Those booking Austrian Airlines flights operated by a Boeing 777 aircraft can virtually discover a seat and reserve it directly during the booking process via a new 3D Seatmap. By the end of the year, the function will also be available in the Web Check-in Portal.

The Lufthansa Group is simplifying its status program and offering an easier and more transparent collection system for achieving and maintaining Frequent Traveller, Senator and HON Circle levels. Effective Jan. 1, 2022, a point system will be used for frequent flyer status that is easy to understand and incudes greater transparency. Frequent Traveller and Senator status will be granted for life for long-term loyalty. The allocation of award miles remains unchanged.

Montreal’s Schwartz’s Deli will be featured this winter in the Sunwing Café, with the iconic eatery’s smoked meat sandwich available for purchase. Additionally, the airline reports that it has renewed its partnership with Food Network Canada celebrity chef Lynn Crawford, who will present new and favourite dishes onboard, for a fourth consecutive year.

DEALS

For new bookings made by Jan. 3, Uniworld and U River Cruises passengers can save up to 30% off select 2020 sailings across most itineraries and room categories.

Travellers can save up to $1,000 per couple on select UnCruise Adventures itineraries in Latin America, Mexico and Hawaii through March 2020. UnCruise’s small ships carry 22-90 guests and take travellers deeper into each destination with included activities and a focus on nature and wildlife.

Princess Cruises is offering guests up to 40% off select voyages from February to May 2020. Through Dec. 10, the sale includes cruises to the Caribbean, Mexico, Panama Canal, Hawaii, and California Coast, South Pacific, South America & Antarctica, Japan, Asia, and Australia & New Zealand.

TOURS

A new wedding planner from Transat features 250 hotels in 22 South destinations hand-picked for their wedding-friendly facilities. The 2020-21 Weddings brochure is packed with info, pointers and ideas and includes weddings at sea plus wedding group booking incentives.

Costsaver is expanding its Europe & Britain portfolio in 2020 to include six new trips and a new destination, Egypt, bringing its total offering to 41 trips. New options include tours in Portugal, Italy, Turkey and Scotland.

Travel agents can now make WestJet Vacations land-only bookings for their clients in SIREV and RevNet and by calling WestJet’s travel support team. Agents will earn commission on land-only bookings at their agency’s current WestJet Vacations base commission rate.

HOTELS

South Africa has enhanced its hotel grading system to include a new 5-Star Premium category for properties in the country that exceed the quality standards and requirements of the 5-Star grading by “exhibiting the pinnacle of world-class service and quality.” Thirteen properties to date have been bestowed with the status: Limpopo – Palala Boutique Game Lodge and Spa, Jabulani Safari and Royal Malewane; Mpumalanga – Lion Sands Ivory Lodge; Western Cape – Birkenhead House, The Silo Hotel, Cape Grace, Leeu Estates, Ellerman House, Grootbos Garden Lodge, Grootbos Forest Lodge, Morukuru Ocean House and Morukuru Beach Lodge.

Intercontinental Hotel Group (IHG) Rewards Club can earn bonus points that double, triple and quadruple with every stay. To take advantage of the 4X Promotion, members must register and book stays at any of IHG’s 5,700 hotels and resorts by Dec. 15 and complete stays through Jan. 31. The first stay is worth 1,000 bonus points, progressively increasing to 4X bonus points by the fourth stay.

Open:

The new Aloft Delray Beach hotel in Florida’s Palm Beaches is situated near the downtown area and offers 122 rooms, a bar offering hand-crafted signature drinks, on-site gym, pool and 835 sq. m. of meeting space.

RESORTS

Memories Holguin Beach Resort in Cuba has now reopened as an adults-only property catering exclusively to guests over the age of 16.

AMResorts has locked in a new resort brand management deal Aruba. The agreement will bring the first Secrets Resorts & Spa-branded property to the island, with the 600-key Secrets Baby Beach Aruba situated alongside Baby Beach, a popular white sand-lagoon in the Southern part of Aruba, close to San Nicolas. Completion is currently slated for the fourth quarter of 2021.

CRUISE

Replacing the traditional bottle of champagne with a chunk of ice, Hurtigruten’s MS Roald Amundson was recently christened in Antarctica – the first ever cruise ship naming on the seventh continent (photo). Polar pioneer and godmother Karin Strand did the honours in Chiriguano Bay on Brabant Island in ceremony honouring the legacy of polar hero Roald Amundsen.

Over 3,500 guests, including many Canadians, were on hand Nov. 22 for the christening of Norwegian Cruise Line’s new ship, Encore, by honorary godmother Kelly Clarkson in Miami. The 4,000-passenger vessel is the fourth and last of NCL’s Breakaway class of ships and is now offering seven-day voyages to the Eastern Caribbean from Miami. Starting April 22 Encore sail Bermuda, Canada and New England itineraries from New York and Western Caribbean voyages from Miami beginning Dec. 12, 2020. In the spring of 2021, she will sail to Alaska from Seattle.

MSC Cruises christened its new flag ship MSC Grandiosa in Hamburg, Germany recently. The launch was part of a series of celebrations over 27 days, eight countries and 11 ports. In other MSC news, the cruise line has announced the opening of its Ocean Cay private island in the Caribbean has been delayed until Dec. 5.

ATTRACTIONS & THEME PARKS

It has started to feel a lot like Christmas at Universal Studios Hollywood with holiday festivities running through to Dec. 29. Highlights include Christmas in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, Grinchmas and “spirited holiday décor and festive whimsy” throughout the theme park.

EVENTS

UNIGLOBE Travel Eastern and Western Canada joined forces recently to hold their first ever National conference in Toronto. Themed, “People, Purpose, Passion,” the event attracted 250 agency owners, partners, managers and staff from across the country, and included presentations from preferred travel partners, a large supplier tradeshow, breakout sessions tailored to specific leisure and corporate agents, and gala awards dinner at which Shawn Ashton, owner of Sportscorp Travel in Bolton, Ont., was named UNIGLOBE Partner Agency of the Year for the sixth consecutive year (photo), and UNIGLOBE Agency of the Year went to Vickie Kyriakakos and the team at UNIGLOBE Le Centre De Voyages Dorval, in Montreal.

FAMS/INCENTIVES

Through Dec. 9, travel agents can earn 10,000 Loyalty Rewards points by booking various travel products through TravelBrands. Successful bookings will be represented by a new ornament placed on agents’ own TravelBrands tree, hosted on Access. Travel agents must book four flights, three cruises and three other products to receive 10,000 Loyalty Rewards points. Other applicable products include car rentals, hotels, packages and add-ons. Agents are able to decorate up to three trees through the duration of this promotion. A Christmas ornament will automatically be added to agents’ trees four days following a reservation for a qualifying product.

Travel agents can earn up to a $1,000 booking bonus for Black Friday/Cyber Monday bookings to couples-only, luxury all-inclusive Serenity at Coconut Bay in Saint Lucia. The bonus applies to five-night minimum stay bookings made through Dec. 6 for travel Dec. 14 through Jan. 5. Bookings must be registered at SerenityResortRewards.com.

Fourteen Transat Distribution Canada (TDC) agents had a chance to discover the Emerald Isle like a consumer as part of a “Ride Along” tour by Collette, so they might better communicate the experience to their clients. The group (photo) took part in Collette’s Shades of Ireland tour departing from Dublin, visiting many of the country’s landmarks like Kilkenny, Waterford, Killarney, the Ring of Kerry, the Cliffs of Moher and Galway.

PEOPLE/APPOINTMENTS

Saint Lucia’s all-inclusive Coconut Bay Beach Resort & Spa has appointed Suzanne Fleming/Blue Wave Marketing as its outside sales representative in Canada. After not having a permanent presence for almost two years in Canada, Blue Wave Marketing will conduct agency visits and training, tour operator training and represent both resorts at consumer and trade events.

Insight Vacations and Luxury Gold has announced a transition of roles for Heidi Schnitker, who returned to The Travel Corporation at the end of last year, from Sales Manager of Southwestern Ontario (SWO) to Sales Manager of Greater Toronto Area (GTA). Megan Debarros, who has been with the brands working in the Contact Centre for the past five and a half years, has now been promoted to Sales Manager for Southwestern Ontario.

ON THE MOVE: Jason Stremble from Trafalgar Vacations to Disney Destinations as District Sales Manager for Ontario…. Ana Vazquez, formerly of Flight Centre, is Air Canada Vacation’s new Area Sales Manager for B.C.

NEWS

Through Jan. 6, the Sunwing Foundation will be collecting new and gently used children’s books at select Hakim Optical locations across the Greater Toronto Area for distribution to local children in destinations across the Caribbean and Mexico. As a thank you for their generosity, customers who make a book donation in store will receive a $50 Hakim Optical gift card for prescription eyeglasses and can enter a contest to win an all-inclusive vacation for two adults and two children to Riu Emerald Bay in Mazatlan.

BY THE NUMBERS

New figures released by VisitBritain show strong growth in visitor arrivals from Canada to the UK during the first six months of 2019. There were 406,000 visits from Canada to the U.K. between January and June this year, up 11% on the same period in 2018, while Canadians spent £380 million. There was particularly strong growth from April to June with 277,000 visits, up 17% on the same period in 2018 and setting a new record for quarter two.

DESTINATIONS

Kauai now has a reservation system to help manage visitations to the Hawaiian island’s popular north shore (and specifically entry Haena state park). The new system was implemented after the area was a hit by flooding and landslides last year resulting in a long closure of the road approaching the park. Now the number of daily visitors is limited and potential visitors must reserve a spot or a shuttle seat (Gohaena.com) at least 30 days in advance.

Ranger’s House in London has re-presented a stunning collection of 700 works of fine and decorative art that includes the newly restored painting Madonna of the Pomegranate, long regarded as a fake, but now confirmed as a 15th-century original from the studio of Florentine master Sandro Botticelli. The collection also features ornate medieval jewellery, Gothic sculptures, Italian ceramics, 18th-century French furniture and British portraits – all brought together by diamond magnate Sir Julius Wernher in the late 19th century.

More than a dozen cheese factories in Quebec’s Eastern Townships have come together to celebrate the unique gastronomic attractions in the region with a new self-guided tour. The 14-stop ‘Les Têtes Fromagères’ Cheesemakers Circuit gives cheese fans a chance to meet cheesemakers working in the Townships and sample a diverse array of gourmet products. With a variety of fine, curd, raw milk, sheep and goat cheeses on offer throughout the region, highlights along the tour include Abbaye De St-Benoit-Du-Lac, Quebec’s first blue cheese producer housed in a 100-year-old monastery; the multi-award-winning Fromagerie Nouvelle France; and Domaine De Courval, which specializes in organic goat cheeses. A map (in English) can be found HERE.