Category: Sidebar

A recent UK survey for the Department for Education found
that of over 1,000 adults found 30% felt unable to compare
rates in exchange bureaux. A similar proportion said they
were not comfortable converting foreign currency into
sterling. Over a fifth of those surveyed admitted they had
wrongly calculated how much they spent on holiday, with 12%
saying they had run out of money.

The Globetrotters Club has just teamed up with Oanda.com to
provide people with information about currency conversions
and cheat sheets. To translate currency or make a cheat
sheet, visit:

The
Globetrotters Currency Converter — get the exchange
rates for 164 currencies
The
Globetrotters Currency Cheat Sheet — create and
print a currency converter table for your next trip.

Under 30? A member of Globetrotters Club? Interested in a
£1,000 travel award?

Know someone who is? We have £1,000 to award each year
for five years for the best submitted independent travel
plan. Interested?

Then see our legacy
page on our Website, where you can apply with your plans
for a totally independent travel trip and we'll take a
look at it. Get those plans in!!

Yes, it's almost that time of year again. The annual
Regent Street Christmas lights will be turned on Wednesday 13
November and will remain lit until 6 January 2003.

A passenger on a Virgin Atlantic flight has won a
GBP£13,000 (USD$20,000) award after being injured by an
obese woman in the next seat.

Barbara Hewson, from Swansea in Wales, was travelling economy
class from London to Los Angeles, 11 long hours when the
incident happened. She suffered injuries to her chest, torn
leg muscles and developed sciatica after being crushed by the
oversized passenger.

The woman next to Ms Hewson, was so large she had to raise
the armrest to fit into the seat and because the flight was
full there was no alternative seat so the woman's arm
rested on Hewson's chest for much of the journey. Ms
Hewson is only 4 feet 11 inches tall. When the flight arrived
in Los Angeles Hewson was admitted to hospital.

Source: airnews.com

Where is Europe's largest and most active volcano?
Answer: Mount Etna on Sicily. Mount Etna has had four major
eruptions in the last 309 years and it has just erupted once
again – the last time was 1992.

Although lava flows have reached the tourist areas and the
airport in Catania has closed and some hotels have been
evacuated, the mayor reassured Catania's 330,000
residents that they were in no danger.

“The situation in Catania is completely under control
and our city is not threatened in any way,” Mayor
Umberto Scapagnini said.

The heaviest lava flow descended towards Piano Provenzana, a
popular area for tourists to take mountain walks in summer
and for skiing in the winter. The flow pushed over ski-lift
pylons, knocked down power lines before surrounding an empty
mountain hotel and lodge. No one was injured. See
Murray's article on Sicily in the main part of the
e-newsletter to see what Sicily has to offer!

Here's a little Beetle quiz based on airport codes. See
how many you get right! Go on, have a guess!

Which cities are served by airports with the following codes:

1. AMS
2. MCO
3. CDG
4. YYZ
5. HND

For the answers, see at the end of the e-newsletter.

A Beverly Hills scuba diving store has resisted a federal
grand jury subpoena demanding that they identify everyone who
had taken, but not finished, recreational dive classes over
the last three years.

The subpoena was based upon far-fetched fears that an
underwater terrorist attack could be accomplished by
partially-trained divers. Apparently the FBI has already
obtained information about every certified diver in the
United States through the certification organisations PADI,
NAUI, and SSI.

Ken Kurtis, co-owner of Reef Seekers, stated: “The
scenario the FBI was painting–of divers swimming into a
harbor with explosives to blow up ships–is extremely
difficult and far-fetched for even the most skilled and
experienced diver, and would be next-to-impossible for a
newly certified diver, let alone one who had dropped out of a
class and never completed training.”

Kevin, our membership secretary likes this one!
theangkorguide.com

Airlines in Europe will have to pay increased compensation to
passengers who are stranded by cancellations or overbooking
on flights if new legislation is approved.

At present, passengers who are forced to take a later flight
because of overbooking – a common practice among carriers –
or find their flight has been cancelled get between EUR150
and EUR300.

The new levels of compensation are lower than figures first
proposed by the European Commission that were proposed at
between EUR750 and EUR1500 depending on length of flight.
Travelers on short haul services that are “bumped”
from a flight or are affected by a cancellation, can now
claim EUR200 (USD$195).

Those on longer flights can be compensated by up to EUR600
(USD$586). Some low cost carriers have warned that the
proposals, passed by the European Parliament on Thursday,
could mean a rise in fares unless carriers are willing to
accept lower profit. The low cost airlines are unhappy about
this and believe that the level of compensation should be
adjusted to the price of the passenger ticket, rather than a
flat rate covering every airline.

Not covered by this new compensation are events outside the
direct control of carriers, including poor weather, long
running strikes and security matters.

The US carrier Horizon Air, based in Seattle, is set to equip
its entire fleet of 60 regional aircraft with defibrillators
and medical kits to deal with in-flight heart attack
emergencies.

Horizon is making the move two years ahead of a US Federal
Aviation Administration deadline requiring any US commercial
plane of at least 7,500 pounds and carrying at least one
flight attendant to install the life-saving equipment.