Talking Travel: ‘Twas the weather nightmare before Christmas
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Imagine you’re in London and trying to get home to some other continent for the holidays. Suddenly there’s an unprecedented dump of snow, below zero temperatures (and we’re talking Fahrenheit!), and Heathrow grinds to a halt. Well, that’s what’s happened to thousands of passengers now stranded at the airport, in hotels, on some friend’s floor.
In this episode of Talking Travel, Lonely Planet’s London editor Tom Hall talks about why Heathrow and other European airports can’t seem to get their snow management together — compared to other northern European airports. And David Allan from the BBC Travel Website loves the snow. All year long he fantasizes about winter.. He previews a full week of stories on BBC Travel about all winter, all the time. And he tells us about his favorite Christmas memory away from home. Hint: it was in a European country where they recreated the “I am Sixteen, Going on Seventeen” scene from “The Sound of Music”.
We’ll also hear about weird Christmas traditions, like the Christmas day swim in Dublin, the odd fact that in Australia, Christmas and New Years fall in the middle of the southern hemisphere’s summer (‘get out the barbie, it’s Christmas!’, and how far do you have to go to get away from Christmas? Tom and David will also give their sneak peaks into what’s likely to happen in travel in the new year. One startling fact: As of the middle of 2011, Istanbul’s Ataturk Airport will connect to more global destinations than London’s Heathrow airport. And those long haul flights from the US and Europe to places like Australia and New Zealand? Well starting in 2011, expect the stopover point to be in the Middle East, not Asia.
[photo credits: Christmas Swim Dublin/Stunned, Street under snow England/Anthony Appleyard]
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