Visiting Paris is about to get a bit more expensive as the city raised taxes on hotels and other accommodations at the beginning of the year.
20.12.2023 - 23:43 / lonelyplanet.com
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Amsterdam has been a global influencer since what began as an inauspicious herring-fishing settlement went on to inspire international seafaring, trade, engineering, art and culture.
Ahead of its 750th birthday in 2025, this visionary world treasure is again leading the way with spirited and innovative community and sustainability initiatives that are enriching the diverse and creative city today and into the future.
Climate challenges facing this low-lying city some 2m (6.6 ft) below sea level, coupled with escalating residents (expected to surpass 1 million in 2030) and visitors (up to25 million by 2025), have galvanized the Dutch capital to chart a new course.
Making the city more livable for locals and enjoyable for travelers is at the heart of Amsterdam’stourism goals. These include managing numbers through measures such as closing its cruise ship port, clamping down on unlicensed accommodation and capping city-center hotels. But it also includes quality of life goals, such as deterring boisterous revelers in the historic center through earlier closing times for bars and clubs.
Beyond the gabled streetscapes radiating from Amsterdam’s Unesco World Heritage-listed canal ring, new residential areas are absorbing the growing population. In the east, IJburg is built across an archipelago of artificial islands on the IJmeer lake, with its gateway, double-cantilevered Sluishuis building that generates more energy than it consumes, and swimming and water sports like wakeboarding and e-foiling at Amsterdam’sbeach.
Western ex-lumber ports Houthavens, where the landmark Pontsteiger building containing apartments, ahotel and public spaces, oriented to optimize passive solar energy, rises out of the river like a giant’s chair. Imaginative developments are springing up around Amsterdam Noord’s once-derelict shipyards, with more planned to straddle both banks of the IJ at “port city”,Haven-Stad.
Green infrastructure plays a vital role in Amsterdam’s ongoing expansion, as part of its mission to become emission-free by 2030 and a fully circular city, reducing, recycling and reusing materials, by 2050. In this cycling-oriented city where bikes outnumber residents, the extensive network of cycleways is supported by facilities like Centraal Station’s two gleaming 2023-opened underwater bike-parking garages for 11,000 bikes (50 percent of the city’s commuters arrive by bike).
A “green by default” ethos sees manmade materials such as bricks and paving stones replaced by greenery, with increased accessibility to existing and newly created parks (no more than a 10-minute walk) and nature reserves (a 15-minute bike ride).
Renewable energy powers canal traffic and public transport – Schiphol international airport
Visiting Paris is about to get a bit more expensive as the city raised taxes on hotels and other accommodations at the beginning of the year.
There are some cool things you can swipe off planes and some you cannot.
2023 has been full steam ahead for rail transport with a roster of new train routes and destinations announced.
easyJet and easyJet holidays have revealed the latest travel trends for 2024 as bookings took off during the first days of its biggest ever Big Orange Sale, offering up to 20% off over two million seats across Europe and up to £300 off package holidays until 5 February 2024. Flights to Amsterdam, Paris, Geneva, Alicante and Malaga from the UK proved to be the most popular during the sale’s first week, while Hurghada in Egypt, Rovaniemi in Lapland and Milan are among the destinations to have experienced the greatest rise in popularity compared to 2023. Since the launch of the sale, destinations including Prague, Nantes, Berlin, Bilbao and Verona also increased in popularity for Brits compared to 2023.
JetBlue is welcoming 2024 with a winter sale that has one-way flights to Europe starting at just $299 and flights across the United States starting at under $40.
China’s travel and tourism industry – among the world’s biggest – last year began its recovery from heavy pandemic damage. One beneficiary: Trip.com Group, a global travel service provider that is China’s largest. Revenue in the third quarter of 2023 almost doubled from a year earlier; net profit in the three months to September totaled 4.6 billion yuan (about $637 million), more than 18 times the year-earlier 245 million yuan.
After spending Christmas on MSC Euribia, I’m convinced there’s no better place to celebrate the holiday season than on a cruise ship. In fact, I’m thinking MSC may secretly stand for Merry Sailing Christmas because it even managed to snag Santa, who was handing out gifts and looking like he’d had a grand old time at the buffet.
Well, we got close, folks. However, it looks like a trouble-free year with only minor cancellations and delays for Christmas travel in Europe won't be happening after all.
Low-cost Icelandic airline Play is going all out for the end of the year by offering a whopping 50 percent off its already low airfare to Europe.
Amsterdam city officials are trying to push tourists away from the city center’s Red Light District.
While shopping on Amazon is great – and super convenient – for some people, there’s nothing like actually going into a brick-and-mortar store. Especially if it is incredibly beautiful.
Delta has all eyes on Austin next spring with a record flight schedule to the Texas capital.