Over the weekend over 40 events really saw the end of Scotland’s Homecoming Year. As you will remember this was a year long celebration of things Scottish and a determined effort to draw people back to their roots. It was almost an attempt to woo people back much as the Irish have successfully done. The timing, though this couldn’t have been planned, gave Scotland a strong tourism appeal whilst other countries laboured to attract visitors. With St Andrew’s Day today heralding the official end, it is probably too early to say how successful it was although that hasn’t stopped people from hailing it as a runaway success.

Madness have been singing about London for 30 years and now the group’s frontman, Suggs, has written a book about his top spots in the English capital. CD Traveller thought it was about time we shared a few of our own favourites…

In the last week or so both Cumbria and Dubai have been hit by disasters of different sorts. As you will all know, Cumbria has been hit by some of the worst floods in memory and Dubai by a financial crisis which few thought would ever happen. Both are heavily dependent on tourism and both have been quick to say that both are open for business.

CD Traveller spoke to James Lohan, one half of Mr & Mrs Smith, about hotels, holidays and his aims for the future…

If you haven’t already had enough of the hard sell that no frills airlines hit you with when you check-in and board their planes, then be prepared because more could be coming. Luckily it won’t be soon because the latest new advertising idea is only occurring on an American airline called AirTran.

In Ireland, Budget Travel is the tour operator. At one point, it carried over a third of all Irish holidaymakers who went abroad which probably amounted to over 400,000 people per year. On Wednesday evening they called in the liquidators.

As in the UK, there is a bonding system operated by the Commission for Aviation Regulation (CAR) so most, if not all of the money put down by holidaymakers will be protected.

Those of you who have paid deposits or have fully paid need to download an 8 page claim form which can be found at www.aviationnreg.ie. On the website, click on the release about Budget Travel and the click on claim.

VAT is charged on nearly everything. And when you stay at a hotel 17.5% is payable by the hotel to the tax coffers. It is a uniform tax payable wherever you are in our countries unlike the United States where taxes vary state by state. But In France, the VAT on visiting attractions is only 5.5% and from the beginning of 2010, Germany will only charge hotels 7% VAT instead of the normal 19%.

Now 40 British M.P’s have signed a motion calling on our government to cut the VAT that accommodation providers and attractions pay.

Starting today, the EU will consult with the travel industry over the next 8 weeks before coming up with new proposals on giving greater protection to travellers.

That headline could be considered to be the announcement of a horror movie. It isn’t but there is an invasion. For those of you who have been to San Francisco, one of the touristy things to do is to go to Pier 39 and watching the sea lions basking on some low level wooden docks. The occasional scraps and growls as another tries to take over the space of another gives photo opportunities for visitors as the 10-20 sea lions swam around.

This year the numbers have increased. The last estimate is 1,585. And that number of sea lions takes up a lot of space. So much space that adjoining marinas and other piers have been invaded.

Why the massive numbers?

Travel writer and photographer, Anthony Lydekker, shares his experience of Latvia with CD-Traveller readers. (for Anthony’s earlier story on Latvia see 9 November 2010)