Category: travel

loving the Calgary Airport

On By Rick McIn Cirque du Soleil, gymnastics, product endorsements, travelLeave a comment

For a city of 1 million, Calgary truly has one of the best airports in the world.

Flying on a Wednesday I had no long line-ups at any of the usual bottlenecks.

The self-service check-in kiosk for United Airlines worked. (You need a zip code and hotel name destination to do it on your own.)

The U.S. border was friendly and efficient.

Security check brisk.

Two Tim Hortons greet you in the departure concourse.

It’s easy to find an electrical outlet for your laptop. And — best of all — there’s 2hrs free WiFi.

You still much flip through some log-in pages. But it’s easy to use your Facebook credentials to speed that process.

calgary-airport

I’m flying to Lincoln, Nebraska for the NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Championships.

Prague’s Kafka International Named Most Alienating Airport

On By Rick McIn humour, travelLeave a comment

Business Week ranked the airport last in customer satisfaction due to long delays, bureaucratic employees, and overall oppressive atmosphere.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

I love the Onion News Network.

They’ve actually hired a former CNN Anchor, Bobbie Batista. That’s her in the clip above.

all-you-can-eat restaurants

On By Rick McIn food, product endorsements, travelLeave a comment

In the 1990s I spent a month in Trinidad, the most developed economy in the Caribbean.

When I asked the young guys there what they liked about the States — young people all wanted to move to Canada or the USA — they told me: all-you-can-eat restaurants.

asian-buffet

Me too.

When on the road I typically replace breakfast with coffee. Then schedule a big, late lunch at an Asian buffet. And snack in the evening.

The last one I visited for $9.99 included Sushi and a Mongolian Grill.

The only downside … Asian deserts.

Yuck!

flightstats.com sucks

On By Rick McIn product complaints, travel7 Comments

Air Canada uses links to flightstats as an extra service for people like me who want to track flights.

I’m stranded in the Calgary Airport, closed due to blizzard and — possibly — a plane that slid off a runway.

It’s 11:50PM now. The Airport has been CLOSED SINCE 10:30PM.

What does flightstats tell me …

flightstats.com sucks
flightstats.com sucks

“Delay Index Moderate”

That the flight I await landed 10min late at Calgary. … In reality it was rerouted to Edmonton.

If flightstats is not up-to-date enough to know that an international airport is closed, what good is it?

Air Canada … you Suck too. Drop flightstats.

UPDATE: Scott Hopkins of flightstats sent a rapid and considered response to my complaint. Thanks Scott. … Still, your service didn’t work for me. I spent 4.5hrs in an airport. $30 on parking. My friends stuck in another city overnight when their flight was rerouted. And your site never reported any of that. Last time I checked, your site still told me that the flight had arrived safely, 10min late.

review – Ghost Train to the Eastern Star

On By Rick McIn books, product endorsements, travelLeave a comment

Ghost Train to the Eastern Star: On the Tracks of the Great Railway Bazaar is the most recent Paul Theroux book.

He retraces his rail journey from Europe through Asia of 30-years earlier.

Theroux has mellowed with age. Now in his mid-60s, he’s less disagreeable than ever before in this, another travel classic.

I’ve read all his travel books. He’s one of my favourite authors. Always entertaining and informative. This one is as good as any of the others. Read it.

Still, critics call Theroux: arrogant, dishonest, a narcissist, a misanthropist.

Certainly he’s envious of greater writers than himself, especially Nobel Prize in Literature winner V. S. Naipaul. Theroux thinks much about the great authors, obviously because he thinks himself just as skilled a wordsmith, unrecognized. Unawarded.

Theroux’s the son of a French-Canadian father and an Italian mother, I learned.

ghost-train

Amazon – Ghost Train to the Eastern Star: On the Tracks of the Great Railway Bazaar

This book has rekindled my interest in travel. I’m ruminating future prospects right now.

Aging too, I liked the moments on this long journey where Paul Theroux found himself “content”. Even happy.

Everything I Know About Barbecue, I Learned From Rockin’

On By Rick McIn food, friends, travelLeave a comment

Now he’s carrying coal to Newcastle. Barbecue to Texas.

040714_shewchuk_ronnie_200

In his day job, Ron Shewchuk is a business consultant who helps organizations communicate better with their employees. In his spare time, he’s built a second career as his alter-ego, Rockin’ Ronnie, international barbecue champion and bestselling cookbook author.

A few years ago Shewchuk had a crazy idea to combine his lifelong passions for outdoor cooking and indoor business communications. The result: a combination multi-course meal and keynote address called “Everything I Know About Communication, I Learned From Barbecue.”

Shewchuk is bringing his smoke-infused business wisdom to Houston’s famed Armadillo Palace on February 26, where he’ll deliver his talk to the local chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators. His visit is timed to coincide with The World’s Championship Bar-B-Que Contest, the first big event of the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. …

… read the whole article – Market Watch – Canadian Barbecue Guru Mixes Business with Brisket

Otalo – vacation rental search engine

On By Rick McIn travel1 Comment

A new service is getting good press.

Otalo is a vacation rental search engine. Save time and search all the vacation home rental sites at once (kind of like Google, but for vacation rentals).

Just enter what you need once, and let Otalo search all the different rental sites for you. It’s easy to use and you can specify everything you want in a vacation home rental. You can save your favorite rental homes from all the different sites in one central place and share your list with friends and folks with whom you’re planning your vacation. Even if you’re not actively planning a vacation, you can just browse the world, looking at all the cool homes in exciting places. …

About Otalo

I have a lot of friends looking for vacation rentals through one service or another. Otalo wants to list EVERYTHING available in one place.

the future at airports

On By Rick McIn travel1 Comment

Remember the movie Total Recall? Commuters were x-rayed to reveal concealed weapons.

tsascreeners

It’s coming to airports soon. But will look like this:

SEE THROUGH SECURITY
Spiegel

Sentinel non-invasive walk-through scanner
Sentinel non-invasive walk-through scanner

AirportTechnology

… you wake on time and make your way to the airport in your battery powered car. At the UnitedDeltaContinental airlines desk you wave your phone in front of the check-in kiosk and a green light indicates that you are cleared to proceed to the security checkpoint.

At the checkpoint, an agent waves his rfid reader tag in front of the wallet in your pocket, and you stick your hand in a biometric ID reader. The agent stares at a hidden display for a few seconds and allows you to walk through the full body scanner. As you pass through the device, you think back to the days when you had to place your bags on that stupid conveyor belt, and how it always delayed getting to the gate on time.

At the gate, you connect your iPhone 5G with the gate information system, and you instantly receive a message about your upgrade request, sadly you’ll be stuck in coach again for this flight.

Boarding is delayed 20 minutes, once it begins, your phone begins to vibrate that your boarding group is allowed to get on the plane. At the gate, you stare into the airline iris scanner, and the gate attendant allows you to board. …

Gadling – The future at the airport involves your phone, fingers and eyes