Tagged With "Prime Air"
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Re: Switzerland: First passengers for world's longest tunnel
That sure is a long tunnel, and from a country that likes to make them as much as the prairie dogs I see on the plains. I would think ventilation would be a problem in such a long tunnel. Would you know if the trains need their own oxygen system? Having driven through the Swiss tunnels by car before, which were about 15 km long as I recall, the air was extremely bad in them and made me regret not driving the scenic route over those windy roads across the mountains.
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Re: Dec 15, 2016: Kamloops, BC, Canada
Her husband is Canadian and went with his job. And she loves the fresh air and wide open spaces. She reckons its a good place to raise her 2 sons,
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Re: Just how much tax is in your ticket?
My recent, free Air France ticket - LA to Paris to Barcelona and then Venice to Paris to LA the tax was $577.97.
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Re: Just how much tax is in your ticket?
Originally Posted by Ron B.: My recent, free Air France ticket - LA to Paris to Barcelona and then Venice to Paris to LA the tax was $577.97. That's a lot of travel, Ron, but it certainly makes one relook at the definition of "free".
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Re: Canada gets its first non-stop to India
Thanks for the bit of advice, Garry. I usually use the USB port to keep my phone charged. Air Canada has a good flight movie menu and I tend to use that time to catch up on new releases.
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Re: Yes, Winter's coming: France gets first snow
Hurricane Joaquin crossed the Atlantic and got split in two by the jet stream. France got trapped in the middle of the two. Allowing cold air from Siberia to blow across northern Europe. So the Geese have arrived here on the wind too. 3 Weeks too early. Its what the remnants of Hurricanes do.
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Re: Gumbo's Pic of the Day, Oct 20, 2015: Sicilian Fiat
These cute little Fiats were only 633cc and air cooled. But the tiny little Fiat engines was banned from western Europe for their excessive emissions.
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Re: Why do Americans pay more to fly Norwegian?
This is really disappointing to me. I'm sad that Norwegian is doing this and that other airlines have done this practice for a long time. Mainly though I'm disappointed to see the above answer given to NRK by spokesman, Lasse Sandaker- Nielsen, who we interviewed on TravelGumbo. At that time of our interview, I found his answers refreshingly direct. https://www.travelgumbo.com/blog/norwegian-air-1
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Re: July 14, 2018: Amsterdam's Dapper Market
The sounds - smells and colours of an open air market. I like the one's that do a taste sampling. And the fur coat you get on your teeth after eating Rhubarb. Stewed and served with custard. Is it true that Rhubarb is the only food that pigs wont eat ?
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Re: Thousands of flights cancelled
Winter has yet to arrive in Western Europe. While the Jetstream continues to push warm air up from the Caribbean it will continue to be frost free.
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Re: "Mind Your Manners!" VisitBritain Warns Hoteliers
No, no one is hacking them...and the "advice" was picked up by all the major British papers...usually with an air of slight derision. You won't find it on the public website, which is devoted to getting us to visit; it was distributed as guidance to hotel operators, and as a press release. Originally Posted by TatToo: It is not the author's list. The cited articles and various others on the Internet state that the list was originally published on VisitBritain's website. However, I am not...
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Re: Whom did you say was flying this plane?
The Air France flight 447 that went down with all souls lost, out of Rio, Brazil in 2009 would have benefitted from a greater system override of the pilots misinterpretation of their flight 'status'. Anything that can reduce pilot error OR system error has to be desirable.
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Re: Space Shuttle Atlantis exhibit, Kennedy Space Center
Last launch I watched was from the East Coast of Florida - maybe near Cocoa Beach. The Sky was complete darkness, just a few stars and the moon. We were listening to the launch radio station from about T minus 15 minutes - as NASA described the last minute checks. A few seconds before launch time you could see the ground at Cape Canaveral illuminated like a bright white flare. The steam from the launch pad turned into a white cloud and on "Zero" the rocket was moving slowly into the air. For...
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Re: Budget Deal Asks Air Passengers to Pay More
This is a massive tax increase hidden as a "small fee". There are millions of people flying every day and paying already steep prices for tickets. I can't see this helping air travel or the economy in any way.
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Re: Budget Deal Asks Air Passengers to Pay More
Ok...I'll bite. I think we have got to realize that air fares are cheaper than ever before, and like it or not security is a much needed part of traveling today. Generally I favour user pay taxes where possible and the U.S. federal government is in no position to subsidize much of anything right now. As far as what to call it... the names that taxes are given bug me too...but I think the public is at least partly to blame for that as well...because if you called it a tax, then there surely...
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Re: The "Eiffel Tour" Only Starts with the Tour Eiffel
T&N, you make an interesting point about the air circulation and coolness of Eiffel's building. These days we are constantly reading about advances in "green design," intended to reduce excess energy use. Ironic how well some of those principles of making life bearable were known so long ago by those who didn't have the option of mechanical air-conditioning! Another example is in today's blog about Gaudi's Casa Battlo in Barcelona, which uses an open well through the center of the...
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Re: Canal St-Martin in Paris/Where Locals and Travelers Mix
The Canal St.-Martin area is also good for food. One of the best-regarded new bakeries, Des Idees et du Pain is on its edge, and there's a great twice-a-week open-air market between the point where it goes underground and Bastille.
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Re: Canal St-Martin in Paris/Where Locals and Travelers Mix
One thing that's very interesting about the open air markets there is after the markets close. The Roma gather up all that's left behind and divide it up amongst the community. Quite a sight, and I was really amazed at just how much is left
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Re: Finishing college. Need help planning trip to U.K,
Hi Hank, I've actually found the UK a pretty reasonable destination in recent years, especially outside of London.(My budget was way under yours for a month long trip to Europe last June.)A lot of museums are free. Transportation costs within the country can be reasonable too.Not only do they have advance cheap train tickets but they have bus and budget air choices.And of course there are some good budget hotel chains as well, such as Travelodge and the Tune Hotel Have fun and keep watching...
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Re: Island Air: Even Billionaires Get Airline Blues
Billionaires are made, not born. Mr. Ellison seems to be making a business move - pressure the FAA to make things difficult for Hawaiian air, upgrade the Island Air service, achieve sole "Ohana" certification for Island Air. Ohana certification is keenly sought for this market. Here is a description. http://www.examiner.com/articl...on-spiffed-up-planes
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Re: Island Air: Even Billionaires Get Airline Blues
Well, it's worth noting that Hawaiian has still not gotten Ohana off the ground, literally. They're citing FAA's cutbacks due to sequestration and then the shutdown as the reason. Island Air used to be a Hawaiian affiliate, flying Dash-8s and ATR-42s into small airports and feeding passengers into Hawaiian. Ohana was/is their plan to stay in that market with ATR42s. Island is unhappy with its ATRs (both the 42 and the larger 72), but doesn't seem to be able to solve any of its problems. I...
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Re: Frommer's New EasyGuides: A Future for Print
A much needed breath of fresh air. Thank you, Frommer's !
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Re: Sri Lanka: A Land Like No Other. (Part 5) The Elephants of Pinnawala
Thanks, PortMoresby! And we've not even been to the sacred tooth relic in Kandy, the medieval ruins of Polonnaruwa, the beautiful hill country filled with tea plantations and "The World's End", a wildlife safari at Yala National Park, nor any of the nice beaches (but keep reading -- reports on these are coming). Sri Lanka is a great destination, especially now that the civil war is over. I was doubly lucky to not only be able to visit a dear friend there but to have time to leisurely explore...
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Re: Visit Canada! Kiss a Canadian
I think there are three main problems Canadian tourism faces. 1) The weather. Very limited season, unless you want to ski. 2) Expensive airfares. In the last 5 years, air fares went from being competitive to being very expensive -- overly taxed, I guess. And predictably, when you charge more for something you get less of that activity. 3) Heightened border security between Canadian and US border can cause long delays and has greatly reduced cross border crossings in the past 15 years. It's...
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Re: Airbus Survey: 41% Willing to Pay for More Space
Good for Airbus! It seems the airline industry may have reached a tipping point where people will pay a little more for a little comfort. I hope that's the case and that they listen and provide options. I always look for a good airfare, but I also look at what kind of comfort that airfare buys me and am willing to pay a little more for a little more. 8-12 hours on a plane is not great fun, although I can divert my attention usually. But it's made infinitely more pleasant by a few extra...
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Re: In which US city do people dine out most?
People eat out a lot in xxx because the prices are reasonable, there is a great variety of types of restaurants - thanks to its status as a city of global commerce - and you can be sure of getting lots of free air conditioning .
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Re: Doctor List for Traveling
SueZee, wherever you travel in the world your hotel will find you a suitable doctor who will speak enough English for your needs - just like Dr.F says - and Italy will have plenty. Don't bother with lists as they will always be out of date by the time you might want to use them, plus it will no doubt not list a great doc that the hotel knows is just around the corner! At the worst the hotel will have an English speaking staff member sit with you to help translate. Conversely, I do think that...
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Re: Hi Everybody! I'm new here.
Originally Posted by Travel Luver: Hi Ted, I think we're all pretty new here. I'm from the Pacific Northwest. Welcome to the group. I get out to LA some. My business takes me to Ventura County (Amgen). Any good tips for a place to eat out that way? I saw the link to www.roadfood.com on a different thread, so I'll check that out, but wonder if there's some place you like to go. Hi Nature Lover, Amgen is T.O., just west of the San Fernando Valley and I really never go there. But about 20 miles...
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Re: Cheapest airfare to Portugal and Spain
Can't speak too much about SEA-TAC strategies, but I'm sure you'll have to change planes at least once! Try to avoid any that change at London, because of the British Air Passenger Duty on the way home, and the huge hassle of Heathrow. I did a little random searching for next July, using an open-jaw plan: Fly to Lisbon, train to Porto, fly to Barcelona, fly home, and found fares around $1600 on offer. Lisbon is not that competitive a city, so one strategy would be to keep an eye out for...
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Re: Jama Masjid, Delhi (Where Gumbo was #256)
Delhi has a lot to offer in terms of interesting sites. HOWEVER, the air pollution is appalling, particularly in the winter. We will be in Delhi in March - when things should start to get a little better - but we have cut our stay there to a mere 24 hours. We would have liked to re-visit some places like Humayun's Tomb or the Jama Mosque, but in the end decided that we could not face the atrocious smog again. We will now leave on the earliest convenient train south.
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Re: Airbus patents a new Monster Airplane
It will be interesting to see if this goes anywhere, and what airlines are telling Airbus about it! As mentioned in a post here earlier this month, Airbus has barely broken even on the A380 program, has sold less than 25% of what they thought they could, and has had no new orders for 2 years. While there's a big demand for air-freighters (it's what's keeping the 747 in production), I doubt there's a big market for a freighter that also carries 6-800 passengers, since there are few routes...
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Re: Air Miles vs Low Fare Airline
The carry-on limits are posted on the site. Still we were a little worried but there were no problems. We each took a carry-on and a personal bag on for free. A note that my same carry-on was too big for Air China so Norwegian had decent limits.
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Re: Air Miles vs Low Fare Airline
I was just reading a Chris Elliott piece on when people get so fed up with air travel they stop flying altogether. He interviewed a man who owned a travel company, Spencer Carlson and the positive airline example he gave was Norwegian. So it seems like my good experience is the norm with them. Here is this link: http://www.seattletimes.com/li...-to-take-it-anymore/
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Re: Two Canadian airlines expand their reach
The Westjet expansion is most welcome to Canadians. The planes will be opening Gatwick, which I don't think Air Canada flies to. Porter flies just small aircraft, but is very popular in the Toronto area.
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Re: Finnair adds weigh-in to check-in
Yet another step in the complete dehumanization of the flying experience. Every airline faces this challenge and deals with it successfully, yet only Finnair and Hawaiian Air need to weight people like they're freight. Shame on them. I had no plans to fly Finnair, all the more now when I read of their corporate mentality.
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Re: Delta, WestJet plan U.S.-Canada link-up
It would be an excellent merger for Delta, WestJet and consumers. I hope it goes through. The folks at Air Canada will fight it tooth and nail.
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Re: Germany's airlines taking up the slack
In a footnote to yesterday's story: Although air traffic in Germany is back to normal, air fares apparently are not. Germany's competition watchdog, the Federal Cartel Office, is investigating complaints that Lufthansa has illegally raised fares on some routes after the Air Berlin collapse. Lufthansa says that it wasn't really raising fares (which went up as much as 30%); it was just their yield management software responding to a spike in demand. In an interview, however, the head of the...
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Re: Gumbo's Pic of the Day, June 4th, 2014: Humming Birds
Our first encounter with hummingbirds was on a hillside near Cortona, in Tuscany, waiting for a table at a country restaurant. They were active in the flowers just behind us and we actually thought they were insects at first. One flew by so close to my ear that I could feel the air move without it actually touching me!
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Re: Where in the World is TravelGumbo (#69)
While I do see a certain resemblance to Cappadocia, it doesn't look real to me. More like a model landscape, as you'd have with a model railroad, but seemingly without the railroad. Maybe this is, in fact, what Cappadocia looks like from a hot air balloon, which I understand are popular there. I see no evidence of people in the form of actual people or vehicles, unless that's a person in red in the lower right-hand corner.
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Re: Is it time to regulate airplane seats? Chris Elliott thinks so!
The trouble with a mandate is that it has deadlines and airlines who fly to the US would have to go through an expensive seat replacement program. That cost is one we share, or that puts the airlines in the red and in jeopardy. Makes sense to pressure them to improve, but that's just my opinion. But I do like the idea of "grading" seats. Helps me know what I'm buying. For example, Canadian airlines definitely have larger seats that American carriers. I'll preferentially fly Air Canada to...
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Re: Canadian airline adopts unpopular US fee
Air Canada just announced that it too will have the $25 baggage fee. http://money.ca.msn.com/invest...for-economy-travel-1
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Re: "Cruise Night", Thunder Bay, Ontario: The 1940's and 1950's
And I'm partial to the 55 Bel Air. Probably the subdued black and white, not the peacockish "Jamaican Bay" color.
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Re: "Cruise Night", Thunder Bay, Ontario: The 1940's and 1950's
The stuff that dreams are made of ! The '57 Bel Air has to be the one above the crowd. Loved the MGs and memories of the time when you could fix your own Midget and Sprite without a College degree ! Happy Days !
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Re: "Cruise Night", Thunder Bay, Ontario: The 1960's (Part 2)
Hi Ottoman. Cristobal was wonderful ! It went up to Iceland and brought the UK warm Caribbean air - and back into summer.
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Re: Heads Up for Travelers: Iceland's Volcanoes May Disrupt Travel Again
I happened to travel to Europe in 2010 fairly soon after air traffic was started back up and there were a lot of hotel bargains to be had whole summer as many people canceled in advance. Then I traveled again in May of 2011 and another volcano disrupted some traffic for a few days and similar bargains were out there.
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Re: Gallery: City of Balconies
They seem to be at about the depth that's sometimes referred to as a "Juliet balcony," just deep enough to step out of a stuffy room into the fresh air and hope for a suitable suitor to serenade you from below...
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Re: A stroll through the Betty Ford Alpine Gardens, Vail
Thanks for the comments, Garry. Yes, winter arrives early because of the very high altitude. Over a mile and a half above sea level. Summers are very nice -- warm (75-80F) dry pleasant days (no humidity to speak off), and it always cools down nicely at night, so most places don't even have air conditioning. It really was that empty. No more than 6 folks in the garden including my wife and I, and of course not counting the hundreds of birds flying about.
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Re: Where in the World is TravelGumbo (#81)
Those ancient air conditioners definitely make it this side of the Atlantic.
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Re: Scotland's vote may help ax high flying tax
UK Air passenger duty for under 12's will be abolished from May 2015. Under 16's will have to wait until 2016.