But, for sure, we didn’t experience the cavalry, the humiliation and the despair that did travelers from Franz Kafka airport.
Don’t expect they take care of you, to pass the control without any problem, to find your gate, neither to fly… Don’t put a feet in this airport!!!

This warning is not in vain, as this airport is number 1 in the ranking of the worst airports in the world, according to The Onion News Network.

Take a look at this video; travelers and staff speak for themselves!

But no worries, if you need to get Paha ( which is a wonderful city) for business or personal reasons, there are other “real” airports and less Kafkaesque.

Even with the crisis, we wish to escape, once, twice, event three times a year from our routine.

But what’s the price of it? Nowadays, there are low cost, flights cheaper than others. We are able to go all over Europe, and sometimes more, for really low-priced.

But, once we’ve got the flights we need to find accommodation, and most of the time, this fee is not low cost anymore. Here, the home exchange for holiday steps in.

The concept is simple. For instance, you go on holiday to US to M. X. While you are there, M.X is in your house, in UK.

Lending your own home is a kind of “special”, I agree. For sure, right now, you are thinking about “Ho my God! What about if someone steals something!!!” or “What about if they do strange things in my bed”. That’s true!
But after a bit of cleanup and changing sheets, it’s fine again. Moreover, I think there is no hotel that changes mattress and bed after each client.

Above all, think about all the saving you can make, by going anywhere in the world. Funds planed for the housing will be used to enjoy, even more, your holiday.

If you are still skeptical, take a look on the websites:
-> Home exchange
-> Switch home
-> Home link

There are offers and feedbacks.

“Thanks for your help to locate an exchange for us. We did find one for Germany and spent the most relaxing holiday we ever had, in the Harz Mountains, for 3 weeks. The other couple met us there and took us for dinner with their mother who would help us out during our stay. We had a great exchange! Both couples did and it all worked perfectly!
We met and made new friends.
Home exchanging is the BEST way to go and we’ll do it again as often as possible. Even people we corresponded with and couldn’t make it work out right, have become friends through email, and it is so interesting to hear from all over the world!”
Dianne and Ed Clowes: Canada”

@ Drewski2112

According to Michael O’leary, CEO of the Irish company, everyone will be able to go the bathroom since no one travels without any coins in their wallet. Did it happen to you already to have only your credit card with you and no coins in the wallet? Did they think about people having some problem?

All of that is supposed to be for the reason of the crisis. Ryanair, like all other airlines, has suffered of the increase of fuel where as they had planned to bring more clients with prices even more attractive.

What will be the next measure they will find in order to save some pounds and to make us thinking their flights tickets are cheap. The only possibility would be charging us according the amount of air breathed in their planes!

We could say that safety in airports is more and more demanding. We are all aware technology moves forward quickly and safety cannot stay in the background. All of that brings us to a drawback situation caused by people or organizations looking for harm.
But city dwellers end to pay for this safety and the process of boarding became a difficult and humiliating experience.

The 11th of September 2001 dredged up a psychotic truth about airports. This highlighted safety weaknesses of a country that runs the biggest amount of movements in its airports.

The scanner that strips

Within other extends, such as forbidding liquids and aerosols, intensification demands to enter in the country, the body scanner enables to see directly under clothes, exposing people to X-rays.
While we travel a lot, it is restrictive and worrying. There is not only privacy violation, as they need to see people stripped, but it can be noxious for our health as well.
Moreover, waiting lines will be even longer as one person at a time can be seen, and as the entire process lasts some minutes.

Even if some other countries, such as Germany, refused it radically, Schiphol’s airport (Holland), and some airports in U.S, have already adopted this new system.

By publik16

Other law projects in airports

On the other side, G8’s countries and E.U, could establish a new aerial anti-piracy law that would permit to seize electronic equipments (laptops, MP3…) for copyright reasons.
In summary, they undermine travelers instead of searching solutions more efficient, but at a higher cost.
Is it possible to reach a point where they will have the right to confiscate our MP3 if they find a downloaded song while we are passing the control? Another privacy violation!

What is the safety limit?

It is quite difficult for a mother, traveling with a baby, taking only 100ml of liquid, or that someone using a spray gives it to the security guard. Nowadays, chemical explosives with less than 100ml of liquid can cause huge damages, but our technology doesn’t able us to analyze instantaneously what passengers are caring; the only solution is, then, to seize.
Even if most travelers would pay a certain price for this safety, preventive laws could stop abuses. If airports don’t have enough frameworks or enough technologies to offer an efficient safety without affecting passengers rights, the solution would be investment.

Which drives us to the point: Are we facing normal safety or abuse of power? Going on board is a pleasure, or it became something stressful?

@Direction l’espace avec Voyageurs du Monde © Virgin Galactic

Everyone has dreamt about it at least once in his life.

In 2010, the agency Voyageur du monde will take you there, on board of the Spaceship2. You will be driven, first by the Whitenight till the altitude of 5249 feet, then, SpaceShip’s jet engine will take over and propel yourself to a speed of 217.480 miles per hour. Your body will have to bear more than 3 Mach (about three times the sound speed). Once out of the Earth’s atmosphere (limit between Space and Earth), the five novices will be able to unfasten their seatbelt and go for a walk, in order to look up to this amazing landscape. This trip takes about two hours.
Don’t be worried about landing. The SpaceShip was made to glide once its engines are off. This spaceship will go back to its starting point, New Mexico, and land with delicacy.

Le SpaceShipTwo et le WhiteKhight de Virgin Galactic Photo © Virgin Galactic

According to the company, one trip per week will be possible. It is the first that an empowered company is doing this kind of travel.
This destination was, till now, only for special customers. Will it become THE destination of the future????

La vue promise par Virgin Galactic Photo © Virgin Galactic

What about the price???

Stop dreaming. Going to stars has an amount. It will cost you 136000 pounds in exchange of 2 unforgettable hours.
We all agree that this king of tourism is still for wealthy people, but if we have a look deeply, the Russian program costs 20 millions of dollars and a 6 months training is required. This French agency offers a three days training and 136 000 pounds! It is a king of better price.
This price will get down in some years with a view of satisfy more inquiring mind.

You can already book tour ticket on http://www.virgingalactic.com/ .You will get in touch with someone from the agency that will help you.

youtube

* In all like hood God does not exist, but if he exists, he would be a pilot of Iberia

At the time of airport chaos, flight delays, canceled, pilots strike, crisis… We need a break to have a little bit of fun.

Last August, in the highest holiday season, the low cost airline, Ryanair, brought suit Atràpalo and other web sites, in order to stop the sale of its flight tickets through online agencies.
Atràpalo’s web site enables, thanks to its search engine, access to offers from 70 airlines, which gives the possibility to compare prices and to combine options. Manuel Roca, executive director of Atràpalo explains his position in a press release, to media and to consumers:
“Our objective is to provide, the most offers as well as technology required to reach it in order to be able to compare prices. Our use is totally transparent and indisputably in favor of our consumers; we believe Ryanair is looking for establishing a distrust atmosphere towards online agencies to try selling its flight tickets through its own web page, avoiding price comparability.
Ryanair had threatened to not accept passengers who bought their ticket through an agency online, which created a big mess between users.
Two things follow from those actions: On one side, Ryanair’s dishonesty and wrong concurrence practices which created stress in clients’ mind, with the only objective to be harmful to our image and to our company, without doubting, that our consumers are also their clients. Moreover, instead of looking for new ideas to attack buyers, they preferred conflict and scandal.
Though, Atràpalo gave to its consumers, a message to reassure them: “It would be grave that the company cancels tickets already issued. The European Commission demonstrated this hypothesis is deplorable.”
Even if in reality the Irish company had never done it, this caused interventions of organizations such as the European Commission, which obligated Ryanair to respect reservations already done by internet users, giving notice of the illegality of the hypothetic threat execution.
The judge rejects Ryanair’s request against Atràpalo
On the 23th of January 2009, the court of Barcelona has rejected Ryanair’s request again Atràpalo about selling its flight tickets through our web site.
The court had recognized the right for Atràpalo to be an intermediary in ticket sale, and no prejudice is made to the airline.
The court had recognized Atràpalo as a travel agency legally accredited, and, from this fact, has the capacity to develop this activity.
The judgment emphasizes also that Atràpalo “does not need Ryanair’s approval to carry out its activity” and it is able to keep in conducting its clients to Ryanair’s home page to end their order (such as booking for suitcases, or insurance…), in total legality.
The judge recognized also that internet is a huge network which put in touch a lot of people, allowing communication and information exchanges and with the conclusion that, if the airline resorts to this channel to publicize its flights and its prices, there can be any limit, for users, to know these services.
For Ignacio Giral, travel executive director, “the biggest beneficiary from the judgment, is the consumer, whom the right to access to information is not limited, with the aim to compare and to chose companies and prices matching the most their needs”.
Atràpalo will be able to get on with selling Ryanair’s and other companies’ tickets in total legality .

picture from Rhobinhood

Have you already been in a bar completly made of ice???? Bar, chairs, even glasses that you drink from????

There are about twenty: Milan, London, Stockholm, Montreal, Tokyo, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Auckland, Poland, Alaska, Sydney, Dubai, Portugal, Captown (South Africa), Orlando, Las Vegas.

It’s something you can’t miss!!!!    They lend you a jackect and gloves at the entrance because  those bars have a constant temperature of  23 degree Fahrenheit. De facto, you are allowed to stay inside about 45 minutes, which is more than enough, believe me!!!!

And if you are a fan of Absolut Vodka, this bar is yours!!!! By the way, they’r even named Absolut Ice Bar

The entrance fees (about 10 pounds) includes a cocktail of your choice with the Absolut Vodka of your choice (lemon, Vanilla, mandarin…); For sure there will be something to your taste