|
|
Volume 5, Issue 35, August 28, 2007 |
   |
At least for one night each year, you can dine, shop and explore European capitals when your own body thinks it’s daytime, even though the local clock says it’s night. The “white nights” program that was begun so successfully in Paris in 2002 has now become an annual event in five cities. The next is Sept. 8, in Rome.
Rome’s La Notte Bianca actually starts the night of Sept. 7, with shops open til midnight and participating restaurants and theaters open til 6 a.m. Then on the 8th, the city goes wild at night, with all sorts of restaurants, shops, museums, monuments, galleries and attractions open. There are lots of special events too, including fireworks, circus acts, dance shows, a concert of church bells, a country music festival, free salsa lessons and a poetry contest. The city center is closed to traffic, and all public transportation runs all night and costs €1 ($1.35).
Riga already had its white night in late August. Coming up in September are the all-night festivals in Madrid and Bucharest on Sept. 22, and Brussels on Sept. 29. Paris, which started it all, ends the white-night season with its gala overnight event on Oct. 6. 
Our deadline approaches: This is your last chance to vote in our annual Global Traveler survey of the best in global business and luxury travel. Don’t let your voice go unheard: Vote in any or all of our 49 categories for best airlines, airports, loyalty programs, hotels, destinations, cruise lines and more. Just go to GlobalTravelerUSA.com/Survey to fill out the easy online form.
After an 18-month, multi-million-dollar refurbishment, The Churchill Hotel on London’s Portman Square is officially “done.” The guestrooms are light and airy, done in neutrals, greens and blues; each has a 26-inch LCD TV and brand-new bath. The two-floor Regency Club and all suites also have iPod docking stations.
Here’s a Web site for travelers with some really useful features. Enter a destination at Multimap.com, and the site will pinpoint such helpful features as ATMs, bars, restaurants and bus stops. You can also send the information to your mobile phone, or sign up for the mobile version.
American Airlines, which has been refining the booking elements on its AA.com Web site since earlier this year, has just introduced another round of enhancements. Travelers can now see seven days of flight options at one glance, see various flights available at a chosen price, and move back and forth among pages more easily.
The Registered Traveler program officially launched at San Francisco International Airport (SFO) last week, and 1,000 people signed up in the first 30 hours it was offered. You can join Clear’s Verified Identity Pass program online, and five enrollment stations are now open in the Bay area: two at SFO, two at San Jose (SJO) and one at the Hyatt Embarcadero. A Clear lane at New York’s Westchester County Airport (HPN) was also launched this week. Travelers pay $99.95 a year to be pre-screened — including fingerprinting and an iris scan — and approved by the Transportation Security Administration. The end result is a biometric identity card that allows use of special RT lanes at airports.
Maharaja Restaurant
100 Herzl St.
Ramla, Israel
tel (972) 07 922 3535
I live in Israel, so I always keep my eyes open for places near Ben Gurion Airport (TGV) to take international friends. And ever since my wife and I spent a few weeks in India, we've been searching for authentic Indian food near home. The Maharaja Restaurant, located off the beaten track in the small town of Ramla (or Ramle) in central Israel nicely met both requirements.
Israel is not as surprising a location for authentic Indian food as you might think. Jews moved to India some 2,500 years ago, and many Indian Jews immigrated to Israel in the late 1940s and today the country has an Indian Jewish population of 60,000, with a high concentration in the vicinity of Ramla. In fact, the Maharaja has an attached Indian grocery store selling items not available anywhere else in the country.
Maharaja is as unpretentious as it is authentic, a classic Indian diner right down to the high-backed chairs and the perfunctory service in broken English. But the ambience (or lack thereof) is made up for by the food.
We started with a mixed platter of appetizers that included batata wada (fried potato dumplings) and two kinds of samosa, to dip in a choice of coriander and tamarind sauces. They were perfectly cooked, crunchy and delicious, exactly the way we remembered eating them on the streets of India.
For the main dish, we ordered the paneer palak, a mix of cottage cheese chunks and creamy spinach, and alu gobi, a cauliflower-and-potato curry. Both were piping hot and filled with the exotic flavors we had come to love from our travels. They came with rice and chapati, a thin Indian bread, and we ordered a platter of puni — essentially, fried dough so puffed up and thin it practically dissolves to the touch. We only ordered the vegetarian Indian food, since that’s what we ate exclusively when we were traveling in India, but the restaurant also serves fish.
We were all too stuffed to order the desserts, of which there was an ample selection. The sweetest part of the meal, however, was clearly the price: only $45 for five people.
Maharaja is not on the main tourist route in Israel. But if you're traveling from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, it's a short jaunt off the main highway, and it’s just 5 miles south of Ben Gurion Airport (TGV) – and well worth the detour.
Score: ••••• Brian Blum
Eos Airlines has a nice deal on its round-trip New York (JFK) – London (STN) flights, if you buy by Sept. 5. Buy one round-trip ticket for $4,999 and your companion flies free; tickets can be used until Nov. 30. It’s not necessarily a half-price deal – some Eos fares are $6,560 round-trip, and all 48 seats are the same – but it’s still at least a 24 percent savings. Only certain fare codes qualify, so you might want to call the airline at 800-458-1277 if you can’t find them easily. Tickets for this deal require seven-day advance purchase; use promotion code BOCO1.
By Sept. 28, you could win 50 free nights to use at any Hyatt hotel or resort worldwide. It’s part of the Hyatt Ultimate Adventure Challenge, a six-webisode online competition in which five families square off in destination adventures and vie for votes. At the end of the competition, the winning family and a random entrant each get the grand prize. You get two entries simply by registering on the web site; 10 more if you’re a Gold Passport member; one more each time you log in (a maximum of one per day), one each time you watch a video and vote, five if you sign up for Hyatt’s newsletter, up to 50 for referring friends to the site, and 50 if you add a link to the contest from your own Web site.
For the next 16 weeks, redeeming miles for short flights (700 miles max) inside the United States becomes less expensive, miles-wise, on United. Redemption rates for EconomySaver rewards have been reduced from 25,000 miles to 15,000 miles for the short flights. Only nonstop flights on United, United Express or Ted qualify. Redeem miles by Dec. 12; travel no later than Dec. 14.
Until Nov. 15, if you rent a car for three days or more at any Dollar or Thrifty location, you can earn triple miles. The ground rules are the same at each of the corporate siblings: Rent by Nov. 15, rent at least a midsize car, and reserve at least 24 hours ahead. With Dollar, you earn miles or points in the loyalty program of Alaska, American, ATA, Continental, Delta or United Airlines, or in the Best Western Gold Crown Club International; use promotion code TRP7. Thrifty’s deal is the same, but also includes Northwest Airlines and US Airways; its code is TPE7.
For three performances in early September, all seats for the New York City Opera at Lincoln Center are $25 to all comers. The Opera-For-All Festival is being held Sept. 6-8. La Boheme is performed on Sept. 7, Don Giovanni on Sept. 8, and on Sept.6 is a special celebration excerpting the entire 2007-2008 season. Extras include behind-the-scenes video footage and an afterparty.
