Traveling Home

I’m on top of the world, in all senses of the term: we’re 500 miles inside the Arctic Circle in Norway’s Lyngen Alps and I’m buzzing at having reached the summit of Riššavárri, after a 31/2-hour hike.

Jagged white peaks rise starkly from snaking, deep blue fjords, the sun is shining, the light’s amazing – and there’s no one here but me and my guide, Mikal Nerberg. With more than 60 summits over 1,000 metres, the Lyngen Alps have a quasi-mythical status among hardcore skiers. It’s a purely touring destination: there are no ski lifts, so any mountain you want to ride down you have to hike up, using “skins” on your skis for grip. With ski fans increasingly wanting a fitness break, rather than just boozy lunches and downhill meanders, touring is a growth area.

The Lyngen Alps is where alpine guides come on holiday once their European season finishes, and where they bring their best and favourite guests. I’m here in early April but the season runs until June, when there’s skiing in the midnight sun.

We planned our route the day before, poring over a giant map, with Mikal pointing out the many peaks at our disposal. Riššavárri, at 1,251 metres, seems a good entry-level option. The temperature hasn’t fluctuated dramatically lately and it hasn’t snowed for a week so the snow pack should be stable, though as this is the high Arctic the weather can suddenly change. “This is more like a mountain expedition than you might expect,” said Mikal.

Instead of getting a resort bus or cable car to our starting point, we take a ferry across the fjord from Lyngseidet to Olderdalen. Our hike begins at sea level, rising up through a forest of elder and silver birch, the trees bowed under the weight of the snow. Mikal is on touring skis, while I’m on a splitboard - a snowboard that splits in two so it can be used like touring skis. The way isn’t too steep, but Mikal insists on a slow pace and makes us stop for snacks every hour to keep energy levels up.

Coming out of the woods we see our target summit, high in the sky, and still another 1,000 metres away. The climb quickly gets steeper but at the hour-two stop I still feel OK. As we reach hour three, however, I begin to wonder if I’ll ever make it to the top.

The silver lining is the view, which as we rise becomes an increasingly amazing distraction. For the last half-hour I really have to dig in, hypnotised by Mikal’s steps ahead of me but at the top the feeling of elation is intense.

I put my board together, while Mikal checks the snow to see which line would be our best descent. We set off, navigate some juddering wind-ruined snow then find a pocket of lovely soft pillow-like powder. Further down we ride super-fast spring slush, passing giant boulders of icy snow, and then cut into the forest we climbed through earlier, dodging the tightly packed tree trunks and stumps as if in a computer game. We emerge into a snowfield and ride down to the fjord, a complete run from summit to sea.

Most skiers and snowboarders stay at the Magic Mountain Lodge (bunks from £40pp full-board) in Lyngseidet – the main, albeit tiny town – but it’s fully booked, so I stay in a private rental house in a hamlet 12 miles north (Take Me Away, Holiday House, from £110 a night, sleeps four). Like almost every house in Lyngen it looks straight out of the Cabin Porn book: white wood with a pretty green trim and a 1960s-style kitsch interior. On my first night a white hare dances in the drive.

On day two we drive north to the waterside hamlet of Koppangen, where the road stops abruptly and turns into mountain. From here we set off for the 950-metre summit of Goalborri. Yesterday’s blue skies have switched to snowy showers. Before long it’s too steep and slippery to proceed by splitboard so I strap it to my backpack, put crampons over my boots, and Mikal hands me an ice axe for stability.

This feels more aerobically tough than the day before – like climbing a snowy ladder, with the odd rock to scramble over – but we cover a lot more ground. After 21/2 hours we reach the top. Tiredness only hits as we start to ride the steep but reassuringly wide couloir. Lower down, we put down fresh tracks in soft spring snow, before popping out at the fjord.

Later that night I see the wisps of the northern lights rise in the sky. It’s beautiful but doesn’t come close to being the highlight of my trip, nor does the snowboarding down, fun as that was. The bit I love best has been the hiking up, the hard work of earning those runs down in this wild, silent and most un-ski resort-like place. Which also happens to be as easily reachable from the UK as the European Alps.

• The trip was provided by Visit Norway and Northern Norway. Norwegian flies from Gatwick to Tromsø; Lyngseidet is about a 1hr 45 min drive from Tromsø. Car rental was provided by kayak.co.uk but there’s also a bus (from £14). A day’s guiding (in a group) with Mikal Nerberg starts at £93pp, lyngenguide.no

United Airlines has dropped the price of their flights from Toronto to San Jose del Cabo, Mexico down to $300 CAD roundtrip including taxes.

The flights have 1 stop each way, in Houston or Chicago, for 1.5 to 2.5 hours.

There are also flights from Toronto to Puerto Vallarta or Ixtapa / Zihuatanejo for $340 CAD roundtrip.

Availability for travel

November, first half of December 2018

mostly January, a few in February and early March 2019

How to find and book this deal

1. Start with a Google Flights search like this one...

Google Flights: Toronto to San Jose del Cabo, Mexico

Google Flights: Toronto to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico

Google Flights: Toronto to Ixtapa / Zihuatanejo, Mexico

Google Flights: Toronto to Mazatlan, Mexico

2. Click on the departure date box to open up the calendar view and browse for cheap date combinations.

- look for the dates that are $301 roundtrip

screenshot from United Airlines

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Photo Credit: Travelers walk through a terminal overlooking an Air China jet at the Beijing Capital International Airport in Beijing, China, on March 15, 2016. Alibaba cautioned its employees to trim its business travel spend. Qilai Shen / Bloomberg

Wyndham Hotels and Resorts also operates the Wyndham Batumi and Ramada Encore Tiblisi in Georgia.

The group is targeting growth in the region, and currently has 15 hotels across Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.

Dimitris Manikis, President and Managing Director for EMEA at Wyndham Hotels and Resorts, commented: “Georgia is experiencing unprecedented growth in visitor numbers, as travellers discover this beautiful country’s charming architecture, rich culture, delectable cuisine and many significant historic sites.

“Wyndham Hotels and Resorts is thrilled to be one of the fastest growing hotel companies in the country, bringing yet another of our internationally recognised hotel brands to Georgia, and adding the vibrant capital city of Tbilisi to the list of international destinations where Wyndham Grand hotels can be found.”

wyndhamhotels.com

By Kerry Medina

In early August, Best Western International Inc. filed SEC Form S-1 with the intent of becoming a for-profit corporation through a merger with its wholly owned subsidiary, with plans to subsequently offer 55 million shares of common stock expected to be issued on Dec. 18 or thereabouts.

But when Hotel Interactive® spoke with David Kong, Best Western’s President and CEO, a week after the filing, he was entirely focused on the expansion that preceded the SEC filling. The company has grown its stable of brands by nearly 65 percent since 2015, adding eight new hotel chains to a portfolio that, three years ago, only consisted of Best Western, Best Western Plus and Best Western Premier.

“To protect market share, we need products that appeal to our current customers, but we also need to reach customers who haven’t used our products before,” said Kong, adding that attracting new customers is a matter of recognizing that travelers have different occasions to travel. “It’s not about creating something in a vacuum, but looking at what’s going on in the industry and what consumer preferences are,” he said.

Among the new labels are urban boutique brand Vīb (as in Vibrant), which made its U.S. debut this past August in Missouri with the 92-room Vīb Springfield, replete with eight gaming stations, an onsite electronics shop and the brand’s signature fireplace. Similarly, the new GLō brand is the company’s answer to midscale, boutique-style accommodations in suburban and secondary markets.

However, today’s traveler also has a keen interest in independent hotels if the company’s three new soft brands are any indication. The new BW Premier Collection by Best Western targets the upscale and upper-upscale segments, while the BW Signature Collection by Best Western focuses on the upper-midscale space and SureStay Collection by Best Western is aimed at the upper-economy and midscale markets.

In fact, the SureStay Hotel Group, which also includes the new classic economy SureStay Hotel by Best Western and premium economy SureStay Plus Hotel by Best Western, marked 189 properties worldwide in July, less than two years after the brand’s launch. The rapid growth is attributed to a competitive fee structure compared with other brands in the upper economy and lower midscale segments and access to the Best Western brand, according to the company.

“I think we’ll continue to grow at a very fast pace with SureStay,” Kong said, noting that the cycle is currently more conducive to conversions, especially in the economy sector, than it is to new construction, which is why Vīb, and GLō have been slower to ramp up.

Kong explained that “at this time in the cycle, new construction is very slow going because land is expensive, financing is hard and construction costs in general –and labor especially—are high.”

The hotel group also marked its entry into the extended-stay space with the 2016 launch of Executive Residency by Best Western. According to Kong, the upper-midscale to upscale hotel already has about 50-dual branded hotels in the pipeline and 10 more as stand-alone properties.

But Kong’s ambitions for the company don’t end with the roll out and ramp up of these eight new brands. He’s also casting an eye to the top 50 markets, as defined by STR, where the hotel group wants to achieve greater penetration for greater visibility. Kong also pointed out that locations in these destinations will also satisfy more existing customer demand and enable the company to reach more new customers.

Yet, that isn’t to say that Best Western is without locations in major global markets. Last November, the company debuted Experiences by Best Western Rewards, another means for its 32 million-plus loyalty members to cash in points for travel to Walt Disney World in Orlando, Grand Canyon National Park, New York City, Paris and Las Vegas. Kong views the program as aspirational for existing members and motivational for potential members. “It also showcases the locations and experiences that guests can have when staying at our properties in these locations,” he added.

As Best Western continues on its expansion path, the hotel group is touting another year of record RevPAR Index, which Kong credits to more investments made in sales and marketing as well as technology, elaborating, “fundamentally, it was also driven by the core brand strategy of customer care that builds a loyal customer base.”

Part of that customer service program included enhancements made to the Best Western mobile engagement platform, including a messaging platform where the hotel group communicates with guests after they’ve made a booking. Such communication includes sending them room upgrade options and suggestions for amenity purchases, such as an in-room bottle of wine upon arrival. According to Kong, the tool is reflective of the company’s customer base, “which is a good cross-section of all generations and income levels.

While the mobile platform has been delivering room revenue, the Phoenix-based hotel firm is also funneling funds into other guest-facing technologies like tokenized credit card transactions that better protect guest data since the brand is no longer storing it.

Additionally, the Best Western Virtual Reality Experience has evolved since its initial unveiling in 2016 to six-second virtual reality videos of hotel interiors using Google Street View. While it’s not yet available for all hotels—although that remains the end goal—those that are available can be viewed on YouTube and Google, which Kong said also improves the brand’s Google content rating. Best Western is also working with IBM Watson to test Artificial Intelligence (AI) in creating vacation packages.

On the back end of the business, a training avatar was launched to improve the skills and services of front desk staff. As an acknowledgement of today’s more informed and thus, more demanding guest, the training program is intended to deliver “superior guest experiences,” as Kong described it, by employing avatars that play the role of difficult guests. The new training exercise complements a new front end reservations system that Kong explained will streamline the booking experience for guests.

Still to come are further enhancements to the Best Western Rewards program and potentially more new brands. “New construction is difficult at this point in the cycle and so we have to look at conversion and repositioning opportunities,” Kong said, hinting “so there will be an announcement at the upcoming Lodging Conference.”

Photo Credit: Trill boards are being used to collaborate and plan vacations. Pictured is an MGM property in Las Vegas. Bloomberg

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A good sale to Florence

Here are some practical travel tips to Florence, Tuscany and Cinque Terre.

Florence, Italy – Photo: Steve via Flickr, used under Creative Commons License (By 2.0)

Sample Travel Date:

• March 13th – 20th, 2019

• This is just ONE SAMPLE travel date, for more availability, please follow the “Fare Availability” and “How to Search for Availability” instructions below

Fare Availability:

• Valid for travel from January 2019 – March 2019 for Sunday through Wednesday departures and Tuesday through Thursday returns. Availability is limited. A 7 day minimum stay is required. Must purchase at least 50 days in advance

• Please note that while this fare is valid at time of posting, if this post is more than two days old, the fare is likely gone.

How to Search for Availability:

• This is just to search for availability. To buy your tickets, scroll down to “How to Buy” section of this post

• The ITA search page should be like below when all values are inputted

• You cannot buy tickets using ITA. To buy, follow our instructions in the “How to Book” section below.

Fare Class:

Elite Qualifying Dollars:

Routing:

• JFK – CDG (Paris) – FLR (Florence) – CDG – JFK

Stopover:

Mileage:

• Miles Flown: 8,338 miles or 6.0 cents
  
• Elite Qualifying Miles: 8,338 miles
• Redeemable Miles: 1,750 miles

How to Buy:

• Book on Delta with dates found on ITA Software Matrix Airfare Search.

Accommodations

• HotelsCombined - One of the leading hotel meta-search engines. Search all the hotel and online travel agencies with one search.

Car Rentals

• Rental Cars - One of the world’s leading car rental agencies. Includes all the major brands like Hertz, Avis, Budget, Dollar, Enterprise etc.

Activities and Tours

• Viator – The world's largest marketplace for destination activities and tours

Travel Insurance

Background Information:

• Visa: US Citizens – Not required. Other nationals, check the TIMATIC Visa Database
• Currency: Euro (EUR). $1USD = 0.86 EUR

Tips for saving when using credit cards at international destinations:

For more of the latest cheap New York Flight Deals:

* The Flight Deal will receive a commission if you use the accommodation, car rental, activities, or travel insurance affiliate links to make a booking or apply and is approved for a credit card using our link above. Thank you for your continuing support.

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Jamie Biesiada

Customer loyalty is all-important to agents, but it's something that is earned through effort, not just a simple weekly email.

"I think the biggest challenge we have in our industry is because vacations are not everyday purchases, they're by and large once a year," said Vicki Freed, Royal Caribbean International's senior vice president of sales, trade support and service. "People are not loyal to their travel agent."

I recently sat down with Freed aboard Royal Caribbean's Harmony of the Seas to talk about the issue.

Royal asks people why they jump around and switch agencies. The top answer?

"'I didn't remember who my travel agent was,'" Freed said. "No. 2 was, 'I don't know, I just didn't feel a connection.' It is not about price. This goes for all suppliers: by and large, people shuffle around agencies.'"

It's not a matter of getting bad service, Freed said. Instead, it's because the consumer simply didn't feel a need to book with the same agent.

"The worst spot to be is in that indifference, they're in that middle ground so they leave their agency because they had no reason to stay," she said.

Knowing this, Freed often asks agents how they stay in touch with clients. The common response is an email once a week.

"That's great, but lots of people get lots of emails, so it's delete, delete," she said.

Instead, Freed urges agents to reach out and proactively call their clients, something many don't do today.

"They'll return a phone call, but it takes more these days," said Freed. "It takes a follow-up note to say, 'Thank you so much for booking your last vacation with me. I hope I've been able to create some incredible memories for you and your family.' And it also takes just calling them."

One of Freed's favorite "Vicki's Tips," a Monday-Friday newsletter containing a daily tip, came from an agent who calls each of his clients at the end of the year thanking them for booking with him.

"It's no other reason than to just stay in touch, just to connect — that's it," she said. "I'm not trying to sell you something, I'm simply trying to keep that connection going so when you're ready to book your next vacation, whatever kind of vacation that is, you're going to call me. ...  It's just being proactive."

Freed practices what she preaches. When I met with her aboard the Harmony, I mentioned my wife and I were about to pick up a German shepherd puppy. Not a week later, I had a card in the mail from Freed with a German shepherd on the cover wishing us congratulations.