Swank Hotel Debuts at Base of Beaver Creek

Westin Riverfront brings Beaver Creek cachet down into the Eagle River Valley

Beaver Creek is an elegant, exclusive gated ski resort that was developed as an uptown place. Think expensive slopeside lodging, chic boutiques and pricey eating places. Avon, originally a lettuce farming center with a railroad depot for shipping the crop out of town, iss a downtown place. It grew a bit more organically with lower-priced lodging, service businesses and even (gasp!) a Wal-Mart.

The opening of the $500 million Westin Riverfront Resort & Spa in Avon last weekend represents the first Beaver Creek-quality resort hotel down in the valley. The lobby, restaurant, enormous 25-meter outdoor pool (bottom photo) and decks of the green-built condo-hotel are oriented directly up the Beaver Creek drainage providing guests with a perfectly framed view of the ski runs. Seen from the Westin, Beaver Creek and Avon seem a lot closer to each other than they do when riding a shuttle bus up the winding access road. Also pulling Avon into the Beaver Creek orbit is the year-old Riverfront Express gondola, which delivers skiers from the hote's doorstep to Beaver Creek's Bachelor Gulch sector in less than three minutes.

The gondola, which is free to all, is not a ski lift but public transportation both up and down from ski area to town, not just for Westin guests but also for guests of other lodging properties in Avon or day visitors parking at the free public lots along US 6. This is especially significant since the Town of Vail, just down the road, is considering raising fees in its parking structures this winter.

Back to the Westin, it is a 210-unit property featuring well appointed studio, one-, two- and three-bedroom units, each with kitchen. The property's facilities and amenities comprise a long, imposing list: Restaurant Avondale run by local star chef Thomas Salamunovich, Spa Anjali (Earth, Fire, Water and Air theme), wine bar, convenience store, on-site sporting goods store/rental/storage, 24-hour business center, free Internet access, recycling stations on every floor, activity concierge, ski valet, meeting facilities and, best for skiers, that gondola conveniently right outside a back door.

I spent just a comfortable night there on opening weekend. The decor is tasteful, pared down and elegant. It's got green versions of popular luxury features, including in-room Internet access, well appointed bathroom, gas fireplace, flat-screen TV, kitchen facilities (my studio had a kitchenette) and Westin's ultra comfortable Heavenly Bed.

In summer, the Westin appeals to golfers (several courses nearby), anglers (it's located right on the Eagle River), cyclists (the bike path is right there too) and, of course, skiers (the gondola makes is a ride-in, ride-out to the slopes). As long as golf weather holds, there should be some interest in the High Flying Golf Package consisting of lodging for two, two rounds of golf at Red Sky Ranch & Golf Course, two 50-minute treatments at Spa Anjali, breakfast for two, complimentary valet Parking and a "welcome amenity" on arrival starting at $224 per person per night. Considerably less expensive is the Master the Mountain Golf Getaway, accommodations, two rounds at the Eagle Ranch Golf Course, breakfast for two, valet parking and "welcome amenity" starting at $99 per person per night. Rates rise during the ski season.


The Westin Riverfront Resort & Spa, 126 Riverfront Lane, Avon; 866-949-1616.

Wall Street Melt Down Hurts Airlines

Air carriers brace for downturn by (guess what?) cutting service

Viewed from a Wall Street-oriented buy/sell/hold point of view, Business Week commented that "High fuel prices are helping make airline travel a 'mid-priced luxury good' and could help the carriers by prodding them into restructuring, an industry analyst says... [Stifel Nicolaus & Co. analyst Hunter K.] Keay said that U.S. airlines prudently responded to high fuel prices by aggressively cutting capacity, dropping marginal routes, and retiring older, fuel-guzzling planes without placing big orders for new ones. The result, he said, has been better pricing power even though traffic growth as been modest or nonexistent. And there's room for growth in ancillary revenue." Positive mid-term news for investors by 2010, assuming that the whole economy has collapsed by then and that fuel prices remain stable or drop, doesn't do a darned thing for travelers who want to visit Grandma at Thanksgiving or take a ski or sun vacation this winter.

Airlines -- especially international carriers (including US carriers that also fly overseas) -- have long cozied up to their "best" customers, with front-cabin comfort, service and amenities. Now, reports Brett Snyder on BNET, a business site, these carriers are "already seeing premium cabin weakness internationally as the economy softens, and now the financial crisis is only going to make things worse. All those rich bankers in New York spend a lot of money sitting up front . . . or should I say 'spent.' (Can you say New York - London?) And as we all know, premium cabins count for most of the profit in the international world. This could get ugly very quickly, especially for airlines that rely primarily on their international premium cabins to generate their profit. Airlines like British Airways with their large transatlantic presence can’t be happy right now, but while US airlines get a smaller share of their business from that type of passenger, they’re still going to be hit hard."

Among the short-term news -- some good, some less so -- affecting air travelers:

• Passengers traveling on premium tickets (i.e., business and first class), which ere on a positive growth curve for the first half of 2008, fell by 1 percent in July. That may be just one percentage point, but it hit airlines hard at a time when jet fuel cost way more than it did in 2007.
• Trying to drum up immediate transatlantic business, American Airlines is offering a free companion ticket the 2008 flyers for a 2009 US-UK flight. The deal is: book and fly roundtrip before Deccember 31, 2008, and earn a free companion ticket for future travel to the United Kingdom or to the Caribbean between January 15 and December 15, 2009. The offer is valid for First Class, Business Class or on "select" Economy seats. And of course, there's fine print.
• Alaska Airlines, which earlier reduced its schedule by about 6 percent. announced that it will cut its winter flying capacity by 8 percent systemwide, and even more on routes to Mexico and Canada.
• United Airlines, which was unprepared for the initial run-up in fuel costs, has taken a second financial hit that could total $500 million quarter. United embarked on some ill-timed fuel hedges it adopted as protect from sharp price increases that didn't materialize. In fact, price dropped. Perhaps feeling a weakness in the "best customer" segment, United has finally loosened requirements for customers to upgrade to Economy Plus. Many of these extra-legroom seats had been filled by elite-level business travelers. Now, with that segment weakening, United is democratizing this service -- not that most leisure travelers, already slammed with baggage check fees, will cough up the extra bucks these days.
• Virgin America’s Main Cabin Select, which offers "first class amenities" to passengers paying extra for "premium coach seats (i.e., bulkhead and exit row), has been delayed. Originally set to launch on September 15, it now won't be bookable until October 6. Reservations system "technical difficulties" are cited as the cause of the delay.
• British Airways, while not immediately paring transatlantic service, is suspending some flights to eastern Europe beginning October 26, backpedaling on new routes originally due to start that same day to Spain and Portugal won't take off after all, and a new route to Hyderabad, India, will be delayed until December 6. "Other changes in capacity come from reduced frequency on multi-frequency routes and have limited impact on our network," said BA.

Galveston's Tourist Zone Devastation Revealed

Hurricane Ike's legacy is a swath of devastation; popular Strand severely damaged

Even as hurricane evacuees were allowed back to hurricane-battered Galveston, TX, to survey the destruction, the Convention & Visitors Bureau website continues to chirp:

"Galveston offers 32 miles of relaxing beaches, superb restaurants, top
resort hotels, marvelous downtown shopping, numerous antique stores,
incredible art galleries, fabulous entertainment and one of the largest
and well-preserved concentrations of Victorian architecture in the
country.

"Galveston is a small romantic island tucked deep within the heart of
south Texas possessing all the charm of a small southern town and just 40
minutes south of the fourth largest city in the United States. At 32 miles long
and two and a half miles wide, most residents can't remember the last time they
visited the mainland and, if circumstances permitted, they would never
leave.

"The Island has seen its share of calamities, yet the worst natural
disaster in U.S. history could not erase the tranquility of a Galveston
sunset.

"From soft sandy beaches to famous 19th century architecture, the island
is surrounded with incredible history and unique beauty."

Sure, there's a donation solicitation from the Greater Houston Community Foundation on the site to "Help Bring the Island Back. Donate to the Hurricane Ike Relief Fund." But that doesn't begin to describe the devastation they found following the cataclysmic 12-foot storm surge and 110-mile winds that made landfall earlier this month. CNN cameras showed closed, flooded stores on The Strand, Galveston's popular 26-block tourist zone, once home to some 100 shops and restaurants. There is limited water (none of it drinkable), and residents and business owners are permitted in only to assess the damages and to undertake very preliminary clean-up but are required to leave the island again by 6:00 p.m.

Galveston Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas and officials from the Port of Galveston and the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston met with an ad hoc Senate committee who said that the city is seeking $2.3 billion in emergency government assistance -- $1.2 billion for the city; $600 million for the hospital and $500 million for the port.

Ironically, it is US Senator Mary Landrieu, a Louisiana Democrat who chairs the ad hoc Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Disaster Recovery Subcommittee, which held the hearing to examine the federal government's response to back-to-back Hurricanes Ike and Gustav -- ironic because the government was painfully slow to help New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina three years ago. And that was before the government was steaming full speed ahead to bailing out failed banks and insurance companies to the tune of $700 million.

Bottom line for travelers: don't plan to visit Galveston Island any time soon, unless you're planning to volunteer for some kind of rebuilding crew.

P.S. On September 29, Boulder blogger Alyce Barry put a post on her with links to additional photos of Galveston and conjecture about the future of the island.

Ten Terrific Terminals

MSN.Travel spotlights notable new terminals that recently opened or are about to open

"9 Amazing New Airports" is the headline on a story on msn.travel. The story itself proceeds to name 10 fabulous new structures. I guess the headline writers can't count very well, but the list is interesting. Indeed, nine of the 10 that writer Harriet Baskas selected, while amazing and dramatic, aren't entire airports but rather individual new terminals at existing airports. (The exception is Branson, MO's new airport, opening next year.)

Perhaps I'm splitting hairs when I should simply be grateful that there are inspiring spaces that we pass through by the millions every year en route to or from our aircraft -- or while we wait in security lines, wait for our flights to board or wait for our luggage. Of course, the waiting doesn't usually take place in the sublime soaring spaces that are the best parts of the terminals that Baskas identified. The website showcases them in a slide show. More likely, we're in snaking security lines or sitting in crowded departure lounges. (Baskas does include useful information on amenities that help us pass the time.)

The first architecturally significant terminal that entered my consciousness was the Eero Saarinen-design TWA Flight Center (top photo, right) at New York's Idlewild Airport (now JFK International Airport). Inspired by the wings of a bird in flight, the terminal seemed large and futuristic when it opened in 1962. It was a time when air travel was a glamorous adventure, and Saarinen's grounded concrete bird conveyed that feeling.

The last time I went inside the terminal was in the waning days of TWA. I was changing planes at JFK, checked in my bags for an international flight and with time to spare, walked back to TWA and wandered in. Once a busy and glamorous space, the terminal had become shabby with security screening facilities cluttering the middle of the space. After TWA went out of business, the terminal was threatened with demolition. Fortunately, it was saved, and has now been creatively incorporated into fast-growing JetBlue's new terminal (bottom photo), scheduled to open next month.

Of Baskas' list of beauties, three terminals (Changi, Heathrow, Beijing) opened in the first three months of 2008, and four have opened or should be opening during the last three months of the year. Here are her choices:

• Heathrow Airport's (LHR) Terminal 5, which stumbled into operation in March 2008
• Beijing Capital International Airport's (PEK) Terminal 3, also opened around the same time
• Singapore Changi Airport's (SIN) Terminal 3
• John F. Kennedy International Airport's (JFK) American Airlines Terminal, which opened in 2007
• JFK's Terminal 5 (Jet Blue), scheduled to open on October 22
• Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport's (DTW) North Terminal, which just opened last week
• Raleigh-Durham International Airport's (RDU) Terminal 2, scheduled to open October 26
• Indianapolis International Airport's (IND) new terminal, scheduled to open November 11
• Branson Airport (BBG), scheduled to open in May 2009
• Madrid Barajas Airport's (MAD) two-year-old Terminal 4

Delta and Northwest to Wed -- Maybe

Proposed merger clears government hurdle

The Federal Aviation Administration has reportedly accepted plans of a merger between Atlanta-based Delta Airlines and Minnesota-based Northwest Airlines into a combined carrier that will retain the Delta name. It is expected to happen, and the European agency that also had to sign off on this has already done so. Then again, as Yogi Berra famously said, "It ain't over till it's over." Remember that Northwest at one point was going to merge with Houston-based Continental, but that never happened -- although numerous other airline mergers have been consummated since then. In any case, if/when approved, combining daily operations will take 15 to 18 months to combine the carriers daily operations. Share holders are supposed to vote on the merger this Thursday.

The merger may be good for shareholders, it probably won't do a lot for the flying public (because nothing lately has been good for the flying public) and it will be another blow to employees, some of who would surely be terminated. Thomas Kochan, an MIT professor whose who studies the airline industry, said that US airlines eliminated 100,000 jobs between 2001 and 2005 alone, and that airline bankruptcies have also decimated 16 pension plans covering 240,000 employees nationwide. Northwest employees belong to the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, while other than pilots, Delta is primarily a non-union carrier. The US Justice Department alone can block mergers on antitrust grounds, but Congress has the powder to protect pension benefits. The current administration and recent Congresses have seemingly been more sympathetic to corporations and their shareholders than to workers, retirees or travelers on common carriers.

Travel Thumbnail #3: Leadville is Fine Fall Destination

This is the third in a series of periodic reports on specific places I've visited -- and which you might want see to as well. Post a comment or let me know directly what you think of this Travel Babel feature.

The Place: Leadville, CO

The Story: Leadville was one of the greatest of all Western boomtowns. The first short boom followed the discovery of gold in California Gulch that lasted from 1859 until 1865. Leadville's bigger, longer boom began with discovery of silver in 1873, increased in 1877 when a smelter was constructed there, began tapering off in the early 1880s and was dealt a dreadful blow in the silver crash of 1893. In between, fortunes were made from mining (rags-to-riches-rags Horace A. W. Tabor with the Little Pittsburg and Matchless Mines), Charles Boettcher (hardware in Leadville, later banking), David May (clothing in Leadville, eventually May D&F, now part of Macy's) and Meyer and Benjamin Guggenheim (bookkeepers at AY & Minnie Mines, later banking). Margaret "The Unsinkable Molly" Brown, Doc Holliday Bat Masterson, the Earps and Oscar Wilde all have a place in Leadville history. At its peak, Leadville boasted a population of 40,000. It is is the highest incorporated city in the US and currently has about 2,700 residents.

My Trip: Kinfolk from Washington, DC, were in Breckenridge this past week using one of their timeshare weeks. By the time I was able to break away to spend a day with them, they had gone fishing and driven the gorgeous Boreas Pass Road on the route of the old Denver South Park & Pacific (DSP&P) Railroad between Breckenridge and Como. The road is not plowed and closes by November 1, so this was a good time for them to drive it.

Neither is a hiker, but both are history buffs, so I suggested an excursion to Leadville. If the weather was good, we could stroll along Harrison Avenue, the history-filled main street, and if it got cold, rainy, windy or even snowy, I figured that we could head for the fascinating National Mining Hall of Fame & Museum that provides such insight into the mining history of Colorado and elsewhere.

For most of out time there, the weather was lovely with bright sun and minimal wind. Such attractions as the Tabor Opera House and the Healy House were already closed, the opera house for the season and the house museum for the remainder of that quiet day. We sauntered along with the visitors' center walking tour map in hand, admiring the 19th-century buildings and talking about what once was there.


I couldn't resist a sweet treat from Hundley's (below left), the souvenir and gift shop where Charlotte Hundley has been turning out fabulous fudge since she and her husband, Keith, opened the doors in 1985. I shared! We stopped for a light bite at the Provin' Grounds Coffee and Bakery (right), a warm, welcoming, off-beat cafe. The two are roughly kitty-corner from each other -- Hundley's at 623 Harrison Avenue and Provin' Grounds at #508.








We then drove south on US 24, passing the imposing hulks of Mt. Elbert and Mt. Massive, Colorado's two highest mountains, and then turned west onto Colorado 82 to Twin Lakes for some mountain and foliage views across the lake (below).








We retraced our tracks through Leadville and continued to the top of Tennessee Pass to pay homage to the imposing memorial (below) to the 10th Mountain Division troops who where housed at nearby Camp Hale and trained as ski troops at what it is now Ski Cooper, a small, snow-sure ski area at whose entrance the memorial stands.


Unsurprisingly, it did start to rain as we drove back over Fremont Pass, where the mammoth Climax Molybdenum Mine (below) is being readied for reopening. At the end of a satisfying scenic day, we stopped for dinner at FoodHedz World Cafe in Frisco before I returned to Boulder and they drove back to Breckenridge.

Cost: Visiting Leadville is, of course, free. Some attractions do have an admission charge, and some are seasonal.

More Information: Leadville-Twin Lakes Chamber of Commerce, 809 Harrison Ave., Leadville, CO 80461; 719-486-3900.

Leadville is south of Interstate 70, via US 24 from Minturn, Grand Junction and the west or Colorado Hwy 91 from Copper Mountain, Denver and the east. From Colorado Springs, Salida or the south, take US 24.

Learn-A-Language Resource

About.com site features links to lessons -- free lessons

I don't speak Spanish and I don't speak Italian, but I "have words" in both -- and I'm always confusing the few things I know in those two languages that I don't speak. And I'm always intending to take some lessons to un-confuse (de-confuse?) myself. In my regular perusal of about.com's Adventure Travel site, I was delighted to see "Find Free Language Lessons Before Heading to Remote Areas or Big Cities," a guide to resources for picking up some basics, for free, before traveling. The languages include the common (French, Spanish, German) to the exotic (Urdu, Romanian, Hindi). The way I see it, if I can pick up the basics for free, it will make that much more available for the trip itself.

RIP, Edna Strand Dercum

Max Dercum founded Arapahoe Basin and Keystone -- and Edna was more than Mrs. Max Dercum

As I drove along Interstate 70 the other day, I thought of Max and Edna Dercum when I passed the Keystone and Arapahoe Basin exits, as I always do. Both were in their 90s -- and far as I knew, were still living in the house on Montezuma Road that they occupied forever. Today's Denver Post carried Edna's obituary. She died, the paper reported, "of natural causes" on Monday, September 15 at the age of 94.

Like many pioneering women who worked side by side with their husbands, Edna was Max's helpmate, partner and soulmate. Max Dercum and Edna Strand met at Penn State, where he taught and she studied forestry. The couple moved to Colorado in June 1942 to buy an old building that had been a stagecoach stop, because Max wanted to be in the snowy mountains to ski. Their son Rolf was, at the time, three months old. When Max founded Arapahoe Basin in 1946 and Keystone a quarter of a century later, Edna was right there. They turned the stagecoach stop into the storied Ski Tip Lodge, still a popular dining place at Keystone -- even though it has lost its remote and private feeling and is now a historic island in a sea of modern condominiums and townhouses.

As a beginning skier during their courtship, Edna had trepidations about the sport. Max said to her, "It's easy, Edna, it's downhill all the way." That became the title of her autobiography, even as she became a ski racer with a wall full of medals in masters racing.

I saw the Dercums numerous times over the years, and Edna was always a warm, wonderful, welcoming woman who had time to chat. The original Keystone Mountain was renamed Dercum Mountain not long ago. I feel honored to have known them both and am sad that I will not see her again.

FOR SALE: Airport (Convenient to London)

British Airports Authority to sell Gatwick

I had no idea that an airport authority could sell an airport until I read the headline, "BAA puts London Gatwick airport up for sale," on a Reuters dispatch. "Some in the industry have said Gatwick, one of Europe's busiest airports, serving 35 million passengers a year, could fetch 2 billion to 3 billion pounds ($3.57-$5.35 billion)," according to Reuters. Seems to me like a bargain, considering that Bank of America is paying $50 billion for failing Merrill Lynch and the US government is supporting a bailout of AIG to the tune of $85 million. That may be good business/investment moves -- or they might be worth the provervial paper they're printed on.

But Gatwick Airport, that's a deal. Thirty-five million passengers travel through Gatwick (airport code, LGW) every year. Twenty charter and schuled airlines, including Delta, currently use its two terminals. The British Airports Authority is not selling Gatwick by choice, according to Reuters, which reported, "The sale is a response to Britain's Competition Commission, which last month said in a provisional ruling that BAA must sell three of its seven UK airports, including two of London's Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted and one of Edinburgh and Glasgow in Scotland.

"BAA said it disagreed with the Competition Commission's analysis, and that it would try to keep all six of its remaining airports after the Gatwick sale, adding that a change of ownership at Stansted to the north of London could interfere with the airport's expansion."

Interested parties reportedly include Richard Branson's Virgin Altlantic as part of a consortium of some sort, a German builder called Hochtief, Frankfurt Airport operator Fraport, Manchester Airports Group and Global Infrastructure Partners, a consortium that already operates London City Airport (LCY).

Portland (OR) Airport Praised

Question: Why can't more domestic airports be like PDX?

There's lots in the world of air travel for The Cranky Flier to to get cranky about. In fact, there's lots to put all passengers out of sorts, but blogger Brett just explored an airport that made him smile -- at least I think he must of have been smiling when he wrote "Five Great Things About Portland Airport." You'll have to go to his blog to get details and see images, but here are the five things he found praiseworthy:

1. Green-tastic: Dual-flush toilets for saving water in "a place that gets far more rain in a year than should be legal ."
2. Pull Up a Seat - "Big benches just past security where you can sit and recompose yourself. "
3. Be Entertained - Live music, including a pianist, offered regularly. "I had to do a double take to make sure I wasn’t in a Nordstrom store," wrote Cranky.
4. Get Online Free - Free airport-wide Internet access, plus chargers for cell phones and iPods. Free WiFi is "more and more popular around the country, but I still don’t see it nearly enough."
5. Public Transit to the MAX -"There’s nothing I love more about an airport than good public transit access, and this has to be one of the best."

Amen!

Tourists Gawk at Lehman Bros. HQ

New York skyscraper draws tourists -- like the Bear Stearns and Enron buildings before it

I must say that I was surprised to read a Reuters news story that began: "Welcome to New York's latest tourist attraction: Lehman Brothers' headquarters (Reuters photo at right). It may be ghoulish, but as Lehman edges closer to a sale or outright failure, its currency as a tourist draw is rising. While regulators and bankers flocked to the New York Federal Reserve in lower Manhattan on Sunday to decide Lehman's fate, shutterbugs descended on the bank's midtown Manhattan headquarters to catch a piece of history before it disappears."

Call it schadenfreude tourism when people want to see a place where a felled giant once ruled. They're the sort who photogaphed the Enron building when that Texas scam operation came crashing down and more recently when Bear Stearns failed. Their latest target is Lehman Brothers' headquarters at 745 Seventh Avenue (between 49th and 50th Streets), conveniently close to Times Square. Lehman Brothers.

"The company's name is affixed in gray, metal letters to glossy black walls flanking the doors.
The nameplates, usually ignored in favor of the massive screens touting swirling, colorful videos, became an object of curiosity on a humid, sunny Sunday morning as people gawked at the home of the latest financial giant to face ruin," Reuters reported in the story called "Lehman Office Joins the New York Tourist Circuit."

Sidewalk gawkers who know the faces of some of the financial world's movers and shakers might have recognized some Citigroup's Vikram Pandit, JPMorgan's Steven Black and others emerging from limousines to deal with the crisis. "Several people posed and smiled next to the nameplates before a security guard shooed them away," the unnamed Reuters reporter added.

Colorado Ski Resort News 2008-09

Tens of millions invested in lifts, base villages and terrain for 2008-09

It's been snowing above 10,000 feet (Copper Mountain shown at right on September 12), which is a visual cue that Colorado's ski season kicks off in less than seven weeks. The biggest recent investments have gone into Snowmass ($35 million) and Steamboat ($30 million), but season pass prices for resorts that attract both vacationers and locals remain shockingly low. Competition is good for customers.

Here's what is and isn't new in Colorado. Click on the resort or ski area name for more info, including season pass info) and my comments appear in italics.

Arapahoe Basin opens in October as snow permits, perhaps the first in the state

A-Basin adds 300 much-needed parking spaces and connects them to the base via a pedestrian tunnel under U.S. 6. A new south-facing deck made of recycled materials is added to the year-old Black Mountain Lodge. Snowmaking now serves Sundance beginner trail. Early to open, late to close and sensational all winter long.

Aspen Highlands opens December 13

Canopy Cruiser is a new name on the trail map for 18 additional acres between Hyde Park and Mushroom Chutes in the Deep Temerity section of the mountain. More steep. More deep.

Aspen Mountain opens November 27

Improvements to the plaza at the base of the Silver Queen gondola mean fewer steps to climb with ski boots. Hooray!

Beaver Creek opens November 26

The Ranch, a huge new on-mountain children's center, is next to the easy-access kid's gondola that was added last year to the beginner area. Snowmaking improvements at key areas on the mountain. The Osprey, a RockResort, is the new name for the older Inn at Beaver Creek, and the Westin Riverfront, with direct gondola access to Beaver Creek, in Avon below the resort. The Ranch makes the Beave even more appealing for well-heeled families.

Breckenridge opens November 7

Peak 7 base development, the first all-new area since Peak 9 opened in 1971, spotlights the new Crystal Peak Lodge, new skier services (ski school, ticket sales, rentals) and Sevens, a new sit-down restaurant serving breakfast, lunch and dinner (Mediterranean-inspired menu), plus pizza bar and quick-service window. The BreckConnect gondola from town adds a stop at the Peak 7 provides more direct access to high terrain at Peak 7 and Peak 8. BreckConnect now enchanced as mass transit as well as a ski lift.

Buttermilk (Aspen) opens December 13

Four feet added to each wall of the Olympic halfpipe for a total of 22 feet. Awesome -- and ready for the Winter X-Games

Copper Mountain opens November 14

The Woodward at Copper, located in The Barn, is a new year-round indoor training facility for snowboarders and skiing tricksters. State-of-the-art facility for safe and serious training.

Crested Butte opens November 26

Camp CB is the totally redesigned and remodeled replacement for Kids World. Terrain expansion off the Headwall lift into Teocalli Bowl's Teo-2 and Teo-2.5 areas. The Treasury Center at the base adds Spellbound Pizza as the old ski and snowboard shop is relocated to slope-side. The nearby Outpost becomes a day lodge. User-friendly tweaks.

Echo Mountain Park (Idaho Springs) opens in December

Westwide Glades are expanded, the Magic Carpet learning area is redesigned and terrain features are improved, but the big deal is dollars. The $129 season pass price is right.

Eldora Mountain Resort (Nederland) opens on November 21

Best prices for Eldorables, Trek, Womens Days and Friday Afternoon Club lessons and season passes through October 12. An easy ride (drive or take the RTD bus #N) from Boulder.

Howelsen Hill (Steamboat) opens December 6

Tough little ski hill, owned by the city of Steamboat Springs, was the training ground for Ski Town USA's 64 Alpine and Nordic Olympians, 15 members of the Colorado Ski Hall of Fame and six members of the National Ski Hall of fame. Legendary ski hill doesn't need to do anything new!

Keystone opens November 7

The River Run gondola has been lengthened and the loading area moved to the middle of River Run Village. A new mid-station enables users to load and unload at mid-mountain, and new big-windowed cabins improve the views. Third time's the charm for third version of this base-to-summit gondola.

Loveland opens in October, as snow permits, perhaps the first in the state

Season pass again includes three unrestricted days at Monarch Mountain. No news is no news at this close-to Denver ski area.

Monarch opens November 26

Two hundred acres added to snowcat-served terrain. New kids' terrain park called Tilt. Sleepy Hollow run widened. Children's ski school and rentals housed in new facility. How about that 200-acre snowcat expansion!

Powderhorn (Grand Mesa) opens December 11

New trails are supposedly being added, but no details are available. Why such secrecy?

Purgatory at Durango Mountain Resort opens November 26

First phase of the $100 million Purgatory Lodge and village revitalization opens, including upgraded skier services, slopeside lodging and new Purgy's Day Lodge. Village development brings welcome evening activity to the mountain, but downtown Durango remains prime for evening.

Silverton opens November 29

Unguided season pass ($699) includes four free ski days at A-Basin and five at Monarch. Go guided or not in Colorado's capital of ungroomed super-steeps.

Ski Cooper (Leadville) opens November 27 (weekends) and December 19 (daily)

Season pass holders may purchase a $25 discounted “Buddy Ticket” valid Monday through Friday (except holidays) during the 2008-09 season. Friendly ski area makes it easy to bring a friend along.

Snowmass opens November 27

The Sheer Bliss lift is converted to a high-speed quad and lengthened by 155 feet. The Sam's Knob restaurant at the top of the Village sixpack express has been renewed with floor-to-ceiling windows, new table serve for 175, outdoor seating and a barbecue-style smokehouse menu. Base Village nearer completion with the new Hayden Peak and Capitol Peak Lodges. Ready to bid farewell to those construction cranes.

SolVista Basin (Granby) opens December 19

Base Camp Lodge completed (but perhaps that was last winter; the website isn't clear). Small, family-friendly resort continuing to develop lodging.

Steamboat opens November 26

Following $30 million in improvements last year, 4 million have gone into additional base area improvements, regrading, upgraded snowmaking and grooming equipment, and a new retail outlet in downtown Steamboat Springs. Champagne powder? Priceless.

Sunlight Mountain Resort (Glenwood Springs) opens December 5

News is in the future, as Sunlight tries to expand into a full four-season resort. For now, it's still a low-key ski area.

Telluride opens November 26

Revelation Bowl, a 400-acre expansion off the backside of Gold Hill and Chair 14, offers new European-style above-the-treeline open-bowl terrain served by a quad chairlift. New advanced and expert terrain.

Winter Park opens November 19

The Village Cabriolet is a new $5.8 million open-air transit gondola linking the free parking lot to the expanding base village featuring new restaurants, shops, real estate, parking garage and ice skating pond. Convenience for day skiers and more amenities for vacationers.

Wolf Creek opens November 7, or as conditions permit

For the third year, Wolf Creek is purchasing 100% of its power from a wind-power supplier, and is now adding a pilot ride-share program by linking to an AlternateRides, a free online carpool matching service. Cheers for the green and white.

Flight Attendant's View of Life in the Air

Air travel is hard on passengers these days -- and on flight attendants too

What's the quotation about not judging a man until you have walked a thousand miles in his shoes? Michelle Higgins, who writes "The Practical Traveler" column for the New York Times, did just that. "In a behind-the-scenes look at the other side of air travel, I donned a navy suit and starched white shirt earlier this summer and became a flight attendant for two days," she wrote. "With the cooperation of American Airlines, I first went to flight attendant training school at the company’s Flagship University in Fort Worth, Tex....I then flew three legs in two days: a round-trip journey between Dallas and New York, and then back to New York the next day. And though the other flight attendants knew I was a ringer, the passengers did not. Thus I got a crash course in what airline personnel have to put up with these days — and, after just one day on the job, began to wonder why the phrase 'air rage' is only applied to passengers."

Her piece is called "Flying the Unfriendly Skies," a title many of us writers have used in many ways but not with such grueling,in-the-trenches research. One of the cabin crews that she flew with comprised three veteran flight attendants with some 70 years of experience among them. "Is there a less-enviable, more-stressful occupation these days than that of a flight attendant? Just the look on their faces as they walk down the aisle — telling passengers that no matter how many times they try to squeeze them in, their suitcases are not going to fit into the overhead bin, or explaining yet again that they will not get a single morsel of decent food on this three-hour flight — tells you all you need to know of their misery," she continued.

The decisions made by airline executives that have resulted in increasingly crowded airplanes, usurious surcharges for everything from peanuts to pillows to pets in the cargo hold are not the flight attendants' fault, and neither is an air traffic control system, congested airports or weather that results in delayed or canceled flights. Imagine the air-travel mess today with Hurricane Ike slamming into the Texas Gulf Coast, including Houston, the seventh-busiest airport in the US and Continental's main hub.

So next time you fly, don't take your frustration out on the flight attendants, or the gate agents for that matter. They are coping with the same air-travel mess you are -- day after wearying day. The article is a good read, and it's a good reminder to display a bit of empathy next time you travel.

Big British Tour Operator Goes Belly-Up

Moral: Read the fine print and buy travel insurance before you travel

Percentagewise, British travelers are more likely to book their vacations (or holidays, in UK-speak) through tour operators than are American travelers. Still, it was quite a shock to travel interests on both sides of the Atlantic when XL Leisure Group, reportedly the Britain's third-largest tour operator, became a casualty of high fuel prices and a looming recession in the UK.

The company canceled all of its flights and stranded what Britain's Civil Aviation Authority estimated were between 85,000 and 90,000 travelers somewhere on the planet. Of these, some 50,000 travelers were abroad on trips booked through one XL's tour companies, 10,000 had simply flown on XL Airways and 25,000 had booked though tour operators that used XL Airways flights. XL's failure also threw into turmoil the plans of something on the order of 200,000 travelers who had booked upcoming trips.

XL Leisure's operated under such names as Kosmar Holidays, Cruise City, Excel Holidays, The Florida Skytrain, Transatlantic Vacations, Travel City Direct, Travel City Direct, Freedom Flights, Aspire Holidays and medlifehotels.com -- and XL Airlways. The company's home page currently includes instructions on what stranded travelers with various of these companies should do now. Meanwhile, Straumur-Burdaras Investment Bank of Iceland acquired XL's French and German subsidiaries, which will continue to operate.

American travelers planning booking package tours -- for value, convenience or both -- might want to check the U.S. Tour Operators Association website for some general advice on the protections they should expect if they are traveling with a tour operator that fails. The website states, "From the association's inception in 1972, chief among USTOA's goals has been to help protect you, the consumer, against loss arising from bankruptcy, insolvency or cessation of business of an Active Member tour operator. To help provide travelers with a solid financial safety net that protects their vacation investment, the USTOA has always maintained a consumer protection program, in which every USTOA Active Member must participate." The site details USTOA's $1 Million Travelers Assistance Program.

And, in these unsure times for travelers, you might consider purchasing travel insurance.

Travel Blog Posting Contest

Here's a chance to win a trip around the world

Does the world need more travel blogs? Probably not. There are already way to many unenlightening "what I did on my vacation"-type blogs out there. Does the world need more informative, insightful, well-written travel postings in cyberspace? Maybe "need" is too strong a word, but armchair and actual travelers alike can never read of the latter. I applaud any medium, traditional or not, that tries to get more quality writing out there.

A British site called My Life of Travel, a searchable online, anthology of travel journal postings, seems to want to elevate the content on the site that currently includes a lot of pedestrian prose. It is trolling for more inspiring words than this sampling I just pulled up from some posts that are on the home page:

• "Annie and I left Grand Junction, CO on the 22nd of June and drove until 4:30 a.m. to get to Sioux Falls, South Dakota. We spent Sunday biking with the Lohans and enjoyed ourselves as we biked past waterfalls, parks, rivers, and vagrants... (the vagrants are wild here so it is suggested that you don't feed them) :0) We then drove north to I'falls..."
• "So we headed for Mancora, a small beach resort in the North of Peru which at the right time of year is a great destination for surfing and general sun lovers! ...."
• "Well, we've done it. Exactly four months and 18,741km after arriving in Cape Town to start my African adventure, we arrived safe and sound in the bustling metropolis of Cairo."

In that context, it shouldn't be too difficult for a talented writer to come up with at least 100 well-chosen words and a photograph s/he has taken while traveling to have a shot at winning one round-the-world trip in a contest that My Life of Travel is promoting. The rules are simple:

How to Win
Create at least 1 journal entry about any location you have visited.
Your entry must contain at least 100 words.
Your entry must
contain at least 1 photograph that you have taken.
Entry Closing Date
September 26, 2008

There is a link you can click on to enter, and you must register in order to do so. My Life of Travel does not indicate who the judge(s) might be, but if my quick scan of the posted journals from the land of Shakespeare and Byron and Austen are any indication, the competition might not be too stiff. Good luck.

Site Features -- Contest or Not

The My Life of Travel site has some intriguing features, including each contributor's ability to create an interactive map to accompany his/her journal entry. And if you are planning a trip somewhere, finding what others have posted there. The search function is easy, and even if some of the prose is snooze-encouraging, you might just find useful gems there. And if you are lusting to launch to your words about travel into cyberspace, paid or not, you might explore My Life of Travel as a way to do it.

It's Elk BuglingTime

The haunting mating call of bull elk attracts cows -- and spectators

During the autumn rut, bull elk battle each other for dominance over a harem of cows. Their haunting, almost plaintive cry resonates from the mountainsides that enfold Rocky Mountain valleys. At dusk, the animals emerge from the high country and the forests to tussle and to mate. When you see them, you marvel that such large, stately animals could utter such a high-pitched shriek. The bugling, the fighting and the mating go on at night, and as the sun rises, the animals begin retreating again and the valleys fall quite for the day.

For us, a drive to Rocky Mountain National Park is an easy destination for this annual spectacle. It think of it as an accessible wildlife experience, sort of like a "National Geographic Special" come to life. For us, coming from Boulder for an evening, the park's prime elk-viewing is Horseshoe Park, a huge, riparian meadow conveniently visible directly off US 34 not far from Estes Park. You can hear the bulls' eerie sound on the Rocky Mountain Drama website.

With no natural predators in or near the park, other than a few coyotes and hunters who take out animals that stray beyond the park boundaries, the elk population is enormous, so visitors are almost sure to view the herd in action. In fact, there are so many elk there now that the vegetation is suffering, the park service is embarking on a "management plan" to try balance a healthy, sustainable herd and the aspen and willow that they feed on.

Rangers who have to balance flora, fauna and visitors, but for us who love to see animals in the wild, elk encounters are thrilling, no matter how many times we have experienced them. In addition to Horseshoe Park, we have also seen/heard bugling in Moraine Park and Upper Beaver Meadows. And beginning in fall and continuing through the winter, we have seen elk right in Estes Park. If you're driving through, note that they don't always wait for the light or cross at crosswalks.

Other places offering such elk encounters include Glacier National Park, MT; Grand Teton National Park, WY; Wind Cave National Park, SD; Yellowstone National Park, WY/MT; and in Canada, Jasper National Park and Banff National Park, both in Alberta. There are of course, millions of acres of other public lands where elk abound, but so do hunters, so I'd rather direct you to places where you're more likely not to get shot.

Some years ago, while visiting along the coast of Maine, I heard the unmistakable sound of bugling elk. I thought I was hallucinating, but it turned out that I was near the Bayley Hill Elk & Deer Farm!

'Parade' Cites Flaws in Airport Security

Sunday supplement piece on America's wasteful and ineffective airport security system

When bloggers write, thousands read. When Parade, the Sunday supplement, publishes a story, it reaches millions. Today's issue contained a piece called "The Wrong Way Protect Airports?", with a title phrased as a rhetorical question to which many of us answered "yes" even before it was asked.

Writer Lyric Wallwork Winik compared Transportation Security procedures, which since the agency was established have involved an increasing amount of technology (X-rays, metal detectors, chemical sniffers, "puff portals" and such, with the Israeli system. She wrote:

"Israel, home to many of the world’s most devastating terror attacks, has a
different approach to security. Liquid sizes are restricted, but first-class
passengers are given steak knives. Travelers in Israel are interviewed by highly
trained security experts.

In the U.S., billions are spent instead on scanning machines and other
technology to detect weapons. 'The Israelis ask questions, and they profile the
situation, not the person,' explains Seth Cropsey, a former Defense Department
official. 'It’s often a much more thorough approach to
security.'”

The TSA, she writes, "is rolling out new procedures that it says will keep us safer when we fly... Some specifics? New shirts and headsets for checkpoint workers, plus two days of specialized training in how to keep passengers calm."

Winik reported that the agency stationed placed "more than 2,000 behavior-detection experts at airports across the country,' but critics say U.S. security strategy still focuses too much on finding bombs rather than bombers." Israel is certainly a far smaller country than the US and it has a small fraction of the total number of America's airports and airplanes, but it also has a far smaller popular from whom to draw security personnel and train them in "behavior detection" -- and I'm willing to bet that the training takes longer than two days or even the length of time US agents are trained in these skills.

TSA defenders claim that the near seven-year period between 9/11 and now proves that the agency's policies have been effective. Others of us would argue that international terrorism has gone after non-US targets to keep everyone guessing -- or that the US government, with the support of sensationalist mainstream media, has fomented such a climate of fear that no further attacks on "the homeland" are necessary.

Seth Cropsey, whom Winik identifies as "Seth Cropsey, a former Defense Department official," told her, that we really don’t know if “the massive amount of technology that we have thrown at the problem actually works or whether it has been intelligence and other methods overseas that have prevented another air attack. I hate to speculate on that answer, because I fly.”

Whatever the reality, I glad that a mass-market publication has introduced this topic to the general public. Is the public buying the TSA line? Perhaps not. Parade included a reader poll asking the question, "Does America have the right approach to airline security?" As of now, 94 percent of the respondents replied "no" with only 6 percent replying "yes."

Summer Waning in Beautiful Boulder

Colorful plantings in Boulder's pedestrian zone attract photographers

Tens of thousands -- probably more like hundreds of thousands -- of visitors come to Boulder, CO, every year: vacationers en route from Denver to Rocky Mountain National Park, parents of University of Colorado students, fans of CU (not UC, but CU) football and other teams, scientists visiting the city's prestigious laboratories, business travelers and folks from elsewhere in the Rockies in town for a getaway at the foot of the Flatirons. Sooner or later, everyone visits the Pearl Street Mall, a beautifully landscaped and immaculately maintained pedestrian mall along a four-block stretch of Boulder's historic downtown.

Visitors and locals alike love to hang out on "the Mall," watching buskers perform their acts, listening to street musicians, attending one of several warm-weather weekend festivals, attending free Wednesday evening Band on the Bricks and Friday Noon Tunes performances in summer, or just strolling to or from dozens of intriguing places to drink, dine and shop. The floral display, from the tulips of spring to blossoms that linger until the first hard frost, are the warm-weather backdrop for all of these other attractions (in winter, little lights are strung on bare trees, but that's still a few months off).

We are lucky enough to live just a few blocks from the Mall, and as I was walking downtown the other day, admiring the plants, I was taken by the stunning array of healthy coleus plants. I took a number of closeup pictures, which I present here now on a misty romantic day that is a souvenir of the sunny summer days that are about to give way to autumn. I leave it to the gardning enthusiasts among you to ideintify exactly which coleus varieties I photographed. The coleus are still there, and will be until they freeze or are are snowed on.

Skiing in Colorado This Winter? Buy a Season Pass

Vail Resorts and Intrawest sell such inexpensive season passes that even vacationers benefit

If you are planning to ski Vail and/or Beaver Creek and/or Breckenridge and/or Keystone and/or Arapahoe and/or Heavenly Resort, CA, an EPIC pass is a great value, because it buys a season full of unlimited skiing/riding at all those resorts for $579 per adult and $279 per child. You must buy it before November 15, and the only other hitch is that it is non-transferable and non-refundable. You can even purchase it online. The ""smart pass" comes with an embedded chip for no-hands scanning; keep it in your pocket, and a scanning device at the gate at the bottom of the lift logs you in.

Vacationers do not typically show up at a ski area and purchase a one-day lift ticket, so even if that rarely purchased ticket price were already announced, it wouldn't be relevant. But to underscore the EPIC pass' value, consider that an advance-purchase six-out-of-nine-day lift ticket will be $564 per adult and $522 per child; a seven-out-of-10-day adult ticket will be $658. For overseas visitors who typically take longer ski vacations, the value is even greater.

Intrawest's Colorado resorts (Copper Mountain, Winter Park and Steamboat) offer similarly attractive deals. The Rocky Mountain Super Pass Plus is good for unlimited skiing at Winter Park Resort and Copper Mountain, plus six unrestricted days and unlimited free Friday afternoons throughout the season at Steamboat. It is just $439, which is $50 less than last winter's. If you will not get to Steamboat, the Rocky Mountain Super Pass offers unrestricted access to Winter Park and Copper for just $399.

It's worthwhile for you out-of-staters to buy one of these passes even if you're planning just a five- or six-day ski vacation but might be able to sneak off to Colorado for a long weekend sometime during the winter. Since the passes are unrestricted, that includes holidays. AND you get four $50-off coupons to be used for lift tickets for friends and family, plus discounts on rental/retail, food and beverage and Ski & Ride School lessons. These passes are also available online or at Christy Sports Front Range locations

And, if you are lucky enough to live in Colorado and ski, you can't afford not to glom onto an offer like this -- maybe even both if you get to lots of days or partial days.

Dollar Gains Strength

International travelers might benefit from stronger dollar

If you're thinking about traveling to Europe or Great Britain this fall, and you can find an affordable air fare, you might want to jump on it. The dollar closed stronger against the 15-nation euro than any time in the last seven months (closing at $1.00 = .69€) and also rising against the British pound (closing at $1.00 = £.65). When my husband and I visited England earlier this year, the dollar-to-pound ratio was practically two to one. The current exchange rate doesn't approach the strong dollar that American travelers benefited from several years ago, but it is more favorable to travelers than it was earlier this year. What goes up can go down again, so if you have the time and the budget to go overseas, this might be the time to do it.

United Backpedals on One Extra Fee

Airline rescinds plan to charge economy passengers for meals on international flights

Airlines have been tromping all over themselves with unpopular add-on fees, one of the more recent of which was United's plan to start selling meals to international passengers. The airline polled passengers who seemingly howled their disapproval of this new fee. Mark Ashley who writes the "Upgrade: Travel Better" blog is skeptical that United is responding to its customers.

"What I’m also hearing is that the airlines’ partners in the Star Alliance
are another major source of the pressure," he wrote. "Disgust at the dilution of
the Star Alliance brand? Fear of reprisals from their own customers on
United-operated codeshares, enraged at having to pay a fee to eat a hockey-puck
sandwich? Or just the last straw, after seeing more and more fees pile
up?... Bottom line: The international meal fee is dead. For now. But don’t
expect this to be the last time you hear this concept floated, at United or
anywhere else. This is guaranteed to be one of those zombie ideas you think
you’ve killed, but it just keeps rising again, under the guise of “'testing new
ideas.'”