At the end of the conference on tourism and the media, British travel writer and BBC TV host John Bell gave the closing speech. He ended it with good advice, paraphrasing JFK, when he said, ‘tourism boards, ask not what the media can do for you, ask what you can […]
Last night was the official opening dinner of the World Tourism Organization conference in Zagreb, and I found myself seated with a bevy of beauties representing the world. Next to me was Zivile Vaskyte, who is the one person who handles the media for the Republic of Lithuania’s state department […]
Today I met a group of journalists who are all here to attend the World Tourism Organization conference. As usual, there was pomp and circumstance, such as when Croatia’s Minister of Tourism glad handed his way through the crowd. The men in suits were all glad to see one another, […]
Our destination on this sunny Sunday morning was New Zagreb, a part of the city developed after the war. We pedaled by a statue of a former mayor of the socialist times, walking through a doorway, symbolizing leaving the old to the new area of the city, which as all […]
We landed at the Zagreb airport and just as I got outside, we walked through a grove of oak trees, a shady oasis right next to the small terminal. This city of about 800,000 is full of shady trees, and smells better than any metropolis I can remember visiting. It’s […]
We are going on a trip, dear readers, so come along with me and I’ll show you a country I’ve never set foot in. Tonight I’ll fly from Boston to Munich, then another short flight to Zagreb, Croatia. The reason I’m going is to attend a conference about tourism and […]
Up on my office wall, I have a copy of an old newspaper article from the Portland Evening Express that was written about me in 1982. Wow, that was so long ago, yet when I think back on the day that story came out, it doesn’t feel like it was […]
We drove up to Erving this morning, planning on a hike on the M&M trail, a long one that bisects the state en route to Mount Monadnock in New Hampshire. We found a place for eight cars to park, and took a quick look at the trail map before heading […]
The scene was what you might see in Greenwich Village: a cool cat playing experimental music and using a bunch of different machines to create ambience and alternative sounds while he pounded on the grand piano….all while playing a hit song by Led Zeppelin. Last night Marco Benevento played the […]
Reality TV sure knows how to satisfy. Networks like A&E come up with compelling shows that are simple and hard not to watch, then they program an entire night worth of shows, one after another, to give the viewers exactly what they want. And last night, the producers threw in […]
Last week in the Gazette, I read a story about some local authors who have discovered self publishing, and are now proud to be offering their printed words without the familiar middle men of agent, publisher and bookstores. Yet the truth is, these authors, no matter how esteemed, will be […]
Every August, nearly a thousand bike riders make a bee line for Deerfield, where they take part in what is considered to be one of the best distance bike rides in the Northeast. It’s the Deerfield Dirt Road Randonee, known by its shorter name D2R2. The course winds up through […]