrow at various times this summer. The world’s second-largest airline in international passenger traffic mishandled bags at a rate that is twice as bad as the worst US major airline, US Airways.
In all, British Airways has lost the bags of more than 550,000 customers in the first half of this year. A look into the root causes of British Airways baggage problems reveals much about the state of airline dysfunction today.
Just like airport delays, bumped passengers and other travel problems this year, the British Airways baggage system shows how airlines have made operations so lean and taxed infrastructure so fully that problems compound exponentially for customers.
Many of the problems likely won’t ease until British Airways moves into a new Heathrow terminal in March, or the British government relaxes its security restriction allowing only one carry-on bag, which has sharply increased the volume of checked baggage.
China visas now US$100 for Americans
China has doubled the price of a single-entry tourist visa to US$100 for Americans. Although you don’t need a visa to visit Hong Kong or Macau, you will need a double-entry visa for trips to those islands and a return to the mainland. There is no extra charge, however, for a double-entry visa.
Pay to board Ryanair
Let’s hope this is not something we will be seeing on all airlines. Ryanair passengers have to pay for the privilege of eating food on board, checking in bags and using a wheelchair, but now they will have to pay for just getting on board the plane. Effective September 20, their passengers will have to pay four pounds roundtrip (about US$8) to check in at an airport desk as part of their strategy to reduce costs. The cost is two pounds for a one-way flight. This charge is on top of the charge of 10 pounds (US$20) to check a single bag.
The airline says it added the charges to reduce long lines and lighten planeloads. Check-in will be free for passengers who travel with one piece of hand luggage only and register for their flight online. Some other charges the airline hits passengers with are a 70-pound charge to change a name, a one-pound charge for using the airline’s help line and four pounds to give a child priority boarding.
Cultural updates
The Houston Museum of Natural Science is displaying rare artifacts in Treasures from Shanghai: 5000 Years of Chinese Art and Culture. It is the first collection in more than 20 years to travel to the US from the renowned Shanghai Museum. The exhibit will be open September 14 through January 6.
English National Opera will open booking for the spring/summer 2008 season on Monday, November 5. This groundbreaking season includes four new productions—(M)ENO’s first-ever staging of Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor, Richard Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier, Lehar’s The Merry Widow and Bernstein’s Candide. These are complemented by revivals of Anthony Minghella’s Madame Butterfly and Jonathan Miller’s much loved production of The Mikado.
The ugly American? Mais non, said 1,500 European hotel managers when asked to rank tourists’ traits by nationality. American visitors, they said, are the most generous, most interested in local cuisine and most willing to adopt the local language. On the downside, they said, Americans are the worst dressed.
The managers, polled online by the German branch of Expedia.com, ranked Americans second as “overall best travelers,” next to the Japanese. The worst travelers, they said, are the French.
US tax dollars at work
New travel rules that swamped passport offices and frustrated US travelers this summer will cost the government an estimated US$944 million over three years, according to federal paperwork filed August 15. That amount is more than three times the State Department’s estimate for the first three years.
The department initially figured it would cost US$289 million between budget years 2006 and 2008 to handle the boost in demand for passports created by security measures passed by Congress. Now, the passport rules are expected to cost US$944 million in budget years 2008 to 2010.
The new cost estimate stunned members of Congress. “Incompetence and poor planning have not only inflicted high costs and personal angst on consumers, but are now likely to cost the State Department itself an astounding amount,” said Sen. Charles Schumer.
Sources: ARTA, TRO Travelgram, BHT, Modern Agent
Judy Newell, a writer and travel industry executive, heads the custom tour company Perfect Journeys that specializes in luxury and adventure travel. Contact her with comments or suggestions at JudyNewell_03@msn.com or go to her website
www.PerfectJourneys.net.
Paracho: Guitar capital of North America
By Laura Vavra
The Mexican village of Paracho (pop. 14,000) lies a six-hour journey from San Miguel. Nestled among volcanic peaks in the mountains of Michoacán, Paracho is Mexico’s center for making stringed musical instruments, especially guitars and guitar-like instruments such as the Mexican vihuela, the requinto, the guittaron and bajo sexto.
A sixteenth-century monk is supposed to have established the musical instrument manufacturing industry here among the pine forests of Michoacán. Now Paracho supplies most of the guitars available in Mexico. The village is reputed to have more guitar builders than there are in the entire US, which you can believe when you take a stroll through town.
The main street is lined with the shops of luthiers, and many more are to be found in the side streets. Many of the luthiers don’t even have signs on the doors; their talleres (workshops) are tucked away behind their houses, or in an upstairs bedroom.
For a guitar player, visiting Paracho is like being a pig in a strawberry patch. So many guitars, where to start?
Paracho holds an international guitar festival every year in August, and the town fills up with tourists. The four hotels in town are booked to capacity and the nearby town of Uruapan gets the overflow. But you don’t have to wait until August—(M)you can see guitarmakers at work in Paracho year-round. And there are always plenty of guitars to choose from.
Paracho is not only guitar country, it is bread country, and you see freshly baked bolillos (bread rolls) delivered by men on bicycles wearing special sombreros which are bread baskets. Also, the atole (a hot corn drink) served here is different from anything else we’ve tasted in Mexico. They call it atole de grana, and it contains corn kernels. It is green and tastes of anise, which comes from the leaves of a fruiting avocado tree. It is delicious and filling, especially on a cold winter night.
In Paracho you can see local Purepecha women selling nopales, vegetables, handmade gorditas, and needlepoint along the main street and in the market. In the Casa de la Cultura, a sprawling building around a central courtyard next to the main square, you can find dictionaries of the Purepecha language, as well as handicrafts and guitars. The region of the Purepecha extends from Patzcuaro to the west of Uruapan. According to the Lonely Planet guidebooks, the Purepecha are direct decendants of the Tarascans, who developed one of Mexico’s advanced pre-Hispanic civilizations.
Like many villages, change comes slowly here, but when it does, it has a big impact. As of March, Paracho is sporting a brand new mercado building next to the main square and the Casa de la Cultura. When I was there on a rainy day last month, I asked the women at our favorite juice stand if the locals like the new building. “Claro que si,” was their answer. “Of course!”
For being a village with an international reputation, there are surprisingly few tourist amenities. Very few people speak English, even among the guitar builders. There are few restaurants in town, and surprisingly, none with live music. For that you have to go to nearby Uruapan, an interesting little city.
For more information on Paracho, please email us at parachotrips@gmail.com.
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