The Complete Travel Detective Bible: The Consummate Insider Tells You What You Need to Know in an Increasingly Complex World

by Peter Greenberg

Overview

This ultimate "physician's desk reference" for travelers addresses the questions, anxieties, concerns, and desire for essential information that are common to seasoned and novice travelers alike.

Peter Greenberg, best-selling author, trusted Today show travel editor, and the man that writer Paul Theroux calls "the liberator and defender of the traveling public," offers an encyclopedic look at every aspect of the travel process, both domestically and internationally, from the true definition of travel terms to in-depth explanations of how things really work.

Do you want to know which airline seats are the best and worst? How you can vacation in a lighthouse, a monastery, or even a converted prison? Which countries require you to get visas before you visit? Or won't let you in even if you have a passport? Which airlines are the worst "bumping" offenders? How you can avoid hidden fees? The Complete Travel Detective Bible offers up answers to these questions and much more. Everything is cross-referenced and each chapter is filled with useful charts, lists, and diagrams, making for an easily accessible format.

Greenberg, who has been to more than 146 countries, is an expert without equal at outplaying the travel industry at its own games, securing the best fares, accommodations, and service at the lowest possible prices. He shares every one of these hard-won, ingenious insider secrets in this book, making The Complete Travel Detective Bible the ultimate word on travel today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781605297644
Publisher:	Harmony/Rodale/Convergent
Publication date:	10/02/2007
Sold by:	Random House
Format:	eBook
Pages:	640
File size:	6 MB

About the Author

Peter Greenberg is the travel editor for CBS News, appearing on CBS This Morning. He is also the host of the PBS show The Travel Detective with Peter Greenberg and the nationally syndicated Peter Greenberg Worldwide Radio Show. He is the author of the New York Times bestselling Travel Detective series.

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

Airports

"It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on Earth has ever produced the phrase, 'as pretty as an airport.' Airports are ugly. Some are very ugly. Some attain a degree of ugliness that can only be the result of a special effort."

--DOUGLAS ADAMS

I've spent enough time in airports to almost consider them condominia, and that in itself is scary. But I spend time there more by design than by accident, and that's the key: how and how well you can navigate through-- and out of--airports. And when you can't, it's all about how you can make the best of a bad situation. And yes, there is a method to the madness here. Remember, the key here is to look at airports as challenging obstacle courses that can be conquered--by you.

For one-stop-shops on all things airport related, these are the two sites to keep in mind.

The site www.worldairportguide.com provides you practically all the information on more than 250 airports around the world "from Aberdeen to Zurich." You can find airport phone numbers, addresses, on-site parking information, which car rental agencies are available, terminal transfers, and nearby hotels.

You're probably familiar with Expedia, but what you may not know is that the booking site www.expedia.com/daily/airports has its own roving reporter, Harriet Baskas, who keeps track of the facilities and services at more than 65 airports worldwide. This includes the history of the airport, shops, attractions, and activities close to the airport.

For fun, you can see moving graphics of airplanes that are taking off, landing, and in transit at 18 different airports at www.passur.com/sites.htm.

Airport Terminal Maps

When it comes to saving time, it's always a good idea to arm yourself with information in advance. Our friends at www.airportterminalmaps.com offer diagrams of all the major international airports in the United States.

If you're running to catch a connecting flight, it's helpful to know the layout of the airport in advance--it can mean the difference between running a mile with your briefcase and flagging down a cart to take you there. And when driving to the airport, you'll know that if an airport's terminals are set up in a loop, zooming past your terminal can cost you an extra 30 minutes to circle all the way back--just take a look at JFK's layout.

An airport that is more gridlike makes it much easier to maneuver from one terminal to the next. Take a look at LAX.

Traveling from one terminal to another at Dallas/Fort Worth is never easy, but, fortunately, the Skylink will get you there a little faster.

Most Delayed Airports

Now onto the bad news. . .

The Bureau of Transportation Statistics studies the performance of major US carriers--19 carriers reported in 2006, including American Airlines, Continental Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Northwest Airlines, Southwest Airlines, United Airlines, and US Airways.

The reports include both arrival delays and departure delays. Now, one of these is easier to cover up than another--once a flight is closed and departs from the terminal, it is considered to have "departed," even if you sit on the runway for another hour waiting to take off. What's harder to fake, however, is delayed arrival time.

Statistics

In 2004, 78.1 percent of flights arrived on time, 19.9 percent had delayed arrivals, and 1.8 percent were canceled.

In 2005, 77.4 percent of flights arrived on time, 20.5 percent had delayed arrivals, and 1.9 percent were canceled.

In 2006, 75.5 percent of flights arrived on time, 22.6 percent had delayed arrivals, and 1.7 percent were entirely canceled.

Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics

So what is that saying? Basically, that things are only getting worse.

The Bureau of Transportation Statistics puts together monthly reports of on- time performances for departure and arrival times of the top 32 airports in the country. Here's what they have to say.

Avoiding Crowds

Here's a trick to avoid lines. When you have an airport that's a double level airport, where departures are upstairs and arrivals are downstairs (especially if it's an early morning flight), you're going to be nailed by crowds if you go upstairs. Go downstairs--have somebody drop you off there-- then take the elevator upstairs. Just rent a cart for your luggage and you'll save 15 minutes.

RANKING OF MAJOR AIRPORT ON-TIME DEPARTURES (YEAR TO DATE, JANUARY 1 TO APRIL 30, 2007)

RANK AIRPORT ON TIME (PERCENT)



1 Portland, OR (PDX) 83.80

2 San Diego, CA (SAN) 82.93

3 Salt Lake City, UT (SLC) 82.05

4 Oakland, CA (OAK) 80.60

5 Tampa, FL (TPA) 80.36

6 Houston, TX (IAH) 80.14

7 Los Angeles, CA (LAX) 79.90

8 Baltimore, MD (BWI) 78.46

9 Seattle, WA (SEA) 78.13

10 St. Louis, MO (STL) 78.12

11 San Francisco, CA (SFO) 77.56

12 Orlando, FL (MCO) 77.35

13 Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN (MSP) 76.73

14 Phoenix, AZ (PHX) 76.66

15 Las Vegas, NV (LAS) 76.26

16 Fort Lauderdale, FL (FLL) 75.05

17 Cincinnati, OH (CVG) 74.97

18 Denver, CO (DEN) 74.84

19 Miami, FL (MIA) 74.75

20 Washington, DC (DCA) 74.64

21 Atlanta, GA (ATL) 74.39

22 Detroit, MI (DTW) 74.19

23 Chicago, IL (MDW) 72.79

24 Boston, MA (BOS) 72.75

25 Washington, DC (IAD) 72.02

26 Dallas/Fort Worth, TX (DFW) 71.59

27 New York, NY (LGA) 70.62

28 Philadelphia, PA (PHL) 67.33

29 Charlotte, NC (CLT) 66.25

30 Newark, NJ (EWR) 65.30

31 New York, NY (JFK) 64.64

32 Chicago, IL (ORD) 61.16

RANKING OF MAJOR AIRPORT ON-TIME ARRIVAL PERFORMANCE (YEAR-TO-DATE, JANUARY 1 TO APRIL 30, 2007)

RANK AIRPORT ON TIME (PERCENT)



1 Oakland, CA (OAK) 80.60

2 Baltimore, MD (BWI) 78.75

3 Houston, TX (IAH) 78.47

4 Salt Lake City, UT (SLC) 78.41

5 San Diego, CA (SAN) 78.33

6 Atlanta, GA (ATL) 77.82

7 Los Angeles, CA (LAX) 77.05

8 Chicago, IL (MDW) 76.99

9 Phoenix, AZ (PHX) 76.72

10 Las Vegas, NV (LAS) 76.65

11 Portland, OR (PDX) 76.15

12 Tampa, FL (TPA) 75.20

13 St. Louis, MO (STL) 75.03

14 Orlando, FL (MCO) 74.84

15 Cincinnati, OH (CVG) 74.50

16 Denver, CO (DEN) 74.17

17 Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN (MSP) 73.24

18 San Francisco, CA (SFO) 72.80

19 Dallas/Fort Worth, TX (DFW) 72.75

20 Seattle, WA (SEA) 72.46

21 Miami, FL (MIA) 71.58

22 Washington, DC (IAD) 70.90

23 Fort Lauderdale, FL (FLL) 70.88

24 Detroit, MI (DTW) 70.59

25 Washington, DC (DCA) 70.19

26 Boston, MA (BOS) 67.91

27 Charlotte, NC (CLT) 65.99

28 Philadelphia, PA (PHL) 64.85

29 Chicago, IL (ORD) 59.79

30 New York, NY (JFK) 59.68

31 New York, NY (LGA) 58.10

32 Newark, NJ (EWR) 55.04

Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics, Airline On-Time Data

The World's Busiest Airports

According to the 2005 airport passenger statistics, the busiest airports in the world were:

(Atlanta) Hartsfield-Jackson: Los Angeles International:

85,907,423 61,489,398

(Chicago) O'Hare: 76,510,003 Dallas/Fort Worth: 59,176,265

London Heathrow: 67,915,403 Charles de Gaulle (Paris):

(Tokyo) Narita: 63,282,219 53,798,308

Again, the best way to avoid these airports and flights is to be as informed as possible. You can track real-time flight departure and arrival delays through several different online sources.

The Web site www.flightstats.com is one of the handiest resources out there right now. You can track the real-time status of flights departing and arriving by airport, as well as check airport weather conditions, facts and figures of airports (e.g., "LAX is the world's fifth busiest passenger airport, serving over 61 million people in 2005"), reserve parking online, see real-time traffic conditions, and see airport security line wait times.

Check www.flytecomm.com for real-time on-time rates by flight number, arrival airport, or departure airport.

You can track real-time flights on www.flightaware.com, organized by flight number, airport code, or even by aircraft type (such as Boeing 737). You can also see the total number of flights in the air at any given time, graphs that depict a full day of flight activity in the United States, and graphs depicting the total number of flights departing and arriving by airport.

The official Federal Aviation Administration site, www.fly.faa.gov, lets you check general departure and arrival delays by airport and zoom in by region to get the stats on smaller, alternative airports as well as the major international airports.

Alternate Airports

As a contrarian traveler, I'm a big supporter of choosing alternate airports over the major international airports. It can save you time and money, and, best of all, you can skip the crowds. Think outside of the box. Almost every metropolis has an alternate airport or a nearby city with a smaller airport that can get you close to where you need to go--and the hassle of a one-stop flight or driving an hour or so to get to your destination is far more palatable than being stuck for 6 hours on a runway. Heading to Washington, DC? Think Baltimore. San Francisco? Try Oakland, which is just a few miles away but a million miles from the fog and congestion.

Consider the case of a friend of mine, who was stuck on the nightmarish delay of JetBlue Airways on Valentine's Day in 2007. Here's the e-mail she sent me after getting off the plane . . . 8 hours after boarding her flight and going nowhere.

I arrived at the airport at 6:30 a.m.; my flight was to leave at 9:05 a.m. We didn't board the flight until about 5 p.m.; and then they kept us on the plane for 8 hours. The airplane was in riot mode; people were everywhere, screaming, crying--mothers with babies, trapped with all of us on the plane- -with no diapers (I even gave one woman a T-shirt from my carry-on bag). We had only Terra Blue chips, water, and soda, but that ran out; toilets overflowed; we could not get off. People were on the phone with their attorneys, people were yelling at each other, babies crying; it was really horrible.

We finally got back to the terminal at 1 a.m.

I then had to search for my luggage downstairs until 2:45 a.m. I managed to book a flight on Continental, traveling the next morning at 8 a.m. I took a taxi over to the Continental terminal, only to sleep on the floor for a few hours before I got in line at 5:45 a.m. to check in for my 8 a.m. that routed me through Houston, and then on to LAX.

I was in a massive line, as you can imagine, and by the time I reached the counter, they told me I was too late for the flight . . . I gave up, grabbed a cab, and went back into Manhattan. Next, I tried calling JetBlue, but their toll-free number just gave out a recording that said they were not taking calls and to call back--and then the connection was cut off.

That's when my friend called me. She was literally trapped in New York with no way to get back home to California.

So I gave her a tip: New York's secret airport, Islip, out on Long Island. She took the Long Island Railroad from Penn Station to the Ronkonkoma Station, then a 5-minute cab ride to Macarthur Airport, where Southwest was operating flights to the West Coast.

A few hours later, I got an e-mail. She had reached the airport easily, and Southwest had booked her on a flight from Long Island to Midway in Chicago, with a quick change of planes back to Los Angeles. And she got home.

Here are just a few of my favorite examples of alternate airports.

Some people actually think that Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR) is a great alternate airport to La Guardia or Kennedy International (JFK) in New York. And it does have some redeeming qualities--not the least of which is that it is the second-largest hub for Continental, which translates into nonstop flights at lower prices. For example, a round-trip Continental flight from Los Angeles (LAX) to JFK, booked 6 weeks in advance, requires one stop in Houston and costs $397. Alternatively, a round-trip flight from LAX to Newark on Continental is nonstop and costs less--$355. Now consider the fact that EWR is far more compact than JFK and therefore that much easier to navigate, with an efficient baggage claim area, and is only about 16 miles from midtown Manhattan (JFK is 15 miles away).

To get from Newark Airport to Manhattan, a $14 Olympia Express bus from the airport travels to Port Authority, Grand Central Station, and Penn Station. The AirTrain system is a speedy monorail that takes you to the New Jersey Transit train, which will take you directly to Penn Station for less than $14. A taxi ride costs between $40 and $55.

But the real winners are the secondary airports in other major cities: Chicago's Midway instead of Chicago O'Hare. (Other options include Northwest Chicagoland Regional Airport, Central Illinois Regional Airport, and Austin Straubel in Green Bay.) And let's not forget the secret third Chicago airport: Milwaukee. Think I'm kidding? Check out the parking lot at Mitchell Field--at least a third of the cars have Illinois plates. That should tell you something.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments     viii
Introduction     x
Basic Facts and Figures
Airports     2
Airlines     28
Cars/Car Rentals     71
Ground Transportation     91
Hotels     108
Cruises     167
Frequent Flier Miles/Loyalty Programs     195
Online Booking     203
Security and Terrorism     217
Important Facts
Baggage     234
Passport Rules     245
Travel Insurance     266
Cell Phones     281
Travel Health     295
Travel by Lifestyle
Accessible Travel     328
Family Travel     343
Women's Travel     371
Gay and Lesbian Travel     382
Senior Travel     393
Solo Travel     404
Student Travel     413
Pet Travel     424
Active Travel
Biking     444
Camping, RVing, and Boating Safety     452
Hiking     465
National/State Parks     479
Travel with a Purpose
Responsible Travel     487
Weather Vacations     504
Culinary Travel     512
Volunteer Vacations     527
Affinity Travel     540
Participatory/Educational Travel     553
Spiritual Travel     564
Tough Travel     572
Medical Tourism     592
Index     602

Editorial Reviews

Thanks to the Internet and international competition, the travel industry is moving faster than the speed of light. Travel Detective author Peter Greenberg has devoted his life to helping you catch up. The travel editor of NBC's Today show and America Online functions as a vacationer's public defender, sorting out the reality and hype of tourism worldwide. In The Complete Travel Detective Bible, he examines every aspect of domestic and foreign travel, from choosing a safe hotel or cruise to ferreting out the best accommodations and fares. This truly encyclopedic paperback is filled with charts, lists, and diagrams; all information is cross-referenced by destination, term, and experience.