Blue Highways by William Least Heat-Moon is probably my favorite travel book of all time, so I was pleased to see it resurface in the news last week, more than 30 years after its publication. CNN.com has an enjoyable interview with the author and a slide show of photographs from the route he took on his classic journey of discovery. For those who aren't familiar, in 1978, William Least Heat-Moon lost his teaching job and his wife left him, so he decided to outfit his van and start driving across the country, avoiding interstates and sticking to the lesser-traveled roads that were colored blue on the old Rand McNally maps. His three month tour produced a terrific book, and one that reveals many great insights into traveling and life in general. ]]> Victor Ozols 2009-11-21T15:19:18-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2009/11/21/14758/866

President Obama is most closely associated with the city of Chicago, but he spent five years in New York as a student and community organizer, and a local actor has created a walking tour that shines a light on what he calls Obama's "lost years" here. The AP introduces us to Jeremiah Miller, whose two-hour "Obama's New York" tour takes visitors to some of the places the 44th president spent time during his 1981-1985 stint in the city. ]]> Victor Ozols 2009-11-21T14:07:58-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2009/11/21/132554/94

I've never taken a pedicab in my life, but it seems I'm in the minority, as the number of the pedal-powered bicycle taxis has risen dramatically since their introduction to New York in 1995. Pedicabs have become so popular, in fact, that they're now regulated by the city, which requires vehicles to be insured, inspected, and fitted with seat belts, headlights, and hydraulic brakes. A story in The New York Times explains that the new regulations legitimize an industry that began as something of a fringe group, attracting actors, artists, and various downtown weirdos to a unique profession that could net them up to $1,000 a week and help them stay skinny and hot. ]]> Victor Ozols 2009-11-21T13:25:54-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2009/11/21/12217/029

Things travelers should put in a money belt: Passport, tickets, cash, emergency contact information. Things travelers should not put in a money belt: lizards. It may seem rather obvious to most readers of this blog, but there's one guy in California who somehow never picked up this basic tenet of travel wisdom. As the LA Times points out, 40-year-old Michael Plank was arrested by U.S. Customs agents at Los Angeles International Airport this week when he was found to have 15 lizards stuffed in a money belt. Plank was on his way back from Australia and apparently decided to bring 11 skinks, two monitor lizards, and two geckos with him to his LA home, where they'd be worth around $8,500. ]]> Victor Ozols 2009-11-21T12:21:07-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2009/11/20/174324/50

FAME: Five Ways To Score Better Airline Seats For Holiday Travel You can get more than just flights with your frequently flyer miles The first glance at Virgin America's 'Fly Girls' TV show

Also: Everything about Thanksgiving Travel

LAME:

What Not To Do In Venice: 5 Tourist Mistakes To Avoid FAA Glitch Grounds and Delays Flights
Has Anybody Flown Aeroflot Lately?

Also: Demon Statues in an Airport. For real.

]]> JetSetCD 2009-11-20T17:59:30-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2009/11/20/143044/06

When the Colonials learned that British forces were planning to send troops out of the city to the surrounding unoccupied hills, they acted. The colonials set up shop at the top of Bunker & Breed's Hill and picked off the redcoats sending them retreating towards Cambridge. Seems to us that FLL is the new Bunker Hill, though we will leave it to you to determine which airline wears what uniform.

By now we all know how Virgin America launched their 10th destination earlier this week at FLL and we have the photo gallery to prove it. However, what really struck us about our jaunt to meet them in FLL was the obvious jockeying for position that was going on there between JetBlue and Virgin America.

The feud deepens, after the jump.]]> markj 2009-11-20T17:09:33-05:00 http://www.jaunted.com/story/2009/11/20/142054/74

Los Angeles' reigning auteur of "weird," director David Lynch, doesn't limit his mode of creative expression to the screen. Though better known for helming films such as Mulholland Drive and hawking the benefits of transcendental meditation on college campuses, the fabulously-coiffed Lynch actually began his career as an artist. In 2007, a major retrospective of Lynch's multimedia art was featured at Paris' Fondation Cartier, and earlier this year, a selection of his photographs were on display at L.A.'s Michael Kohn Gallery.

We deemed the latter exhibition, a visual offshoot of the Danger Mouse/Sparklehorse album Dark Night of the Soul, a mediocre representation of Lynch's creative bounds. We've yet to see his paintings in person, but as dedicated Lynch-o-philes we'll be rushing off to see his first L.A. painting show in a decade at Santa Monica's Griffin Gallery. ]]> Heidi Atwal 2009-11-20T16:29:30-05:00 Search Jaunted string http://www.jaunted.com/search/