February 16 is Chinese New Year and marks the start of the Year of the Dog - one of the 12 signs of the Chinese zodiac. Unlike Western astrology, each sign lasts for a whole year and each year takes the name of an animal whose characteristics color and influence everything that happens for the next 12 months.
The United States Travel Advisory for Uruguay offered a not very encouraging description of the country for foreign visitors but anyhow is well distanced from most of the rest of Latin American, and neighbors.
This Wednesday, the first ever budget flight from London to South America departs from Gatwick airport. Fares on the 14-hour Norwegian Air Shuttle flight to Buenos Aires start from £259 one-way. The seats are tightly packed and food and luggage cost extra, but the no-frills model of flying, so well established on short-haul routes, is becoming increasingly common on intercontinental flights.
The winners of the 2018 Cruise Critic UK Cruisers’ Choice Awards were announced today. The awards name the most popular cruise ships of the year, based entirely on UK reviews posted to the Cruise Critic website. The site boasts the largest online cruise community in the world with more than 350,000 cruise reviews, covering approximately 500 of the most popular cruise ships.
Europe welcomed 671 million international tourist arrivals in 2017, an outstanding 8% growth compared to 2016 (+2%), consolidating for the eighth consecutive year, its position as the leading destination worldwide.
The CEO of the European Tourism Association, ETOA, Tom Jenkins told Parliament that Brexit is already harming the inbound travel industry, damaging productivity and asked for assurances that hiring non-UK EU workers remains free from bureaucratic burdens, since language skills are particularly important in the industry.
Europe is once again a top travel destination for Americans. Five European countries, Italy, Ireland, France, Iceland and the United Kingdom, comprised half of the top 10 spots for vacation plans in 2018.
The Peruvian-Argentine consortium Kuntur Wasi said that it plans to sue Peru in an international arbitration court after failing to reach a deal with the government over the cancellation of its US$525 million Chinchero airport project.
Ushuaia in the extreme south of Argentina is experiencing one of the busiest weeks of the current cruise season with six vessels and thousands of visitors calling at the capital of Tierra del Fuego. This includes the Emerald Princess, which is the largest to visit the End of the World city and will be completing its third call this season.
The Falkland Islands government and the Ministry of Defense have agreed to address the challenge of rotor winds, which have become a serious problem for the operations at the Mount Pleasant Complex.