Vacation Time

Those that can will already have packed their bags and be ready to take off for someplace else — anywhere else — as soon as they can get away. Holy Week — or Easter Week — is on the horizon. Schools close from this weekend until April 9. Government and banks only get next Thursday and Friday off, but anyone with clout will not be around even before then. Finding a hotel room by the beach may be nearly impossible, but the big cities should be more enjoyable than ever.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Tianguis Ends

The Tianguis tourism trade show came to an end on Wednesday. Rodolfo López-Negrete, head of the Mexico Tourism Board, described it as the most successful ever. For the first time in 37 years, the event was held outside of Acapulco. This year Puerto Vallarta and the neighboring Nayarit Riviera played host. López-Negrete said 7,500 people from some 30 countries attended, and that 23,000 appointments were arranged between buyers of tourism services and sellers.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Maya ‘Disneyland’

Work is nearly two-thirds completed in Yucatan on what has been called the Maya Answer to Disneyland. Journalists and others recently were invited to see the Great Museum of the Maya World and the Palace of Maya Civilization, located between Merida and Chichen Itza. Both will be enormous and are expected to increase travel to the area.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Economy blamed for cruise cancelations

Although cruise lines says worries about crime led to their avoiding Mazatlan, Oralia Rice, director of the state tourism office, said it really is a matter of economics. She declared that stops in Mazatlan cost cruise lines more than at other ports and that they earn more by selling shore excursions elsewhere. And while gang warfare is a serious problem in Mexico, Rice maintained that there have been no incidents in Mazatlan involving cruise ship passengers. Rice replaced Antonio Ibarra, the director of the state tourism office whose murder never has been explained.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Tianguis Starts Today

Now that the Pope has flown off to Cuba, President Felipe Calderon is scheduled to officially open the Tianguis tourism trade show this morning. Participants began arriving over the weekend in Puerto Vallarta and the Riviera Nayarit, joint hosts of the event. This is the first time since its inception in 1976 that the Tianguis has not been held in Acapulco. There have been reports of disorganization and confusion, but it can be hoped that all problems are being solved.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Pope Arrives Today

Benedict XVI is scheduled to fly to Leon in Guanajuato this afternoon, and while the visit will cost authorities dearly, the papal visit is expected to generate something like $80 million for the state. Security measures are tight, and while there may be some protests about papal attitudes toward abortion, homosexuality and pedophial, no trouble is forecast. His Holiness may meet with four candidates participating in the July presidential election. The 84-year-old Pope on Monday flies on to Cuba.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Obama daughter spring breaks in Oaxaca

In the care of a reported two dozen U.S. Secret Service officers as well as scores of Mexican security people, Malia Obama and some members of her high school class are enjoying the spring recess in Oaxaca City, noted for its viceregal era monuments and nearby pre-Hispanic ruins. Although Oaxaca is not on the list of places the U.S. Government advises its citizens to avoid, the visit was criticized by Rick Santorum, who hopes to be the presidential nominee of the Republican Party in the United States.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

The Shakes

No deaths, few injuries and minimal property damage were reported in the wake of a strong (7.8 Richter) earthquake that rattled Mexico from Acapulco to Veracruz at noon on Tuesday. This is the most powerful earthquake since 1985. The fact that it did little harm surprised experts, who should be advancing theories as to why for months to come.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

More Violence, More Tourism

That is the headline Latin America columnist (Miami Herald) Andres Oppenheimer gave to his latest report. He noted that in spite of the nearly 50,000 killed in the war against organized crime, travel to Mexico was up by 2 percent last year and keeps growing. This Oppenheimer credits to easier access to the country: anyone with a U.S. visa automatically qualifies for a Mexico visa. This means more Russians, South Americans and even Chinese. Travel from the United States itself may be off slightly, but a slow economy, not fear, is blamed.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

The Salzburg festivals: Summer celebrations in a World Heritage city

The Austrian city of Salzburg lives up to its reputation as one the world’s great festival cities with the summer long Salzburg Festival season offering more than 4,000 music and theater events.

Beyond the festival events themselves, the medieval streets and the squares of Salzburg’s historic city center comes alive with visitors thronging the sidewalk cafes and restaurants to be entertained by all manner of buskers.

The Salzburg festivals

The Salzburg Whitsun Festival
May 25 to 28

The festival season starts with the Salzburg Whitsun Festival, which takes the theme : Cleopatra — In the Labyrinth of Love and Power and opens with a new production of the opera Giulio Cesare in Egitto by Georg Friedrich Handel.

There will also be a concert performance of Jules Massenet’s opera Cléopâtre, with the Salzburg Mozarteum Orchestra, and ends with Cleopatra and the Asp, a work by Rodion Shchedrin. Visit: www.salzburgfestival.at.

The Salzburg Literature Festival
May 30 to June 3

The fifth Salzburg Literature Festival has a program of readings and discussions for all ages, held in historic settings within the old city UNESCO World Heritage Site. Visit : www.literaturfest-salzburg.at.

sommerszene

July 5 to 22

Sommerszene, Salzburg’s international dance and theater festival, offers free performances of contemporary dance and theatre productions by young, international and elite performers. Visit : www.sommerszene.net.

The Salzburg Festival

July 20 July to Sept. 2

The 2012 Salzburg Festival, itself, runs for six weeks instead of the previous five, and will see 232 opera, concert and theater performances in 14 city venues, ranging from Mozart to modern and traditional to experimental.

The Festival opening on July 20 and 21 July is a street festival of performances, musical events and the chance to meet festival stars and get behind the scenes views. Visit : www.salzburg.info.

Summer ball

The 2012 festival also sees the staging of a ball in the Summer Riding School as a fitting finale.
Visit : www.salzburgfestival.at.

The Salzburg Festival will be supported by a program of performances, between July 16 and Aug. 25, by the Mozarteum University’s International Summer Academy and the Salzburg International Summer Academy for the Visual Arts. Visit : www.summeracademymozarteum.at and www.summeracademy.at.

Salzburg Festival Nights

The Salzburg Festival Nights, which start on July 27, on Chapter Square will broadcast audio concert performances daily from 6 p.m. and films of Festival productions on the big screen from 8 p.m.

The open air atmosphere of these to the backdrop of Chapter Square at the foot of Hohensalzburg Fortress makes the Festival Nights a unique summer experience. Visit : www.festspielnaechte.at.

Also enjoy the following:

Afternoons in the Hedge Theatre

The traditional open-air afternoons in the Hedge Theater, Mirabell Gardens take place every Friday from the end of June to the end of August, and has dance groups, singers and musicians performing.

Promenade and Fountain Concerts

The Promenade and Fountain brass band concerts in the Mirabell Gardens take place from May to August on a Sunday (10:30 to 11:30 a.m.) and Wednesday (8:30 to 9:30 p.m.).

Street festivals

Salzburg’s street festivals are another very popular fixture and include the Kai District Festival (June 15 and 16) and the Linzergasse Festival (June 29 and 30).

The Steingasse Festival, on Aug. 24 and 25 has a Mediterranean flair at the foot of the Kapuzinerberg, with Italian songs, passionate tango, Schrammel music and fine cuisine, plays and some bizarre performances.

New exhibits, tours, hotel, events coming to classic destination Cody, Wyoming

Cody, Wyoming’s summer season kicks off June 1 when attractions like the nightly rodeo and fun traditions like the gunfighter shootout draw visitors from all over the world. This summer visitors are in for a few surprises too, with two new museum exhibits, a tour, new hotel and roster of special events.

“Cody shakes off the winter blues with gusto, and by the time June 1 arrives, every attraction, restaurant, lodge and museum exhibit has been spiffed up in anticipation of the thousands of visitors who come each summer to see the town Buffalo Bill built,” said Claudia Wade, executive director of the Park County Travel Council, the marketing arm for Buffalo Bill’s Cody/Yellowstone Country. “With summer-season standbys like the Cody Nite Rodeo and Dan Miller’s Cowboy Music Revue as well as the new offerings, our visitors will find plenty of ways to spend their days with us.”

Exhibits

Heart Mountain Interpretive Center — This will be the first full summer season for the Heart Mountain Interpretive Center, which opened last August. The center is situated at the site of the Heart Mountain Japanese-American Internment Camp, which housed more than 14,000 internees during World War II, making it the third-largest city in Wyoming. The center’s poignant exhibits are intended to leave visitors with a better understanding of the challenges faced by the Americans who were interned there. Heart Mountain is one of the few Japanese-American internment camps with ruins still standing.

Buffalo Bill Historical Center — After a $2.75 million renovation and reinstallation, Buffalo Bill Historical Center will reopen its inaugural museum, the Buffalo Bill Museum, on May 19. The new Buffalo Bill Museum will focus on the life of the famous sharpshooter, showman and town founder. The family-friendly museum will include interactive exhibits and a “Storybook Garden” with life-sized cutouts of the town’s legendary leader. A grand opening event is scheduled for July 3. Buffalo Bill Historical Center is comprised of five separate museums, also including the Draper Museum of Natural History, Plains Indian Museum, Firearms Museum and Whitney Museum of Western Art. Admission to Buffalo Bill Historical Center is $18 for adults, $16 for seniors 65 and older, $14 for students, $10 for children ages 6 through 17 and free for children under 6. The admission price includes visitation for two consecutive days.

Tour

Cody Trolley’s new tour, “An Agricultural History: The Heart Mountain Tour” travels through the fertile agricultural farmlands of the Big Horn Basin and stops at the Heart Mountain Interpretive Center, where passengers will have 60 minutes to wander through the exhibits. The two-hour tour will introduce travelers to the crops and agricultural methods used by farmers in the region as well as the rich history and legends of the area. The tour is offered at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. daily June 1 through Sept. 22. A 10-passenger minimum is needed. Cody Trolley Tours also offers an entertaining one-hour tour of Cody three times a day during the summer season.

Lodging

Best Western Ivy Suites. Opened this month, this new 70-room, 22-suite hotel is situated in the heart of the town and within walking distance of many of its key attractions. The hotel includes a restaurant and lounge, indoor pool and hot tub, free in-room wireless Internet access, fitness room and meeting facilities.

Yellowstone Country is comprised of the towns of Cody, Powell and Meeteetse as well as the valley east of Yellowstone National Park.

The area of Park County is called “Buffalo Bill’s Cody/Yellowstone Country” because it was the playground of Buffalo Bill Cody himself. Buffalo Bill founded the town of Cody in 1896, and the entire region was driven and is still heavily influenced by the vision of the colonel. Today its broad streets, world-class museum Buffalo Bill Historical Center and thriving western culture host more than 1 million visitors annually.

The Park County Travel Council website (www.yellowstonecountry.org) lists information about vacation packages, special events, guide services, weather and more. Travelers wishing to arrange a vacation also may call the Park County Travel Council at (800) 393-2639.

Cheap airlines not so cheap

A recent study indicates that Mexico’s new, supposedly low-fare airlines no longer offer bargain prices. Interjet, Volaris and VivaAerobus took off only about five or six years ago. All benefitted when financial problems grounded Mexicana and Aviacsa. All have been ordering more jets, adding routes and charging higher prices. Some argue that taxes, which can add as much as 50 percent to the cost of a ticket, are to blame for the high cost of a ticket. Meanwhile, prospering Aeroméxico has added a fourth daily flight to its Mexico City-New York City (JFK) route.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Caribbean Beaches

Rescue efforts are being programed to save the beaches along the Riviera Maya. Sugary sand that never grows too hot to walk on long has been a major attraction on the Riviera as well as in Cancun. However, in recent years beaches have grown as much as 50 percent smaller. There are many theories as to why, but whatever the cause, authorities have announced they plan to bring in more sand. From where, they did not say.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Progress Report

Mexico’s two newest states, Quintana Roo (Cancun, etc.) and Baja California Sur (Los Cabos), lead the nation as tourism destinations. Both became states in 1972 when tourism development ended their dependency as federal territories. Mexico City in the now self-governing Federal District, ranks ahead of the two new states as a travel estination and might well become state number 32 sometime during this decade.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Mayas

This being Maya Year (and the final year, according to the Maya calendar), the National Commission for the Development of Indigenous People is preparing 15 eco-tourism projects that are expected to attract 52 million visitors, most of them probably residents of Yucatan. Details on these projects are available from the Yucatan Tourism Office, yucatan.travel/en.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Dazzling daffodils herald spring in the Litchfield Hills

The “oohs and ahs” and great photos are guaranteed. Hundreds of thousands of daffodils carpeting more than 15 acres of woodland are a blooming bonanza each spring for visitors to Laurel Ridge Farm, an unspoiled oasis in Northfield, a village in the township of Litchfeild, in Connecticut’s Litchfield Hills. The wild natural landscape of gently sloping woodland, fields and aged stonewalls overlooks a small lake dotted with two tiny islands. The land and one of the islands is completely covered with gold and white blossoms, a glorious welcome to the season for about four weeks, usually beginning by mid-April. The property is private but is opened to the public free in April and May thanks to the generosity of one family.

The story began in 1941 when Remy and Virginia Morosani moved to the Northfield section of Litchfield to begin what became known as Laurel Ridge Farm. The pasture across the road from their home was too rocky to support crops, but they were taken with the rugged beauty. In the fall of 1941, they planted 10,000 daffodil bulbs in the rocky valley bottom. Daffodil bulbs multiply themselves, often doubling. It takes hard work to separate the extra bulbs and replant them in the fall, but the Morosanis persevered, digging and replanting each year from the mid-1940s to the 1960s, expanding the original two acres to 15. By that time the fantastic annual display was attracting visitors. In the mid-1960s, the couple formed the Laurel Ridge Foundation, a private foundation, to preserve the daffodils. The foundation is managed and supported by Remy and Virginia Morosani’s descendants.

Visitors are welcome to walk on the paths and take photographs on the property on Wigwam Road, off Rt. 254 in April and May. The grounds are open from sunrise to sunset. Strollers are allowed, but picnics and pets are not permitted. Visitors are asked to park carefully so as not to block traffic on Wigwam Road. Parking is not permitted on the property. For more information, see litchfielddaffodils.com.

For more information on the daffodils and other spring gardens nearby and a free copy of UNWIND, a 112-page color guide to lodging, dining and all the attractions in the Litchfield Hills, contact the Western Connecticut Visitors Bureau, PO Box 968, Litchfield, CT 06759, (860) 567-4506, or visit its web site at www.litchfieldhills.com.

Toluca Airport

VivaAerobus is expected to become the fifth airline operating scheduled flights from Toluca, the alternative airport for Mexico City. United, Spirit, Interjet and Volaris are the others. Toluca is closer to western Mexico City than is the capital’s own airport, but it lacks connecting flights. As a result, newer, smaller airlines shifted operations to Mexico City International. Flights out of Toluca, however, usually are much cheaper.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Magic Towns

The Federal Tourism Ministry is racing to reach its goal of having designated 52 localities as Pueblos Mágicos by the end of the year. Small, often unknown communities considered to have tourism potential get the nod, and, on occasion, places such as Taxco and Patzcuaro. With the nod comes a federal largess, but only if the towns themselves paint designated buildings (the government supplies the paint), repave rutted streets, clear out peddlers with stalls on sidewalks and so on. No statistics have been released that I have seen explaining whether towns have complied and whether or not they have benefitted.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers

Airlines

Aeroméxico management has announced that the carrier will invest $2.5 billion as it adds 27 aircraft to its fleet during the next three years. The assumption seems to be that Mexicana never will fly again. A bankruptcy court revealed that $300 million is ready to be invested in Mexicana once authorization to fly is given by the Transportation Ministry. The ministry says no authorization will be given until the money actually is invested. Much of the cash may be claimed by debtors, including those who hold tickets they never were able to use.

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Jimm Budd

Reporting From Mexico City

Member of the Society of American Travel Writers