Blogging since 1998. By David Wertheimer

Category: travel (Page 2 of 4)

The year in cities, 2017

Now in its thirteenth year, with nods to persistence and/or not knowing when to quit, depending.

Herewith, all the places I went in 2017 and spent the night. Repeat visits denoted with an asterisk. Lots of new and different visits to old places this year.

New York *
Palm Beach Gardens, FL *
London *
Palenville, NY
Saratoga Springs, NY *
Hanover, NH
Newton, MA
Edgartown, MA *
East Hampton, NY
Gloucester, MA *
Livingston, NJ *
Santa Monica, CA *
San Diego, CA *
Lake Buena Vista, FL *
Longboat Key, FL *
Las Vegas, NV *

The year in cities, 2016

Now in its twelfth year, I’m listing in this space all the places I went in 2016 and spent the night. Repeat visits denoted with an asterisk. (I’m already excited for next year.)

New York *
Lake Buena Vista, FL *
Palm Beach Gardens, FL *
Las Vegas, NV *
New City, NY *
Livingston, NJ *
Winter Haven, FL
Longboat Key, FL *
Denver, CO *
Saratoga Springs, NY
Bolton Landing, NY
Portland, ME
Gloucester, MA *
Edgartown, MA *

The year in cities, 2015

Eleventh edition! Here is everywhere I visited and slept overnight in 2015. Repeat visits denoted with an asterisk—lots of them this year.

New York
Palm Beach Gardens, FL *
Lake Buena Vista, FL *
New City, NY *
Livingston, NJ *
Toronto, Ontario, Canada *
Denver, CO
Hershey, PA
Gloucester, MA *
Groton, CT *
Edgartown, MA *
Athens, GA
North Creek, NY *

A list of musicians of some renown that I did not know were still active but are, and have gigs at the Foundry in Athens, Ga., this summer and fall

Shawn Mullins
Shuggie Otis
Drivin N Cryin
Denny Laine
Albert Lee
James McMurtry
Loudon Wainwright III
George Winston

Either the Foundry is a fascinating music venue, or the old rock n’ roll hands are going down fighting, or maybe I just need to get to a show more often. (I’m thinking a bit of all three.) Also, the Foundry is a pretty cool joint. Good choice by the UX STRAT folks and their sponsors for the happy hour there.

This is a roundabout way of noting that I’m speaking at the conference tomorrow, on the subject of customer experience and how to successfully embed the discipline within a product hierarchy. I’ll post a link to the video here or on Twitter if one becomes available. Very good conference, by the way—highly recommended if you’re a UX professional.

The year in cities, 2014

Tenth edition! (And not a long one, either; a couple of nice vacations and not much else.) Listed here are the places I visited over the past 12 months. Per the annual rules, only overnights are listed; repeat visits (from anytime in the past) are denoted with an asterisk.

New York
Baltimore, MD
Palm Beach Gardens, FL *
Positano, Italy
Rome, Italy *
Chicago, IL *
New City, NY *
Gloucester, MA *
Edgartown, MA *
Livingston, NJ *
Toronto, ON, Canada *

What I did this summer

It’s been quiet around here because I spent July recovering from my concussion and August catching up from a month of not working full speed.

That said, everything is great! I came out of the trauma fog in time to find lots of fun this summer, including a full 11 days of vacation, which I’d travelblog in this space in detail had we not basically repeated our trip from 2006 to great satisfaction. Shorthand version: Cape Ann; Bass Rocks Ocean Inn; Roy Moore Lobster Co.; Martha’s Vineyard; incredible car ferry reservation luck; Atria and Among the Flowers; Larry David’s ex-wife; ball in the yard with my two growing sons; beaches, starry nights, bunny rabbits, grasshoppers, jellyfish, three-year-olds eating salads, six-year-olds reading 200-page books in one day, an outdoor shower, a flat tire, two more trips to the local playground than we’d made in our previous nine Massachusetts vacations, and a single fish caught with a kids’ rod and reel for the second straight year. Oh, and lots and lots of ice cream. More like this, please.

The year in cities, 2013

Ninth edition: listed here are the places I visited over the past 12 months. Per the annual rules, only overnights are listed; repeat visits (from anytime in the past) are denoted with an asterisk.

New York
Akron, OH
Atlanta, GA *
Livingston, NJ *
New City, NY *
London, England *
Avignon, France
Paris, France *
Cleveland, OH *
Groton, CT
Edgartown, MA *
North Creek, NY *
Jacksonville, FL
Portland, OR
Paradise Island, the Bahamas

Instead of just narrowing airline seats, charge for better ones, too

The Wall Street Journal’s expose on airlines narrowing coach-seat widths seems, to me, yet another market opportunity for the airlines, if only they’d position it correctly.

Now, I’m no advocate of skimpy seating. I want to travel in as much comfort as I can afford. But the key word there is afford. 

Consumers have continually shown that they have strong price sensitivity when they fly. This forces the airlines to keep their base fares low, which in turn forces them to find ancillary revenue sources. Upcharges for baggage, exit rows, and priority boarding are all designed to offset the cost of keeping airfares at competitive rates and aid profitability. (It’s working, too.)

So why not use this seating to their advantage? Selling more-hiproom seats in the same manner as more-legroom rows would undoubtedly prove profitable by servicing that segment of the policy (such as this author) that is willing to pay a small premium for an upgraded experience. If that extra seat in a nine-across row generates another $300 fare, having a handful of eight-across rows generating $40 per passenger in upgrade fees would be similarly profitable.

I do not look forward to my first 17-inch-wide airline seat. Here’s to hoping the more-space movement hits the front of the coach cabins on these planes sooner than later.

The year in cities, 2012

Eighth edition: listed here are the places I visited over the past 12 months. Per the annual rules, only overnights are listed; repeat visits are denoted with an asterisk (even those that I last visited five or 10 years ago; previously, I used a dagger, but it’s gotten redundant).
New York *
Punta del Este, Uruguay
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Orlando, FL *
Washington, DC *
New City, NY *
Livingston, NJ *
Hong Kong *
Blue Bell, PA
Bellevue, WA
Montauk, NY
Gloucester, MA *
St. Thomas, USVI *
Short Hills, NJ
Hawley, PA *
Palm Beach Gardens, FL *
Lake Buena Vista, FL *
Lakewood, NJ

Travel evolution in the 21st century

Stuff I carried around Hong Kong as I explored on my first trip there, October 2000:

  • Map
  • Camera
  • Guidebook/phrase book 
  • Magazine (for reading while on trains, at lunch, etc.)
  • Handwritten sheet of destinations
  • Nokia 8290 cell phone
Stuff I carried around Hong Kong as I explored last week:
  • iPhone
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