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Category: Air Travel

United Airlines gaffe: get 'em while they're hot

God bless the United Airlines worker responsible for this faux pas.

Around noon today, tickets sold for seats on Chicago-based United started selling without the fuel surcharge, which amounts up to $150 on some domestic round-trip tickets. According to FareCompare.com, the problem won't correct itself until 8 p.m. tonight on United's computers. So travelers can take advantage of the unexpected deal until about midnight, when travel reservations systems have caught up to the airfare changes.

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Category: Festivals

Tulips and a touch of Europe north of the border

Spring may be gray and rainy here in Southeast Michigan but just 400 miles to the northeast, Canada's capital city is exploding in red, orange, yellow, purple, and pink.

Ottawa is home to the Canadian Tulip Festival and claims to be the world's largest such festival with more than 3 million tulips in bloom throughout the capital region. Some 600,000 visitors from North America, Europe and Asia attend the 18-day festival, which also includes an International Pavilion with food and entertainment from around the globe.

Held each year since 1953, the Canadian Tulip Festival commemorates a gift of 100,000 tulip bulbs given to our northern neighbor by Queen Juliana of the Netherlands at the end of World War II. The flowers were a thank-you gift for not only keeping the royal family safe during the war but also for the role Canadian troops played in freeing the Netherlands from German occupation.

Canada may not be the bargain it used to be for Americans, but it's a lot cheaper than traveling across the pond these days. And Ottawa, like Montreal and Quebec City, exudes European ambience.

The Canadian Tulip Festival continues through May 19. Check out Ottawa Tourism for deals on overnight packages.

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Category: Celebrate Michigan

Celebrate 'Year of the Car' with summer auto events

On Sept. 16, 1908, Billy Durant founded General Motors. On Oct. 1, 1908, Henry Ford produced his first Model T. Skip forward 100 years and it's time to mark these milestones by celebrating "2008: Year of the Car."

For Metro Detroiters and car-lovers everywhere, that means a summerlong auto-tourism festival featuring more than 100 activities at nearly 60 different locations in southeast Michigan, including Model T rides at Dearborn's Greenfield Village.

The centerpiece is August Autopalooza, with everything from the popular Woodward Dream Cruise on Aug. 16 and the Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix from Aug. 28-31 to new events such as a downtown car festival, Cruisin' MotorCities from Aug. 8-15 in Foxtown. Scheduled the week before the Woodward Dream Cruise, it kicks off with a free Detroit Festival of Speed and Style car show from Aug. 8-10 at Campus Martius Park.

To find out more about these and other car-related festivities, check out The Detroit News' events listings or the Motor Cities National Heritage Area, call (313)720-9982 or e-mail bchapin@motorcities.org.

Category: Thrill rides

Experience Niagara's Fury and the Behemoth, new chills and thrills in Canada

Theme parks aren't alone in developing new, high-tech attractions to lure first-time and returning visitors.

Travelers to Niagara Falls, Ont., this summer may experience -- virtually -- the powerful forces that created the majestic falls in a new, $7-million immersive-style attraction called Niagara's Fury.

Scheduled to debut Memorial Day weekend at newly-renovated Table Rock, the attraction, in a 360-degree, stand-up theater, uses visuals of massive, calving glaciers that were shot with technology previously used only in satellites and medicine, according to a Niagara Parks Commission spokesman. Multi-sensory special effects include a floor that trembles beneath visitors' feet, roiling waves and a 35-degree drop in temperature in just seconds. Check it out here.

Also in Ontario , at Canada 's Wonderland amusement park near Toronto, Behemoth unleashed a torrent of screams when it opened last week. The 230-foot-tall, $26-million thrill ride, with a dramatic 75 degree angle drop, ranks as Canada 's tallest, fastest and longest roller coaster. Early reviewers rave about the coaster rush known as "airtime" and say riding Behemoth gave them a flying sensation.

See more here.

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Category: On TV

After traveling vicariously through 'Survivor,' it's time to hit the road

I've had a dirty little secret for years now, but something happened Thursday night that's making me reveal it: I'm still watching "Survivor." I know, it's way too long after it went stale and early-season characters like Richard Hatch and local chef Keith Famie made for some intriguing group dynamics and psychological twists.

As a travel writer, I'm still watching it for the luscious scenery of distant sun-drenched lands such as Micronesia, the Marquesas, Cook Island, Palau.

But last night, I was just floored when our hometown guy, Eastern Michigan University student Erik Reichenbach, let himself be played bigtime by four conniving women and actually handed over his hard-won immunity necklace. Now he's going back to Hell (Michigan) where he works as an ice cream scooper. I guess that's where he belongs after such a boneheaded move.

The fact that I even care about any of this simply underscores how much I need to stop traveling vicariously through "Survivor" and hit the road myself.

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Category: Air Travel

What the ...? Spirit starts another saucy sale

You have to give it to the marketing folks over at Spirit Airlines for having a decent command of irreverent pop culture references.

This week brings us the WTF sale, a play off the Internet shorthand lingo for "What the ____?"

Spirit's playing it off as the "World Travelers Fare" sale. This follows other recent promotions like the M.I.L.F. sale and the Threesome sale.

Another personal favorite: the Mullet Sale. Yes, it was a reference to the ill-fated hairstyle. The pitch? A business fare sale with the tagline "Business in the front, party in the back."

Here's hoping the LOL sale isn't next.

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Category: Celebrate Michigan

Family travel in Michigan: New guide leads the way around the mitten

Few writers know Michigan's kid-friendly spots better than Ellyce Field, who has covered the family entertainment scene for The Detroit News for years. Now, she has packaged dozens of them together in a user-friendly book that could be a bible for road-tripping families interested in vacationing around the state this summer.

From Ann Arbor's Hands-On Museum to little-known parks and zoos, Field not only describes fun things to do at more than 60 Michigan spots but also offers dining suggestions and other tips that could turn a so-so outing into one for the memory books.

For a chance to win a copy of "Michigan Family Field Trips: Fun Sites for Kids," please send me an e-mail at srpollack@detnews.com. Happy family travels!

If you want to chat with Field in person, she will discuss where to take the kids this summer and sign copies of her book at noon Saturday at Art Van Furniture in Shelby Township and at 7 p.m. June 10 at the Royal Oak Public Library.

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Category: Places to stay

Wanted: live-in lighthouse keepers

Here's a great deal to remember for next summer: A monthlong stay in Traverse City for just $600.

Your accommodations are modest: a simple timber-frame house with a short wooden tower -- the Old Mission Point Lighthouse, which has stood at the tip of an 18-mile-long peninsula since 1870.

As a volunteer lighthouse keeper, you'll have some obligations, of course. They include light maintenance work, answering visitors' questions and running a soon-to-open gift shop.

Response to this volunteer opportunity has been "unreal," said Mike Norton, a spokesman for the Traverse City Convention & Visitors Bureau. So much so that the lighthouse, which opens to visitors for the first time this summer, is booked from July through April next year.

Until recently, the structure was used as a private home. With its opening Memorial Day weekend, visitors will be able to explore historical displays in several rooms and climb the tower for panoramic views of Grand Traverse Bay.

The volunteer program is based on a similar effort begun several years ago at the Grand Traverse Lighthouse.

To learn more about how the program works, check out Grand Traverse Lighthouse.

Category: Air Travel

Delta to shutter nine Crown Room Clubs

Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines, which recently announced plans to merge with Northwest Airlines, announced earlier today that it would shutter nine of its Crown Room Clubs.

It's a cost-savings move that will remove the luxurious lounges from mostly secondary airports.

Northwest's WorldClubs members, this affects you as well, since Delta's clubs are part of a reciprocal sharing agreement between the two airlines.

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Category: Health & fitness

Yearning for serenity? Try Yoga on the Rocks

I don't do yoga and, with a broken ankle, I can't do yoga. But if I ever did do yoga I'd want to do Moab Yoga on the Rocks, joining getaways this fall in the vast, sagebrush-, juniper- and cactus-studded Moab Desert in southern Utah. Pictured on the cover of the March issue of National Geographic Adventure, the serene retreats in the Needles District of Canyonlands National Park include two daily yoga sessions, guided hiking tours, camping and organic meals for groups of five or fewer participants. Get inspired (and information) here