Features

August 2005 issue

A novel approach to travel

For people who like murder mysteries in exotic locales, here is a fun list.

• “The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency” by Alexander McCall Smith is one of a series of six books set in BOTSWANA. The land and culture are also like characters in this delightful collection of detection pursuits and everyday African life.

• The “Mrs. Pollifax” series by Dorothy Gilman takes readers on adventures all over the globe. I particularly enjoyed the ones in Asia, including “Mrs. Pollifax and the Hong Kong Buddha” (I subsequently got lost in the narrow alleyways wending my way through the back...

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November 2005 issue

Bratislava — a visit to Slovakia’s capital city

by Jan Oravetz, Ft. Myers, FL

During summer 2004, my wife, Eva, and I visited Slovakia, the land where we both were born many years ago. It is a small country (19,000 square miles) in the heart of Europe, and I think it is fair to say that the average American knows little about it.

Many confuse it with Slovenia, which is also a small new country in Europe; however, that one is situated more southwesterly, between the south Alps and the Adriatic Sea. Slovakia is landlocked east of Austria.

A few facts

The official language is Slovak, but many people also speak...

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February 2006 issue

Historical Malta

—by Vernon Hoium, Minneapolis, MN

When the temperature in Minneapolis reached 14 degrees below zero, it was time to think of visiting a warmer climate. In January ’05, my wife and I flew from Minneapolis to Malta via London. We purchased two separate tickets for the trip, traveling to London on Northwest Airlines and from London to Malta with British Airways, allowing us to have a 3-day stopover in London on our return trip. (The airfare from London to Malta was only $200 for the 3-hour-and-20-minute trip.)

Getting settled

Upon arrival in Malta we were met by a...

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May 2006 issue

A novel approach to travel

What books or movies inspired you to travel to another country (outside of North America and the Caribbean)? ITN asked that question and received many responses, which were printed in the June through September 2005 and February 2006 issues. Here are a few more.

If you have suggestions to share, write to A Novel Approach to Travel, c/o ITN, 2116 28th St., Sacramento, CA 95818, or e-mail editor@intltravelnews.com (please include the address at which you receive ITN).

Although I had always wanted to visit the BRITISH ISLES, I’d never thought much about specific areas. That was...

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August 2006 issue

Wingin’ it in Venezuela

Improvisational travel is challenging, exhilarating and the ultimate expression of freedom because one can go where, when and with whom one chooses on a daily basis. It’s also exciting because it varies — sometimes wildly — from its more predictable counterparts: cruises and professionally organized tours with their frequently inflexible itineraries.

But such travel is not for everyone. Sometimes surprises are happily serendipitous, sometimes they’re edgy and provocative, but often they’re mixed bags with a little more “adventure” than one bargains for. Such was the case on my...

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June 2005 issue

Stopping at select sites on a Eurail tour of Austria, Hungary, and Romania

by Beth Habian, Features Editor

It sounded like the perfect itinerary to me. We would begin in Vienna, a city I had been dying to see but had not yet had the pleasure of visiting. We would continue to Hungary, which is emerging as a fashionable travel destination while still exuding Old World charm, and end in Romania, my father’s boyhood home, before returning to Vienna for my flight back to the States.

Okay, maybe it was a little ambitious for a 9-day trip (most press trips are arranged to get in as much as possible in the shortest amount of time), but it was a nice...

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December 2006 issue

Malaysia — an independent journey

by Lillie Echevarria, Livermore, CA

Traveling to Malaysia with my friend Michelle in February ’05 was somewhat more challenging than traveling in neighboring Thailand, Cambodia or Vietnam due to the limited number of local tour companies available, especially in Borneo.

Arriving in Kuala Lumpur, our first stop as independent travelers was to book our free tour of the Petronas Towers. Tickets went fast — at 9 a.m. I was able to get reservations for 1:30 in the afternoon.

Our tour included an informative background film on the towers’ construction and a short ride to...

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September 2005 issue

St. Moritz — Summer in a Swiss winter resort

by Don and Betty Martin, Columbia, CA

We had our faces pressed against the cool window like kids outside a candy store. However, we were enjoying scenic candy as our train climbed through a steep, wooded valley toward the noted Swiss Alps resort of St. Moritz.

Each twist in the tracks brought a new alpine vision: verdant pasturelands glowing greenly in the sunlight; cascading streams milky with glacial silt; villages with slender church steeples standing like architectural exclamation points, and the distant promise of the Alps with their glossy white glaciers.

On the...

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