Category: Travel

Why It Might Pay to Delay Planning Holiday Travel

Loknath Das

Procrastinators who have yet to book holiday flights might still have a shot at getting reasonably priced tickets—especially if they’re willing to play chicken with the airlines. AAA analyzed three years of domestic flights to identify the best times to reserve seats for Thanksgiving and Christmas travel and found that dawdlers got the best prices. Those who waited until seven to 13 days before the week of Thanksgiving paid $482 on average. Those who waited until that close to the week of Christmas paid around $488. By those calculations, holiday…

Read More

12 Packing Hacks For Winter Travel, So Your Suitcase Isn’t Super Heavy

Loknath Das

Traveling light seems to come easier for some people more than others. Even if you think it’s impossible to, there are ways to pack light — even in the winter. Maybe you learned the hard way: On one trip, your overstuffed bag literally ripped at the seams and you vowed to never overpack again. (Just me?) Plus, you tended to wear the same few outfits anyway — and in most photos, you’re bundled up in your coat, hat, and scarf, so it turned out that it really didn’t matter how many…

Read More

Travel Texas Names MMGY NJF As New North American PR AOR

Loknath Das

AUSTIN — The state-run Texas tourism department has handed MMGY NJF its North American PR business, which was most recently handled by Edelman. As Travel Texas’ North American PR and social media agency of record, MMGY NJF will be responsible for developing earned media and social strategies targeting domestic tourists, who make up 90% of Texas visitors. Out-of-state visitors were responsible for 44% of the $80.3bn Texas travelers spent in 2018. The remit includes targeting national and regional media through proactive pitching efforts, media missions to target markets and marketing…

Read More

The 2019 Guide To Space Travel

Loknath Das

Earlier this week, Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic made waves when it became the first commercial human spaceflight company to trade on a stock exchange. With space tourism long considered a futuristic pipe dream, this move signals new confidence among investors in the industry’s long term viability. Shortly after the IPO, NASA made announcements regarding Boeing’s and SpaceX’s upcoming Commercial Crew capsule abort tests, which represent important technical milestones towards achieving commercial orbital spaceflight. All the while, the International Space Station (ISS) has continued with business as usual, with the first all-female space walk occurring just…

Read More

Travel annoyances abound in the air and on the ground. Here’s how to fix a few of them

Loknath Das

What do you hate about travel? And is there any way to fix the problem, besides staying home? For Brett Manders, the answer to “what drives you crazy?” is simple. “The carousel cozy-uppers,” he says. You know, the folks who crowd around the baggage carousel after a flight lands. “I’m 100% certain that your bags will not come out any quicker the closer you are to the baggage carousel,” says Manders, an international airline pilot who wrote the book “Behind the Flight Deck Door.” The solution – at least to this…

Read More

Travel shaming vs. travel reality

Loknath Das

I was 11 when I saw my first Corvette. It was love at first sight. Yes, it had an anemic in-line six-cylinder engine, a chassis and suspension that dated from 1939 and a perfectly awful two-speed automatic transmission. But it was the most beautiful U.S.-made automobile I had ever seen. The first Corvette I owned was a 10-year-old basket case that I painstakingly restored. I built a high-performance engine for it that was unusual because, when driven sensibly, it yielded 21 mpg. My third Corvette had quite a powerful engine…

Read More

Take A Guess What Holiday Travel Will Cost You This Year

Loknath Das

If you plan to fly to a destination during the holidays, consider that the average airfare cost for each household is expected to be about $800 for a Thanksgiving trip and more than $1,000 for a December holiday excursion. Those findings in a new CreditCards.com survey are, of course, just the beginning of the money you will spend on a holiday trip. The average expense for those planning to stay in hotels or short-term rentals is expected to be $673 for the December holidays and $536 for Thanksgiving. Millennials (ages 23-38) are…

Read More

8 Winter Travel Destinations for the Perfect Holiday Getaway

Loknath Das

Where should you go for the holidays? Even though a popular song says there’s no place like home for the holidays, a vacation isn’t exactly a bad way to spend your time off, either. With the holidays fast approaching, now is the time to nail down those travel plans, starting with where you’ll go. If you’re not sure of a destination yet, this list includes something for everyone, from tropical paradises to snow-capped mountains. Image source: Getty Images 1. Saint Lucia If you’d take a sunny day at the beach…

Read More

Qantas completes record 19-hour flight to test limits of air travel

Loknath Das

Qantas just broke a record for air travel, and it may have helped science in the process. The Australian airline has completed the first non-stop commercial flight from New York City to Sydney as part of a project researching the effects of very long flights — in this case, 19 hours and 16 minutes. The study measured pilots’ brain waves, melatonin and overall alertness, while passengers helped gauge the effectiveness of anti-jetlag measures like changes to cabin lighting and meals. Travelers even participated in exercises to keep their bodies limber. There are two…

Read More

Here Are This Week’s Weirdest Reasons to Travel

Loknath Das

Get ready for some good ol’ wholesome vacation suggestions, my sweet friends. Everybody’s got their reason for traveling, be it for the beautiful locales, incredible cultural experiences, rugged landscapes, et al. But what about those of us with extremely specific interests that reside outside of these (very nice) reasons? We have compiled a list of this week’s weirdest and extremely specific reasons to travel this fall, and approximately five kinds of people who will be very into them (er, one of them, at least). You Never Forgot Lisa Frank and You Never…

Read More