A first-timer's guide to Luxembourg

Anthony Bourdain was a prolific chef, author, and TV personality who changed the world of travel and food. Today, five years after he committed suicide, there still hasn’t been anyone able to take his place in the culture, though many have tried. Throughout his career, Bourdain’s work emphasized cultural exchange, open-mindedness, and deep respect for the people he encountered in his travels in a way unlike any other, using food to bridge cultural gaps and explore the shared human experience.

With Oktoberfest just around the corner, it’s a great time to plan a trip to Munich, a great starter city if it’s your first-ever trip to Germany. Rich in Bavarian culture, this vibrant locale is worthy of a visit all year long, with enough museums, historic squares, parks, palaces and beer gardens to suit every style, interest and budget.

Dogs in handbags, whimsical fountains, rogue Statues of Liberty and cakes like jewels. Paris mesmerises all ages with its sights, sounds and spectacles. Introducing the kids to the Mona Lisa or scampering up the Eiffel Tower are bucket-list highlights. But there’s also an inherent charm in walking through neighbourhood parks and elegant tree-shaded boulevards, marvelling at magical window displays, scoffing sugar-dusted crepes on a cafe pavement terrace and catching street performers on bridges across the Seine.

Every couple of years when I was growing up, my family would embark on a European vacation. My dad is Italian, and my mom is Spanish, so we'd fly to their respective countries to see family and do some sightseeing.

Airfare prices change regularly throughout the year, but if you know where to look, it's possible to find a bargain to even the most popular destinations — especially if you're able to be flexible with your travel dates.

While US airlines are ditching international first class, the cabin is still a huge money-maker abroad — and carriers aren't skimping on the luxuries.

Majorca, the largest of Spain’s Balearic Islands, has been a classic summer destination for Europeans and Brits for decades. But long before the big resorts sprung up along the coastline and villas came with helipads, the island’s hilltop villages attracted artists, musicians and writers in search of year-round sun and solitude. Among the best known of those early visitors were the Polish composer Frédéric Chopin and the French novelist George Sand, who spent the winter of 1838 in the town of Valldemossa, in the mountains above Majorca’s northwest coast. By 1929, when the British writer Robert Graves and the American poet Laura Riding arrived in the nearby village of Deià — at the recommendation of the American writer Gertrude Stein — and later built a home there, that picturesque hamlet of stone houses and olive groves was already a fledgling artists’ colony. In 1956, the Barcelona-born artist Joan Miró and his family moved to the outskirts of Palma. Plenty of artistic talent was homegrown, too, nurtured by generations of weavers, glassblowers and ceramists. One of Spain’s most prominent contemporary artists, Miquel Barceló, grew up on the island painting landscapes with his mother and her friends. Among the island’s many signature local crafts is the , or cloth of tongues, a style of ikat believed to have arrived from Asia centuries ago via the Silk Road. And it’s that deeply rooted artistic tradition combined with an extraordinary natural beauty that’s attracting the latest influx of creative types. In the last few years, a number of artists and designers have left larger cities in Europe and moved to Majorca. Some of these new arrivals are renovating old houses and farms in and around the country towns of Sóller and Deià or choosing to base themselves in Palma’s Old Townwhere Gothic spires loom over the port, and there’s a fresh wave of contemporary art galleries and idiosyncratic shops dedicated to supporting local artisans. All over the island, new or newly revived hotels compete for the most impressive views.

The number of foreign tourists visiting Portugal surpassed eight million in January-June, making it the best first half on record, official data showed on Monday.

Madrid, long known mainly for its architecture, vibrant nightlife, and electric food markets, has the sixth longest metro system in the world. And if you’ve ever taken a ride on Line 1, particularly between Bilbao and Iglesia, and thought you saw a blurry, abandoned-looking station while peering out the window, you weren’t mistaken.

Roch Ventures, a €150 million ($160.2 million) fund for travel tech startups in Europe and Israel, has made its first investment. 

Indian bankruptcy court National Company Law Tribunal has granted bankruptcy protection to cash-strapped airline Go First and a full moratorium on its assets and leases. The order prevents the airline’s lessors — some of which include Sky High XCV Leasing, ACG Aircraft Leasing Ireland, and SMBC Aviation Capital — from taking back aircraft. “This is a historic ruling as an application of insolvency has been admitted so fast. The order prevents a viable airline from becoming an unviable one. The purpose of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code has always been revival,” said Go First CEO Kaushik Khona. This means there are chances that the airline might end up protecting some of its assets under the bankruptcy code to ensure its survival, as all its assets and properties remain as it is till the completion of the bankruptcy. The tribunal, in its order, said that an interim resolution professional would take over the airline management with immediate effect. The current operation of the airline’s 27 aircraft is also expected to continue and no employee of the company would be laid off, the Indian tribunal ordered. Earlier this month, the airline filed for bankruptcy, blaming “faulty” Pratt & Whitney engines for the grounding of about half its fleet.

Global aviation leasing watchdog Aviation Working Group — that monitors leasing and financing laws on behalf of planemakers and lessors — has placed India on a watchlist with a negative outlook. Citing India’s failure to comply with international aircraft repossession norms after cash-strapped airline Go First was granted bankruptcy protection, the UK-based entity’s outlook falls under the Cape Town Convention, an international treaty on plane repossessions. India’s score has been reduced to 3 from 3.5 earlier. The move could translate into higher leasing costs for other Indian carriers. India’s inability to process deregistration applications for aircraft, whose leases got terminated before a freeze was imposed, resulted in a negative outlook, the watchdog said in a notice. Go First’s lessors include SMBC Aviation Capital, CDB Aviation’s GY Aviation Leasing, Jackson Square Aviation and Bank of China Aviation. The inability to repossess Go First’s planes in a timely manner comes as Indian air travel is booming and local carriers, which regularly turn to lessors to help finance plane purchases, have ordered hundreds of new jets. Go First filed for bankruptcy protection last week, blaming “faulty” Pratt & Whitney engines for the grounding of about half its 54 Airbus A320neos. The airline is only the latest — after the failures of Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines — struggling to stay afloat in an increasingly competitive market.