Fleet Invades NYC: From River to Square

Fleet Invades NYC: From River to Square






The fleet is in. And it's all over town. Manhattan's been invaded for Fleet Week 2009. Ships are arriving and everyone's enjoying the sights of New York City, from the Hudson River to Times Square, some even waiting in line to try to get stand- by tickets for Phantom of the Opera. Two of them, Manning and Platon were kind enough to pose with Yankees and Mets caps (can we get more New York?) and Lance Corporal Pace saluted in the center of Foley Square.

From Times Square...to the shores of the Hudson River it's Fleet Week 2009.

And on Memorial Day , remember our troops!

source: cnn

Bush: It's 'liberating' to be out of office

AP – Former President George W. Bush speaks at a reception for high school seniors receiving the 2009 Chase …

ARTESIA, N.M. – It was a humbling moment for the former commander in chief: President George W. Bush was walking former first dog Barney in his new Dallas neighborhood when it stopped in a neighbor's yard for relief.

"And there I was, former president of the United States of America, with a plastic bag on my hand," he told a group of graduating high school students in New Mexico on Thursday. "Life is returning back to normal."

Bush, in one of his few public appearances since leaving office in January, told the students that leaving office lifted a heavy burden.

"I no longer feel that great sense of responsibility that I had when I was in the Oval Office. And frankly, it's a liberating feeling," he told seniors from Artesia High School.

He received a warm welcome in the southeastern New Mexico community, the Roswell Daily Record reported. Bush declined interviews and no video cameras were allowed inside.

The crowd gave him multiple standing ovations and after his speech he was presented with a sculpture of an eagle taking flight from a torch. The sculpture will be dedicated at City Hall on Memorial Day in honor of Bush and America's veterans.

Bush invoked an Iraq veteran's story to motivate the students to continue their educations. He described visiting Army Staff Sgt. Christian Bagge, a soldier from Oregon who lost both legs in combat.

When he visited Bagge at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Bush told him that someday Bagge would get out of his bed and run.

Then, one day, an aide went into Bush's office and said Bagge was waiting on the South Lawn and wanted to go running with the president.

If Bagge could do that, Bush told the students: "You can go to college."

Bush said he hoped President Barack Obama's administration would be successful. He also said he was writing a book about some of the difficult decisions he made while in office

source: AP press

'whole-body imaging' machines : Airport security bares all, or does it?

Airport security bares all, or does it?

• Story Highlights
• Privacy advocates to launch campaign against 'whole-body imaging' machines
  
• They say airport security device gives 'virtual strip search' and needs regulation
  
• TSA: Technology saves time, improves safety and is welcomed 99 percent of time
  
• One critic calls investment 'stupid,' part of 'cover your ass' politics in post-9/11 world

Privacy advocates plan to call on the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to suspend use of "whole-body imaging," the airport security technology that critics say performs "a virtual strip search" and produces "naked" pictures of passengers, CNN has learned.

A TSA employee, shown from the back, as he stands in an airport whole-body imaging machine.

1 of 2

The national campaign, which will gather signatures from organizations and relevant professionals, is set to launch this week with the hope that it will go "viral," said Lillie Coney, associate director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, which plans to lead the charge.

"People need to know what's happening, with no sugar-coating and no spinning," said Coney, who is also coordinator of the Privacy Coalition, a conglomerate of 42 member organizations. She expects other groups to sign on in the push for the technology's suspension until privacy safeguards are in place.

Right now, without regulations on what the Transportation Security Administration does with this technology, she said, "We don't have the policy to hold them to what they say. They're writing their own rule book at this point."

The machines "detect both metallic and nonmetallic threat items to keep passengers safe," said Kristin Lee, spokeswoman for TSA, in a written statement. "It is proven technology, and we are highly confident in its detection capability." Watch a video of the body-imaging scans »

Late last month, freshman Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, introduced legislation to ban these machines. Of concern to him, Coney and others is not just what TSA officials say, it's also what they see. iReport: Tell us what you think about these scanners

The sci-fi-looking whole-body imaging machine -- think "Beam me up, Scotty" -- was first introduced at an airport in Phoenix, Arizona, in November 2007. There are now 40 machines, which cost $170,000 each, being tested and used in 19 airports, said TSA's Lee.

Whole-Body Imaging

These six airports are using whole-body imaging as a primary security measure, according to TSA:

San Francisco, California

Miami, Florida

Albuquerque, New Mexico

Tulsa, Oklahoma

Salt Lake City, Utah

Las Vegas, Nevada

Six of these airports are testing the machines as a primary security check option, instead of metal detectors followed by a pat-down, she said. The rest present them as a voluntary secondary security option in lieu of a pat-down, which is protocol for those who've repeatedly set off the metal detector or have been randomly selected for additional screening.

So far, the testing phase has been promising, said Lee. When given the choice, "over 99 percent of passengers choose this technology over other screening options," she said.

A big advantage of the technology is the speed, said Jon Allen, another TSA spokesperson, who's based in Atlanta, Georgia. A body scan takes between 15 and 30 seconds, while a full pat-down can take from two to four minutes. And for those who cringe at the idea of being touched by a security official, or are forever assigned to a pat-down because they had hip replacements, for example, the machine is a quick and easy way to avoid that contact and hassle, he said.

Using millimeter wave technology, which the TSA says emits 10,000 times less radio frequency than a cell phone, the machine scans a traveler and a robotic image is generated that allows security personnel to detect potential threats -- and, some fear, more -- beneath a person's clothes.

TSA officials say privacy concerns are addressed in a number of ways.

The system uses a pair of security officers. The one working the machine never sees the image, which appears on a computer screen behind closed doors elsewhere; and the remotely located officer who sees the image never sees the passenger.

As further protection, a passenger's face is blurred and the image as a whole "resembles a fuzzy negative," said TSA's Lee. The officers monitoring images aren't allowed to bring cameras, cell phones or any recording device into the room, and the computers have been programmed so they have "zero storage capability" and images are "automatically deleted," she added.

But this is of little comfort to Coney, the privacy advocate with EPIC, a public interest research group in Washington. She said she's seen whole-body images captured by similar technology dating back to 2004 that were much clearer than what's represented by the airport machines.

"What they're showing you now is a dumbed-down version of what this technology is capable of doing," she said. "Having blurry images shouldn't blur the issue."

Lee of TSA emphasized that the images Coney refers to do not represent millimeter wave technology but rather "backscatter" technology, which she said TSA is not using at this time.

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Coney said she and other privacy advocates want more oversight, full disclosure for air travelers, and legal language to protect passengers and keep TSA from changing policy down the road.

For example, she wants to know what's to stop TSA from using clearer images or different technology later. The computers can't store images now, but what if that changes?

"TSA will always be committed to respecting passenger privacy, regardless of whether a regulation is in place or not," Lee said.

She added that the long-term goal is not to see more of people, but rather to advance the technology so that the human image is like a stick-figure and any anomalies are auto-detected and highlighted.

But Coney knows only about what's out there now, and she worries that as the equipment gets cheaper, it will become more pervasive and harder to regulate. Already it is used in a handful of U.S. courthouses and in airports in the United Kingdom, Spain, Japan, Australia, Mexico, Thailand and the Netherlands. She wonders whether the machines will someday show up in malls.

The option of walking through a whole-body scanner or taking a pat-down shouldn't be the final answer, said Chris Calabrese, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union.

"A choice between being groped and being stripped, I don't think we should pretend those are the only choices," he said. "People shouldn't be humiliated by their government" in the name of security, nor should they trust that the images will always be kept private.

"Screeners at LAX [Los Angeles International Airport]," he speculated, "could make a fortune off naked virtual images of celebrities."

Bruce Schneier, an internationally recognized security technologist, said whole-body imaging technology "works pretty well," privacy rights aside. But he thinks the financial investment was a mistake. In a post-9/11 world, he said, he knows his position isn't "politically tenable," but he believes money would be better spent on intelligence-gathering and investigations.

"It's stupid to spend money so terrorists can change plans," he said by phone from Poland, where he was speaking at a conference. If terrorists are swayed from going through airports, they'll just target other locations, such as a hotel in Mumbai, India, he said.

"We'd be much better off going after bad guys ... and back to pre-9/11 levels of airport security," he said. "There's a huge 'cover your ass' factor in politics, but unfortunately, it doesn't make us safer."

Meantime, TSA's Lee says the whole-body imaging machines remain in the pilot phase. Given what the organization has gleaned so far, she said additional deployments are anticipated.

Get Rich Cheating - Now The Commercial

Get Rich Cheating - Now The Commercial

Last week I told you about a new book that really made me laugh – it’s called GET RICH CHEATING: The Crooked Path To Easy Street published by Harper Collins [NWS 10.20 0.37 (+3.76%) ].

Today the author of the book, Jeff Kreisler sent me an email to share the news that he’s just made a commercial for the book – and yes, it’s hysterical and worth a watch.

source: cnbc

5 tips for avoiding the latest hotel scam

• Story Highlights
• Hotel guests may be put up elsewhere if a hotel is overbooked
  
• Putting a guest in another hotel is called "walking"
  
• Some guests are "walked down" to lesser properties

Jack Taras and his friends thought they would be checking in at the Occidental Grand Hotel on the Dominican Republic's postcard-perfect Eastern shore for spring break. But when Taras, a 19-year-old sophomore from Providence College, arrived at the resort, he was greeted with the hotel industry's latest trick: he was walked down.

"They were sent to a hotel that wasn't as nice," says his father, John Taras. He phoned his son's online travel agency, Cheaptickets.com, and asked about the downgrade, which lasted the full five nights of Jack's stay. It deferred to the hotel, which offered an apology and a vague explanation of a "computer mishap" that resulted in an overbooking.

"Walking" is a practice that's as old as the hotel industry. When a resort is overbooked, it typically sends a guest to a comparable property, covering the cost of transportation, a phone call and accommodations. But somewhere along the way -- probably at the start of the current recession -- the word "comparable" was conveniently dropped, and hotels quietly began sending guests to lesser properties.

That's not supposed to happen, according to Joseph McInerney, president and CEO of the American Hotel & Lodging Association, a trade group. "It's most often the hotel's policy that guests are provided accommodations in a facility of equal quality," he told me. "The last thing that a property wants to happen is to compound the problem by sending the guest to an unacceptable facility."

But problems are being compounded. That's the bad news. There's also some good news: Walking doesn't happen as often as it did before the economy started going soft. The latest lodging industry forecasts predict more empty rooms in the months ahead, in an historic downturn that a recent PKF Hospitality Research study predicted would be "deeper and last longer" than previously thought.

"With lower occupancy rates, I'm sure hotels are not having to walk as many guests," says Robert Mandelbaum, PKF's director of research information services.

The Occidental Grand offered Taras a voucher for a two-night stay, which he doesn't want, and Cheaptickets.com has told him his case is being escalated to a supervisor. I contacted both the resort and the site on Taras' behalf, but neither has responded.

It's easy to understand why a hotel would want to walk a guest "down" when it's overbooked. The property must cover the cost of your room when you're "walked" and even though it often pays a discounted industry rate, it can save a few bucks by sending you to a lesser property and pocketing the difference.

Question is: what to do when it happens to you? Here are a few tips for guests who have been walked:

Refuse the room

Richard Carson wishes he'd done that when a four-star hotel in San Diego decided to downgrade him to a motel recently. "We arrived about 3 p.m. and were told we had no room, because 15 guests had decided to prolong their stay," he says. "I'm sure that if I had been a no-show, they would have pocketed our deposits, even though there were no rooms available."

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He's right. If Carson had politely stood his ground, pointing out his guaranteed reservation for a medical convention that had blocked hundreds of rooms at the same property, he probably would have been sent to a better hotel, if not offered a room at that one.

"The next time, I will simply start disrobing in the lobby, and wait for them to suddenly find a room," he jokes. Now there's an idea.

Know what's happening behind the scenes

When someone tells you they're out of rooms, it doesn't necessarily mean the hotel is full. It just means there's no room for you.

"It's totally political," says Kitty Cayo, who used to walk people for a hotel in the Midwest that she prefers not to name. "No frequent-stayer status? Walked. Not a corporate client? Good-bye. Booked through central reservations and an infrequent pleasure traveler? Hasta la vista." She says at times there were rooms available, but they were being held for a VIP or two, "who managers hoped like hell were going to show up."

Knowing that full doesn't always mean "full" can be useful when you're negotiating the terms of your walking papers. If a hotel employee admits that a few rooms are being held for late-arriving VIPs, you might talk your way into a better hotel.

Invoke your status

Speaking of which, if you're a frequent guest, and you're in danger of being walked down, this would be a good time to whip out your program membership card.

When Lyn Greenhill tried to check in at a Hilton Garden Inn recently, and was sent to "some other property I've never heard of," he called the Hilton HHonors phone line. As a gold-level member of its frequent-stayer program, Greenhill had more clout than the average guest.

Like it or not, better customers are often singled out for preferred treatment, so having a card can protect you against a walk and a downgrade. But it's no guarantee. A Hilton representative said the best it could do for Greenhill was to offer him a room at the Garden Inn the next day. So he phoned the nearby Marriott property, which had room.

Crack a joke

No, seriously.

That's what Jonathan Yarmis did when a Marriott property in Los Angeles tried to walk him to a less desirable hotel. "What would you do if J.W. Marriott were in town?" he asked the clerk. "Well, I'm sure we'd find Mr. Marriott something," the employee responded. "Well," said Yarmis, "I have it on good authority that he's not coming -- and I'll take his room." The clerk laughed and asked him to wait a minute. "Sure enough, they found a room," he recalls.

Moral of the story? There's always a room or, at the very least, it's someone else's problem.

Be nice

It may make the difference between a downgrade and an upgrade.

When Anne Wiggins checked into a luxury hotel in San Jose, Costa Rica, a receptionist told her there was no room at the inn. "I asked what the problem was and they said the education convention was still in progress and no rooms were available," recalls Wiggins, a retired college administrator.

She politely asked to speak with a manager, who declared, "No problema" and ordered an employee to walk her to a condo. "What a lovely place," she remembers. "It had two bedrooms, each with its own bath, a kitchen, dining room and living room. There was a gorgeous view out each window. We stayed there for several days and were not charged extra."

Being nice is your most effective weapon against an involuntary downgrade. Niceness often trumps status and hotel employees can -- and frequently do -- go out of their way for a friendly guest.

Ideally, when a hotel runs out of rooms, it should do everything it can to make you happy. Right down to the last detail.

Consider what the Sheraton Old San Juan did for Clyde Permenter when it couldn't accommodate him. "They reserved a room at the DoubleTree, paid for it, paid for my taxi fares, for a complimentary buffet breakfast and returned my deposit," he recalls. When he returned the next week after a cruise, he was upgraded to a suite. "What more could they have done?" he asks.

Until every hotel guest is "walked" like Permenter, these tips will ensure you get what you paid for.

source: cnn

* Deals to Be Had * Even in a tough economy, you can snag vacation deals on Memorial Day weekend.

Vacation Rentals May Hold A Key To Vacation Savings

Even with a tough economy, is it possible to snag a deal in Palm Springs on Memorial Day weekend?

Kristen Bergevin, a 35-year old Los Angeles resident who works in a marketing communications agency, wasn't sure it would be possible to fulfill her vacation wishes, but with by taking some extra time to research possible vacation spots she found a great deal. The key: opting for a vacation rental with friends rather than staying in a hotel.

Photo by: Adam Chamness For bigger savings, try destinations that are slightly off-the-beaten path such as Lake Martin, Ala.

"I would have to spend at least $300 a night in a hotel, and that’s just the room," she says. "By renting a house, it becomes $250 per person and we get our own rooms, a jacuzzi, and privacy."

With consumers uncertain about the economy, many are forgoing vacations, and leaving deals out there for those who are still traveling.

Renting a house or apartment can allow travelers to maximize their budget. Not only are some property owners cutting prices to attract guests, but more people who own second homes are renting them out in order to cope with the economic downturn. As a result, interest in rental properties is growing.

Online vacation rental sites such as HomeAway.com and VillasOfDistinction.com have seen a big increase in their traffic.

"Business is growing quite aggressively," says Brian Sharples, CEO of HomeAway.com. "People are still traveling and they are looking for more value."

"People are shopping around more," says Maya Offenbach, Manager of Villas of Distinction. "In the past, they weren't worrying about deals as much."

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Sharples says that part of the reason for the increase is the fact that people are having a tough time selling their homes and they have started to see the value on vacation rentals.

"The supply for vacation rental homes has increased dramatically," says Stephen Ferrari, who has owned a five-bedroom vacation home in Duck, N.C., for the past 16 years. "You’ll find a place even if you wait until the last minute."

Still, Ferrari insists that even though there is more supply, the industry is not flourishing. "We have seen trouble," he says. "I used to rent my home 25 or 26 weeks in past years. Now I’ve renting only 15 or 16 weeks."

That may be good news for vactioners. As homeowners have started to be wary that the economic downturn might eventually hurt the business, real estate managers have started to act.

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"Our rental manager dropped prices by 10 percent this year," says Shari Hindman, who rents a home in Lake Martin, Alabama. "The recession is on people’s minds."

"It’s a great time for the consumer," says Robert Haupt, a lawyer who represents vacation rental owners in the Midwest and in Florida. "Because of the recession we will start seeing prices drop this summer, and you’ll see lots of deals out there."

Photo by: Keith Bellvay There are plenty of rental options available in North Carolina's Outer Banks.

For those who don't wish to gamble on snagging a deal at a popular resort area at the very last minute, try locations that are off the beaten path. Here are a few, lesser known destinations, where the deals are already available:

Duck, North Carolina

Located on North Carolina's Outer Banks, the "cottages"—as they are commonly known locally—can be as big as seven rooms. With balmy summer temperatures and the choice to enjoy the ocean or the bay, Duck is a popular destination.

The prices for a week’s stay range from $2000 to $9000 depending on the location and the size of the house.

Lake Martin, Alabama

This traditional Southern town in Alabama has been well regarded for fishing, swimming and boating.

"Anyone with wealth has come to build here," says local owner Aubrey Hornsvy. "But it’s still economically attractive to families."

Most homes in Lake Martin can be rented as low as $200 per night.

Photo by: Tony Mt. Hood provides an option for those who want to leave the beach behind.

Mt. Hood, Oregon

Forty minutes away from Portland, Mt. Hood offers an interesting option for groups looking to leave the beach behind this summer.

"The summer is actually busier than the ski season," says Frank Groff, who owns a cabin in the area. "The topography looks like you’re in a fairy tale. The trees are huge and the mountain is amazing."

The peak summer season extends from May 23 through September 11, and cabins at Mount Hood can cost $250 a night per person.

source: cnbc

Wi-Fi Service in Air Is Slow to Take Off

Internet Service in the Air Is Slow to Take Off

Though Rollout Is Under Way, Carriers Still Can't Confirm Which Flights Have Wi-Fi

The World Wide Web works well at 30,000 feet. But first you have to find it.

Several U.S. airlines, including Delta Air Lines Inc., Virgin America, AMR Corp.'s American Airlines, Southwest Airlines Co., Alaska Air Group Inc. and UAL Corp.'s United Airlines, are rolling out technology to bring wireless Internet service to hundreds of aircraft -- a move that promises to allow passengers almost continuous access to the Web and email while flying. The nascent services are particularly attractive to frenetic business-class travelers who can't stand being off the email grid for even an hour or two in-flight.

Any carrier that establishes a big head start over rivals could have an advantage in the battle to attract these coveted passengers. The airlines hope revenue from Internet-access fees will cover installation costs, roughly $100,000 per aircraft for the most widely used service, and add to their perennially challenged bottom lines.

View Full Image

Delta

Decals like this from Delta are often the first sign a flight offers Wi-Fi.

The biggest challenge for fliers is finding a flight actually offering Wi-Fi access at all. While a few planes are starting to sport Wi-Fi access, so far, no big carrier has built up an advantage. None of the major airlines can promise which flights offer the service. That means it will be some time before most airline passengers can tell the home office they will be able to keep working midair.

Virgin America, the fledgling discount carrier founded by Sir Richard Branson, is moving fastest out of the Wi-Fi gate, with plans to have all 28 planes outfitted by the end of May. At bigger carriers with exponentially larger fleets, it will take years to outfit all aircraft. Delta, which last year said it would be the first of the major airlines to equip its entire domestic fleet with the service, has Wi-Fi on about 130 aircraft currently and won't be finished equipping all 500 until late next year. American Airlines plans to have as many as 150 of its roughly 600 aircraft Wi-Fi enabled by the end of the year.

Big airlines say they can't guarantee which flights will feature the service because aircraft and schedules are moved around so frequently. "The service will have to be widespread around the fleet" before the airline will promise it to passengers on a particular trip, says American spokesman Tim Smith.

Delta has aggressively publicized the service in recent months -- in its in-flight magazine, billboards and some airport advertising -- even though it doesn't list which flights actually offer Wi-Fi. On a Tuesday afternoon last month, on Delta Flight 1782 from Atlanta to New York's LaGuardia Airport, there was no indication before boarding that the Boeing 757 was outfitted with Wi-Fi. The Journal had confirmed ahead of time with Delta that the flight that day featured the service, but a regular passenger wouldn't be able to do the same.

The first sign that 1782 had the service was a small decal next to the aircraft door with a Wi-Fi emblem of the sort often posted in coffee shops and hotel lobbies.

Once passengers had boarded, flight attendant Linda Oakes announced over the intercom: "We have our state-of-the-art in-flight access to the Internet on-board." She instructed passengers to read a cardboard flyer located in the seatback pocket, outlining simple instructions on how to log on once the aircraft was airborne and above 10,000 feet. The service, to minimize interference with the aircraft's communications systems, isn't authorized beneath that altitude.

The gist of the directions: Turn on your laptop. (Tip: Your computer must be equipped for wireless access.) Look for the wireless network and connect. Open your Web browser and follow the online steps to pay for the service with a credit card.

Like American, Virgin America, and the service planned by United, Delta uses a system called Gogo, developed by Aircell LLC. The service, which uses land-based cellphone towers for its signal, costs $9.95 for flights under three hours and $12.95 for longer flights. Those with Wi-Fi enabled hand-held devices can log on for $7.95 and the company says it will soon introduce a monthly pass for travelers who expect to use the service often during any given 30-day period.

Flying With Wi-Fi Is…

• Not a sure thing: Airlines are still rolling out the service and can't guarantee which flights have access.
• Largely DIY: Flight attendants don't receive much training on the systems, so passengers should come prepared.
• Powerless: Most commercial planes don't have outlets. So make sure your device is fully charged before you board.

A rival service provided by Row 44 Inc. uses satellite communications for its signal and is currently being tested by Southwest and Alaska. Prices for that service have yet to be determined.

Most Flight 1782 passengers using Gogo said they found it easy to use and at least as fast as most Wi-Fi spots on land.

"I'll definitely want to know which planes have it and which planes don't," said Scott Brown, an Atlanta-based executive with a Danish technology company, seated just aft of the business-class section. "It makes a big difference to be able to stay busy."

Mr. Brown said he was able to watch live Internet video, send email and do other online tasks without delay. In the next seat, Sean Hill, a marketing executive with an Atlanta-based restaurant chain, said he logged into his company's virtual private network easily. "I can get a lot of work done," said Mr. Hill, justifying the fee he billed to his corporate credit card.

While the system seems easy enough to use for those with hassle-free computers, passengers shouldn't expect flight attendants to stand in for the office IT consultant if they have problems logging on. "We got 20 hours of training on the system," joked Ms. Oakes, the flight attendant, explaining that attendants are merely briefed on the basics of the service, but in fact have little knowledge of any technical issues that could arise.

On another recent Delta flight between Washington, D.C., and Atlanta, flight attendants said they didn't know whether Wi-Fi was available and scoffed at the suggestion they help a passenger who was having trouble logging on.

Aircell offers a live chat service with technical-support personnel once customers log on; one customer-service rep said the support center gets over 40 chats per day. But that doesn't do much good for those who can't log onto the network in the first place.

Passengers should also remember that very few commercial airliners currently have power outlets on board in economy class. Airlines are increasingly installing them on newer aircraft, but passengers should charge up laptops to be on the safe side.

Another concern is security. This week, Netragard LLC, a network-security company, said its testers were able to intercept data from the Gogo service. "It is extremely easy for a hacker on board to intercept and record all data sent and received by passengers," the company said in a statement. Aircell in a statement said data sent via Gogo "is as secure as any public Wi-Fi hotspot in a hotel, airport or coffee house."

source: wsj

Three Ways to Save on Your Memorial Day Vacation

According to AAA, Memorial Day travel is projected to increase 1.5 percent as lower gas prices and lodging deals woo recession-weary consumers. Gabe Saglie, senior editor for TravelZoo, says that beyond lower prices at the pump there are three big ways for regular people to save on that much-needed vacation to kick off the summer:

Airfare. Airlines have cut ticket prices to unprecedented levels, Saglie says. Why? Two reasons. Fuel prices are still 50 percent below last year’s levels, so airlines can pass those savings onto the consumer. Additionally, legacy airlines and low-cost carriers are fighting tooth-and-nail to fill seats and more competition means better prices for you.

Examples:
New York to San Francisco roundtrip: Last year, this route cost easily well over $400 during Memorial Day. This year, you can fly for $239 including taxes and fees on American or Delta.

Boston to Miami roundtrip: Fly for $450 on American versus $673 on low-cost AirTran. This fare exemplifies that the “airfare wars are on,” Saglie says.

Hotels. Occupancy rates are 10 percent below last year’s levels thanks to the recession and less corporate and leisure travel. The need to fill rooms translates to lower rates.

Examples:
San Francisco’s 4-Star Hotel Triton: $99 per night for Memorial Day, compared to $200 last year.

Miami’s 4-Star Royal Palm Hotel: Stay beachfront on Collins Ave. for $129 per night, compared to $250 per night last year.

Freebies. Hotels can only cut prices so low, but they can increase the value of your stay by sweetening the deal with various freebies like complimentary meals, waived resort fees, substantial discounts for spa services and more. Amusement parks like Disneyland are offering ‘twofer’ deals that let visitors come back within 30 days and stay for free.

>> Web Extra: 3 Hot Memorial Day Travel Deals

source: cnbc

The Best Hotel Deals for Memorial Day

Whether you’re traveling by air or car this Memorial Day weekend, wouldn’t it be nice to get to your destination and stay for less?

Gabie Saglie, senior editor of Travelzoo, reveals three hotels currently offering spectacular deals for vacationers:

Westin Casuarina Resort & Spa in Grand Cayman: $159 per night (a 45 percent discount). Relax by the hotel's oversized outdoor pool and grab a cocktail at its convenient swim-up bar.

Rosen Centre Hotel in Orlando: $69 per night. Upscale hotel includes parking, accommodations in a deluxe room, free self parking, free shuttle service to Universal Orlando and Wet 'n Wild. This same hotel on other dates runs as high as $299.

Fairmont Hotel in Dallas’ Art District: $79 per night, which works out to a 60 percent savings. Many big city hotels are slashing prices to attract visitors.

source: cnbc

New York Eateries Hit the Beach Branch restaurants open at the rehabbed Fontainebleau, with mixed results

New York Eateries Hit the Beach

Branch restaurants open at the rehabbed Fontainebleau, with mixed results

Miami Beach, Fla.

Michele Oka married Fred Doner in 1966 in the swanky Gigi Room of the Fontainebleau Hotel. Daughter of a former mayor of this resort island, she wore a long white dress with nary a sequin on it. "I was a minimalist even then," she said at dinner last week. But now, Mrs. Oka Doner, an established minimalist artist with a big installation at the Miami airport, had put on a gold lamé jacket for a gaudy celebration of her past and the billion-dollar rehab of the premiere hotel from Miami Beach's midcentury heyday.

Moris Moreno for The Wall Street Journal

Black tagliolini with seafood

We met the Doners over dinner at Gotham Steak, the high-end restaurant that now purveys $68 seafood "towers" and $95 steaks in the same spot off the main lobby where the Gigi Room used to be. The Doners brought along another scion of another Miami Beach mayor: Mitchell "Micky" Wolfson Jr., a notable connoisseur of the decorative arts and founder and chief donor of the Wolfsonian-Florida International University museum, in the raffish Art Deco district of the island's South Beach. Mustachioed and resplendent in a florid shirt, Mr. Wolfson beamed at the Fontainebleau's neo-Modernist design and tied into a juicy veal chop with bone in, as ordered. "They've kept the whimsy and the elegance," he said. "Especially at night."

On our big night with the mayors' heirs, a full moon shone down on tranquil sand and the lights of Collins Avenue. The floor of the lobby bar shone blue (echoing the canonical mispronunciation of the hotel's name, Fountain-Blue). You'd hardly know that Metro Miami was a flashpoint for foreclosures in the current crisis if the Gotham Steak waiter hadn't offered you a discounted price of $75 for the 50-day-aged Niman Ranch steak and also suggested that the table might want to share the seafood tower.

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Fontainebleau

Fontainebleau Hotel

Gotham Steak is one of three star-chef venues that have opened at the Fontainebleau since its renovation completed in November. It's a clone of Alfred Portale's Greenwich Village standby, Gotham Bar and Grill. Another clone is Scarpetta, a reduced copy of Scott Conant's remarkable neo-Italian place at the edge of Manhattan's Meatpacking District. A third clone, Alan Yau's long-rumored Florida remake of Hakkasan, his chic London neo-Chinese hit, opened here just two weeks ago. Since talk of a North American outpost for Mr. Yau in New York City had come to nothing, we figured we'd sample what the other establishments had to offer and give him a chance to get his seaside legs before tasting his food.

Moris Moreno for The Wall Street Journal

Gotham Steak's Grouper

To prepare for our trip, we visited both Scarpetta and Gotham Bar and Grill in New York. These are both superlative and expensive restaurants. And they were both filling all their seats when we visited. We admired Mr. Conant's black maccheroni with sea urchin and other seafood and Mr. Portale's beautiful steaks and other fine comestibles. How, we wondered, would this intricate "signature" food transfer to a gaudy, big resort full of family groups?

In our view, Mr. Portale made the leap with aplomb. Mr. Conant fell, if not flat, then definitely pratwise. We started at Scarpetta Miami with a fritto misto, a mixed fry of seafood that was totally routine, just battered strips of indistinguishable fruits of the sea. His black tagliolini wasn't al dente but undercooked, and there was virtually no sea urchin in a dish explicitly billed as coming with mixed seafood, sea urchin and bread crumbs.

The waiter told us the roast chicken had been cooked "slow, slow," but it came out dull, dull and not outstandingly moist or flavorful. For $27, one might expect something better. Certainly for $42, or even a lower price, no one deserves a veal chop so fatty and rare you wished you'd stayed in your very nice oceanfront room and ordered a burger from room service. ("Oceanfront" is a key word for prospective guests at the Fontainebleau. The similarly labeled "ocean view" room I got was a curved sliver that didn't offer "sweeping views of the Atlantic" except from its outside terrace. When I complained, the hotel promptly moved me to an oceanfront room.)

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Moris Moreno for The Wall Street Journal

Gotham Steak

How can it be that one fine cook botches a veal chop, while another, operating in the same hotel complex, turns out beautifully grilled, deeply flavorful steak? We'd be glad to chalk this up to an anomalous misstep, but then there were Scarpetta's other mediocre dishes, the underdone, undergarnished tagliolini, the blah chicken. So we're inclined to think something has gone sour between Mr. Conant and his Florida satrapy. Another sign, perhaps, is his menu's lack of emphasis on local ingredients.

Mr. Portale, on the other hand, has taken the trouble to procure some remarkable Florida heirloom tomatoes from Homestead to the south, for a juicy and refreshingly acid salad with watermelon, feta, red onion, basil and white balsamic vinaigrette. And he serves a Florida grouper, carefully grilled and garnished with quinoa, green beans, picholine olives, Speck ham and cherry tomatoes. So Mr. Portale wins this seaside smackdown.

Moris Moreno for The Wall Street Journal

Scarpetta serves a veal chop

Another winner in the hotel is the little bakery called Solo. It offers the bleary-eyed a kind of Starbucks experience -- latte is spoken here -- and house-made pastries. It also doubles as a source of extraordinary cakes bordering on the surreal, such as the chocolate and silver nested ovoid assemblage the size of a toddler.

So, on balance, our visit at the Fountainbleau was a dandy trip to the beach in a dramatic environment updated from the era when Frank Sinatra and Eleanor Roosevelt could find themselves sharing a table in the lap of semitropical luxe. Still, as the hotel's architect Morris Lapidus famously said, "Too much is never enough." One evening, we retrieved our rental car from valet parking and drove to dinner at Michy's, the culturally diverse Miamian bistro run by Michelle Bernstein in an unglamorous stretch of Biscayne Boulevard north of downtown Miami City and the Fontainebleau. Ms. Bernstein, who is herself of Jewish and Argentine heritage (and married to David Martinez), presides over the local food scene with a diverse and peppy menu that reflects the Miami outside its resort scene, with such dishes as a white gazpacho and a snapper garnished with mashed boniato, a white-fleshed Caribbean cousin of the sweet potato. This is a notable food world, worth visiting for itself.

source: wsj

Intimate Look At Susan Boyle Invites Oprah Into Home to Talk Life Before & After 'Talent': What She Said

Boyle Tells Oprah Singing Helped Her Cope With the Loss of Her Mom

In the beginning of April, not many people knew who Susan Boyle was. Fast forward to May and 100 million YouTube views later and she's arguably the most popular woman on the planet.

Think that she'd be overwhelmed by all that attention? Susan Boyle told Oprah Winfrey she's loving every minute of it.

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Susan Boyle, who's performance on television show Britain's Got Talent sparked global interest, outside her home in Blackburn, Scotland, revealing a new look after undergoing a makeover Friday April 24, 2009. (AP Photo / Andrew Milligan ,PA) ** UNITED KINGDOM OUT NO SALES NO ARCHIVE **

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"Pretty awesome to be recognized in the street and asked for autographs," she told Oprah on a satellite interview on Monday. "I'm getting quite a few fan letters and cards from around the globe. I'm loving every second of it."

"It takes a bit of time to take in because it happened so quickly," she laughed. "I'm really enjoying every second of it. It's like a dream come true."

Susan told Oprah that she was a slow learner in school and that singing helped her "boost my confidence." It also helped her get through a terrible loss.

"My mom died two years ago. After that there was a wee period where I didn't sing. You try and keep going through that pain and that's what I try to do with my singing. I am very slowly getting over it. One of the reasons I applied to the TV show was to see if I could perform in front of an audience."

Winfrey asked Boyle if she'll get a major makeover before her next appearance on the 'Talent' semifinals this month. "Depends what you mean by a makeover. My best friend helps with my makeup. That's hardly a makeover."

But didn't she get her hair done, asked Oprah? "That was just to tidy myself over like any female would've done," says Boyle.

'Talent' judge Simon Cowell joined Oprah and says he believes Boyle can win the whole thing, but also make sure to tell his most prized contestant to keep her focus.

"One minute you are living with Pebbles the cat. The next you have the media camped outside your front door," he said to Boyle. "It's all about you and your singing voice now. I think you know what you want to do now in the semifinals ... 100 million YouTube hits. It puts you under tremendous pressure and tremendous scrutiny. I think that's a high class problem. I think you want to win it."

"There's a lot of other talent in the competition so I'm willing to take my place with them," responded Boyle.

Oprah signed off with Boyle with a hint at what she'll be facing this month; "Good luck in the next round. It could be the most watched television broadcast ever. With 100 million YouTube hits, everyone will be watching. So no pressure at all."

source: aol

Breaking Into Beverly Hills Montage challenges formidable hotel rivals with service, comfort and a giant spa

Breaking Into Beverly Hills

Montage challenges formidable hotel rivals with service, comfort and a giant spa

With its white lounge chairs, tented cabanas and arcs of water creating a fountain effect in the pool, the rooftop deck looks like a relaxing spot, if you can just ignore the view: on one side a construction crane, on the other, a looming office tower.

Finicky Traveler: The Montage Beverly Hills

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Laura Landro / The Wall Street Journal

The Montage's rooftop pool deck

It took big ambitions -- and years of work -- to create an urban, Beverly Hills version of the tranquil, luxurious oceanfront Montage Laguna Beach resort, one of the highest-rated spa hotels in the country. The result stands 65 miles away on one of 90210's busiest corners, and construction sounds from a block off drift up the nine floors to the roof.

Yet with no expense spared at the Montage Beverly Hills, it's hard not to be impressed. The 201-room hotel, in a Spanish Colonial revival design, has a lavish 20,000-square-foot spa with 17 treatment rooms, salon, fitness center, and yoga and Pilates studio that dwarfs anything offered by the competition. Its public spaces, combining classic furnishings and Moroccan touches, are pristine and polished, and its central location makes it easy to walk a few steps to stores and restaurants -- a very rare thing anywhere around L.A. Managers, concierges and engineers snap to it when presented with problems, in our case ranging from a broken air conditioner to a no-show massage therapist.

Just breaking into Beverly Hills, where a new hotel hadn't been built in 16 years, was a feat in itself. After finding a site that was home to a parking lot and some derelict buildings -- an eyesore in the city's Golden Triangle shopping area -- the Montage won approval in part by offering to build an adjacent public park, office building and garage for the city. Then, a "Campaign to Save Beverly Hills," with some funding from rivals, tried to stymie the project by forcing a voter referendum. The Montage prevailed and broke ground in 2005, investing $300 million.

When it finally opened last November, though, the economy was entering a free-fall; the hotel had to reduce starting rates for a double room to $395 nightly from a planned range of $480 to $595. Moreover, the Montage is the new kid on the block in a market saturated with luxury properties, each with their own loyal clientele, including the Peninsula, with its entertainment industry power-broker scene, and the Beverly Hills Hotel, with its pink façade, bungalows and storied Polo Lounge.

Beverly Hills Stop

The competition spiffs up in and around L.A.'s toniest neighborhood.

The Beverly Hills Hotel
The historic "Pink Palace," on 12 acres on Sunset Boulevard, is building two new state-of-the-art "super bungalows" on its existing tennis courts with private pools, refurbishing its 201 rooms and suites and upgrading technology throughout the hotel

The Bel-Air
A lushly landscaped 92-room hideaway in Bel-Air, also on 12 acres in an exclusive residential enclave, is opening a new La Prairie spa later this year, has a new general manager and a new chef and plans renovations to its gardens, rooms and restaurants.

The Beverly Hilton
This 50-year-old property, where Trader Vic's served up the original Mai Tai and Esther Williams inaugurated the pool half a century ago, completed an $80 million renovation last year of its 570 rooms and public spaces; it hosts many red carpet events such as the Golden Globe Awards

SLS Hotel at Beverly Hills
Starwood converted a Le Meridien hotel just outside of Beverly Hills into one of its Luxury Collection hotels, which opened last November with 297 guest rooms, a spa and rooftop pool.

Whether die-hard fans of those hotels will try something new remains to be seen. Montage chief executive Alan Fuerstman says the hotel is already getting some loyalists of its own, with up to 20% of its clientele on return visits. And the hotel hired as its general manager someone with excellent contacts in town: Ali Kasicki, who ran the swank Peninsula Beverly Hills for years. Bruce Baltin, a travel expert at PKF Consulting, says that while occupancy in Beverly Hills fell to 71.7% in February from 80.1% in the year-earlier month, hotels catering to the luxury market, including the Montage, are doing relatively well compared to the rest of the industry.

That's one reason Mr. Fuerstman says Beverly Hills still seems like the perfect place to expand the Montage brand. (The group is also opening a ski resort next fall in Deer Valley, Utah, and a hotel in Mexico's Los Cabos in 2012.) He also remains optimistic about the potential to sell 20 residences at the Montage Beverly Hills at prices ranging from $5 million to $20 million. As for the hotel, he says that despite the economy, "we are capturing our fair market share, and when things rebound, we know where we'll be." The aim, he adds, is to appeal to guests who want creature comforts "but feel put off by the pretentiousness that accompanies most luxury hotels."

I was a little worried on that score, since an entertainment-industry friend advised me that he'd been to the Montage for lunch and found it exactly that: pretentious. True, the main dining room, where lunch and breakfast are served, could lighten up a little. And a wood-paneled dining venue, Muse, seemed so formal that we skipped it. But the staff is on the ball and responsive, the breakfasts excellent. The dining room looks out across the public park (pretty but mostly unoccupied when we were there) to the new low-rise office building, which has a cupola tower that looks like it could be on a Florentine church, and is built to look like part of the Montage complex. Eerily empty, it awaits office and retail tenants.

Our favorite hotel dining place was the rooftop Conservatory Grill, next to the pool but covered by tarps that shielded both the sun and the more unsightly parts of the view. (From some angles the roof deck does offer some nice vistas of the Hollywood Hills.) A late breakfast starts there at 9:30, and we had a pleasant lunch served by a nice young waiter who agreed to reconstruct a turkey club on the menu to our specifications.

Some packages include a spa credit and breakfast; suites booked at $950 and up include use of a Mercedes. We booked a deluxe double at $625, and our travel agent secured an upgrade to a garden suite. It was spacious, but the folding doors that closed off the living area from the bedroom had no handles and weighed a ton, which made them hard to move. The glass panes covered with sheer curtains were neither soundproof nor light-proof. There were two big flat-panel TVs, and sliding glass doors led to a terrace, which looked out over a blank, rather antiseptic courtyard and the dome of the empty office building. Mr. Kasicki, the manager, says the courtyard will soon be better landscaped with places to sit and catch the sun.

The room, with gold and cream fabrics and carpet, was comfortable, though it took us a while to figure out the high-tech switches and buttons for the lights, drapes and sheers. I had to call the operator to figure out how to turn off the light in the desk, but I was thrilled with its pop-up panel with several electrical outlets, unlike most hotels where you have to crawl under the desk or unplug lamps to power your various devices.

The spacious marble bathroom had a built-in TV above the tub, a separate shower with both a rainfall fixture and regular showerhead, and nice pomegranate-scented toiletries from a brand called Agraria. Unfortunately, the bathroom also had a not-so-great scent of mildew in the water closet, which we mentioned to the front desk. We never heard back about that one, but the manager, Mr. Kasicki, later told me that because the building is so new and not all the rooms have been regularly used, water buildup in the pipes has caused that problem in some rooms. He says the issue is being resolved by plumbing-maintenance staff.

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Laura Landro for The Wall Street Journal

The lobby lounge at the Montage Beverly Hills has a fireplace and piano player in the evenings.

We also had a problem with the air conditioning, which wasn't on when we checked into the room, making it hot and stuffy. The staffer who showed us to the room worked the controls, but hours later, when we returned, the A/C was just blowing air. Fortunately two engineers sent to fix it got into the works in the closet and found a sensor to adjust, and it seemed to work fine after that.

I arranged to meet my friend Michele at the spa, where we each booked a 90-minute hot stone massage followed by an exfoliating scrub and a Vichy shower to rinse it off. Michele was whisked away, but after cooling my heels for about 10 minutes, I was told that my therapist was late, and when I asked again five minutes later, that she had been in a car accident. (She was OK, but wasn't going to make it to work.)

A spa manager appeared and apologized profusely, offering me a complimentary 90-minute massage, since no one else trained in the hot-stone-scrub-shower treatment was around. As it happened, I loved the massage, and Michele said I didn't miss much with the other treatment, which was too much shower and not enough massage and scrub.

The spa has spacious locker rooms with sauna, steam rooms and plunge pool. One level down, there's a co-ed relaxation area and a giant bubbling mineral pool. The gym, with its treadmills with built-in touch-screen TVs and holders to charge your iPod, pleased my husband. One disadvantage of the rooftop pool, besides the feeling that people are peering down at you from the office tower: It wasn't long enough to swim laps, and the fountain sprays kept hitting me in the face as I was trying to.

On our last evening, we wandered into the hotel's spacious lobby lounge, with its intimate library off to one side, fireplace and cozy seating areas. A piano player entertained a full house of folks having after-dinner drinks and coffee. In fact, after waiting a while to be served we headed upstairs and ordered tea from room service, which came promptly. But I was glad that the joint was jumping. I guess there's always room for a little more competition, even in Beverly Hills.

source: wsj

How to Land the Best Deals on Airline Tickets

Shopping for airline tickets is one of the most complex consumer transactions. Tickets come with rules and restrictions wordier than apartment leases. Prices change several times a day. Plans have to be made far in advance to get a good deal, and penalties can be severe.

John Pirman

For most of us, shopping has moved from travel agents and the telephone to the Internet. Travel Web sites have given consumers access to enormous amounts of information -- too much information for many people. Still, with a few smart clicks, you can wade through vast amounts of fare data.

Here are some tips to land great deals.

Time It Right

In general, the cheapest days and times to fly are Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday afternoon, when airlines usually have the weakest demand for tickets. When you shop for tickets can affect the price as well. The worst time to shop is on the weekend -- just the time many people are also shopping!

Airlines tend to file price increases on Thursdays to see if competitors will match over the weekend. If rival airlines don't follow, the price increases can be rolled back by Monday morning before business travelers start buying again. Fare sales typically begin on Mondays and often expire on Fridays. So in general, Monday through Wednesday are the best days to buy.

Rights of Passage

When it comes to airline tickets, travelers have few rights. Here are some of the protections you do have:

• Change of plans: Most U.S. airlines allow buyers of nonrefundable tickets to hold a reservation for 24 hours or will provide refunds if you cancel within 24 hours.
• Advance cancellations, schedule changes: If the airline cancels your flight or changes its schedule, you can request a refund or rebooking.
• Airline problems: The airline must offer you a refund or pay for accommodations if you are stranded because of a problem caused by the airline.
• Weather problems: You're on your own. Some airlines may offer discounted rates at hotels. Some airports provide cots and blankets.
• Delays: No compensation. Airline ticketing contracts promise to provide a seat on the next available flight.

Typically, I start a search using Orbitz.com because I find its pricing matrix the easiest to navigate of the online travel sellers. Lots of people like Kayak.com because it searches not only online travel agencies but also airline Web sites themselves, and then offers a one-click link to whichever Web site had the price most appealing to you. Mobissimo.com is another popular site that searches multiple ticket-selling sites at one time, including ticket consolidators and other ultra-cheap outlets.

Find the site that you are most comfortable with. It's unlikely one will have prices that differ significantly from the others.

One way to expand your fare search automatically is to install a tool on your computer from SideStep.com. With this tool, every time you search for airline tickets, either at an online travel agency or an airline itself, a SideStep box opens on your screen and asks if you want SideStep to conduct the same search. SideStep, which has merged with Kayak, goes out and makes an inquiry for you at some 200 different places -- Web sites of discount airlines, for example, that may have cheaper prices. It's a handy way to boost your search power.

Another Tool to Try

A tool popular with road warriors is found at ITA Software's itasoftware.com. ITA can list different flights by many different factors, such as the trip's duration or connection times. It can create its own connections and routings, sometimes producing cheaper prices but with bizarre routings. It may turn out that the cheapest way to get from Los Angeles to Cleveland is to fly via Boston. But do you really want to connect in Boston?

One handy feature of ITA's search engine is that you can search for multiple destinations just by stringing them together in the "Destination" box. Suppose you want to go to Europe, but are indifferent about where you want to land. You can put lots of airport codes or just the city names in the destination box, separated by semi-colons, and one search will list loads of flights, with the cheapest listed first.

Two other Web sites can give you even more information, and more confidence that you are making the right choice. FareCompare.com shows you the cheapest tickets available on the route you want for the next 11 months, shown by month (airlines set their schedules and fares only 11 months out.)

Adapted from "The Wall Street Journal Guide to Power Travel: How to Arrive with Your Dignity, Sanity and Wallet Intact" by Scott McCartney. Copyright 2009 by Scott McCartney. Published by Harper, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

Another of FareCompare's niftiest features: Search for the lowest prices from your departure city world-wide. There may be times when you are indifferent about your destination -- you just want to go to the beach, cheap.

Meanwhile, Farecast.com predicts whether the price of a ticket will likely rise or fall. In addition, you can see what the cheapest price was over several weeks. That can be helpful in trying to determine the best price.

Consider 'Consolidators'

Some of the lowest-priced tickets available are found with airline ticket "consolidators" -- brokers who take seats from airlines and sell them at deep discounts. Think of them as the outlet mall for airlines. There are flights that airlines know won't fill at published prices, and to avoid fare wars with competitors, they dump seats with consolidators.

Use usaca.com to search for consolidators, but be careful. While the savings can be substantial, the tradeoffs can be significant: With some consolidator tickets, you may not be eligible for frequent-flier miles, or, more importantly, pre-reserved seat assignment. You often don't get to pick your airline or your route, and there may be a broad time window of when you agree to travel. You pay the cheapest price, and you are on the bottom of the service totem pole.

Another option to consider is buying a package tour, which may or may not include a consolidator's ticket. Online agencies such as Expedia, Travelocity, and Orbitz have gotten quite skilled at putting together packages. The magic comes mostly from the travel vendors negotiating special rates with hotels.

Happy hunting. May you always pay less than the person sitting next to you.

source: wsj