Holiday News - Direct

With two bank holidays in one month, May is one of the top months for taking a short break. According to a recent survey, nearly half of Britons are planning to go on a holiday during May. Many of these are heading abroad for a short city break.
Of those planning a holiday in May, 25% […]

There are several in-flight mobile use trials on the way at the moment, and the issue is on everyone’s lips. But trial by Air France is reportedly not running very smoothly. The British Airways has announced it will not be introducing the service any time soon. On Air France flights, there seem to be several difficulties in using mobile phones. The connection is slow and of poor quality, and incoming calls and emails are not yet able to get through to the planes.

While on holiday in Las Vegas a British tourist managed to con his way to the film set of Iron Man. The film is set to be next summer’s blockbuster, with Robert Downey Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow amongst the leading stars.

The holidaymaker had been staying at the legendary Las Vegas hotel and casino Ceasar’s Palace when he spotted the film set and managed to get by security guards by saying he was one of the extras.

Holidays in the US could become more difficult in the future as the US government’s plans to fingerprint all arriving and departing visitors are causing controversy. The latest announcement said it would be up to airlines and cruise ship companies to take the fingerprints from their passengers arriving or departing from holidays in America and deliver them to the government in 24 hours.

New Orleans is beginning to see a real recovery of tourism after suffering severely from Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The city had almost double the amount of visitors in 2007 compared to 2006. Last year 7.1 million tourists visited New Orleans from outside the US. The visitor numbers were released by the New Orleans Convention and Visitors Bureau recently.

Low cost airline Ryanair has announced two new routes to operate over the summer from Stansted airport. The airline will offer flights to Beziers in France and Rimini in Italy. Holidays in Italy are very popular during the summer season, and Rimini is one of the many destinations where holidaymakers from Britain head to. Holidays in France are equally popular, and both are easy to get to with routes from regional airports.

As cruise holidays continue to grow more popular, Princes Cruises has announced it will increase capacity by 40% on its ships for 2009. The cruise line will have most of its fleet in Europe next year, with Emerald Princess, Ruby Princess, Royal Princess and Tahitian Princess all sailing around Scandinavia and the Mediterranean.

Low cost airline Jet2.com has announced two new routes to summer holiday destinations from Newcastle International airport.
The airline has added two Greek islands to its expanding destination list – Corfu and Rhodes. Flights will commence on June 4th to Rhodes and June 20th to Corfu.
“Both destinations have lacked direct, scheduled and, importantly, low cost services […]

The best way to get people to visit an online travel agent site is to attract them with email marketing. According to a new survey, email offers and newsletters are a better marketing tool in online holiday sales than TV and newspaper ads as well as sponsored search engine links.

Majority of over 50s couples are planning to take four or more romantic short breaks this year, compared to just one when they were in their 40s.
The figures were revealed by a survey by Holiday Inn. In two years there has been 25% rise in the number of older couples taking short city breaks.
Holiday Inn […]

Every year more and more bags are mishandled or delayed in airports around the world. Last year, a total of 42.2 million pieces of checked baggage did not get to their destination with their owners.

After moving its base of operations to St Pancras International rail station, Eurostar has seen a massive increase in passengers. Over 2 million people have taken the high-speed train between London, Paris and Brussels since beginning of 2008.

The luxurious villa in Jamaica, where Ian Fleming wrote many of the James Bond books, is to become a holiday resort for the rich and famous. The 15-acre site is currently owned by music tycoon Chris Blackwell who has already turned Fleming’s villa (Goldeneye) to a hotel visited by A-list stars. Now Blackwell will begin £60 million improvements on the estate to create 85 homes for pop and sports stars.

Virgin Atlantic airlines has announced it will be adding a new daily service between London Heathrow and Washington Dulles International. From April 20, there will be a twice daily service between the two big cities by Virgin.

The cruise line has received nominations from families and local communities this time – usually cruise ship godmothers are celebrities, but Independence of the Seas will have a more down to earth godmother.

A new 60 million Euro ski centre construction will commence in Bulgaria in May. The project in the Bansko ski area has been planned for a long time.
“Mechi chal” ski centre will have ski lift capacity of 2,000 as well as a hotel and a restaurant ready for ski season 2008-09. In the second phase […]

The famous concerts held at the Ischgl ski resort are getting closer to the grand finale of May 3. Easter Sunday saw a concert by Stereophonics, April 20 will see a reggae performance by Jimmy Cliff and the final event on May 3 will be topped off with a performance from Sir Elton John

As the Euro continues to grow stronger against the pound, the dollar grows ever weaker against the pound. For British holidaymakers this means that holidays in Euro-countries are becoming more expensive.

Cayman Islands have kicked off a new initiative to achieve a more environmentally friendly tourism sector. Seven holiday resorts in the exclusive Cayman Islands are taking part in the pilot scheme from April.

A new survey has shown that on average 200,000 people have had to deal with misplaced or lost luggage at UK airports over the past two years. According to the figures by InsureandGo, August is the worst month for lost luggage, while January is the best. 250,000 passengers luggage was misplaced in the month of August, while “just” 156,000 passengers faced the same situation in January.