Well it’s 5AM EST of another day and, as I read my e-mails and read the morning news, it’s interesting what I find. In my e-mails, I have another photographer inviting me to join his group on another African safari, another commercial interest is entreating me to travel once again to their hotel overlooking Niagara Falls, and many, many companies are wanting me, or anyone else for that matter, to book early for the best all-inclusive deals to Caribbean climates. “Plan now to escape the sure-to-arrive winter cold and snow”, they all say in one way or another. Decisions, decisions, decisions!
With New York’s Central Park covered, for the first time since 1952, in the white stuff in October of this year, talk of global warming has had to take a back seat to all of the more heated discussions about Greece and their economic malaise, but a mailing from a Manhattan hotel certainly looks appealing. Great price reduction, if you book immediately :-), and close enough to all of the Broadway shows to warrant consideration. When I went to New York City in March, 2008, it was to get away from a huge pile of snow in my front yard. I would like to go there again this year, but I guess I had better check the weather forecast to see if my snow shovel will be needed. I have an alpine snow shovel with a collapsible handle that I can carry with me when I’m out on the trails in winter so it would fit in my luggage :-), if needed.
It looks like it might be a tough year ahead for the travel industry as economics and safety issues come to the front. I love to travel but just recently had to reconsider travel to one Caribbean destination when a friend advised me that curfew conditions were now in force in his Caribbean island homeland. If it isn’t one thing, it’s another.
As I continue to scan the news from around the world, it looks like Thailand and the industrial centres around Bangkok will continue to be fighting floodwaters for perhaps another month and some important factories will be inaccessible or inoperable into the New Year. With much of Thailand under water or under threat from flooding, I’m certain that their tourist industry can’t be happy. For companies such as Nikon, and Honda and Sony and many others, the impact on the next Christmas tree offering of a new camera model or a new car or TV is definitely a serious one. I’m not in the market for a new car or new TV but was rather looking forward to Nikon’s next DSLR offering. Whenever there is discussion of floods and dikes, it brings back memories of my youth in Winnipeg where I was often involved in the whole sandbagging process. The Winnipeg Floodway has alleviated much of the flooding threat to the City of Winnipeg but many of the concerns mentioned in the stories about Bangkok canals, and which neighborhoods should be spared and which should be protected, has resonance to the situation along the Red River each Spring.
On a bit happier note, the BBC News reports that the 23rd 007 James Bond thriller is once again in the works and will likely star Daniel Craig as James Bond, Javier Bardem as the villain and with Dame Judi Dench returning as M. If rumours are correct, the film will hit the theatres in the Fall of 2012, forty (40) years after Dr. No reached the big screen in 1962. Who knows, maybe the film makers were able to film a bit of snow in New York this past month and will be ready with a film version of Ian Fleming’s “007 in New York” with an October snowfall twist.
I have enjoyed previous movies in the 007 series so it will be interesting to see how James Bond fares again another time around.
