October 2007 Archives

Now that we have your attention, some eyebrow-lifting news that we feel merits a bit of, well, exposure: Travelodge recently released a new report on the rise in male hotel guests sleepwalking in their birthday suits.

The budget chain's annual "sleepwalker audit" revealed a seven-fold increase in the number of sleepwalking guests at 310 hotels in the UK. Men in the buff accounted for a whopping 95 percent of the sleepwalkers. One unfortunate gentleman guest even managed to get himself locked out of the hotel and later arrested. To deal with the growing predicament, Travelodge has asked its receptionists to keep an extra stock of towels behind the desk in order "to preserve a nude sleepwalker's dignity."

IT doesn't mean to poke fun at sleepwalking—a serious disorder by all accounts—but still, we can't help but giggle at the thought of an unsuspecting hotel receptionist being asked for a copy of the newspaper by some naked, clueless bloke mid-snooze.

Lately, it seems everyone has been thinking about what travel will be like in the future. The lovable blokes behind the book (and phenomenon) Freakonomics posed the question about how things would look ten years from now to a series of industry bigwigs on their New York Times blog, and got some interesting responses:

• Brookings fellow Clifford Winston proposed charging airlines fees for every flight that is delayed, and suggested a "satellite-based air traffic control system that, among other things, would give pilots the freedom to choose the most efficient routing."

• Gary Topping, CEO of Topping Travel, foresaw the end of First Class, a renewed focus on happy airline employees (phew!), and the fabulous suggestion that "baggage will be electronically tagged, never to be lost again."

• Josh Marks, founder of MAXjet, spoke of increasing specialization for airlines based on traveler's spending preferences (evoking a 'there's room in the market for both Wal-Mart and Saks' theory); and warned that GPS and "data communications between aircraft and controllers must replace the antiquated radar-and-radio infrastructure that we have now outgrown."

Meanwhile over at Forbes, which just put out their very cool Future package, reporter Elizabeth Eaves makes some interesting predictions. Here's a quick sample:

In our continuing coverage of all things mystic, spooky, and supernatural, we wanted to share a finding from our all-star researcher Marilyn Terrell. She uncovered a list of international libraries where spooks can be found in between the stacks.

Morelia Public Library, Michoacán, Mexico. Library staff say that a “nun in blue” has haunted the 16th-century premises for many years. Director Rigoberto Cornejo said in Monterrey’s El Norte newspaper, “When I leave the building, I feel the sensation of someone following me. In fact, I can even hear the footsteps.”

State Library of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia. This massive structure dates from 1856 and hosts many specters. The ghost of a female librarian named Grace keeps an eye on the children’s books in the Arts Collection, and a mustachioed gentleman protects the music stacks and piano. Poltergeist phenomena have been reported in the newspaper room. Glowing balls of light appear on the stairs. Security guards witness many of these antics after the library is closed.

Today's postcard from contributing editor Andrew Nelson leaves us longing for something shiny:

New Orleans' onetime U.S. Mint (400 Esplanade; 800 568 6968) has struck gold again, only this time it's a special exhibit devoted to the precious metal. "Gold," which opened this month, marks the Mint's grand reopening, having been closed since Hurricane Katrina peeled back the building's copper roof, allowing rain to damage the interior. Located in the French Quarter, the Mint was built under President Andrew Jackson. It operated until 1909, and later became part of Louisiana's State Museum. The exhibit documents the use of the metal and its place in the human psyche. Objects include jewelery from Cartier and Tiffany's and the gold cigar box of King Farouk of Egypt.

"The coolest artifact for me is the Eureka Bar," says director of exhibits Sam Rykels. "It's an 88-pound gold bar, but looks like an oversize brick. It's the last bar from the California gold rush. It was lost in a shipwreck and recovered recently."

Photo: The Louisiana State Museum

Returning to the Wanderlust in 1980 on a dhoni 'manned' by boys. 

We were very pleased to see that last week, the editors over at the New York Times added another great blog to their mix: Dot Earth, which will focus on sustainability and climate change and is written by science reporter Andrew C. Revkin. In his introductory slide show, Revkin describes how much of his reporting has been informed by his varied travels, so we decided to ask him to delve a bit deeper about the place where travel and sustainability collide.

Before you became a reporter, you sailed around the world. Can you tell us a bit about that experience and how it led you to do what you're doing now?

As a senior about to graduate Brown University with a biology bachelor's degree (I had visions of being a marine biologist, thanks to Jacques Cousteau), I won a fellowship allowing me to pursue a proposal to study "man's relationship to the sea" in some isolated villages on islands—Fetuna, Raiatea, and a couple of places in the Tuamotus, in French Polynesia.

After a few months, I headed to New Zealand for a big international science conference and while in Auckland saw a sign that said simply: "Crew Wanted, Yacht Wanderlust, headed to Mediterranean. Inquire Marsden Wharf." I'd grown up in Rhode Island sailing, but not bluewater cruising. Nevertheless, that was hard to pass up. I sent a letter back to the fellowship committee at my school and said I was going to study man's relationship to the sea in a more intimate way. . .

I was on the boat for 17 months, 15,000 miles, and about 15 countries as we sailed around Australia, through Indonesia, across the Indian Ocean, up the Red Sea, and around the Mediterranean. I saw the splendor of untouched reefs, the troubles created by poverty and pollution, we almost sank twice, and all of that prompted me to take a lot of photographs and return planning to be a writer, not a scientist.

Here at National Geographic Traveler, going to lunch at the cafeteria can mean sitting next to a filmmaker just back from the Serengeti who's more than willing to regale us with their travel tales. But, while we're always up for a good story, we can get a little bit jealous from time to time. That's why we were pleased to see that the NG website now features a new Wildlife Filmmaker program, which lets us act on our directorial ambitions. You can edit clips and add music, sound effects, and captions to make short documentary films. As a result, we may have spent a little too much time "working" on our films this morning...

Send us your own filmmaker efforts and we'll have our readers vote on which one ranks best!

Do you believe in ghosts? Whether you do or not, around this time of year we like to give ghosts the benefit of the doubt. Here are some tours that will leave the hair standing on your neck this Halloween.

Alexandria, Virginia: Check out Old Town Alexandria to catch a glimpse of the spirit of Robert E. Lee in his boyhood home, or the 19th-century bride who burned to death just days before her wedding at the House in the Country building on North Fairfax Street. The colonial city’s Ghost & Graveyard Tours take place all year, but they also give special Halloween tours “with a twist” on October 26, 27, 28, and 31.

Gettysburg, Pennsylvania: Watch out for the specters of Civil War soldiers at one of the nation’s most haunted battlefields. “Sleepy Hollow of Gettysburg” tours are operated by the sixth-generation granddaughter of the owner of the battle site of Pickett’s Charge. Or, get free use of electronic ghost finders on a tour through Gettysburg.

Personally, we prefer to get a little shut-eye when we stay at any hotel. But some hotels just beg to be haunted. If you're planning  to stay at any of these ghastly quarters, you won't even need your own ghost stories. To these ghosts, it doesn't matter if it's Halloween.

Construction of the Victorian-style Ocean Edge Resort began in 1907, when banker Samuel Nickerson decided to replace the site’s original home, which had burned down a year earlier. Nickerson completed the Cape Cod mansion—which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places-- in 1912 for his son Roland, who died before the new house was completed. But his wife, Addie, seems to have loved the place so much, she can still be seen roaming the halls today (she is said to be looking for her husband). About two hours away is the Hawthorne Hotel in Salem (also haunted - but then again, what house in Salem isn't?), which hosts an annual Halloween Costume Ball.

New Mexico: An old Sante Fe Trail outpost (which is linked to Jesse James and Billy the Kid), the St. James Hotel reportedly still sees visitors from the Wild West. One Trip Advisor traveler attests to hearing a scream at 3 a.m., and to seeing a ghost vortex through a camera lense. Even if you can't find any ghosts, every few months the hotel hosts "Murder Mystery Weekends," a two-night event where guests become Annie Oakley or Doc Holliday and try to solve their own murder mystery.

The Danbury family in the U.K. just can’t get out of the ‘70s. But we think that’s great, because they have taken regular VW campervans and turned them into something a bit more luxurious.

Take the Danbury “Rio.” It has a modern water-cooled engine, full-length kitchen unit furniture, 40-liter fridge, table, wardrobe, double bed, and optional roof bed. It’s a bit cozier than an RV, but it has just about all the luxuries. Prices for the Type 2 “Rio” start at $40,000.

If you don’t want to buy your own personalized “Rio,” you can rent one from other U.K. companies such as O’Connors Campers (from around $500), which has a fleet of 11 VW campervans. Or, rent one from Seven Degrees West (from around $500) which, with the help of Carbon Footprint, will offset the van’s carbon emissions by planting a tree for every trip taken in one of its vehicles. This means that anyone wanting to relive their hippie days can do so, all the while knowing they're having fun and staying green.

Thanks to GetOutdoors, for the post!

The project is a collaboration of Bonaire’s local energy company and EcoPower Bonaire BV. Construction of a new wind turbine is already underway and will be installed on Bonaire's southeast coast, an area with favorable climate conditions where a defunct turbine currently stands.

Last week, IT got a sneak peek at the country's newest National Monument, Lincoln's Cottage, which is in the midst of a $15 million restoration funded by the National Trust for Historic Preservation (NTHP). Just three miles north of the White House, it was the summer residence for Lincoln and his family, and, historians surmise, the place where he first penned the Emancipation Proclamation.

The site consists of two buildings: the 34-room Cottage, where Lincoln resided, and the Robert H. Smith Visitor Education Center, which will feature a signed copy of the Emancipation Proclamation at the opening of the museum. It is the first "green" renovation project that NTHP has undertaken, with a Silver LEED certification pending, and while it is still very much underway (we had to interrupt the workmen sanding the floors during our tour), the folks at the Trust promise that the restoration will be complete this February for its President's Day opening (naturally). It's sure to become a mecca for Lincoln admirers worldwide.

If you’re in New Orleans this weekend, I’m jealous. The Voodoo Music Experience has taken over City Park, and this year’s offerings will definitely please NOLA’s music gods.

The Voodoo concert centers around three themes. Big-name bands like Rage Against the Machine, Fall Out Boy, and Smashing Pumpkins pull in crowds at the stages dubbed “Le Ritual.” The area called "Le Flambeau" pays tribute to the R&B and jazz that nourished NOLA’s roots. Catch local singers and brass bands that hearken back to the sounds of generations past, and listen for new, up-and-coming artists that are keeping the Big Easy on the musical map. In the third area, "Le Carnival," you’re in for a wild time. This bohemian paradise is all about showcasing creativity, New Orleans-style. Expect over-the-top performance art that hints at the famed mayhem of Mardi Gras.

For a complete New Orleans experience, look for vendors offering delicious bayou cuisine and booths full of wares from local artists. The Voodoo Music Experience kicks off Friday, October 26, and spans three straight days of music and revelry before winding down Sunday night. Tickets range from $40 per day or $115 for a three-day pass.

Photo: Voodoo Music Experience

Using GPS (global positioning system) to find where you're going has become almost commonplace: more and more cars are rolling off the assembly line equipped with navigational devices and about half of cell phones now feature the system. But increasingly, GPS is not only being used to help you know where you're going, but where your friends are going as well. The International Herald Tribune just wrote a piece about GPS phone systems Loopt (which works on Sprint and Boost mobile phones) and Buddy Beacon (which works with Helio phones). Both use the technology to help you keep tabs on your friends, and raise new questions as well:

Such services point to a new truth of modern life: If GPS made it harder to get lost, new cell phone services are now making it harder to hide.

"There are massive changes going on in society, particularly among young people who feel comfortable sharing information in a digital society," said Kevin Bankston, a staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, based in San Francisco.

"We don't know what the implications are," he added. "We seem to be getting into a period where people are closely watching each other, and there are privacy risks we haven't begun to grapple with."

IT is intrigued by the idea that finding your friends could be so easy, and its certainly nice to know when an acquaintance has come to town. But we also rather like the idea of being completely off the map. Let us know what you think.

Image: Loopt

IT has gone crazy for apples this year. We visited six orchards outside the Washington Beltway and made apple butter, apple pie, apple crisp, and applesauce (yum!). Apple season is almost over, but many farms and orchards harvest other seasonal treats (like pumpkins, honey, and Christmas trees). This year’s bout of warm weather has extended the harvest season, but please call the orchards ahead of time to make sure their fruits and vegetables are still available.

Hartland Orchard: Granny Smith, Stayman, and Gala, oh my! These are just a few varieties of apples you will find at this Markham, Virginia, orchard. Visitors can get fresh honey, cider (made fresh on the farm), and pumpkins until the apple-picking season ends November 4. The orchard also has free hayrides, and will begin its cut-your-own Christmas tree season right after Thanksgiving (3064 Hartland Lane Markham, Va. +1 540 364 2316).

Baugher’s: For more than 100 years, this orchard has been delivering the freshest fruits and vegetables to Maryland. Tomatoes, pears, pumpkins, gourds, and Indian corn are available for sale in their market through November. Stop by their restaurant (located at 289 W. Main Street) or bakery for homemade apple butter, jams, fruit pies, and ice cream (1236 Baugher Road, Westminster, Md.; +1 410 848 5541).

Photo: Marc Paterson

Chris McCandless, the 24-year-old vagabond who hiked into the Alaskan wilderness alone with a ten-pound bag of rice in 1992, never made it out of the wild, but the abandoned bus where he died of starvation just might—that is, if some Alaskans have their way.

The Toronto Star has the scoop: Alaskans are now bracing themselves for an influx of “McCandless pilgrims" (such as Marc Paterson, pictured) inspired by the release of the Sean Penn-directed film, Into the Wild, to trek the Stampede Trail, seeking out the infamous city bus where McCandless perished. Local residents in Healy, Alaska, are brainstorming ways to deal with the “unwanted tourist attraction.”

Among the suggestions is airlifting the bus from its site, either to the start of the trail where it would be more accessible or nearby to a park in Fairbanks. The Star explains:

About 100 visitors, mostly young men, make the trip to Healy (population 1,000) each year. Many making it into the bus shoot videos for posting on YouTube and snap photos for Facebook, often imitating the iconic pose of the skeleton-like McCandless in Krakauer's book, which showed the young man grinning as he leaned against the bus, days before his death.

The McCandless pilgrims carve their names into the rusted sides of the bus. Paterson signed his just beside the door. And they leave messages in aged notebooks; [Jon] Krakauer, McCandless' mother and Penn have all left notes.

Perhaps we've got beer on the brain this week, but our ever-wandering contributing editor Andrew Nelson reports that one haven for stein-guzzlers in New Orleans may be in jeopardy:

Hurricane Katrina destroyed many historic structures in New Orleans, but the latest storm brewing in the city is over a new hospital that's threatening yet another classic landmark. For eight decades the Deutsches Haus (200 South Galvez St.; +1 504 522 8014) has been the site of many an Oktoberfest in its classic beer garden—a tradition in the Crescent City that's been going on at least as long as the Mardi Gras celebrations. "The beer gardens were big in New Orleans when German immigrants first arrived here in the 1830s," says Alecia Long, a historian with Louisiana State University (LSU). "The Deutsches Haus is the last survivor of a very nice, family-oriented custom."

The Haus, which has been at its current site in the Mid-City neighborhood since 1928 and underwent a painstaking restoration after Katrina, is now being threatened by demolition by a new LSU and Veterans Administration medical complex. The 475 members of the Haus are working to ensure the city's German culture is protected; they aren't opposed to the complex, but hope a compromise can be found before another piece of authentic New Orleans vanishes in the winds of change. Visitors should hurry. The last weekend of the Oktoberfest is this Friday and Saturday night (October 26-27th).

Check out here for more on New Orleans culinary comeback from Katrina, and here for more great places to see when you're in town.

Photos: Courtesy of the Deutsches Haus

IT was recently browsing National Geographic Traveler's free cities index, with hundreds of listings on how to spend your down time without spending a dime. What we were surprised to discover, is that many cities—and the more expensive ones at that—offer free tours by local guides.

Want to see Pacific Heights' mansions? The Coit Tower murals? How about "bawdy and naughty" sites? San Francisco's City Guides offers a wealth of themed tours—more than 70—that encompass the city's rich cultural history.

Chicago's Greeter Program features local experts on more than 25 neighborhoods as well as themed tours including antiques, literature, the Chicago Fire, farmers markets, Ukranian American heritage— there's something for everyone.

If you've just got to know why Benjamin Franklin electrocuted a turkey, try Washington DC By Foot. Guides in blue T-shirts offer quirky monument tours rain or shine, six days a week.

New York's Big Apple Greeters welcome visitors in 22 languages and observe a strict "no tipping" policy. While they don't give formal tours, they'll show you the ropes on the subway and give you inside tips on where to eat and their favorite sites around the neighborhood. And every Friday at 12:30 p.m., urban historian Justin Ferate gives an acclaimed, 90-minute walking tour of Grand Central Station, for the grand price of: zero dollars.

Now that's what IT calls a bargain!

Become your own hero on your next Fijian vacation. Or become an artist. Or become both! (You don't even have to drink any kava to do it.)

Turtle Island, located in the Yasawa Group in Fiji (known for being the film location for Blue Lagoon), has a Turtle Release program, in which it buys green and hawksbill turtles from local fishermen. The turtles are auctioned off to Turtle Island resort guests, who then get to paint their names on the turtles’ shell. The turtles are then released back into the ocean. The paint is permanent, but non-toxic, which means that it won’t hurt the turtles. But it will make them useless to trophy hunters, who want turtles for their shells.

Thanks to Kim Lisagor and Heather Hansen, who blogged about Turtle Island on EndangeredPlaces. Both eco-savvy women were part of our 522-member team of sustainable tourism experts that we consulted for our upcoming "Places Rated: Islands" story in the November/December 2007 issue. Also be sure to check out Kim and Heather's upcoming book, Disappearing Destinations (2008), which highlights 37 of the world's most endangered places.

As a recently transplanted Iowan, I couldn’t help but get a bit homesick when I noticed my favorite greasy spoon was featured in the Washington Post’s “At the Diners” series, a part of their Campaign Trail blog.

The Waveland Café, in Des Moines, Iowa, is a diner so unpretentiously authentic it can almost dare to make a lifelong Iowan feel out of place. As a playground for political and media types leading up to the influential Iowa Caucuses, the café serves coffee and hash browns with a side of local politics.

With aptly-chosen words, Des Moines local dining critic D.V. Wagman sums up Waveland:

Endearingly tacky, wholeheartedly unhealthy, and often overly crowded, it is nevertheless one of the most delightful places in Des Moines. Personified, it would be a bizarre genetic mixture of mouthy Roseanne Barr combined with cartoonist R. Crumb's Keep On Truckin' guy.

The city of London was met with an unusual sight a few weeks ago when a 25-foot statue of Anubis, the Egyptian god of the dead, made a trip down the Thames on the back of a cargo ship. The fiberglass statue’s journey ended in Trafalgar Square, where it rested for three days before being transferred to different locations throughout the city.

Anubis’s appearance is a precursor to the November 15th opening of the Tutankhamun and The Golden Age Of The Pharaohs exhibition, which will be housed in London’s O2 bubble (formerly the Millenium Dome). Sponsored by the National Geographic Society, the exhibition will showcase over 130 artifacts found in the tomb of Egyptian King Tutankhamun, allowing visitors to marvel at treasures such as the golden diadem worn by the king, or the gold coffinettes that once cradled his internal organs. Over 300,000 tickets have already been sold or reserved for the exhibition, which just completed a three-year tour around the U.S.

Anubis—believed by the Ancient Egyptians to have escorted the dead to the underworld—was “protecting the Tutankhamun exhibition as it [left] America . . . for the U.K.," Visit London spokesman Ken Kelling told the Associated Press.

Photo: Pomphorhynchus via Flickr

Travel isn't just about taking in museums and historic sites, it's as much about mixing it up with the locals in their natural habitat. So what does that often entail? Nightlife. But it's hard to be thinking "green" when you're a few drinks in (which might explain the popularity of phrases like "trashed" or "wasted," no?). Thankfully, there is a nightclub that's already thought things through. Writer Matt Bloom reports from San Francisco that the new club Temple is working not only to sustain the party, but the planet:

A trip to San Francisco calls for two things: eating and drinking. Throw some hot sounds and a dance floor in the mix, and you've got the Zen Compound, where for the last two months, hungry ravers have been gathering for late-night eats and beats. It's a tough title to claim in a town that outlawed plastic bags, but the SoMa compound, comprised of Prana Restaurant and Temple nightclub, might be the most progressive testing ground for renewable energy in the city. For starters, the facility holds no-waste events: They don't use plastic (except water bottles), the cups are made of corn, every food scrap (and napkin) is composted, and every bottle is recycled. The Pan-Asian cuisine at Prana is almost exclusively local and organic. And the light displays, powered by energy-efficient LED and CFL bulbs, are projected to save the club thousands of dollars in resources each year.

And now a word from Traveler's production manager and resident beer connoisseur, David Burneston, who's just back from the 16th annual Great Eastern Invitational Microbrewery Festival, hosted by Stoudts Brewing Company in Adamstown, Pennsylvania:

"Every year Stoudts invites a dozen or so other microbreweries to come together and show off their craft beers to a bunch of beer geeks. This has become an annual event for me, my brother-in-law John, his two brothers Jeff and Jerry, and our longtime friend Al. We’ve been going to the festival for ten years now, sampling some of the best beers I’ve ever tasted. And now a second generation has joined us: John’s son Paul, whom we quickly introduced to the art of tasting—not just drinking. We do drink our share though.

With taste glass in hand and a list of breweries ranging from Dogfish Head Craft Brewery of Milton, Delaware, to Magic Hat Brewing Co. of S. Burlington, Vermont, we ambled through the hall trying the stouts, lagers, bocks, IPAs (India Pale Ales), and pilsners, with names like Belgian Freeze, Loose Cannon, Circus Boy, Mai-Bock, and HopDevil. The brews tasted even better paired with the dinner served at the fest—'The Best of the Wurst'—which featured authentic German sausages, cabbage, sauerkraut, potato salad, and homemade beer bread."

We were intrigued by the idea of beer bread, so we made a call to Stoudts to learn a bit more. Ed Stoudt’s daughter, Carey Matson, was happy to share her knowledge:

Our intrepid contributing editor Andrew Nelson is just back from a trip to Turkey, and he sends us this report from the 360 Istanbul Restaurant, a nightclub with its own worldview.

With jaw-dropping vistas of two continents, the Golden Horn and enormous, illuminated mosques, the club/restaurant 360 Istanbul (Istiklal Caddesi Misir Apt. No. 311 K. 8; 0212 251-1042-43) makes a good place to end your day in Turkeys' largest, most cosmopolitan city.

This homemade sign on one of the ubiquitous tuk-tuks in Thailand says it all: Farang (foreigners) are a precious commodity in traffic-choked Bangkok and throughout the land of smiles. Tuk-tuk drivers depend on tourism for their livelihoods—sightseers willing to shell out a relative fortune for the ride of a lifetime. But with more than 11 million visitors each year, can the country afford to have people breeze in and out, leaving a thick trail of exhaust in their wake?

The government has been making an effort to curb pollution and increase awareness about global warming with events like Bangkok Car Free Day. But seeing this sign got me thinking about the trade-offs of travel. How can we live up to the responsibility that this sentiment places on our shoulders?

Please send us your reactions, similar travel dilemmas, or thought-provoking photos about the tenuous relationship visitors often have with their destinations.

Introducing "Tour Guide": IT's picks for great ways to get away. Check back in every Tuesday for new posts!

We here at Traveler love to go off the beaten track to obtain a true sense of place, but we also know that traveling can take its toll on the environment. So of course we're thrilled to find that more and more tour companies are offsetting their carbon footprints, donating to conservations efforts, and overall, becoming more eco-conscious. From Madagascar to Mexico, here are some eco-adventures that make us travel happy.

The Mesoamerican Ecotourism Alliance (MEA), which offers trekking tours into Mexico’s 300,000-acre El Triunfo Biosphere Reserve, recently joined with Trees, Water & People (TWP) to offset all of its itineraries. MEA calculates the carbon footprint for each itinerary and then makes a corresponding financial contribution to TWP, who then re-invests the money into reforestation projects, solar heaters, or fuel-efficient stoves.

CC Africa provides refuge to nearly 90 black rhinos near five of its lodges. The conservation group has raised over 5.5 million dollars in the past 15 years to fund animal conservation projects, as well as to community development projects (they have built more than 120 schools and trained 250 teachers and 4,500 students in environmental awareness) in six African countries.

Here's a new gadget that will get your wheels spinning: Cy.fi, the world’s first wireless bike speakers.

There are two parts to the device: the transmitter and the speakers. The cy.fi transmitter attaches to an iPod. The iPod stays in the cyclist’s pocket and transmits a signal to the speakers, which are attached to the handlebars. Unlike headphones, the cy.fi won't obscure important traffic noises, and cyclists will never have to reach into their pockets to skip songs (the controls are all on the speaker dock). Granted, it also means that your guilty-pleasure music can be heard by everyone (come on, we know you’ve got “Ice, Ice, Baby” on there).

These speakers came into being after Global Icons CEO Jeff Lotman--both a biking and music enthusiast--wanted to provide a solution to the dangers of biking with headphones. According to the company, the cy.fi’s Kleer audio transmission means the speakers’ transmission is “100% lossless” and claims to be ten times more energy efficient than Bluetooth.

Why we think it’s cool: If you are cycling with several people who also have cy.fi, one iPod can transmit signals to all of them (up to four). If you're on a scenic bike tour of Umbria, everyone in your party would be able to listen to a walking tour podcast of Rome or Venice to prepare for the next day's adventure. So, instead of annoying passersby with Nsync’s “Bye, Bye, Bye” ('cause we know you've got that, too), put the speakers to good use. Or at least play good music. The cy.fi will cost $149.95 and will be available in 2008.

The tour outfitter explora has crafted a series of remote yet luxurious lodges in Chile's inspired places that get IT feeling dreamy: you can sleep among the Atacama oases or alongside a placid lake in Patagonia. This December, they'll add another to their roster when they open a property on Easter Island.

The newest lodge will be the Posada de Mike Rapu (named for the company’s co-owner), and is the first LEED-certified hotel in South America. (This of course is a tad ironic, seeing as how Easter Island is located 2,360 miles from the continent, but it's a start.) The lodge’s eco-friendly design and architectural attributes include passive energy designs, thermal retention for energy storage, low-flow water fixtures, renewable building materials, and a commitment to being a low-waste resort.

Ahh, the sweet luxury of traipsing around Paris on holiday. Hobbling along lovely cobblestone roads, gaping at Gothic cathedrals, taking romantic strolls along the Seine … and indulging in famously divine Parisian cuisine is reason enough to go, n’est-ce pas?

Perhaps — unless, of course, you’re a vegetarian, considered by many the lowliest target of French disdain. Sure, crepes, quiche, and good ol’ baguettes and cheese are ubiquitous. Even so, some meals demand a palate a bit more refined, which is where a vegetarian’s trouble lies.

But amid Paris’s go-meaty-or-go-home mantra, a few veggie-friendly havens are serving tasty (and yes, leafy) meals in charmingly authentic Parisian kitchens.

Last month, officials in Cyrene, Libya, unveiled a surprise PR blitz riddled with buzzwords like “sustainable” and “eco-tourism,” declaring the dawn of a new age for the formerly reclusive Mediterranean nation—one that’s apparently swathed in green.

The $3 billion project, dubbed the Green Mountain Sustainable Development Area, is an effort to “show the world that Libya has turned a corner—that they can fit into the modern world,” Cambridge University Professor George Joffe told the International Herald Tribune. The carbon-netural development zone would become the world’s first eco-region, and the ambitious plans include a national park, eco-friendly hotels, bio-fueled public transportation, organic farms, and the restoration of ancient ruins—currently in danger of dilapidation—on the list of UNESCO World Heritage sites.

It used to be that eating organic was the ticket to healthy living. But chemical-free doesn't necessarily connote freshness and quality, and there is an increasing demand to both purchase and consume produce that are not only organic but has also been carefully tended to. As Jen L. Karetnick points out in an article she wrote for Wine News last year:

"Chefs are no longer content to merely have exclusive sources for organic vegetables. They now want to be involved in growing, raising or grooming all of their ingredients, ensuring that every item is picked, caught or slaughtered during the right season, in the best possible provenance and under the most favorable or humane conditions."

Take D.C.-based chef Robert Weland—executive chef of the Hotel Monaco'™s Poste Moderne Brasserie—whose concern for food is evident in all facets of his chef duties. The produce he uses comes from the garden he grows on the patio outside the restaurant, the meat he buys is responsibly raised, and the fish and shellfish he purchases have been ethically caught by a retired marine biologist. Weland has even composed a comprehensive training manual for his staff that sheds light on everything from old wives'€™ cooking tales to the history of botanicals. 

A beach-and-theme-park vacation is much too tame for resident family travel expert Norie Quintos. This year, for part of her summer vacation with her two sons, she headed out to Wyoming:

What parent hasn’t read the Dangerous Book for Boys? Okay, I haven’t, but I’ve read all about it. Here’s the gist: What our overprotected, over-teched, overscheduled suburban sons really need to blossom is the freedom to climb trees and get muddy and learn Morse code. Well, I’ve believed and lived it all along, and the kids and I recently returned from a vacation that hits the spirit if not the actual suggestions on the book’s list.

We squished our toes in the mud of a creek.
We fed leftovers to a black lab named Twister.
We threw tomahawks.
We played cards.
We heard cowboy poetry.
We canoed in a lake with loons.
We fell asleep to the howls of a coyote.
We threw lassos.
We read by the light of a lantern.
We searched for signs of bear.
We whittled.
We absorbed U.S. history by listening to a cowboy tell tales of Butch Cassidy, Wyatt Earp, and the Donner Party around a campfire at night.
We traveled by covered wagon.

Ever wanted to give back to the places you visit? Global Vision International, a U.K.-based volunteer group, organizes volunteer projects and expeditions that allow travel do-gooders to do just that.

Volunteers can work with velvet monkeys or needy children, research endangered species in Ecuador, or scuba dive in the Seychelles. With over 150 projects to choose from, even the pickiest of travelers will find at least one adventure that suits their needs.

GVI prides itself in its economic, social, and environmental responsibility. It uses local resources whenever possible, a percentage of participants’ fees go directly to the expedition or project, and GVI has even set up a Charitable Trust to fund future projects. Trips last anywhere from a few days (such as learning essential wilderness survival tips in the U.K.) to a year (such as training as a safari guide in South Africa).

While GVI isn’t exactly a traditional “tour operator,” this organization still gets a big plus in our books for giving travelers the opportunity to (literally) get hands-on experience with local cultures.

Photo: GVI, http://www.gvi.co.uk/

Here at IT we like to talk about food, about places that are up and coming, long established, or are just hitting their stride. But what about restaurants that get knocked off their feet suddenly -- what does it take for them to rebuild and what is the impact on the community? We're thinking about New Orleans. Jazz and Mardi Gras aside, it's Nola's unique cuisine that always tickled our tastebuds. Is the city's legendary culinary culture making a comeback?

Thankfully, our questions were answered when we heard about a traveling exhibit by the Southern Food and Beverage Museum. Originally commissioned for the 2006 James Beard Awards in New York, "Restaurant Restorative" documents the experiences of restaurant owners and as they try to rebuild and reopen after Katrina.

By last spring, only 40 percent of New Orleans' 3,414 restaurants were back in the kitchen, according to the museum. For more recent updates, New Orleans radio personality Tom Fitzmorris lovingly keeps tabs on local restaurants on his website. But it's clear from looking at the exhibit online, (as a PDF), that it's not just about po'boys, soul food, and turtle soup. (Or the gumbo -- did we mention the gumbo?!) These restaurants are places of community and sources of comfort. It's Southern history-by-recipe, passed down from generation to generation.

It’s that time of year again - when thousands of high school seniors around the country are frantically trying to decide which university they’d like to attend as they start the long, daunting college application process.

And now, thanks to the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education, we’d like to recommend a few college campuses that recently caught our attention. For students looking for a greener education, AASHE just awarded Campus Sustainability Leadership Awards to six North America campuses.

IT loves green hotels. IT loves animals. So what could be better than putting animals to use to help sustain eco-lodges? Not a whole lot. EndangeredPlaces.com recently reported on one Costa Rican eco-lodge that is doing just that.

Lapa Rios Ecolodge is nestled on a 1,000-acre private nature reserve in Costa Rica’s last remaining lowland tropical rain forest. Its owners, John and Karen Lewis, are going above and beyond the forest canopy to make sure that their eco-lodgings are sustainable: They've installed solar panels; only hire local workers (currently they employ more than 50 people); and help fund the Carbonera School, which provides educational facilities in a very rural area that previously had little sense of community. Their lodge serves as a protective barrier to the flora- and fauna-rich Corcovado National Park (it raises money to fund park rangers to patrol the park), they only use biodegradable products for guests and employees, and renewable materials were used (about 70%) to build the bungalows. But perhaps most intriguingly, they have an extensive waste management system that employs its pigs to make renewable energy.

The Costco theory of tourism—Bigger is Better!—often flies in the face of sustainable travel. And unfortunately, it's a trend that's becoming almost as prodigious as the projects it promotes.

In a recent article in The Guardian, Leo Hickman reports on growing evidence supporting the bigger-faster-better model of tourism (see: Las Vegas, Cancun, Benidorm):

"Not since the 1970s have we seen such epic tourism projects. The spark for much of this about-turn is the success of Dubai, the holiday jewel of the Middle East, that has risen rapidly out of the deserts of the eastern Arabian peninsula and, in just over a decade, become one of the world's highest-profile tourist destinations, luring six million visitors a year."

Dubai certainly epitomizes the trend: with its intention to build the latest version of the world’s tallest building, its indoor ski runs, and its plan to build a theme park twice the size of Disneyworld. But it isn’t the only place looking to cash in on this new rash of unnatural, gargantuan tourism projects—there are plans in the works for a monstrous steel and glass pyramid on top of the Alps’ Klein Matterhorn and an artificial sandy beach in Andermatt, Switzerland. Even Iran is stepping up to the plate with its $2.4 billion “Flower of the East” development, set to open on Kish in 2010 with a “seven-star” hotel.

This Saturday, San Francisco is turning itself off. On the 20th, Lights Out San Francisco is asking residents to shut off all non-essential lighting from 8 to 9 p.m. in a citywide effort to save energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

LOSF estimates that turning off essential lighting for one hour will save about 15 percent of the energy regularly used on a Saturday night in San Francisco. The nonprofit has been giving away compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFL) in the weeks leading up to the self-imposed blackout. PG&E and Yahoo! have already donated 210,000 CFLs for the event. But no one expects people to just sit in the dark, so the group is encouraging participants to have fun while the lights are out—by holding a block party, telling ghost stories to the kids, or sharing a romantic candlelit dinner.

LOSF founder Nathan Tyler was inspired by the recent Earth Hour event in Sydney, Australia, where Sydneysiders were asked to turn off their lights for one hour on March 31 of this year. More than two million residents participated, resulting in a 10.2 percent energy drop that day.

Even if you don’t live in San Francisco, you can still go green by going dark. LOSF plans to launch a national Lights Out event on March 29, 2008, in cities across the U.S., so stay tuned in to get turned off.

With Halloween around the bend, we’ve got candy on the brain. And while the National Confectioners Association has released its list of the top ten candy destinations in the country (Hershey, Pennsylvania, predictably tops the list), we opted instead to get in touch with Steve Almond, author of Candyfreak: A Journey Through the Chocolate Underbelly of America. Almond (yes, that’s really his name) has traveled the country in search of old fashioned, mom-and-pop candy factories. His book is a gooey paean to a time when you could waltz into the drugstore and buy, for mere pennies, delicacies like the Twin Bing, Idaho Spud, Valomilk and Abba-Zaba. We recently caught up with Almond, on tour for his latest book, to ask him a burning question: What’s the farthest you’ve ever traveled for a candybar?

“I traveled all around America trying to find lots of different freaky candy bars. But the farthest I ever traveled was, I think, to Israel. When I was there in college, I became obsessed with this amazing dark-chocolate covered wafer bar, which I used to buy by the pound in the open market in Jerusalem. Seriously, I'd go through, like, two pounds of these things a week. The guy who sold them got to know me, which always feels kind of pathetic and wonderful at the same time. Anyway, I spent the next few years angling to get back to Israel—not in an effort to reconnect with my spiritual heritage, or even to understand the painful politics of that country—but because I was jonesing for that bar (the name of which I don't even know). I did get myself back to Jerusalem a couple of years later, but the stand that sold these bars were gone. Serves me just about right."

We did some investigating and found the dark bar pictured above—a Pesek Zman Black bar—posted in the Israel section at a cool candy blog. Alas, it isn't the fabled candy, says Almond: "The bar I'm thinking of didn't even have a wrapper—it was sold by the pound."

Photo: Cybele May, www.typetive.com/candyblog

Today marks the launch of National Geographic Traveler's newest Web column, "The Genuine Article," written by Laura Morelli, an art historian with a passion for the world's artisanal traditions. Her first piece offers tips on purchasing the delicate saris, skirts, and other fabric items mentioned in our October story, "My Big Fat Indian Wedding." In it, she writes:

Indian textiles count among the richest craft legacies on Earth, encompassing literally thousands of local styles and techniques. Textiles from Rajasthan represent an entire tradition with many sub-specialties, from wood-block prints to tie-dyed cottons and a litany of embroidery techniques long enough to fill a glossary of their own. Through the centuries these rich regional fabrics have constituted a valuable part of women's wedding trousseaus and dowries, identified social status and class, and—through elaborate color symbolism—even conveyed details about the wearer like her hometown and if she is the mother of a boy.

Check out the full column here, and visit our Authentic Shopping Guide for more recommendations on where to find native artisanal crafts. Look forward to Laura's columns on the site each month.

Photo: Palani Mohan/Getty Images

Where there’s a will, there’s a way.

The Bookinist chair, created by German designer Nils Holger Moormann, has a lamp, bookshelves, a secret compartment that holds your favorite pens and paper, and naturally, a wheel, to ensure the reader always has the best seat in the house.

No word yet on whether the chair is actually comfortable, but we’d gladly take our favorite travel books for a spin on this mobile literary explorer.

Photo: Nils Holger Moormann, www.moormann.de/en/

Tokyo’s Narita International Airport is finding unique ways for passengers to kill time between flights: How about trying on some Japanese body armor or a handmade kimono? Attendants will dress you and take your picture, all for free. All we can say is: Where's the runway?

Jetlagged IT staffer Emily Haile dons a kimono and warrior hat on a layover between Bangkok and D.C.

Perhaps it's a good thing that some folks in England are pursuing greener flights, as the Guardian reported last week that Britons are the world's biggest emitters of CO2 from air travel. (Researchers blame both their island home and their propensity for low-cost carriers as two major causes.)

Fortunately there are a few Brits who are creative enough to forego air travel completely in their efforts to get off their isle (and no, we don't just mean the Chunnel). Let us first introduce Ed Gillespie, author of the "Slow Travel" blog and columnist for the Guardian. This past March, he and his girlfriend set off on an around-the-world journey that employs "every mode of transport available"—except planes. His point: "reveling in the slow movement through landscape, culture, people, and language rather than just passing over it all in an aluminium sausage!"

So far, Ed has made his way to Australia and is driving a camper van through the Outback, where he's apparently met up with some suicidal kangaroos and had to shower with a python in his bathroom. We wish him luck.

Photo: Fox Searchlight Pictures

In Wes Anderson's new film The Darjeeling Limited, three brothers travel through India by train, seeking to find enlightenment and reconnect as a family, all while they wrangle with cobras, overindulge on cold medicine and carry an inordinate amount of monogrammed luggage (or baggage, if you will). While primarily a comedy, the film is also part travelogue, and Anderson's painstaking cinematography captures amazing shots of the Osian Dunes, a Sikh temple and marketplace in Jodhpur, and the Udaipur airport.

Getting such fantastic glimpses of India got us thinking about different ways to see the country by train.

It's Monday morning and just about time for that coffee run. But why deal with the lines at the local shop? Thankfully our friends at Gridskipper, who are pros at mapping out a city's hidden gems (such as San Francisco's cupcake invasion, and late night eats in D.C.) recently posted their guide to REAL Manhattan espresso. These coffee shops are a welcome change from the cookie-cutter Starbucks on every corner of the city—perfect for one of those mornings when you're craving a little more atmosphere and an exquisite barista-tailored brew.

So next time you're in the Big Apple, stop for an authentic cup of joe. Here are a few of Gridskipper's picks:

Aroma: 145 Greene St., New York, N.Y.
Israeli chain Aroma came to New York just last year and has already made an impact with its strong espresso drinks and Middle Eastern pastries and snacks. The modern European decor and the well-executed bevs made the place an immediate Soho/Village hit.

Cafe Grumpy: 193 Meserole Ave., Brooklyn, N.Y.
Greenpoint's Cafe Grumpy is one of Brooklyn's many quality-obsessed coffee shops. With Ninth Street Espresso and Gimme Coffee, the shop is considered a pioneer in the artisan coffee movement, and they are devoted to excellent espresso and roasts. Beyond the coffee, the shop wins extra points for its laid-back environment and cutesy illustrations on the bags and cups. 

Atlanta-based students Shane Zucker and Steven Peterman—arty adventurers after our own camera-toting hearts—are calling all photographers (amateurs, pros, and everyone in between) to join their interactive adventure-themed photo contest. Zucker and Peterman want people nationwide to sign up to document their explorations—having “a good time doing something that you wouldn’t normally do”—between now and November 1.

The guys are sending disposable cameras to anyone who wants to participate, and cameras are due back by December 1. The art show, "A Million Little Pictures, Vol. 3," is set to happen sometime in December in the city that drums up the most photo entries.

Here at IT, we've always got a case of the travel bug, but as we can't always be on the road, we're forced to live vicariously through the travels of others. That's why one adventurous Aussie recently caught our eye when he completed a 6,200-mile (10,000-kilometer) trek on horseback from Mongolia to Hungary, in the footsteps (er, horse tracks) of Genghis Khan.

Twenty-eight-year-old Tim Cope, from Gippsland, Victoria, (southeast of Melbourne), is an adventurer, writer, and filmmaker (not to mention 2006 Australian Geographic Adventurer of the Year and Arctic wilderness guide). He's also fluent in Russian and knows his way around Eurasia (having bicycled through Russia and Mongolia in 1999-2000, and rowed a wooden boat through Siberia in 2001). But just because he has explored the far reaches of the world before, doesn’t mean this three-year (2004-2007) trek was easy.

Calling all architecture enthusiasts: Your Frank Lloyd Wright dreams have come true. The 1957 Usonian-style Duncan House in Pennsylvania is now taking reservations, making it the sixth Wright home in the U.S. available for overnight stays.

Unlike Wright’s nearby Fallingwater, which only offers tours, guests at the Duncan House in Polymath Park Resort (which is also home to the Wright-inspired Blum House and Balter House) can fully experience life in a Wright home, from relaxing on the couch to eating in the sunny breakfast nook. In 2002, the 2,200-square-foot, three-bedroom Duncan House was moved from its original location in Lisle, Illinois, to Acme, Pennsylvania, and put in storage until 2006. The Cherokee red-and-beige-striped house was then reassembled, but remains true to Wright’s original construction. Duncan House sits on 125 wooded acres with hiking trails and a reflecting pond.

Today kicks off the third Solar Decathlon in D.C., where students from 20 universities swing into town and transform the National Mall into a solar village. Sponsored by the Department of Energy, the competition involves ten events which must "power all the home energy needs of a typical family using only the power of the sun." From their rulebook:

The homes must be attractive and easy to live in. They must maintain a comfortable temperature, provide attractive and adequate lighting, power household appliances for cooking and cleaning, power home electronics, and provide hot water. These houses must also power an electric vehicle to meet household transportation needs.

The homes will be on display on the National Mall from October 12 - 20. Tours of the team houses are available every day, except Wednesday, October 17, when they will close in order to measure their temperature  (see the full schedule here). Visit our friends over at Inhabitat for more photos of last year's event.

Photo: Stefano Paltera / Solar Decathlon

Since IT is always on the lookout for unique places to stay, we were pleased to stumble upon TripAdvisor's list of the top ten world’s quirkiest hotels. From canine quarters to deep cave dwellings, here are a few of our favorites.

Fur ‘n’ Feathers Rainforest Tree Houses, near Cairns, Australia
This wacky, four-star establishment is made up of five tree houses and has received the highest rating by Australia’s Eco Certification Program. In spite of its location on a 100-acre private wildlife sanctuary in the Cairns Highlands, the getaway prides itself on having “no mosquitoes, flies, or crocodiles." More likely sightings are the tree kangaroos, endangered cassowaries, and wallabies that hang out around the tree houses; and the hosts offer a complimentary platypus watching tour. Fur ‘n’ Feathers starts at $159 for two nights off-season double occupancy.

This past September, the U.K.’s Commission for Integrated Transport released a report detailing transportation trends and their effects on climate change. Included in this report are a series of transportation goals, one being to reduce CO2 emissions by 60 percent by 2050. While switching to eco-friendly vehicles is one way of reducing transportation-related carbon emissions, the report also sheds light on the importance of practicing ecodriving.

What is ecodriving?

According to ECODRIVEN, the official campaign to increase energy-efficient driving in Europe, ecodriving “is a way of driving that reduces fuel consumption, greenhouse gas emissions and accident rates." It establishes basic driving etiquette such as winding up windows to reduce drag, regularly checking tire pressure, and maintaining a steady speed. One of the main goals of this campaign is to train at least 2.5 million drivers to drive in a more energy-efficient manner, and the EU hopes that by 2010, 50 million tons of CO2 emissions will be avoided.

The fundamental element in sustainable travel is making sure that the places you visit will still be there when you return. Because skiing isn’t fun when you’re sweating through your parka. And there’s less room on the beach when the shorelines are shrinking. The Toronto Star considers these and other scary scenarios in an interesting piece on how climate change can potentially influence how we’ll travel in the future. A scary recap:

• It’ll change our flying habits: Frequent and increasingly intense storms will keep planes grounded, and rising summer weather temperatures will make it harder for them to take off.

We recently came across these bags, perfect for map-loving, eco-conscious editors like us. The collaborative effort of a cartographer and fashion stylist, the bags feature cities like San Francisco, London, our own stomping grounds in D.C., and many more. Each tote maps out the city's neighborhoods, city icons, and landmarks and are large enough to hold a bag of groceries or library books. Plus, they cost around 15 bucks. Check out Maptote's listing of stores carrying the bags all over the country.

And before visiting any of these cities, be sure to visit Traveler's Authentic Shopping Guide for suggestions on things to fill up your tote!

All IT needed to hear to inspire an outing to Brooklyn’s Habana Outpost can be summed up with these incredible words: bicycle-powered blender.

So on a recent long weekend in Brooklyn, this IT staffer hightailed to the Latin café, touted as New York’s first solar-powered restaurant and home of the world’s first sunlit chandelier. A green oasis amid the urban grit, the lively eco-eatery more than lived up to expectations.

The scene at Habana Outpost is like the best block party you’ve ever attended, but a whole lot greener and without your dorky neighbor attempting the electric slide. From noon to 6 p.m., servers and customers take turns peddling the power behind slushy smoothies and cocktails. Chef Oscar Teco serves up tasty grilled corn (rubbed with mayo, cotija cheese, chile powder, and served with a lime wedge) and inexpensive Cuban nosh from inside a bright red truck outdoors. Best of all, a rowdy blend of locals mingles in the colorful outdoor garden, a courtyard lined with recycled-plastic picnic benches and below huge solar panels.

The third and newest of New York’s family of Habana restaurants, Habana Outpost functions as a community-gathering place, perfect for catching a glimpse of authentic Brooklyn. Highlights: Attend free screenings of movies like E.T. on Sunday nights; scour for flea market bargains and locally designed creations at the free weekend market; and come back often to check out the rotating art exhibitions on display inside.

Since the Outpost is open seasonally, be sure to visit before it closes Oct. 31!

As globe-trotters are becoming more aware of the carbon footprint that flying produces, airlines are now vying to create "greener” flight systems to offset the tons of CO2 released into the atmosphere during each flight.

The BBC reported that Air New Zealand has just announced plans to test a 747 that will use biofuel in one of its four engines. Virgin Atlantic countered that it too has designs in the works for an eco-friendly plane, and is hoping to beat Air New Zealand to the tarmac, (though they have released fewer details about what exactly their plans entail). Both hope to have their engines revved up for 2008.

While the Kiwis and Brits duke it out, the folks over at Singapore Airlines are counting down the days until the first commercial flight of the new Airbus A380, the largest passenger aircraft ever built (with room for 555 people), which will fly between Singapore and Sydney at the end of October.

Excuse us for a moment while we celebrate. On Monday, the Society of American Travel Writers announced the annual Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism winners. Among magazines, National Geographic Traveler won five awards, including the Gold for Best Travel Magazine. The other winners were:

Magazine Article on Foreign Travel
Bronze: Christine K. Eckstrom, “The Last Real Africa,” National Geographic Traveler

Article on Marine Travel
Gold: Sisse Brimberg, Cotton Coulson, Thomas B. Allen, Keith Bellows, “Eye-Level Cruises,” National Geographic Traveler

Environmental Tourism Article
Bronze: Jonathan B. Tourtellot, “Places Rated: How Do 94 World Heritage Destinations Stack Up?” National Geographic Traveler

Cultural Tourism Article
Silver: David Lambkin and Tom Dunkel, “Trading Places,” National Geographic Traveler

Congratulations to all of our winners! And of course to you, all of our readers!

The Beijing 2008 Olympic Games are less than a year away, and while China has been making significant efforts to clean up its notoriously smoggy city, some don’t think the ancient metropolis will be clean enough by the time the torch is relayed in. And some of its organizers are worried about whether certain events will be held at all.

According to the New York Times, the World Health Organization reported that water- and air-related pollutants in China kill about 750,000 people per year. In a recent air-pollution test, Beijing limited the city’s number of drivers for four days, and officials claimed the vehicle limit reduced pollution by 15-20 percent. If this is the case, Beijing will take similar initiatives during the games, but many countries don’t think this is enough. The Australian government recently decided that its athletes will not arrive in Beijing until just before the games begin, in order to limit their exposure to pollutants, the Times reported.

Calling all food enthusiasts: Wake up and smell the oregano. The Culinary Institute of America has recently designed five food-centric getaways that won’t leave you hungry.

The CIA “Sophisticated Palate,” a selection of epicurean adventures that offer lectures on cooking techniques, traditions, food and wine pairing, and of course, wine tasting, encourages its guests to “see, taste, and explore.” On each of the two- or four-day programs ($1,995 for two days; $3,995 for four days; accommodation not included) CIA guests will meet exclusively with local vintners, food producers, chefs, premier growers, and restaurateurs in the Napa Valley region.

After being devastated by its countrywide genocide in 1994 (documented in the subsequent film ten years later), Rwanda has since made a significant comeback. It has pushed aside its war-torn stereotypes (as best it can) and created a tourism industry that is steadily growing, thanks to the country’s first democratically elected president, Paul Kagame, and Rosette Chantal Rugamba, the director general of the Rwanda Office of Tourism and National Parks (ORTPN).

The New York Times reported that Rugamba has several plans to keep Rwanda afloat. One of the main initiatives reserves a portion of tourism-generated proceeds for local villagers. This allows them “tangible incentives to stop poaching wildlife, cutting trees and drawing water from the national parks,” according to the Times. Her plan is to allocate five percent of all tourism revenue to a variety of community projects, including the cultivation of bamboo, construction of water tanks, and a multitude of beekeeping and handicraft programs to encourage villagers to sell their handmade items to tourists.

We've all heard it before: George Washington had wooden teeth, and he once dined with Abraham Lincoln. Womanizer Ben Franklin fathered dozens of illegitimate children. The Liberty Bell cracked when it first rang out on July 4, 1776.

Unfortunately, none of the above facts are true. But these made-up tidbits are often told by private tour guides in Philadelphia and other historic cities in the U.S. Some Philly folks have finally had enough.

Last spring, Philadelphia Councilwoman Blondell Reynolds Brown introduced a bill that would require tour operators who offer paid, private tours on public property in Philadelphia to be tested and licensed. Private tour guides would have to take an annual test to renew their license; those caught giving tours without a license would face a $300 penalty. Not all guides would need a license, Jeff Guaracino at the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation told the Christian Science Monitor. Those working in top historic sites - Valley Forge National Historical Park, the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, etc. - are National Park Service employees, and have already received special training. While only a small fraction of visitors take private tours, Guaracino says, "Our goal is that every single story you hear in Philadelphia is authentic."

First Portland, then Madison, and now Paris? The City of Light has recently adopted a free bike system called Velibs, the name combining velo, meaning "bicycle" and liberte, for "freedom." After just 40 days more than 2 million journeys were made.

According to "Free Wheeling: Paris's New Bike System," in The Washington Post, the French have "have taken to their new mode of public transport like canards to water."

Paris is surprisingly cycle-friendly, and bicycling is statistically the second-least-dangerous way to get around the city (after riding a bus). Most large roads have bike lanes, and since the introduction of the Velibs, many cyclists have noted that drivers have become more conscious of their presence.

Here's how it works: Velibs can be picked up and dropped off at any of a thousand stations around the capital. Users insert credit cards into a machine to sign up for a day (one euro, or about $1.40), a week (five euros) or a year (29 euros). A fee of $205 is taken from your account if the bike is not returned. (Caveat: At this point, only smart-chip Visa cards and American Express cards are accepted.)

In August, IT wrote about Sustainable Travel International, an organization that helps hotels and hotel guests offset their carbon emissions through the recently launched “Travel Green” program.

This month, we bring you another carbon-offsetting agency: the Carbon Capital Fund. The fund, a joint effort by the National Forest Foundation and the U.S. Forest Service, aims to offset carbon emissions by reforesting areas destroyed by wildfires and other natural disasters.

As the East Coast temperatures begin to drop, IT staffers want nothing more than to sip hot tea by a roaring fire and bundle up with warm wool sweaters and scarves. Our yearning for yarn sparked an interest in one knitting blogger who recently traveled to Peru to learn more about the country’s ancient textile traditions.

Lauren “Lolly” Weinhold (pictured) author of Lolly Knitting Around, blogs about her recent Peruvian adventure in “A Way of Life.” She writes,

"Before traveling to Peru, I did not completely understand how the fiber arts could play such a large role in a culture—not as a hobby—but more as a livelihood and a deep-rooted tradition. I knew about the Peruvian weaving techniques, the knits and the crochet, and a little about the spinning. Reading about these things in glossy travel magazines is one thing; yet seeing the fiber arts in action is definitely another thing all together."

IT loves New York, but knows that there's a lot more to see of the city beyond the boundaries of Times Square. Negotiating the streets and subways can be tough, especially in the outer boroughs, where there aren't as many recognizable landmarks to help with navigation. That's when the knowledge of a neighborhood tour guide can be invaluable. IT editor Janelle Nanos recently wandered through Queens with Jack Eichenbaum, an urban geographer and tour guide, as he planned out an upcoming tour of Astoria. Dr. Eichenbaum, a professor at Hunter College, has been giving tours of Queens for 27 years, and his unique knowledge of geography influences the way he gives his tours.

In a piece in the New York Times, Janelle described his style:

There are no double-decker buses on Dr. Eichenbaum’s tours, no visits to Times Square. “This isn’t about tourists,” he said.

After more than a decade of primping, the Museum of French Monuments recently reopened on Paris’s Left Bank as La Cité de l’Architecture et du Patrimoine (the City of Architecture and Heritage), the BBC reports. Housed in the east wing of the Chaillot Palace with a jaw-dropping view of the Eiffel Tower, the architectural showcase spans 800 years of French building design in a majorly revamped space.

We’ve all done it - crashed on a friend's couch after a memorable night of chatting, laughing, and drinking cheap wine. Now some travelers have taken this universal custom a step further and founded the CouchSurfing Project—a worldwide network of people offering free accommodations (in the form of comfy couches) to travelers looking to cut costs and make new friends.

Here’s how it works: Set up a profile on CouchSurfing.com. Once you have travel plans, you can search for couches in the cities you're planning to visit. You'll then receive a list of hosts in the areas you've specified whom you can go ahead and contact. The hosts will get back to you if they have a couch available on the dates you need. And after you decide which couch suits you best—voila!—you’ve got a free place to stay and a new friend who most likely knows the city better than any hotel concierge.

This idea was formed a few years ago by New Hampshire native Casey Fenton, who e-mailed 1,500 students from the University of Iceland asking them if he could crash on their couches. The responses he received were overwhelming. After spending an amazing weekend exploring Reykjavik with his Icelandic rhythm-and-blues-singing host, Fenton decided he would never stay in a hotel again.

IT’s love affair with trees is no secret, so it’s only natural that we swooned a bit when we discovered Mexican artist Francisco Verástegui’s tree map. As the 2007 winner of Planeta.com’s Colibri Ecotourism Award, Verástegui’s Árboles Históricos y Notables is the first city map to navigate historic and notable trees in leafy Oaxaca City.

The honor was especially cheery news for Oaxaca, which endured a five-month-long siege by political protestors in 2006 that frankly left it feeling more riotous jungle than tree-hugger’s paradise. The area’s tourism industry was nearly uprooted: Indigenous artisans in nearby craft villages suffered huge losses, and the three-star hotel on the main square, the Marques del Valle, was forced to close during the crisis.

But these days, Oaxaca seems to be on the upswing due to a growing ecotourism sector. An annual ecotourism fair, sponsored by Planeta.com, promotes projects that include ecotourism, adventure tourism, and rural tourism. According to Treehugger, Oaxaca is home to 19 collectives, 30 private companies, seven sustainable agriculture farms, and five eco-coffee farms.

National Geographic Traveler contributing editor Andrew Nelson, yet again, sends IT a dispatch from a destination we never even knew he was visiting. He writes:

Santa Barbara's famous for its Spanish mission. Today there's a Santa Barbaran with a mission of his own—wheeling travelers around the chic California colonial outpost on the two-wheeled electric, zero-emission scooters known as Segways. Jerry Mahoney and Trish Caron, owners of Segway of Santa Barbara, mainly sell the whiz-kid marvels, but they also have a profitable sideline offering tours to travelers. He operates from the company's headquarters, an old warehouse in a neighborhood called the Funk Zone—a collection of industrial-style buildings housing sculptors, skateboard makers, and surfing outfitters squeezed between Hwy 101 and the Pacific Ocean.