19 NOV 2018: In case you missed it, and even if you didn’t, here’s a quick look at some of last week’s need-to-know travel news:

AIR

Air Tahiti Nui has taken possession of its first 787-9 Dreamliner for long-range use between French Polynesia and destinations such as Paris, Tokyo and Los Angeles. The new plane seats 294 passengers in three classes, including 30 full lie-flat business class seats, along with 32 premium economy seats.

Brazil’s largest airline, GOL Linhas Aéreas Inteligentes has launched direct flights from Brazil to US destinations, including Miami and Orlando. The routes will be operated on new Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft. Launched in 2001, GOL has a fleet of over 120 aircraft and operates 700 flights daily. In the US GOL will connect with partner Delta Airlines.

TOURS

Costsaver’s new 2019 Europe and Britain program has nearly three dozen itineraries across Europe and Britain with ‘Ready to Go Rate’ prices starting from $130 p.p. per day. Based on two travel styles – regional and panoramic experiences – accommodation is in three and four-star hotels and includes breakfast and up to half the evening meals. A new tour is the nine-day Highlights of the Baltics, starting in Warsaw and travelling to Vilnius, Lithuania; Riga, Lativa; and Parnu and Tallinn, Estonia.

Aqua Expeditions, which offers five-star luxury cruises on the Amazon River in Peru and on the Mekong River in Vietnam and Cambodia, is planning to “extend its footprint” by expanding its fleet and introducing coastal cruising in new soft adventure destinations over the next two years. Full destination and ship details will be announced shortly, says the company.

DEALS & DISCOUNTS

Clients looking to take an Avalon Waterways cruise in Europe in 2019 can save $600 p.p. when booking by Dec. 18. The early booking bonus on nearly 60 Active Discovery departures can be combined with Avalon’s Fly Free offer, which includes free economy sked airfare to Europe from Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal; and $299 (including all taxes) from other Canadian gateways.

Black Friday (Nov. 23) and Cyber Monday (Nov. 26) have inspired a number of sales from suppliers, among them:
•    Sunwing is offering 35% off all week on select premium vacations leading up to “Orange Friday.”
•    Savings of 15% off per person are available on 15 Trafalgar trips to Eastern Europe, Scandinavia and Russia through Nov. 26 using promotion code PPBLACKFRIDAY18.
•    Starting Friday, through Nov. 30, Contiki has 20% savings on a series of 20 tours, including Europe, Asia, Latin and South America and Down Under.
•    Touting its “biggest cyber sale ever” G Adventures is offering up to 35% off on up to 10,000 trip dates. The sale is in effect from Nov. 20 to 26 for departures Dec. 1 to July 31, 2019.

Goway is inviting Canadians to “join the 1%” – or more precisely, the 0.0004933% of the world’s population – who visit Antarctica each year. To encourage them to do so, the tour operator is offering up to 30% savings on select 2019 cruises to the seventh continent, with prices starting from $9,710.

Until Nov. 25, Air Canada Vacations’ clients booking a Celebrity Cruises departure from Rome, Barcelona, London, Athens or Venice, fly for free (up to $299) from Toronto and Montreal and pay only flight taxes (approx. $600). The offer is valid for two passengers in an ocean-view stateroom or higher for select sailings between March 1 and Oct. 31, 2019 only.

HOTELS

Prestige Radium Hot Springs Resort in Radium Hot Springs, BC (photo) is the newest member in the BW Premier Collection by Best Western. With 70 guestrooms and 17 suites, the newly renovated property is located at 7493 Main St. and only a five-minute drive from Kootenay National Park and its renowned Radium Hot Springs Pool.

Barbuda Belle, an intimate, luxury boutique hotel on Antigua’s sister island of Barbuda, has reopened for first time since being damaged by Hurricane Irma in September 2017. Accessible by boat from Barbuda’s Codrington Lagoon, the rustic-styled property located at Cedar Point offers ultimate seclusion and a picturesque pink sand beach. The Barbuda Belle re-opening is the first of many openings that will take place in Barbuda for the winter season, including the Barbuda Ocean Club, and Barbuda Cottages, which are expected to open in December.

RESORTS

Refreshed restaurants and new dining options, including a new tandoori clay oven, are being served up at Coconut Bay Beach Resort & Spa following the popular Saint Lucia all-inclusive resort’s annual September closing. Coconut Walk, the resort’s main restaurant, will see its independent cooking stations expand with the addition of a pizza oven, and the Jerk Treehouse Restaurant has an expanded kitchen. Canadians can book at up to 65% off with prices starting at $1,579 p.p. for seven nights.

The shutters will soon be coming off Florida’s well-known Diplomat Golf Tennis Club, which dates to 1958 and was once the only hotel between Miami and Fort Lauderdale. The property is set to become the SLS Resort Residence & Marina Hallandale Beach with a projected opening date of 2022. The resort, belonging to hospitality group sbe, will feature new construction, resulting in 90 hotel rooms including 50 condo/hotel units, restaurants and bars, an 18-hole Greg Norman-designed championship golf course, 10-court tennis complex and a 48-slip marina. The resort is located 20 minutes from Fort Lauderdale Airport and 40 minutes from Miami.

Marriott International and Abu-Dhabi-based developers Eagle Hills have announced the signing of The St. Regis Tamuda Bay, marking the debut of the iconic luxury hospitality brand in Morocco. To be located in the stylish epicentre of Tamuda Bay on the country’s northwestern coast, the hotel is slated to open in mid 2020 as part of La Bahia Blanca lifestyle resort development. The resort will offer easy access to one of the world’s most magnificent beaches and include 100 luxurious guestrooms and suites that feature all the hallmarks of the brand, including signature St. Regis Butler Service.

CRUISE

Norwegian Cruise Line returned to New Orleans last week with the recently renovated Norwegian Breakaway (photo) beginning a series of five- to 11-day Caribbean cruises. The ship is the largest to homeport in the city, featuring 25 dining options, 22 bars and lounges, a comprehensive water park featuring the fastest waterslide at sea, one of the largest rope courses of any ship and “an entertainment program that mirrors the vibrancy of the Big Easy.”

Bookings for Princess Cruises’ 2020 Canada & New England cruise season are now open. Showcasing fall foliage in amazing destinations along the east coast, along with a summer journey to see the frozen landscapes of Greenland, there will be 16 departures visiting 16 destinations on five itineraries aboard two vessels: the new Sky Princess and Caribbean Princess. Cruises range in length from five to 16 days and include departures from Quebec City, New York and Fort Lauderdale.

Following its mandate to combine learning opportunities for passengers while cruising in comfort, Viking has announced a new 11-day Mediterranean ocean cruise itinerary aboard the Viking Sea in early 2021. The Greek Odyssey itinerary will allow guests to explore the ancient empires of antiquity of the Aegean Sea during the quiet season, starting in Athens with calls in Volos, Thessaloníki, Nafpilo, Crete and Rhodes in Greece, and Ephesus, the latter marking the cruise line’s return to Turkey.

THEME PARKS

Fans of the LEGO movies will be able to relive the “blockbusters” at LEGOLAND Florida Resort in Orlando with the opening of The LEGO Movie World, featuring three family-friendly marquee attractions inspired by the characters and themes of the films. The 60-hectare LEGOLAND theme park has more than 50 rides, shows and attractions, a water park and two hotels.

Currently under construction near Epcot in Orlando, Disney’s Riviera Resort will be the 15th Disney Vacation Club property, and first since Disney’s Saratoga Springs Resort & Spa opened in 2004, when it opens in 2019. With plans for approximately 300 units across a variety of accommodation types, the property will connect to Disney’s Hollywood Studios and the International Gateway at Epcot via the Disney Skyliner. This new resort will be the first all-Disney Vacation Club property at Walt Disney World since Disney’s Saratoga Springs Resort & Spa opened in 2004.

PEOPLE

More than 50 WestJetters recently travelled to Dominican Republic for the eighth annual WestJet Live Different Builds humanitarian trip. For nine days, the team immersed themselves within the local community of La Union in Puerto Plata to build new homes for five families living in extreme poverty. Participants also raised over $17,000 of extra funds that, when topped up to $22,000 by WestJet, were used to create engineer-designed paved pathways throughout La Union, improving walkability, water dispersion and the overall health and safety of the community. Since WestJet’s first humanitarian trip in April 2012, more than 400 WestJetters have volunteered their time to build 38 new homes for deserving families.

AGENT TRAINING

A new revamped agent specialist program is now available from Rocky Mountaineer. The five-module TRACKS course offers learning on service levels, routes and seasons, packages and more, along with providing easy access to sharable sales collateral, webinars, and support teams. Agents who complete certification by Dec. 31 will have their names entered into a draw for two two-day rail-only GoldLeaf Service tickets.

Tourism Australia has launched a competition for qualified Aussie Specialists to become an ‘Australian Ambassador.’ If selected, they will join a tailor-made trip ‘down under’ to share their Aussie experiences with other international travel sellers. Applications for frontline travel sellers from Canada are open until Jan. 7. For information click HERE.

BY THE NUMBERS

With the renovation of its first property in Jamaica, the RIU Palace Tropical Bay in Negril, now complete, RIU Hotels & Resorts has taken stock of its 17-year history on the island: six hotels, 3,152 rooms, 2,779 members of staff, more than 330,000 guests per year and a total investment of over US$550 million dollars, which includes the US$35 million renovation of Tropical Bay, which opened in 2001.

Europe’s tourism numbers are up and visitors are sharing the love. Research from the European Travel Commission says 32 of 34 destinations in the region registered some form of growth over the summer period, with one in four enjoying double-digit expansion in arrivals. Overall, Europe saw a +7% increase in international tourist arrivals the first half of 2018 over the previous year. Notable arrivals winners included Turkey (+23%), Greece (+19%), Serbia (+15%), and Malta (+16%).

As the world’s top outbound tourism market, China‘s 142 million outbound travellers spent an estimated $258 billion traveling abroad in 2017, according to the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO). By comparison, the Chinese cruise industry served only about 2.5 million cruise passengers last year, representing less than two percent of China’s outbound global travellers. As the travel industry continues to grow and develop in the region, China is widely expected to eventually become the largest cruise market in the world.

DESTINATIONS

Trendy Eataly is expanding its North America footprint with news that the authentic Italian marketplace will fill a 40,000 sq.-ft. space at the Park MGM in Las Vegas in December. The Italian-based company, which has 35 locations worldwide, including Boston, Chicago, New York (two) and Los Angeles, and soon in Toronto, features unique food counters, bars, cafés and dining experiences offering traditional Italian food, as well as al fresco dining, live cooking demonstrations and premium food items for purchase.

Chicago Detours now offers a free lunch-break tour of the historic Monadnock Building. The 30-minute tour, which takes place on Fridays at 12:30 p.m. looks at the building from outside to absorb its monumental architecture. The late-19th-century skyscraper is particularly beloved by Chicagoans for its unique shape and structure and stepping inside is like taking a step back in time with the building’s ornate staircases, historic lighting fixtures and old-time-style small businesses. Reservations are required.

Send news to baginski@travelindustrytoday.com