Israeli authorities granted some one million visas to vacationers from the West Bank to cross the border during the recent Ramadan holiday. Some had never set foot in Israel before.
Tag: tourism
GAMCHEON – It has been called the “Lego village,” the “Korean Machu Picchu,” the “Santorini on the South Sea…” Gamcheon, in South Korea’s southern port city of Busan is indeed all of these – a multicolored village that looks like it was made out of candy, with its little green, yellow and blue hillside cubicle […]
MOSCOW – The 9,265-kilometer trip across Russia, from Saint Petersburg to Vladivostok, via the Transiberian Railroad, the world’s longest railroad, is the most popular product for the British tour operator Russia Experience. The trip is 16 days long, with a full week spent on the train. Tourists can decide how to spend the rest – […]
Brazil has overtaken Canada as the top foreign source of both tourists and property buyers in the Florida city, which has been suffering through the real estate and financial crises.
-Essay- BEIJING – On April 10, Fenghuang, a popular tourist town that is on the UNESCO World Heritage tentative list, started charging entry for visitors, triggering public outcry in China. Fenghuang is located in Xiangxi Prefecture, in China’s central Hunan Province, which is home to the Miao and Tujia ethnic minorities. Now, whoever wants to […]
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Turning A Refugee Camp Into A Golf Resort
CALAIS – Jacques Gounon is very happy. The CEO of the Eurotunnel Group has just announced the launch of a huge real-estate project in Sangatte, on France’s northern coast. If the name rings a bell to newspaper readers, it is because Sangatte is where up until 2002, there was a massive refugee center, housing asylum […]
LA STAMPA (Italy) Worldcrunch ROME– Workers restoring Rome’s historic Palazzo Venezia have discovered what they are calling Benito Mussolini’s 12th and most secret bunker, reports La Stampa. There are no records or mentions of this bunker, which was abandoned and left incomplete. City superintendent Anna Imponente and architect Carlo Serafini made the discovery after they […]
BUENOS AIRES – The hunger to learn more about the life of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, now and forever known as Pope Francis, is gripping the Argentinian capital. Just back from a meeting with the new pontiff in Rome, Mauricio Macri, head of the municipal government of Buenos Aires, announced that he will launch a “pope […]
ROME – Benedict XVI couldn’t have imagined this, because his thoughts were elsewhere: but the news of his resignation was met with cheers by thousands of people in Rome. Why? Because the resignation of a pope has the same effect as the Olympic Games or a Jubilee for the city of Rome: it brings tourists, […]
BBC NEWS (UK), AL-MASRY AL-YOUM (Egypt), AP Worldcrunch CAIRO – A hot air balloon caught fire and exploded as it was flying over the ancient Egyptian city of Luxor on Tuesday, killing at least 18 tourists. The casualties included French, British, Japanese nationals and nine tourists from Hong Kong, a security official told AP. The […]
CAIRO – Among the amazing landscapes Egypt possesses, the most precious are undoubtedly the seashores on the North Coast and the Red Sea, as well as the desert. Countless sites in these areas are unique and rare wonders of nature, and require special care and protection. The Egyptian Tourism Ministry has a plan for how […]
The taste of Alsace deep in the Malaysian heartland.
A Chinese reporter crosses the border to take the pulse of the closed-off nation, where young North Korean leader Kim Jong-un may have begun to loosen things up ever so slightly.
Located near the Berlin zoo, the address is the first in Germany for the famed US luxury hotel brand.
PAPEETE – Regardless of what geographers might say, there is a certain proximity between Tahiti and Iceland… The lush green rock dropped in the middle of the southeast Pacific Ocean might be a hundred times smaller than the chunk of windswept ice in the Northern Atlantic Ocean, but insularity is not about surface or latitude. […]
KIGALI– Beginning in January, every African visitor to Rwanda will be granted his or her visa upon arrival in the country from any border post. This “on-the-spot” visa process, according to Ange Sebutege, communications officer at the Rwandan Immigration Services, is designed to bring in more Africans tourists. Until now, visitors had to fill out […]
The Aegean town of Sirince has just 600 residents, but thousands are flocking there to survive supposed “end of the world” on Friday.
KAMCHATKA PENINSULA – “The Kamchatka? Why?” was the response I got from everyone who heard I was going there, even though I think they all knew how beautiful the region is. It’s true; the Kamchatka is far away and expensive (although no further than Japan or Cuba). And for some reason, it’s a little scary. […]
BELGRADE – “Go to Republic Square first, and then walk along Knez Mihailova Street, that’s Belgrade at its most beautiful…” With the counsel of the young woman at Reception, a rickety Dacia taxi gets me from the residential neighborhood of Senjak – pretty, but with some parts in urgent need of a facelift – past […]
EL OBSERVADOR (Uruguay) CLARIN (Argentina)

 Worldcrunch MONTEVIDEO – As the Southern Hemisphere’s summer vacation season approaches, the tourism industry in Uruguay is already sweating Argentina’s new restrictions on changing money to dollars and using it for travel abroad. The Association of Hotels and Restaurants of Uruguay has taken extra steps to attract Argentines, including publishing […]
FEZ – Everyone should go to the Moroccan city of Fez at least once, if only to get lost in the medina, around the mosque of al-Karaouine, the oldest university in the world. You could choose to spend the hot hours of the day in the Bou Inania Madrasa, the religious school built in the […]
LE MONDE (France), DW-TV (Germany) EFE Worldcrunch From London, Barcelona, and Rio de Janeiro, the list of cities worldwide that are being enticed by the allure of suspended cable cars is growing, heralded as a cheap, green and safe means of transport suspended above the normal rush of urban traffic. Although the cable car systems […]
MOSCOW – The traffic jams in Russia’s capital have become world-famous in the last several years, so bad that in 2010 the Federal Government decided to address the problem directly. At the time, then-President Dimitri Medvedev commissioned a plan for the development of Moscow’s transportation system through the year 2020 that aims to get Muscovites […]
Cruise lovers come in all shapes, sizes and inclinations. Some climb aboard for the pleasure of getting decked out in their sharpest evening wear. Others like to keep it as casual as they can. Dress codes, indeed, vary from ship to ship. UK-owned Cunard Cruises may still require tuxedos and evening gowns on its ocean […]
XINHUA (China), UNITED DAILY, CHINA TIMES (Taiwan) Worldcrunch TAIPEI – The Taiwanese are famous for being hard-working and creative when it comes to business. And thus the ongoing dispute between China and Japan has turned into an opportunity for the busy brains of Taiwan businessmen. While the boycott of Japanese goods is growing, an emphasis […]
GAHUNGA – Not long ago, the communities bordering Rwanda’s three national parks were the biggest threat to their survival. The villagers poached animals and illegally exploited the forest. But today, locals collaborate with the tourism industry and take part in the protection of biodiversity while improving their living standards. Much of the credit goes to […]
MARSEILLE – The Old Port, the historic quarter’s main street known as the Canebière, Notre Dame de la Garde church — these are three must-sees for any tourist in Marseille, France. And everybody visits them. But how about the old quarter known as the Panier? Very few venture there. Even many locals take the long […]