Page 60, May 23, 1979 - North Shore News

By ED MacPHERSON
THOUGHTS WHILE
%, travelling...
Delayed for four hours in
the Los Angeles airport is a
boring’ sojourn, but three
extra hours in Amserdam’s
Schipol airport is a welcome
change of pace. You can
imagine the population build-
up in one of the world’s
busiest airports -when air

controllers pulled a wildcat —

slowdown. It was a gathering
of the masses and tougues but
the Dutch controlled the
‘emergency with eclat.

os, very word in four lan-
~ ould be . heard
clearly My point in the

vast airport. No. shouting or.
garbled announcements. Air- .
port announcers should be

’ dispatched to take lessons on

how to use a microphone.

Schipol has 35 duty free.

' stores. Department store size

for men’s and ladies’ clothes,

sporting goods, cameras and |

TV sets, and choices of
alcoholic beverages from
around. the world. The

cheese and flower shop is
larger than Vancouver’s one
outlet, but prices generally
are no longer bargains and
we must agree with seasoned
giobe-trotters that ‘‘duty
free’’ is a misnomer.

Your cheeky reporter re-
cently sounded off to Fiji’s
tourism minister on the same
subject. In that delightful
holiday area every
displays ‘‘duty free’’ signs.

Travel operators in Europe
fear the price escalation is
starting to discourage the
tourist influx from the United
States and Canada. They feel
it will lead to a complete
turn-around to the benefit of
North America.

GETTING
‘BOMBED’
_IS DYNAMITE!

WAIKIKI, $369

@ Nays. 7 Wights. Av 3 Hote!

WAIKIKI $439

15 Days. 14 Mights. Av & Hote!

LAS VEGAS $189
‘RENO $229
@ Days. 7 Wights. Av 3 Hote!
RENO $199

6 Boys, 4 Wights, Arr.& Hotel

DISNEYLAND $199

Aw & U-Onivo

~ CENTA Tours

1666 Robeon Street
10507 K. Geo. Hwy. Surrey

689-7117

Reg. Travel AGernt Ne. 167-9

store |

In Amsterdam’s . airport |

restaurant, the menu indica-
ted a small steak with two.
vegetables amounted to $16
in Canadian funds. If you
wanted soup, coffee and a
slice of pie, add another $5.

A Montreal travel writer
told us she has just returned
from her native Brussels
where a dinner for two in a
downtown cafe would cost

$30 per person Canadian |

pwith no extras.

#

A panel of travel industry |

‘experts in New York, deeply

involved in travel to China,
warn that the industry is
courting consumer fury by
not doing a better public
relations job in preparing

. tourists for the kind of hotel

and transportation conditions
they will encounter in China
in the immediate future.

Surely, travellers intent on
visiting the People’s Repub-
lic of China, must be
cognizant of these~deficien-
cies.

A Japan Air Lines staff
manager-tour and group
co-ordination is quoted as
saying: ‘‘Although the the
much sought-after desti-
nation offers an unusual
cultural exchange and a
-warm welcome to Canadian
‘and United States tourists, it
has poor hotel standards and

upkeep’’.

A Pan-Am tour expert,
who cited travellers’ com-

plaints about such’ problems

‘“*static growth’’

ree is duty free? —

as faulty plumbing, added ©

that China’s ‘‘touristic infra-

structure has been taxed to

its limit’’ and he. said that
until 1982 when major U.S.
hotel chains complete their
hotel construction program
in China, there will be
there.

Airline officials stress that
those who miarket China
could encounter a backlash of
consumer discontent unless
travellers are prepared for
the conditions they will find.
Hotel and _ transportation

services are inadequate and
the country suffers from a
basic. shortage of modern
equipment.

But the visitors returning

from China, while admitting .

that hotels and other services
are not what the Canadian
travellers enjoys, seeing the
country and its slow resur-
gence, compensates for the
inadequacies.

Ed. MacPherson is a sales
representative with Kerris-
dale Travel in Vancouver

a

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