baby boomer travelers
I’ve long had an ambivalent feeling toward the reviews on TripAdvisor, the extremely successful user-driven website that provides readers’ takes on everything from hotels and restaurants to museums and travel activities.
TripAdvisor rules that newly renovated hotels should get a clean slate on reviews.
Like many baby boomers, I find the reviews can be extremely helpful in sorting out the travel-related chaff from the wheat — a long as I can first sort out the chaff from the wheat of the reviews themselves.
It’s not uncommon to come across restaurant reviews, for instance, that are the diametric opposites of each other:
“Ate at Luigi’s last night, and it was the greatest meal I’ve ever had — maybe the best that anyone has ever had! Love those meatballs!”
And, right below it: “Don’t listen to anyone who likes Luigi’s — this place is the worst! Worst food, worst service, and… Continue reading
New Zealand’s fabulous scenery makes it an inspiring place to hike. Photo by Clark Norton
Along with Switzerland, New Zealand is my favorite place to hike.
The “tracks,” as hiking trails are known there, lead along mountain ridges, lakes, and rivers and through valleys and rainforests. The scenery is, well, choose your cliche: spectacular, breathtaking, unforgettable.
Some of the tracks are relatively easy, while others can literally take your breath away.
A Kiwi-owned company, New Zealand Trails, makes it easy for baby boomers — about two-thirds of its customers are in the 49 to 67 boomer age range — to experience several of the tracks as well as other South Island highlights, such as a train journey across the Southern Alps, a glowworm cave, a kayak trip through a coastal lagoon, a scenic helicopter ride, a lake cruise, and a boat trip across Milford Sound.
Hiking trails include a… Continue reading
Downtown Bushmills — is it real or is it faux? Photo from theworld.org
Here’s a story I love.
As reported by eTurboNews, a travel industry news reporting service, the northern Ireland town of Bushmills is “faking prosperity” in an effort to draw more tourists.
Bushmills is best known as one of the temples of Irish whiskey, but it has fallen on hard times of late, resulting in a fair number of abandoned homes and shops and a drop-off in tourist visits. Besides its four-century-old tradition of whiskey making, Bushmills is a gateway to the Giants Causeway, a dramatic natural formation that resembles stepping stones leading into the sea.
So the town has called on “cosmetic enhancement,” as eTurboNews describes it, a facelift of sorts for a dozen or so boarded up buildings that had become a blight on Bushmills’ main street.
Known as the “Brighter Bushmills Project,” the enhancements… Continue reading
One of the big developments in cruising in the past few years is the rapid rise of river cruising, which has a big marketing advantage over ocean cruising among a certain segment of the population: namely, those who don’t like the idea of being out in the ocean on a big ship.
Emerald Waterways features an innovative “indoor balcony” in some cabins. Photo from Emerald Waterways.
Whether it’s fear of open water, fear of getting seasick, fear of overcrowding, or fear of being on a big ship if a crisis strikes at sea — such as some of the highly publicized events of the past year or two — a number of people just won’t consider taking a traditional ocean cruise. (No matter how much I or many other cruising advocates try to convince them otherwise.)
River cruising, on the other hand, enables you to stay close to land on… Continue reading
Victoria Falls at dawn — no theme park needed? Photo by Dennis Cox
The news that Zimbabwe is planning a Disneyland-style theme park near Victoria Falls, one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World, is yet another example that Robert Mugabe’s corrupt, brutal and clueless rule is ruining that beautiful central African country — for both its citizens and tourists.
One writer has likened it to building casinos next to the Pyramids in Egypt, and I can’t disagree. (Cairo has enough tacky papyrus shops near the Pyramids as it is.)
I’ve been lucky enough to twice visit Vic Falls — also known in local tradition as “The Smoke That Thunders” — and consider it among the most stunning places I’ve ever seen, on a par with Arizona’s Grand Canyon or China’s mist-enveloped, multi-peaked Mt. Huangshan.
The last time I visited Vic Falls, I saw Mugabe speak, shortly after he… Continue reading
On a recent trip to Europe, I carried a 3-ounce travel-size tube of toothpaste from Tom’s of Maine — a size that’s OK with the TSA to get through their “liquids” screening process at the airport. (“OK With the TSA” — a possible slogan?)
Tom’s of Maine toothpaste in the “grab-and-go” three-ounce travel size. Photo by Clark Norton
The Tom’s had a nice “fresh mint” taste for freshening breath; it’s said to whiten teeth “naturally,” to contain no artificial ingredients, dyes, preservatives or sweeteners, and to help remove plaque with regular brushing; it’s made with no animal testing; and the 40-year-old company gives 10 percent of profits back to the community to promote “human and environmental goodness,” always a hit with baby boomer travelers.
(Actually, it never occurred to me that toothpaste might be tested on animals — canine canines? monkey molars? chimp incisors? — but maybe that’s a subject… Continue reading
We had out-of-town guests over the weekend, and one recurring topic of conversation was how much we all like shopping at Costco.
Costco draws baby boomer travelers and other customers primarily through word-of-mouth advertising
For instance, when they mentioned they needed new luggage for an upcoming cruise, I suggested looking at Costco, because that’s where we’ve been buying luggage for years — great quality at half the price or less. They quickly agreed to check it out.
While I wasn’t getting a commission (and am not for anything I write here today), that was a classic example of word-of-mouth advertising. And it didn’t cost Costco a cent.
Then today I came upon this fascinating piece in The Huffington Post about “Ten Cult Brands So Popular They Don’t Need to Advertise.”
One of them is Costco.
According to Jillian Berman, who wrote the piece, Costco does use social media to reach… Continue reading
Jeff Bezos of amazon.com has committed $250 million to buying The Washington Post
The recent news that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is buying The Washington Post left a lot of people scratching their heads.
Why would one of the most successful leaders of online commerce invest in a “dying” industry like newspapers?
There’s a short answer to this: to paraphrase Mark Twain, the death of newspapers has been greatly exaggerated.
I don’t say this just as someone who has written travel pieces for a good number of newspapers over the years — including The Washington Post — and to some extent still do. Or as someone who cut his journalistic teeth in newsrooms from Ann Arbor to Long Island to Miami. Or as someone who still reads newspapers myself.
I also acknowledge that much of my current work is done in the digital realm, including this blog.
But then, much… Continue reading
Will boomers stop traveling to courses like Turnberry in Scotland? Unlikely.
An old friend who I used to play golf with in school sent me a newsletter item from the National Golf Foundation (NGF) that questioned whether or not baby boomers would go bust in retirement — and, as one result, not be able to afford to play golf as much as retirees usually do.
According to the NGF, about 10 percent of boomers (aged 49 to 67) play golf, about one-third of all golfers in the U.S.
Typically, the NGF notes, retirees play more and more golf the older they get, until they’re too elderly to swing a club anymore. And the fact that boomer retirees 65+ will almost double the number of current retirees — there being 76 million of us, after all — means that golf should be looking at a, well, green future for the next… Continue reading
Marinas like this one in Mallorca, Spain, may provide baby boomer renters with chances to go for a spin. Photo by Clark Norton
For several years now we’ve been able to share cars and bicycles (especially in cities) — enabling people who don’t actually own a car or bike to rent or use one for part of a day — and now we’ve entered the era of boat sharing.
We’re talking everything from kayaks to catamarans to fully crewed yachts, in more than 60 countries around the world.
This is one of those great ideas I wonder why I didn’t think of it myself. The folks at GetMyBoat did — they launched their service in March — and more power to them.
Some 92 percent of boats are sitting idle in marinas around the world at any one time; why not create a system so others can rent them… Continue reading
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