Truly Odd Planet » Travel and Leisure

Airline thinking about charging clients to use toilet

Chris — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 04:00:03 +0000

Would you fly an airline that charged you to use the toilet?

Well that’s exactly what an Irish budget airline, Ryanair, is considering!

The Chief executive, Michael O’Leary, said on Friday that the Dublin based carrier was looking at the possibility of charging passengers to use the toilet during flights. If they go forward with this idea toilet doors that will open only with the insertion of a one pound coin (1.10 euros, 1.40 dollars) will be installed on their planes.

O’Leary said : “I don’t think there is anybody in history that has got on board a Ryanair aircraft with less than a pound.”

It is the latest Ryanair idea to save money in the tough economic climate.

Last week the airline confirmed it planned to close all its airport check-in desks by the end of the year to cut costs.

A Ryanair spokesman, Stephen McNamara, later played down the toilet charge idea.

“Michael makes a lot of this stuff up as he goes along and while this has been discussed internally there are no immediate plans to introduce it,” he said.

Would you fly on an airline that charged to use the toilet? I might if it were a short flight as I probably wouldn’t need to use the washroom, but for a long flight – forget it! Airlines charge enough as it is!

Turkish Hotel fires all male staff for having affairs

Chris — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 02:46:55 +0000

There’s been a lot of romancing going on in a small hotel on Turkey’s Mediterranean coast only the romancing hasn’t been between the hotels guests! Oh no … it’s been between the male staff and the hotels foreign female guests.

Pelin Yucel, manager of Image Hotel in Marmaris, said her 27-room hotel now only employs female staff. Most of the guests are British and Russian tourists, she said.

“We had been facing the same problem every year but after the last incident we decided to run the hotel by only female staff,” she told Reuters by phone.

“The last straw was when I saw our bartender, who was a very decent man, walk out of the bathroom with a British tourist,” Yucel was quoted in the media as saying.

Around 20 million tourists visited Turkey last year, many of them drawn by its sandy beaches and turquoise waters.

We’re looking forward to our Niagara Falls vacation in August

Chris — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 20:00:09 +0000

My wife and I have been trying to decide what we’d like to do for our upcoming summer vacation. I’m off work during the last two weeks of August and since we have family who are planning to visit during that time period we really can’t take off for the full two weeks. So I guess we are going to mostly have a staycation. By this I mean we’ll be staying at home here in Toronto for most of the two weeks period, however I’m sure we’ll get out and do quite a few things as there’s a lot going on in Toronto during that time period.

We haven’t been on a real holiday for quite a while so we do hope to at least get away for a weekend. My wife would very much like to go to Niagara Falls or perhaps Niagara on the Lake. Both places are well known romantic get aways, but there’s quite a few attractions and things to do in the area as well.

I guess we’re lucky in that we live so close to Niagara Falls (the Canadian side which of course is the best side of the falls!) being in Toronto that it only takes about an hour and a half to get to this beautiful area. We both love the falls and have been on the Maid of the Mist which is a boat that takes visitors near the base of the falls – very exciting.

The main street in Niagara Falls has tons of attractions. Much more than it had when I was a kid visiting Niagara falls with my family! There’s four wax museums that I know of – Louis Tussaud’s Waxworks, Movieland Wax Museum of the Stars, Criminals Hall of Fame Wax Museum, Rock Legends Wax Museum, two casinos, Ripleys believe it or not, and the Guinness Museum of World Records. Plus there are quite a few theme parks, water parks, ongoing festivals and other exciting attractions and activities in the area surrounding Niagara Falls.

If you’ve been thinking of visiting Niagara Falls, Ontario you might want to take a look at the Niagara Falls Tourism website. I’ve spent the last hour browsing through the site and discovering all of the great things that my wife and I can do if we do go to Niagara Falls and you know … I think we might need more than a two night stay, there’s just so much to do!

As for where we’ll stay when we are in Niagara falls we still haven’t decided, but I did find a great site called Hotelscombined.com that has a listing for many of the Niagara Falls Hotels. Prices start as low as $39 Canadian a night! I had no idea you could still stay in a for that low a price! We’ll probably want to stay right in Niagara Falls, perhaps in a room with a view of the falls so I expect we’ll be paying at least $100 a night. That’s ok though, just like Vegas, a lot of the big hotel chains in Niagara falls offer extras like Casino vouchers, free breakfasts, dinner coupon vouchers and even free entertainment or attraction passes.

We haven’t actually been to Niagara Falls for a number of years. I’m excited to see how much it’s changed. Just looking at all the attractions I have a feeling that our visit might remind us of our recent visit to Vegas! I think I’m starting to get excited. I know, it’s only a weekend trip, but it’s our vacation and it sure seems like we’ll have a ton of things to do!

What did you, or what are you going to do for your summer vacation?

Sometimes a free ticket isn’t worth it

Chris — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 01:08:39 +0000

Can you believe this story?

In May, Mr. Gokhan Mutlu filed a lawsuit against JetBlue Airways for more than $2 million dollars. Why? Well, he’d boarded the full New York to California flight using a “gift” ticket. During the flight he was ordered out of his seat by the Captain and told to either stand up or go hang out in the bathroom for the duration.

An off-duty JetBlue employee who had originally agreed to sit in the cockpit jump seat changed her mind and wanted to sit with the other passengers. The plane was full so the captain made his strange order to Mutlu since he only had a gift ticket. The off duty employee then took his seat.

Mutlu points out that during the flight he was unseat belted when the flight experienced turbulence and also during the landing!

I hope he wins his lawsuit. That’s just awful isn’t it?

Truly Odd Planet » Travel and Leisure

Airline thinking about charging clients to use toilet

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