(00:00:00) It is five minutes past eleven o'clock. And hello. This is the midday program on Minnesota Public Radio. I'm Karen booth and with me in studio is Katherine Watson. She is the travel editor for the Star Tribune newspaper and whether you're only thinking about travel plans for the spring in the summer or already have your destination marked out on the map. This is your time to give us a call and ask for some questions talk about travel Styles. We've been sharing some travel stories ourselves in studio and it's pretty much wide open to you. And the number to call in the metro area is 2276 thousand and if you're outside of the metro area, it's a toll-free call at one eight hundred to four to 2828. So I guess the first thing I would ask you is. Where are you going this year any plans I have well, I have tons of plants. I've spent the last week kind of badgering my travel agent about Antarctica because I've always wanted to go there so I have stacks of brochures. Now about cruises and I'm discovering things like you can spend thousands and thousands of dollars and there's no guarantee. You'll actually see the continent because of the weather, but that's that's my my most exotic. Hope for the coming year. Hmm travelbug. I mean we all get it especially in the winter time. We start thinking about places to go and usually it's points South this time of year. But you know, we were talking about travel Styles and travel partners and when you put together a checklist of travel, what do you usually recommend that people do well? I have two at the outside admit that I had the the last time I traveled with another person with a friend. I didn't do any of the stuff that I advise what what people ought to be doing is talking carefully with whoever they're going to travel with whether it's a relative or your best friend and making sure that you that you both know what time the other person wants to get up in the morning when you like to have breakfast do you like Go to bed watching TV. Do you like to read quietly? Are you going to share a room or make an arrangement where you share part of the time and and how are you going to divide the costs of the cost of gas or money or meals? Some people like to settle up the instant lunch has done other people can go weeks without ever setting up and there those are the things that people get upset about and then beyond that it's what you want to see. What do you want to do? How long do you want to stay in a place? How do we negotiate it? If we change our minds now what if you're wide open and we're talking about a very large world. Where do I want to go? Are there some trends that you're seeing now, there are but one of the things that always troubles me when I start reading about trans. My least favorite thing is the travel article it talks about where the beautiful people are going knows. It is integral. Yeah in the last few years because the economy and the as been so poor and the dollars been so weak. What you've seen is a lot of scaling down that dovetails with a trend that's been around for about 10 years, or maybe more of Of two families to two income families where people can't get away at the same time. So you don't have the giant family trip as much as you used to you see a lot more of the mini vacation multiple vacations in a year and people tending to if they were going to Europe they went to Europe cheaper during the last recession if they went if they barely could afford to go to Europe before they stayed home or they went to Canada or Mexico. You see that kind of that kind of scaling back, but I think that might go up a little bit at least if we all stay hopeful about the economy. Well, I don't know about you but I want to jump to the phone lines because I want to hear what people have to ask and how about if we go to our first caller. Hi, are you there? (00:03:42) Yes a good morning. Good (00:03:43) morning. So why are you packing (00:03:45) yet? Not quite we're planning for fall trip to New England was curious as to what how can I find out? What will be the good spots to see in New England were primarily going to go for the Fall colors? Hmm. I'm concerned a little bit about safety traveling through the big cities in the (00:04:04) Northeast. Are you driving? Yes. Okay, I wouldn't really worry too much about safety. You're in your car. You will be traveling presumably through this Eddie. I'm not sure if you're planning to stay or not. What you can do is when you've got your route planned out right to or call the Chambers of Commerce in the cities that you're planning to go to and they can send you all sorts of materials on what to see where to stay. What's in the region. You may want to stay outside a large city and Drivin that's often more economical and that's what I've been trying to do in Europe New England also has that the states have a fall color information available. So I would write to the the state tourism offices for the state's you want to go to and they will probably tell you although I can't give this to you off the top of my head. There is a sort of hotline for where the color is as is the as the weather gets colder in the colors change you Find out where it's going to be hot as the next week, but you can find that out from the state tourism offices. Does that answer your question? Does that help? Yes, okay. Okay, we'll have a good trip and drive safely. What about our next caller? Let's see. What kinds of travel questions do you have as you prepare for your trip? (00:05:25) I'm going to take off on Friday and I had two questions one is what should I do with medically before I go should I take any medicines with me and secondly what kinds of consumer goods should I look for and and where to buy and bring back? (00:05:51) Okay. I'm my polish experience is limited to a trip right before the whole Iron Curtain fell apart. I was there in 1989. So I'm going to be a touch out of date in terms of medicine. Generally what I tell people is if you're taking anything regularly take it along and take a backup. I carry my medications on my person when I'm on the plane. I put a backup in the carry-on don't pack anything that's going to go through the check-in process in addition to quote a traveler. I want much admired. He said he always takes a starter and a stopper no matter where you're going in the world jet lag will throw off your body and you may get constipated. You may have the opposite problem. I would take some over-the-counter medications for for those ailments eyedrops is a good idea to take a spare pair of glasses. If you wear glasses, you might want to take just sort of General painkillers any drug that you take it home off and on routinely I would buy simply because it's very hard to find equivalents in other countries and it tends to be a lot more expensive me too. And you waste time looking for them in terms of shots. I know that I'm going through some of that right now for my summer travel plans. And so what I've had to do is I called the CDC in Atlanta and they have a traveler's hotline and you can punch in if you have a touch-tone. Own punch in your destination and they'll go through the entire list of recommendations of shots that you that the CDC recommends for you to take prior to a trip in terms of things to buy one of the big Bargains in Poland when I was there was fur, if you have no bias about about wearing pelts of wild animals fur was a tremendous bargain the catch was that especially because the rate of exchange was so amazing. You could essentially drop a zero off of her fur coat price. The catch was you would have trouble getting at home because you'd be facing fairly large duties bring it in what I would look for is handicrafts. And if you're in the northern part along the coast, especially look for Amber Amber is found along the Baltic coast, and there are terrific Bargains in beautiful handmade brooches and pieces set in sterling silver for pennies compared to what you'd pay here. Hmm. The number to call if you have any questions we in studio right now is Katherine Watson. She's travel editor for the Star Tribune newspaper and we're answering your calls at the number in the Twin Cities to dial two two seven six thousand and in the outside of the metro area rather, it's 1-800 to for 22828. Hello. You're on the air with Katherine Watson. Do you have a question for your travel plans? (00:08:36) Yes. Hi. I'm calling from my husband and I go to Mexico in April over the Easter weekend will be staying at a resort outside of Ensenada (00:08:48) and (00:08:49) we were wondering if the stores and restaurants will be open on Easter (00:08:54) on Easter Sunday. Yes. I can't answer that. I would say that there will be lots of places that will be open on Easter Sunday. The timing might be a little off. I'm not sure if they're going to be open all day. What you need to keep in mind is that that Holy Week is one of the Weeks for Latin American Travelers. So your competition for places to eat sightsee shop will not be other American tourists as much as it will be local people Mexican people on vacation in the same area that will make it very interesting and lots of fun very colorful to I would look for Holy Week celebrations. Hmm fascinating it seems as though that when traveling points South such as Mexico one might want to also consider diet and be very experimental. What are some of the favorite foods that you might say you it's a must it's a must it's okay. Here's one it's called wheat huitlacoche and it is an Aztec word. It's an Aztec specialty and what it translates to according to one of the friends. I have I just got back from Mexico about three weeks ago. It's corn smut for meant for midwesterners. This is nuts that but it is an Aztec delicacy and when it is in season, it's a go. Me it's like truffles in France has been very mild flavor. So what is it? I mean it's what black lumpy thing and you eat and you eat it. It's served cooked as a sort of a chopped-up mush kind of thing. We had we had crepes made out of it at a restaurant in Acapulco about three weeks ago. That was there were delicious. Hmm. But as long as you think of it as we'd like coach a instead of his corn smut. You can pay the prices for it. You wouldn't go into a restaurant and Order corn smut. No, no, you have to use this other words. And what do you see this it huitlacoche? Okay. Okay. We'll have fun in Mexico and let's go to another caller. What what kind of questions do you have for your travel (00:10:44) plans? Hi. Well, my husband and I are planning a trip to Italy next fall. And what we intend to do is fly in rent a car and travel the countryside Tuscany and Umbria. Well now my I have sort of three questions here reservations for lodging are suggested in larger cities. Problem with small villages and so forth where you know, you don't know where you're going to be from one day next in there are a few little places I've read about in some books. Is there a problem with making reservations based on information read in books? And yes, (00:11:29) the problem is mainly that once it makes it into a book two things happen. The book is about a year old. The information was gathered at least a year before just given the leg and Publishing time. So the prices will be out of date. The other thing is that once it's in a guidebook the people inevitably raise their prices. So if you've read about it, it's going to cost you more than the place next door. I used to follow guide books and and just walk down the block and stay in the next little little hotel. I found because it would get the spill off from the other tourists that would probably be perfectly fine and it isn't any guidebook. So it's cheaper. If you're if you're renting a car and driving around what you're going to want to do is not have advanced reservations from here. They're hard to make any way in small towns. What I would do is take advantage of an Italian tourist office service. You can in in the major train stations make reservations for that City and they can tell you what the tourist office numbers are in surrounding small towns. We went to Italy traveled back and forth between Italy and first of all Tuscany and Umbria good for you great choice. It's the green heart of Italy you might say and and go heavy on the olive oil in terms of renting a car. What what I learned was Europe by car might save you a little bit of money rather than going through the Italian rental agency. We didn't know at first that we wanted a car before leaving it was after we got there we decided I think we wanted to do the car now and instead of the trains so you might want to check your work by car which is based out of New York. Right? And if you're probably going to be working with a travel agent, I would assume that for at least for your are as Relations, I would ask the travel agent if there any fly-drive packages if you can get a good price from here set the car up in advance and then wing it when you get to the small towns and you'll love the Italians we get to other questions, but were the (00:13:22) only ones one was really with it with the travel agent. If you thought it was necessary and how would you find a travel agent with the skills or knowledge to plan this kind of (00:13:33) trip? We're fortunate in the midwest, especially here. We have a lot of travel agencies and it is an extremely clean industry here. You don't know unlike New York and Chicago and Miami and La where there are some shady operators. This is a very clean very well organized self self patrolling industry, I guess and it's their job to know more about this than anybody else. It's sort of like like buying stock on your own. It's just a lot easier to use a broker or somebody who's really experienced in it. And if you are working with a travel agent on airfare ask every other question you've got But the a lot of people don't understand that that the advice is free if you book with an airline directly, or if you book with the travel agent the ticket costs you the same the airline merely pays a commission to the agent. So there's no additional cost to you and use that expertise another good way to is because I'm very demanding of a travel agents. But if you go to travel book stores, usually the people who work there hair well-traveled and there another good resource in terms of asking travel information find out if they've done the trip themselves ask them what kinds of things they experienced and and in terms of books. Don't forget the public library. That's right. What I have recommended often is that go to the library check out the books that you are interested in before buying one go by the one you like. Yeah. Good. What was question (00:14:54) 3. Well, the last one was really any safety issues. I mean, I know big cities you have to be careful. But what do you do if I died have no feel for how relatively populated the countryside is. If you have car troubles or (00:15:10) I don't think that will be a problem. I think your biggest problem would be simple safety and car break-ins. I would not leave anywhere in Europe. I would not leave anything visible in the car. If you go in in to stay overnight someplace, take all your luggage with you. It's just a lot easier. Don't leave your purse on a back seat and then go shopping. Don't leave it on don't leave anything visible. It's a temptation to break a window on and come in. Otherwise, you should be fine. You know, you brought up a point of about the books because really travel books really cater a different kind of traveler. I have found differences between baedeker's versus farmers and so forth. So even the Lonely Planet some are, you know, geared toward the person who might have more money to spend on a vacation and some books are are geared toward the student. Do you have a general rule of thumb anything middle of the road the the overall best series I've ever seen is the Insight guides, which go heavy. Into the culture and history of a place so that you understand the background of what you're going to go see they have they will cover everything major that you want that you want to look at whether you're traveling with a tour group traveling on an organizer to package to our traveling as a Backpacker. I would start there for for getting a feel for the culture and then explore the other other books. Look at the library. Look at the Travel section in a large bookstore Lonely Planet is excellent for for Budget Travel and then you can come all the way up to there some luxury books and you can kind of get a feel for how it sounds when the price range is seem to be where else are we going in the world? What kinds of questions do you have for Katherine (00:16:47) Watson? Good morning. Hi. All right. Thank you for being on the show and articles for several years. I've fantasized about about doing a trip to Eastern Europe Czechoslovakia and Southern Poland where I have relatives in the foothills of the tatra mountains and I thought that I had would be to take the trains into perhaps Vienna Prague across vodka and up into Poland but I don't know anything about just how good these chains are whether they'd be suitable for traveling with families. (00:17:26) They're fine. They're just fine. I that's how I got around in 89 all through Eastern Europe how depend a little bit on how younger children are. Well, I've got little tiny tiny ones trains get kind of (00:17:38) claustrophobic right now. They're five and eight hmm. The other thought that I had entertained was doing some bicycling while we were there perhaps through some areas of the countryside taking bicycles on the train. Hmm as we have done here in the states and then getting off at points to travel through the countryside (00:17:57) that's perfectly doable you would you would need to check into how you can actually how you how they need to be boxed how they need to travel on the train and you could probably check that with The both the check and the Polish government's maintain National travel offices in the United States. I don't know whether they are outside New York. Sometimes there are branches in Chicago, but I would check the New York phone operator and to see if they've got offices and ask them (00:18:23) travel is perfectly feasible for something like that. Yes. Great. Thank you very much. (00:18:29) Okay. Thanks for calling in and talking to talking to us about your travel plans. Of course, we're envious. I want to get out of the studio now and explore but what kinds of questions do you have for your upcoming plans? (00:18:41) I actually don't have a question but rather would like to offer a couple of tips. Okay. I'm a physician who has a lot of patients who travel and I certainly second Miss Watson's advice about taking along back up prescriptions, but there's a great deal of caution about the use of illicit drugs and bringing them across borders these days. I frequently provide my patients with samples and it's not a good idea to Take Along unlabeled sample number two and perhaps more importantly. It's not a good idea to take the drugs out of their prescription bottles of prescription got bottles. Number one identify those as as licit rather than illicit drugs. They were actually provide useful information if the patient is in an emergency, so especially if they perhaps can't give a history and more importantly they those containers are designed to protect the pills against a light and moisture and mixing pills in an envelope or another container isn't very a very good idea. Thanks and keep up the good work. (00:19:38) Well, thank you, and those are excellent tips 11. Other tip that I would add and I'm really glad you brought that up because people do tend in there in the attempt to shrink what they're taking with them you tend to throw all your stuff into one little bottom and take that leave them in the in the prescription bottles for safety for for preservation. And so that when you cross Customs nobody's is what's this white thing and then you have to defend that this is really an aspirin and not who knows what I have a severe allergy and I have to carry syringes with me for to treat it it I don't run into it very often, but I have to carry these things when I had my doctor do was write me a letter that said these are the the medications and answer inches that this person needs for these conditions on very formal stationary and I carry that with my passport. It looks impressive. If you're ever called on to approve proof white that you're not you're running drugs essentially is the problem but yes, those are great tips and people should follow them to the letter. Thanks for calling what kinds of questions do you face for your travel? (00:20:42) Good morning. I'm a single female and I'm considering going to China and I was wondering if you could give me some advice on how to evaluate the different tour groups that go to China and whether or not traveling on my own would be recommended or not. (00:20:56) I think actually traveling on your own in China is I think that's one of the safest places you can do that. The there is still a sort of respect for the person unlike traveling in some countries. You will not be hit on as a single female the catch is that when you get out on your own in the places you want to go which is mostly rural areas. You really want to see the countryside nobody's going to speak English. So that that can be a real drawback in terms of tour groups. A lot of a lot of the most will see the same place as you can for example in Tibet the most expensive ones stay in the same hotels as the very low-budget ones because there aren't more hotels there. Build more than the prices get differentiated or the quality of lodgings do but I went to Tibet once maybe five years ago and we were paying $700 for a round trip out of kampmann Katmandu and we were staying in hotels or people had paid $2,000, huh? And it was it was we just didn't talk about what we were paying. I would I would look at price. I would look at the number of places that you get to see I would look at any tour that takes you out in the countryside or shows you shows you more than another one and I would try to arrange some time some down time. So you can wander around I think a lot of people when they opt for at or wherever it is tend to feel that they have to stick with that to her. And once you've paid the money it is perfectly okay to skip a meal go off on your own take a picnic lunch someplace. Skip the tour of the guided tour of X Y or Z. If you want to spend more time someplace else what I found in China on a tour that I took their is that they tend to be quite regimented and a lot of time is allotted for me. If you're willing to skip a meal you can see a great deal more. So if you skip a meal. Then you go you go to the local market you go into a grocery store you negotiate for a loaf of bread and you find out what things cost the people and you find out what the people shop like and it's fascinating are most of the meals on the on the pre the prefix if you will or on the package indigenous or are you getting American Sandwich it varies? It varies pretty widely in China on a budget or you will get a lot of Chinese from you really get Chinese food in China on large large package tours for the groups are 35 40 people you tend to get standardized meals and they tend to be pretty boring compared to what you could get on your own if you're going to France, for example, I would definitely break away from the tour as often as you can you are buy it buy it with it only gives you breakfast because that's sort of built into most hotel prices anyway, and then go off on your own for lunches or dinners or pack a lunch. Yeah, go on a picnic or or eat lunch and I really great great expensive restaurant because it's cheaper than that place for dinner and picnic at night. Yeah. an idea got more. Yeah, what's your question for Katherine Watson? (00:23:48) Yes. I read the travel stories in the Sunday paper with interests including yours. Thank you. And I one of the things I notice is that most of them are very glowing reports of these places and almost rhapsodic at times and I'm I'm curious as to who pays reporters such as you for these trips and what assures, you know, the reader generally that you know that these are legit effective story. (00:24:16) Okay, we tried when we're editing when I'm editing wire service stories to cut out the rhapsodies. Usually if it's very risky rhapsodic and it mentions a couple who tells in a couple Airlines over and over, you know that they've been paid for it. So I don't run those stories my newspapers policy on all travel for all sections including mine is that we pay every dime the average traveler would we don't take a we don't take a familiarization rate. We don't take a travel agency rate where people are going as part of Business to learn about a place that rates usually about 50 percent of actual cost many travel writers are subsidized by tourist offices there the minute I get offers probably ten a week of trips I could take for little or nothing and the first week. I had this job about 12 years ago. I thought wow but it's unethical what what my my premise is and what most travel sections of any size now follow as a practice is if we have to pay the same price you do and we have limited budgets to then we are finding out the same kinds of problems that the average traveler would if you take any kind of help you don't run into the problem somebody runs at the very least, even if you paid every dime and you went on an organized group tour for travel writers, somebody runs interference and you never find out if there's a problem getting a ticket from A to B in some train station. You never find out if you need more language skills than you than you actually have so we try to keep it as realistic as possible in terms. Terms of objectivity. The problem is with objectivity in any aspect of the news objectivity is a thing we shoot for but it depends on one person standing in a place in observing an event. So I look at Travel writing a little bit more like reviewing restaurants. I try to make it as personal as possible. So I'm reporting accurately on what happened to me and warning people when I run into a pitfall to watch out for that but I can't speak for everybody that guards also against reports that are unduly negative because the writer was tired. There are plenty of places that I didn't like just because I got up on the wrong side of the bed and I try to do not judge those places too. Harshly. When you when you travel abroad how do you put yourself in the mindset of the culture so that you're not overly critical. I follow a if I can remember in my letters here. There's a little little tip from cross cultural education. It's the key word is dy D IE, which is a really unfortunate one, but it stands for describe interpret evaluate and you try to leave the evaluation off. That's the Judgment call. So you say things like I observe a taxi drivers sitting at the curb in this city. I observe the track Taxi Driver reading a newspaper. I assume this is the interpretive part. I assume he's on break. I assume he's waiting for if I'm sorry. I assume he's waiting for a fare in France. It means he's on break. If you try to get that guy to take you someplace. He's going to say no because he's on break you won't understand why you're going to judge him and he'll come home saying all those French taxi drivers are nasty. That's the evaluative part. So you drop that as much as possible any time you find yourself. Of getting angry in another culture or another place. That's a tip-off that there is probably some cross cultural communication gap. So stop yourself at that point and try and think of other explanations or ask or say out loud things are going wrong here in the quietest Possible voice. You can muster. How can I help the situation? Say it out loud? What do you need me to do here? And that goes a long way to making things smoother interesting. Hello your online on the air with Katherine Watson. What's your (00:27:54) question? I appreciate you mentioning libraries as a source for travel information because I'm a librarian and it's it's a very enjoyable to do armchair travel to those books. My cousin and I are in our 50s and we plan to do some travel in August for about three weeks and both Wales and Sweden and anytime I ask for airline rates for that it gets Sky High because of the two (00:28:26) places hmm. (00:28:29) You think it'd be better to have two round trips. They from Minneapolis to London and then from London to Stockholm or to make three legged trip, you know, (00:28:39) just to try and get all three in this is one for the travel agents. I would I would talk to a travel agent and find out if there is a quite often there's a fair that goes from from Minneapolis to let's say point point x and it allows you stops on the way see if you can work that out. Sometimes you can do it get a get a good deal that way sometimes you can get a good deal by going to your farthest point and then taking short trips from there. But that is one to ask a travel agent. We didn't talk about finding travel agents stick to ones that are in our communities near near where you live don't go for the ones that advertise and are based in Chicago or New York just because you can't get Adam. It's much harder to deal with somebody who's not your neighbor and ask these questions. You can do that part. The phone you can come in. If you don't get a satisfactory answer ask a couple of others and go with the person you feel most comfortable with, you know, I would also recommend keeping an open mind because one time I was planning a very lengthy and very complicated trip and that was going from Minneapolis to Greece to Israel to Egypt to Italy now because of the Season changes in the drop and fair and they dropped earlier in Greece and they did in Italy and all of all of this factored in I cut two hundred and some dollars off all of my airfare by changing my plans a little bit and getting a round trip rather than a series of one ways. And I think if you map it all out remain open-minded and question the travel agent, I mean this was this involved a lot of negotiating I went in with one plan the travel agent figured out how I could do it. Didn't come up with Plan B. Yeah other words if you change your mind, you can actually save this money. This is what I might recommend. Mmm. So, yeah, and and sometimes people go into a travel agent and say I want to go to Los Angeles on this date at this price at this time, they'll give you that but if you say I want to get to Los Angeles the cheapest way possible. I don't care what day is long as it's this week. I don't care what flight I don't care what time of day you can often come up much better. So try not to set too many limits for the travel agent when you initially start to work with him or think of it as all movable Parts. Hello. What's your question? (00:30:59) I've got a question on Southern Caribbean cruise Caribbean cruise lines and whether or not it's considered a good travel value and secondly when you land on some of these places whether or not it's a good idea to strike it on your own on some of these either a guided tour go out by (00:31:14) yourself cruising and and sightseeing are a little bit different than then sightseeing any other way. I think the problem with Cruz I think they're wonderful values because you're paying a flat fee you unpack once to put your clothes away in the cruise ship and usually there's a very economical airfare that's built into it or add it on. So it sit for a week in the sun. It's a great value. The catch is you mustn't think that you're going to get a lot of sightseeing in I did this on a cruise years ago, and I thought I'd take a cruise right accrues story and then we'd stop and 7 ports. Wow, and I get seven different stories. The problem is you spent a lot of time disembarking and then getting back on the ship and you go through customs when you're at least entry procedures when you get off. Usually you're required to be on board an hour or two before it sails again. So an 8-hour stop in a port turns into maybe four hours five hours if you're if you're lucky and I would I would in this case take an organized tour but there they tend to be more expensive if you book them through the ship you can save some money. Money by hiring a cab or hiring a guide when you get to the port if you've done your reading and if it's an English-speaking area, you can hire a cab and say I want to see this this and this and at least have a TaylorMade Tour and you can sometimes save quite a bit of money shore excursions, which are booked on board the ship before you go before you you reach the port tend to be more costly do cabs everywhere. Operate along the same lines as they do here. No here we're used to seeing that meter click and you know how much to add for a tip and it's all cut and dried in most other countries most especially developing countries and tropical countries. You negotiate with the cab driver when you get in before you start it happens a lot in Mexico that people will get in asked to be taken wherever they're going and then find out they've got this horrendous bill because the guy decided that's what he was going to charge you negotiate in the beginning and if you're not sure how much something audit of a destination ought to cost from your hotel asked the hotel ask somebody what it's going to cost to get To where you want to go and back in the negotiate you may not get that price, but you'll come a lot closer. Hello. You're on the air with Katherine Watson. What's your question? (00:33:34) Yes, we had just purchased round-trip tickets to Florida and we realized there are travel agent that the airline's even for the real cheap ones. They no longer allow for if there's an illness. I know what used to seem that used to be if there was an illness in your immediate family that was traveling or of an illness like with grandparents or something. There will be a refund and now the message we got was is one of the four of us who are traveling died, then yes, then we would get a refund but then other than that, there's no refund whatsoever. That's right. And now we're having to buy travel insurance. Is that (00:34:04) just that's not new and I know okay. It was not it was never the airline's practice that I know of to give you a refund. If you couldn't go because of illness sometimes out of the graciousness of their hearts, they might if it were a death but by and large if you didn't have travel insurance to cover you are out the money, so most people buy tend to buy my The wrong tend to buy baggage Insurance most of the luggage you've got if you've got homeowners insurance, it's already covered what you want is insurance that will cover the reef the cost of your tickets. If you can't go for reasons of illness or whatever and make sure when you're buying that insurance that what you're that the what you want is actually covered because there are lots of types lots of policies and they don't all cover the same thing. Where do you buy Travelers Insurance? You can get it through a travel agent and and just make sure that they are explaining to you exactly what you're going to get and read the fine print because policies do different what they cover. What you want is something that will will cover trip cancellation and you also want if you're going anyplace remotely exotic insurance that will cover your passage home. You want a medical evacuation insurance. That is that's crucial. If you're going to Florida Medical Care is going to be good. You've got insurance here. You just want to make sure that you can that you know what to do. If there's an emergency check with your doctor before you go your clinic in sure but if you're going to the third world or somewhere you want insurance that will get you out. Have fun on your trip. Hello, you're on the (00:35:32) air. Hi. I am planning a trip to London and I need to take it in this next month. I'm on a travel Grant and I'm wondering because my passport has been expired and actually lost. What is the best way to expedite the process so that I can get out of the country in in time in order to to follow the guidelines of this grant. Okay, and I'm also looking for inexpensive lodging in London or outside. London (00:36:00) macaron can see the last one better than I can but let me do the passport one first. Okay here I am going to assume that you've got a travel agent working on your airfare. If you don't this is where you this is where you need to travel agent. There are passport expediting services in Washington and you can you can for a fee have your travel agent contact one of those Services. They express mail it out there. Somebody walks it through and walks the application through and brings it back. You can do that for visas as well. I would I would definitely Learn to Pro for help with that one. You can also call the passport agency in Chicago, but I don't know it's phone number and ask if there's a way to expedite it there is usually pay it's usually a matter of paying extra mailing fees at each end. But I would I return first or travel agent and ask what they can do in a pinch. Well in terms of accommodations, I was able to stay at the BBC house, which is not open to the public great and it was lovely but I did notice that near Victoria Station. There's two places that I would recommend if you go to the Victoria Station train station as soon as you disembark the train if you will is to some Barca something you do on a train or is that just a ship close enough? Okay, when you get off the train go to the tourist Travel section and what they have is a free service. Tell them where you want to stay in what neighborhood and what your budget is and they'll give you a list of hotels. Even make the call. It's probably about a 10 dollar eight to ten dollar US dollar service, but it's well worth it because it'll save you a lot of time and then you can hop the bus and do some sightseeing right away. Although I did notice that near very near the Victoria Station which is some people I've heard mixed reviews, but I didn't think it was so bad. The Y MCA actually was very clean and and very hospitable and a good place but I would I would just try the tourist station right there. Britain has probably the best tourist lodging advice of any country in Europe. They're really well organized. They know what they're doing you might in your case. See if you can talk to people who've had the grant before invariably if you're in a country long enough you find out cheaper places, so don't sign a long lease look around for the first couple weeks find someplace cheap to stay right away and then look a little bit for something longer longer term. Yeah. Hello. You're on the air with Your question. (00:38:30) Hi, we're considering going to Barbados and wondered about the snorkeling there. (00:38:38) I always have to say I haven't been everywhere. I've never been to Barbados. I've done some snorkeling in the Caribbean and it's wonderful. But but that's a thing that a guidebook can tell you. I would I would check a good Caribbean guidebook and there are a number that are Geared for for people who are athletic or Sports minded and I would I would simply go to the library or to a good book shelf in a trying to travel oriented books or (00:39:01) are there certain things that you would purchase (00:39:04) there? In Barbados human again, I don't know what the handicrafts are there. But or whether whether the duty-free stores are going to be I'm going to give you enough of a savings if you are buying do if anybody's going abroad in their thinking of buying perfume and lots of liquor and and liquor check the prices here before you leave the savings are not always as good as they seem (00:39:31) and as first language, I believe that's English. I speak English. (00:39:36) But yeah, good guy book will help you on this one pack some suntan oil. Yes pack a good one with a good sunblock. Does that answer your (00:39:44) question? Yes, you don't really know anymore about that that she's (00:39:49) about that Island. I've never been there go to the library right? Thanks for your call though. And enjoy your trip. Hello. You're on the air. What's your travel question? (00:39:59) Yes, I'm going to West Africa in Durban and I need about eight multiple-entry visas and I was wondering if you knew anything about Visa expediters (00:40:09) or yes, again the advice that I gave a minute ago on on talking to a travel agent and using a passport of our Visa service in Washington. That's the best bet. I went to Africa a few years ago. And that's what we did. We just sent the passport out to one of these these organizations in Washington and they went from Embassy the embassy and got the (00:40:25) passport. (00:40:29) I would allow a good week for for out and back in terms of mail and about a week out there. If you're closer than that, you might have you might have some real trouble. Okay, does that answer your question? I would allow more time than that. But Brad is a minimum. (00:40:42) Well, I will allow more time. Okay wandering on a curiosity? Okay, (00:40:47) and I hope you call the CDC. I think you're going to need some shots. We only have about 10 minutes left. This is going by so quickly. I'll give out the numbers. If you're in the metro area to 276 thousand outside the metro area one eight hundred two, four two two eight two eight. We're talking to Katherine Watson, who is the travel editor at the Star Tribune newspaper. Hello. You're on the air. What travel question do you have? (00:41:12) Hi? Hi Catherine, my fiancé and I are considering going to Spain this June late June early, July for our honeymoon this thing here and we don't have a lot of money. So we were trying to figure out a low-budget way to do it. I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about how big a price difference there is between offseason and on season and I think one of our bigger concerns is finding Smaller less expensive hotels are places to stay ahead of time and what your recommendations might be with it. (00:41:46) The small ones are are found when you're there either through a tourist office like the ones we've been mentioning a train stations or just walking around town or a neighborhood that you like the what I usually do. What we both do we discovered is make a reservation for the first night you're coming in first couple nights. If you want to it's your honeymoon you want to sort of relax a little bit and also for the last night before you leave so you don't have to spend any of the initial the first two days when you might have jet lag or the last day when you're probably rushing to catch the plane trying to find a hotel that's just awful. I would book those and I wouldn't put anything in between Spain is still one of the bargain countries of Europe in terms of offseason on season. I can't tell you the price difference. It's bigger for airfare and it's bigger for for large hotels small ones usually don't change much at all. What about Portugal that's cheaper yet. Really? Okay and that Night to you you want to have time to get that last food item, you know, you won't get at home or the last special dinner. That's right. So I'd booked to from from here but to book from the u.s. To be bookable from the us a hotel has to have a whole lot of electronic equipment and be more organized than tiny. Tiny pensee owns and been breakfast. So that's why you can't book in from here. The the big ones are set up to deal with travel agencies and and callers but the small ones aren't what about sleeping accommodations in Europe you how do we booked a room? I found that most rooms you have to specify the Macho Man Macho demand Manali bedroom or yeah, you want to say there are two of us. We need separate beds or there two of us. We need one bit you need to say that they have more options for single Travelers than we do and that's and that's actually good. But yeah, you do need to specify that. I spent one of my first weeks overseas with it with a girlfriend sleeping in what was I think a a youth bed? With slightly larger than the win and we were so broken Paris. We couldn't afford anything else and it was it was a nightmare. I think we might still be able to get back to these. Hello. Hello. You're on the air. (00:43:49) Hi. I have two small preschool. Children. One is 4 + 1 is 1 I wondered if you had any recommendations for good travel options that don't require a lot of logging of miles in this (00:44:01) area. You mean places you can take them or ways you can get them (00:44:04) their places. I can take (00:44:06) them. Okay with the one-year-old that's kind of a problem because they're really not interested in too much except whatever their whatever they want to break into. The four-year-old is probably going to be interested in Hands-On museums anything that that you can you can physically learn about and there are there the science museum here is wonderful as you probably know the touch and see room Touchin touch room. Whatever at the Bell museum is another good one and any small Hands-On Museum out State and I think you could call him in a sort of tourist office in st. Paul and ask More specifically, I can't be much more specific than that, but I'd keep the trip short go out and do one thing and come back. If you're going to stay overnight do plan on doing one thing and a break one thing and another treat something they can't do all day and they'll let you know that thank you for the call. Hello. You're on the air. (00:44:59) Hello. I am we are planning a trip to Istanbul Turkey and we listed our travel agent the other day and he is doing some research on flights and he mentioned a consolidator or something and I didn't have sense enough to ask him what that (00:45:17) meant. Well do ask him you can still do that consolidators in this is a definition that is pretty loose consolidators tend to buy a big box of tickets on usually on on schedule aircraft rather than chart is they buy them up and because they're buying a whole bunch of them. They can get them cheaper and then they pass the savings on to the public that That used to be something that you could access easily on your own and nobody else could and now travel agents are able to tap into that. He what he's what he's telling you is he's going to try and get you a better rate as make sure that you you find out what airline and isn't an established airline. That would be my main concern but if it's travel agent from here, you're probably not going to have much trouble. Hmm. So it could be a Northwest or TWA or whatever. Hello. You're on the air. Hi. (00:46:03) Yeah, this is Radio. Yeah. Oh you're I'm on your on your on I wanted to say that people single people who are going to go to London can stay over at Essex Gardens. And so the whole area is full of these houses with rooms for rent. I paid Thirty to sixty dollars a week, which is rather cheap. My question is why is the ticket from New York to Minneapolis far more expensive than the Los Angeles to Minneapolis and in New York is half the distance. (00:46:30) It depends on what the airlines can charge. I tend to be kind of cynical about this whole thing if there's a lot of demand sometimes prices go down. Times they go up because people really want to go there. It depends on what what the airlines are doing and they pretty much can do what they want. I think things were better before we deregulated this industry, but it's it's it's the same if we fly from here for example to visit my stepson in Milwaukee if we fly directly to Milwaukee at cost us a lot more than going to Chicago renting a car and driving north. It's it depends and that case it depends on demand lots more people want to go to Chicago and walkies a special deal interest and then try try flying from here to someplace in north dakota, if you really want to want to price difference, but that's an airline your line with him. Hmm. It's one of those things. I've never been able to figure out actually and always seems that it's the ticket you want. Yeah. Yeah, right and when you want to buy it, right? Hello, you're on the air. (00:47:23) Hi. My husband is going to be taking a business trip to Istanbul in May and we're both fairly experienced foreign Travelers. We love to travel but we've never been to Turkey and now we have an 18 month old son and worrying about the wondering about the feasibility of taking him (00:47:37) along. I how long will you be gone? (00:47:44) Oh, we're coming. We don't really don't know. It could be gone, you know a week or two weeks (00:47:48) or for a short trip. I'd leave him home. Just yeah it is. This is not fair to babies. But I think the same thing applies to pets a lot of people like to take pets in their trips to it's just too hard. He will be jet-lagged. Everybody gets jet-lagged adults tend to adapt better because they can tell themselves. They need to sightsee. You will have him sleeping at funny times two weeks is just long enough, so he'd be adapting and then you'd have to come home again for for a week or two. I leave him with his grandparents or with a sitter that you (00:48:17) trust apart from the actual trip think of turkey. I mean, is that what would that be something that a baby could adapt to (00:48:25) or yes, and in a lot of countries turkey included babies are wonderful entry points into the culture because everybody wants to come up and touch the baby most most tourists don't take little children with them. So you'd have that that kind of connection here. You with that but he's no longer being bottle-fed. He's eating regular Foods. You want to take his foods with you and that gets to be a hassle to Turkey is one of the places we're going to want want to watch drinking water and for yourselves as well and and fresh fruits and vegetables will be a problem salads will be a problem. I think there's some health concerns again. If you call the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, that is a question to ask them and ask your pediatrician. Okay, we have less than a minute. I don't even think we can get another Colt right? Let's try one more. So, okay, let's go for it. What's your question quickly? Oh (00:49:14) good. I'm disabled and when I drive I need some special decorations on the car, but I'm wondering I had a time if I can set this up, you know with the tread with the rental whose car rental (00:49:32) places. Sometimes you can I would check with the travel agency. I would check with one that specializes in disabled travel and there are a number of organizations that that can put you in touch with one but I would call well ahead of time and see what you can arrange and quickly for all the people who didn't get their questions answered what next Library where else Library called me at work. I don't give the phone read the newspapers Tribune and talk to talk to a travel agent. They can help you more than most people think. Okay Catherine. Thanks very much. When is your next article Sunday? Okay thinking I can't remember to Sunday Sunday somewhere something. All right. Thank you very much. And that wraps up the midday program and now we go to the news room for this update.