Another country to major on its past is Greece as typified by the slogan (the headline above) that they will be running on the advertising early next year. But as with any successful tourist destination Greece blends the old with the modern. With a history and the remains of buildings going back millennia, part of everyday life is that almost wherever you try and put up a new building or a pipeline you hit Greece’s cultural past. (That would make Channel 4’s Time Team envious!)

This may not be your first choice of destinations and, we have to confess, that we have never covered Iraq before in CD-traveller (except about the loss of items from the Iraqi National Museum) but the time has come. What has sparked this interest is that Iraq exhibited for the first time in a decade at World Travel Market. Even the BBC picked this up and ran a story about it on “Breakfast” this morning.

The first leg of the visit was just a few hundred yards at Dover Docks, in the Coach, to board P&O’s refurbished Pride of Canterbury. On the boat we enjoyed upgrades to the Club Lounge: very comfortable with freedom from baby buggies and very good value at £12 which including free newspapers and Champagne .

The UK has had a love affair with Ibiza for well over 30 years. It began as a hideaway and then the package holiday market found it. Split in appeal to those who liked the towns and the nightlife and those who provided the quieter parts, it attracts vast numbers of us. But it is still seen, primarily, as a summer destination. Ibiza is now going to try and persuade us to winter there as well just as we do in the Canaries. Part of the problem has been that there have been many fewer flights to Ibiza in the winter but Ryanair has stepped in and will provide an all round service to complement the others.

Tourism to the Gulf countries is relatively small but growth is likely given the amount of investment that is being ploughed in an attempt to get us to visit. Abu Dhabi is anticipating growth of 10% for next year and 15% for the following two years. We have previously carried stories about what Abu Dhabi has to offer and it certainly shouldn’t be thought of like Dubai as a luxury destination. Hotel rates are reasonable and with all the competition amongst gulf airlines, prices are reasonable.

No the headline isn’t a typing error; this is the new slogan to entice us to travel to Slovenia. Will it work? Ask in a year’s time and we’ll find out. That’s a problem with finding quick pithy lines to help you remember. Australia came out with “where the bloody hell are you?” which certainly generated the publicity if not always the numbers.

Whatever slogan is chosen, about 2.2 million visitors have gone to Slovenia this year and, by year end, it looks as though overall tourism will have dropped by only about 1% making Slovenia a success story in many people’s eyes. The UK is the fifth largest provider of visitors but to the capital, Ljubljana, we are the third

Egypt has been one of the success stories of the last few years. Blessed with a fascinating culture, beaches on the Red Sea and a heritage that is second to none, Egypt could be seen as almost the perfect destination. Everything is there.

Now there will be more as they develop the “White Med” which is the coastline west of Alexandria and towards El Alamein and beyond

Croatia is not yet a member of the EU so is outside the eurozone. That may be why visitors from Britain rose by 2%. The Croatians like us. Apart from the fact we are only the 10th largest country in terms of visitors we spend a lot more than many others so they will encourage us to visit by offering value for money and that all important price difference.

The Maldives has been in the news quite a lot recently. Their cabinet, you might remember, held a cabinet meeting under water to highlight the effects of climate change. When you think of the Maldives the first thought is of a luxury holiday location. Now the tourism authority is trying to encourage 3 and 4 star hotels so that there is more on offer to suit every pocket. Independent travellers like backpackers are also welcome and will find it easier to get around as new infrastructure projects are completed.

Kicking off WTM is a forecast of what can be expected in the future and this comes from the research firm, Euromonitor. In 2009 they think that we will have flown 14% less, stays in hotels will be down by 16% and overall tourism will be down by 8%. The market for luxury holidays won’t recover before 2013 they think. But in the UK, they have highlighted a trend for pop-up hotels. These are almost prefabricated hotels that can be put up and taken down quickly. They are cheap to construct and cheap to stay in.

Youth, architectural beauty and music really stood out for us in Latvia.

Riga (the capital pop. 800,000) is a UNESCO World Heritage site due to its celebrated
streets of Art Nouveau facades mainly from 1900 to 1917 and many are apartment buildings still in use . The architecture now has its own museum: Rigas Jugendstila Centrs. A curious city feature is the hundreds of spires – not just on churches. Map reading by spire can be easier than reading street names.

Why tell you this when members of the public aren’t allowed in. Because this is probably the biggest showcase for tourism in the world. Each day, we will have 3 people there talking to different destinations and bringing you snippets of news that might give you ideas for holidays or travel

It may not come as much of a surprise to you to know that more of us are visiting Turkey. As one of the “best value” destinations for us this year, it has drawn visitors away from usual places such as Spain and other countries inside the euro zone. 11% more of us visited it that we did in 2008 and with Istanbul being 2010 European Capital of Culture next year, the numbers will probably continue to rise.

Whether you’re staycation-ing or vacationing, CD Traveller tells you what’s happening in the travel world
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The UK’s first gay tourist office opened in October in Chinatown, London. The office – located at 30 Lisle Street, WC2 – will prove to be as useful to Londoners as to tourists, covering as it [...]

We are used to some airlines trying to grab as much money as they can. In fact last week there was a meeting in the US that considered new ways. We aren’t used to tour operators doing it as well but one has broken ranks with the others and wants your money earlier. You won’t pay any more but you will pay earlier

Last night the winners were announced of the British Travel Awards. CD-Traveller is one of the sponsors because these are the only awards where you, the traveller and holidaymaker, can vote. So it’s not just the travel industry patting itself on the back. And over 100,000 of you voted so our thanks, and those of the organisers, for taking the time to vote.

You get many travel writers promoting the sites from train journeys. I have travelled myself on the Indian Pacific which travels from Sydney to Perth. (I got as far as Peterborough in South Australia when I got bored and took a train instead to Adelaide.)The Bullet train, the Orient Express, the train to Kyle of Lochalsh and the Blaenau Festiniog railway are also supposed to be things you should do.

Well let me offer another, cut down version for you to consider.

We hear a lot about the effects of travel on the amount of carbon emissions created. Being sceptical along the lines of Tom Fuller who writes a really interesting environmental column in the Los Angeles Examiner (freely available via the net), I am not an ardent proponent but neither do I believe that life stays the same. There is another climate change meeting coming up in Copenhagen shortly and Fiji has rather stolen some of the thunder by declaring that, as an entire nation, they will become a low carbon destination.

The announcement that a new Disneyworld would be built in Shanghai in China shows once again how tourism can be created from nothing. The last Disneyworld was opened in Hong Kong on reclaimed land in 2005. From that “nothing,” developed a resort that has seen over 15 million people visit it. It all shows that you [...]

Forgive us for talking about ourselves but we have been aware that there are lots of destinations and attractions around the UK and Ireland that deserve to be better known. Sometimes lack of money is the reason; sometimes it is because its appeal is not as great as it once was. Whatever the reason, we thought we would do something to help.

So what are we doing?

In order to deal with security in Italy, the government has introduced some rules. The main rule is that mayors of Italian cities can introduce laws to take account of their own needs. If the new laws covered the whole of Italy, the holidaymaker would know where they stood but there are different laws in different cities. What applies in one place needn’t necessarily apply in another.

In the travel industry there are only two seasons, summer and winter. Summer ends at the end of October. No figures have come out yet showing what we did this summer but there are some hints.

We didn’t go abroad as much as we did the year before. Maybe the numbers dropped by between 15 and 20%. Europe and North America would have been the worst hit since their currencies were strong and there was less discounting on hotel prices. Unlike Turkey where flexibility and keen pricing will have prompted many more of us to go there

That’s what Sydney Opera House in Australia did last week.

A company offered a million dollars if it could project its logo/details onto the shells of the building. Was it just a publicity stunt or was the offer genuine? Was the Opera House right to refuse the money?

[ November 5, 2009 9:00 am to November 8, 2009 6:00 pm. ] 5-8 November

Kensington London

http://www.luxurytravelfair.co.uk/

[ October 31, 2009 9:00 am to November 2, 2009 7:00 pm. ] 31 October-2 November,

NEC, Birmingham

http://www.globalsnowshows.co.uk