Joel and Lenore Abels tribute dinner

It was a family run business for more than 3 quarters of a century. Joel and Lenore Abels were the best friends the travel industry ever had. Joel passed away on January 25, 2007 at the age of 80 and Lenore passed away 2 months later. The industry lost two great supporters that year.

I wondered what would happen to the publication that was built from scratch 78 years ago. I soon found out that the publication was sold to Ian Gittlitz and that he was going to continue the rich tradition of Travel Trade.

Things started to change at Travel Trade and it just didn’t look right. Then came the headline ” Ian Gittlitz, one of the owners of Travel Trade, had been arrested on embezzlement charges. If convicted, Gittlitz faces four to 15 years in prison.”

I was still told that Ian’s son, Seth was running Travel Trade and he was planing a great celebration for the 80th anniversary. But then things started to go south. They stopped publishing the print version of the publication and went to a “Web Only” version. Then at the end of September of 2009, the Website started to shut down. I tried for 3 weeks to contact someone at the offices in New York, but all I was able to get was a voice mail box. Then on October 20, the Website was pulled off the web and the phones were disconnected. This is very sad. Something that took 78 years to build was trashed in less then two and a half years. I am sad to see it go, but I will always remember my many years of friendship with Joel and his wife and what wonderful people they were.

MGM Hotel in Las Vegas

“CSI: The Experience” which has been touring the country has found a permanent home at the MGM Hotel in Las Vegas. This new attraction will give visitors the chance to be part of the CSI phenomenon. Guest will be able to survey their own crime scene, analyze evidence and crack the case. The experience starts at one of three crime scenes. After exiting the crime scene, the guests will head to the crime lab with their list of evidence and begin to piece together the mystery.

This is the first permanent exhibit for CSI, which has been touring the country for the past 2 years.

Rather than a “look-and-see” exhibit, this one lets visitors control the action. The interactive nature of the program and the technology are what sets “CSI: The Experience” apart from other museum exhibits

“CSI: The Experience” will be open to its first visitors starting at 10 a.m. Sunday September 13. The exhibit will be open daily from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. with tickets priced at $30.

Alan & Lil on The Tender with the Mariner in the background

This is my second time on The Mariner of The Seas and my 87th cruise over all. With all these cruises under my belt, I feel that I have a good Idea of what makes a great cruise vacation.

My wife and I departed on July 12, 2009 from the Port of Los Angeles on Royal Caribbean’s  Mariner of The Seas. We were very excited to be on the Mariner again and were looking forward to a great vacation at sea. We sailed away from the dock at 5:45 PM and headed south from LA to Mexico in the crystal blue Pacific Ocean.

We Unpacked and settled into our stateroom.  We headed to the dinning room at 555PM, as we had first seating dinning. Royal Caribbean has instituted a “As You Like it Dinning” as an option for people that don’t like  early or late set dinning times. This option gives you the choice to come to the main dinning room at anytime between 6PM and 8:30PM and you are seated as if you were at a restaurant. I personally like the fixed seating at the same table, waiters and people at my table all week. We were seated at a table for 6 with two other couples. One couple was from the Chicago area and was also in the cabin next to us we discovered. The other couple was from Big Bear California. Really very nice people and we had a great conversation at dinner. But that’s what dinner on a cruise ship is really all about. Meeting new people, great food and great conversation. The food was excellent, which was nice to see that Royal Caribbean had not cutback on the quality of the food during these trying economic times.

After dinner it was off to the Savoy Theater for the welcome aboard show. We met our Cruise

The Parade on the Mariner of The Seas

Director Abe who gave us a rundown of what to expect during the upcoming week. Then we were entertained by a juggler and a comic, who were both very good. The evening ended with a great “Welcome Parade” on the Royal Promenade. So for the first day, things looked pretty good.

Since we had travelled with Royal Caribbean on more than 24 cruises, we are considered Diamond Plus members in their Loyalty program, which is the top tier of the program. Along with being in the top tier brings some perks, such as a special on board coupon book. Now it’s been 18 months since our last Royal Caribbean cruise and we were expecting the same perks in the coupon book we received in February of 2008. Well they have decided to change the coupon book and take away a lot of the “Perks” that they gave to their best customers. This did not make much sense to me. Why would you take away perks to your best customers. Things such as a free 8” X 10” photo is now gone and replaced by a 20% off coupon on a special type of 8” x 10” photo. Gone also is a free 30 minutes of internet usage, replaced by a $10 off coupon for internet usage. At a ridiculous $0.55 per minute (OUCH!) you will use that $10 credit up real quick, as the internet connection on this ship is so slow, you could finish the novel War and Peace before you could send your email.

Gone is the “Ship Shape” program. This program got people involved in the fitness activities aboard the ship. You would earn Ship Shape dollars for participating in the activities and you would then be able to redeem them for “Ship Shape” gifts at the end of the cruise. A really great program that I really was sorry to see it eliminated as I was on the ship that they started the ship shape program back in the 1980’s. I guess the one thing that Royal Caribbean eliminated that I was really sad to see go was the Mint and Saying on the Pillow at night. Did I eat the mint every night, no, but It was like a warm fuzzy that I had come to expect on Royal Caribbean ever since we sailed on our first cruise on the Song of Norway in 1978.

To be continued……..

United Terminal at O'Hare

This has got to be the height of how not to treat a customer. My daughters Mother-in-law purchased 2 round trip tickets for my daughter and her husband for their honeymoon. They were headed to Rome, Italy from Chicago. The best fare and connections were through Toronto on Air Canada. The entire itinerary was on Air Canada except for the first leg of the trip which was from Chicago to Toronto. This leg was a code share flight with United Airlines. That means that United Airlines operated the flight, but the ticket showed an Air Canada flight number but also said “Flight Operated by United Airlines.”

The tickets were purchased about 4 months ago. During that time, United Airlines had a major schedule change and canceled a large number of flights. One of those flights  was the Air Canada code share flight that my kids were on. Now you would think that United would have let us know that the flight was canceled. That would have been the proper thing to do, but remember, this is United, an Airline that does not know what the words “Customer Service” means.

So let’s jump ahead to the night before the flight. I ask my daughter what the flight number was so I can check the times and maybe even get them checked in and get a boarding pass. She gives me her itinerary and I proceeded to look up her flights, but I could not find her first flight number. So I checked all the flight from Chicago to Toronto and I found that her flight did not exist anymore. So I tried to check her in on the United website. But it was not able to check them in as the website said that they did not have a flight from Chicago to Toronto. Now I am really worried. So we call Air Canada. They tell me that they have rebooked them on a United flight to Toronto at 110PM. So I felt a little better, but I still didn’t trust United. So I  called United Airlines Reservations. By the time we got to a real person I was very nervous. I gave the United reservation agent the reservation number and I was told the flight was an Air Canada flight. I told the agent, “No it is your flight, because it is a 737 aircraft and Air Canada does not have any 737’s. The agents argued with me for a few minutes, but then agreed with me that it was a United flight. I hung up, but I still was not feeling very good about this, as it was still not showing the flight correctly in the United reservation system.

The No Customer Service Gate Check In

Fast forward to the next day. My kids arrive at O’Hare Airport at 11AM for the 1;10PM Flight. They get in the International check in line and they wait, and wait and wait. After 50 minutes in line, they get to the kiosk and try to check in. But my fears come true and it will not let them check in. It says on the screen “Cannot complete check in, Please see agent.” So they turn around and grab an agent and she tells them they have to go and stand in yet another line to see an agent. They have now been at the airport for 1 hour trying to check in. The next line has at least 40 people in it and only one agent working the line. It takes them 40 minutes to get to the agent. Once they get to the agent, they are told  by the agent “You are too late, I cannot check you in, there is only 20 minutes before flight time. Go to Air Canada, it’s their ticket.” Can you believe that! And she was rude on top of it. They told her that they have been waiting almost 2 hours in LINE! There was no response from the agent. So they gathered up their luggage and  walked from Terminal 3 to Terminal 2, which is a long haul.

The Air Canada Agent they finally checked in with could not have been nicer to my Daughter and Son In Law. She could not believe that United treated them so poorly. She apologized and booked them on an Air Canada flight at 2PM and up graded them to First Class. This is the sign of a Class Airline. United can learn a lot about customer service from the Ticket Agent at Air Canada. Because if you don’t treat your customers with respect, then you won’t have any customers. And if you don’t have any customers, you won’t have an airline. Just some food for thought United!

Grand Hyatt Hotel New York City

I just returned from a business trip to New York where I gave a presentation to a group of travel industry professionals. The conference went well, but that is not my reason for writing this. The problem was with the Hotel.

The conference hotel was the Grand Hyatt in New York City. This is a very large business hotel located right next to Grand Central Station on 42nd street. I was excited about staying at the hotel as I really enjoy the Hyatt brand. 

I arrived at 1250AM in stead of 1030PM as my flight was late from Chicago due to weather in the New York area. So I am now very tired, somewhat wet as it has been pouring rain for the entire trip from Newark Airport to the Grand Hyatt Hotel and I had to wade through the rain to get to the Super Shuttle Bus. I walk into the lobby of the Grand Hyatt and proceed to the Registration Desk. Now remember it is 1250AM on Thursday morning and there are at least 12 people waiting in line to check in. Now that would not be so bad, but there is only one desk clerk handling the check in and to add insult to injury, there are approximately 15 self service check-in kiosk that all say “OUT OF SERVICE – SEE DESK CLERK TO CHECK IN.” So now I am very tired, I have a bad headache and I am standing in a line that is not moving at all. 

20 minutes later I make it up to the desk clerk. I give him my name and my reservation number. He types it into the computer and then I see that look on his face that I have seen to many times before. You know the look of bad news at 115 in the morning. So he tells me that the room I reserved was not available. My heart dropped! I said you have to give me a room. He tells me that he has a queen size smoking room. I said to myself, “how bad could a smoking room be?” So I say to the desk clerk, I just need a room to sleep in, I will take the room. 

So he gives me the key card and I proceed to the 15th floor room I was assigned. I get to the room and open the door and walk in and then it hit me. This room REAKED of smoke! Oh did it stink, it just knocked you over. It smelled like someone chain smoked no-stop for a week! But again, I was so tired and I had this terrible headache and I just needed so sleep. So I climbed into the bed and fell asleep. 

When I woke up, I really look around the room for the first time. The window shade was all stained and looked as if someone threw a cup of coffee on it. The lights on the night stands did not work properly. The Desk lamp shade was broken and had a hole in it.  There was a floor lamp that was leaning over like someone bent the base.  And the final straw, the wifi in the room did not work.

I walked into the bathroom to take a shower. The bathroom look pretty good, so I get into the shower, close the curtain and turned on the water. I adjusted the temperature and then the tub started to fill up. Ok, so the drain was running slow. I hit the shower button and the shower turned on. It started to spray nicely around the curtain and on to the floor. I could not get a good flow onto me, but it did a great job of making a puddle on the floor of the bathroom, which I could not stop.

I was really frustrated by this time. I got out of the shower and threw two towels on the floor to soak up the water. I then dried myself off with a third towel, at least they gave me 4 towels and they were not the usual fluffy Hyatt towels, they were very scratchy and thin towels.

The service was just fair throughout the hotel. The public areas were very nice, but the service was poor at best. I stay in lots of hotel rooms during the year and this was a stay that I want to forget. I cannot recommend the Grand Hyatt in New York until they do something to improve the quality control of the rooms and the attitude of the staff.

The Las Vegas Strip looking South from Flamingo Blvd

I love to go to the shows in Las Vegas. Over the past 5 years I have seen some wonderful entertainment. From Elton John & Bette Midler at Caesar’s to Penn & Teller at the Rio, it has been some of the best shows I have ever seen.

Tickets to some shows can put you back a few hundred dollars. I am the kind of person that likes to find a way to save money on shows. When I am in New York, I like to go to the Time Sq “Hot Tix” booth and get last minute half price Broadway tickets. Well, they have a ticket service for last minute show tickets in Las Vegas on the Las Vegas Strip. It’s called “Tix4Tonight” and you can get tickets for loads of shows in Las Vegas for the current evening at up to 50% off the box office price. They also offer up to 50% off a number of Las Vegas Buffets and Restaurants for a $3 charge for the restaurants and $2 for the buffet’s. It is a great way to do dinner and a show for a great price.

Tix4Tonight Logo

Here is how it works. You show up at the Tix4Tonight in the morning. Some days the line forms early. They post the current days shows they have tickets for at 9:30AM on 3 TV screens. These list the Show, Hotel, Time of Show and Price. Pick your show and pay for your tickets. It’s that easy. Be advised that there is a $5 service charge added to all the posted prices. Once you pay for the tickets, you will receive a voucher that you have to exchange at the box office of the show you are going to see. I suggest you go to the show box office as soon as you can, but you can exchange the voucher up to 1 hour prior the show time.

Now here is the really nifty part. Tix4Tonight wants you to come back. So if you bring your ticket stub and receipt from the previous days show, you get to use the Tix4Tonight VIP line, so you do not have to wait as long to purchase your tickets and you get a $2 discount on your ticket purchase. Such A DEAL! I loved it. I purchased tickets for Howie Mandel  at the MGM for half price and got GREAT SEATS! I also purchased tickets for George Wallace at the Flamingo, Steve Wyrick at Planet Hollywood and The Crazy Horse Review at the MGM all for half price. And they were all great shows and great seats. I figured I saved close to $200 off the retail price.

Ticket booth at Fashion Sq Mall

So you are now asking, where are these Tix4Tonight ticket booths. Glad you asked that question. Here are the 6 locations. 1. Fashion Show Mall, strip entrance in front of Neiman Marcus, 2. North Strip Just South of The Riviera Hotel, 3. Showcase Mall, South Strip at the base of the Giant Coke Bottle, 4. Bills Casino on the corner of Las Vegas Blvd and Flamingo next to the Flamingo Hotel. 5. Hawaiian Marketplace, south strip across the street from the new City Center development. 6. Downtown at the 4 Queens Hotel at Fremont St. Experience.

Just remember that not all shows are available every night and midweek is better then weekends. But it is a great way to see some of the best shows in town for up to 50% off. I tried it and I just loved it. The people that work at the booths were great and very helpful. So the next time you are in Las Vegas, try Tix4Tonight you won’t regret it! Remember, you can take the Deuce Bus to any of the Tix4Tonight locations.

Alan on The Deuce Bus

I was in Las Vegas from May 3 thru May 8 and I want to bring you up to date on the changes to the Deuce Bus. 

As you may or may not know, the Deuce Bus is the public transportation bus that travels up the Las Vegas strip from the south end to Downtown Las Vegas on the North. The buses are Double Decker and run 24/7. I personally love to ride the Deuce Bus when I am in Las Vegas. The buses are new, clean and very comfortable. The drivers are very friendly and helpful. 

Now for the changes. The Deuce Bus has raised their fares. The one way ride ticket is now $3 (up from $2) while the 24 hours unlimited ride pass is now $7 (up from $5). Since they raised the fares, they have instituted a 3 day pass for $15. This pass is only available from the ticket vending machines. These machines are available at both the north downtown terminal and the south end terminal, plus at the MGM stop northbound. There are also 2 other machines along the route, but I cannot remember where exactly they are.

The Deuce Bus at the MGM stop

If you have an iPhone, use the GPS maps and you can route your trip on the Deuce Bus and get departure and arrival times. It really helped me get between the Monte Carlo Hotel and the Rio Hotel.

I have included some new photos of the Deuce Bus. Next time you are in Vegas, take the Deuce Bus and relax. Oh, and try to get the front seats on the second floor. It is the greatest way to see the Strip!

Also, if you are looking for show tickets at up to 50% off. Try Tix4Tonight, here is the link to the blog post I wrote about my experience with the service. http://thetraveldoctor.wordpress.com/2009/05/12/tix4tonight-in-las-vegas-save-big-bucks/

The Great Front Seats on The Deuce Bus

Disney Ship in Port

Disney Cruise Line has named it’s two new ships. The cruise line began construction on the two new ships in March. The ships are being built at the Meyer Werft shipyard in Germany. The delivery dates for the ships are 2011 and 20012. The new ships will weigh in at 128,000 GRT’s and will have 1,250 staterooms. The new ships will be named The Disney Dream and The Disney Fantasy. A Disney spokesperson called the names “a natural choice for our ships.”

Ryanair on Take Off

Ok, this is the most ridiculous thing I have every heard. Ryanair, an Irish discount airline is considering a new way to make money. They already charge for everything extra on their flights, but now they want you to pay to pee! That’s right, you have to go, you have to pay! I never thought that anyone would have the nerve to charge you to go to the toilet on an airplane! 

So there you are at 35,000 feet and you have to go and you don’t have any change? What do you do? Do you wet your pants? Do you walk down the aisle and ask everyone for spare change so you can GO? 

Here is a quote from a Ryanair official. ”One thing we have looked at in the past and are looking at again is the possibility of maybe putting a coin slot on the toilet door so that people might actually have to spend a pound to spend a penny in future,” This is just crazy! 

So if you are thinking of flying Ryanair in Europe, be sure to take some spare change. You never know when you may have to GO!

Just Waiting for That International Flight

You think that you have seen everything and then your friend gets hit with a bogus credit card charge for purchasing an Air Canada ticket in the United States. Here is what happened.

My friend purchased a ticket from a travel agent in the Chicago area. The Ticket was purchased  from Chicago to Rome round trip on Air Canada with a connection in Toronto. The ticket was purchased in the United States in US dollars. Now you should know that it is against the law to purchase an international ticket in the United States in a foreign currency, so the ticket must be purchased in US Dollars. My friend used his Bank of America Visa card to purchase the ticket. When the Bank of America Visa statement arrived, there was a 3% currency conversion fee for the ticket which amounted to over $80. Now how do you charge a currency conversion fee for a ticket that was purchased in US dollars? That’s right, you can’t but Bank of America did because they can and there is nothing you can do about it because they tell you it is a fee that cannot be disputed.

We talked with Air Canada and they agreed that the ticket was purchased in US dollars in the US and there was never any currency to convert. We called Bank of America back and they insisted that they were right that there was a currency conversion (yeah right) and that the fee could not be disputed. My friend asked Bank of America for proof. They said they would send proof. I can’t wait to see what they sent. The travel agent has proof that there was never any currency conversion, Air Canada has proof there was never any currency conversion, but Bank of America, they have proof. This is the biggest scam I have seen in the travel industry in years. I cannot imagine how much money is taken in by charging this fee on Air Canada tickets.

If anyone out there has had this happen to them, please reply to this blog. This has got to end and my friend will not let it go.