International Travel News articles from February 1999

International Travel News archives from February 1999

Regional wine and culture highlight Asti film festival.
February 1, 1999... Last September I was offered an opportunity to visit Italy to attend the first Astifest, held in Asti and its surrounding cities. A week-long film festival designed to promote the wines and culture of this area of Piemonte, Astifest offered...

City and countryside visits reveal diverse dimensions of Mongolia's culture.
February 1, 1999... "Where did you go on your vacation this time?" When I replied, "Mongolia," most people found it hard to believe that anyone would actually choose to vacation there. Actually, Mongolia was the final destination on an August '98 trip to Asia...

A winter escape to islands full of pleasant surprises.(Canary Islands)
February 1, 1999... Last winter my wife, Fran, and I decided to visit the Canary Islands, an archipelago of seven inhabited islands off the coast of Africa. We discovered a world of wild diversity and pleasant surprises as well as plenty of sunshine and warm...

Tanzania: close encounters + ballooning + a posh bush breakfast = one special safari.
February 1, 1999... Our safari seemed doomed from the start. February was supposed to be the best month. The short rains of December and January settle the dust and bring new grass, but not so high as to hide the animals. But unseasonal rains El Nino, of...

Pilgrimage to Portmeirion: Wales' Italianate fantasy.
February 1, 1999... In the late 1960s a TV series was created that sparked a cult following. This was "The Prisoner" starring Patrick McGoohan, who conceived and wrote many of the 17 episodes. This story is about my fanatical desire, for years, to visit where the...

Hitting the road north of Buenos Aires to see Mesopotamia's crowning glory.(includes related article on hotels and restaurants in the Iguazu and Mesopotamian regions of Argentina)(Argentina)
February 1, 1999... Joy and I have seen Niagara, Victoria and the Rhine Falls plus many other spectacular waterfalls in Norway, New Zealand and elsewhere, but we were unprepared for the spectacle of Iguazu. This immense falls on the Iguazu River between Argentina...

Vaud's Crystal Panoramic.(All Aboard!)(Vaud, Switzerland's train)(Column)
February 1, 1999... Your Crystal Panoramic Express train brings you into Switzerland's eastern canton, Vaud, at Chateau d'Oex (say "Chateau Day"). You are halfway through your trip and halfway between the Bernese Oberland and the Lake of Geneva. The mountain...

Travelers' Tales Guides: Paris.(Review)
February 1, 1999... Collected and edited by James O'Reilly, Larry Habegger and Sean O'Reilly (1997, Travelers' Tales, Inc., 10 Napier Ln., San Francisco, CA 94133 - $17.95, 395 pgs.). The simple, yet wonderful, premise of this series of guides on countries,...

Time Out London Guide, 5th ed.(Review)
February 1, 1999... (1997, Penguin Books, 375 Hudson St, New York, NY 10014 - $14.95, 346 pgs.). Anyone familiar with Time Out Magazine will certainly recognize the famous logo on the front of this guidebook. I was skeptical when I read the guidebook,...

Trekking in Langtang, Halambu and Gosainkund.(Review)
February 1, 1999... By Jamie McGuinness, with additional material by Seth Thomas (1997, Trailblazer Publications, The Old Manse, Tower Road, Hindhead, Surrey, GU26 6SU, U.K. - $14.95 paperback, 256 pgs.). Tramping, hiking, trekking: these are words used in the...

Little Adventures in Tokyo.(Review)
February 1, 1999... By Rick Kennedy (1998, Stone Bridge Press, P.O. Box 8208, Berkeley, CA 94707 $12.95, 173 pgs.). I started to read this book and finished reading it several hours later. It kept my interest completely. The book is well written, like a fine...

Back to Finland.(Hidden Travel Bargains)(Column)
February 1, 1999... Upon completion of my visit to eastern Germany recently, I decided to make a return visit to one of my favorite cities in Finland on my way home. As always, I was not disappointed in my recent impressions of TURKU, which is located in the...

Medievaled in Europe.(Europe Through the Backdoor)(includes related article on hotel rates)(Rothenberg, Germany)(Column)
February 1, 1999... Rothenburg, Germany's best-preserved walled town, is the premier stop on a medieval trading route which survives today as the Romantic Road. Within the ramparts of Rothenburg's walls, red-tiled roofs point higgledy-piggledy and squat...

Kyoto, city of temples.(Focus On Archaeology)(Column)
February 1, 1999... To me, Kyoto epitomizes Japan. Not the Japan of the skyscrapers and Bullet trains but the Japan of contemplative gardens and ancient wooden houses, of willow trees bending low over canals and of women dressed in colorful kimonos shuffling along...