Spendthrift Shoestring

Weekend: Iceland, More Cartagena, Cheap Caribbean, London Embassies, Alesha Dixon

Sarah Lyall's piece on Iceland in the New York Times yesterday documents the fall-out from Iceland's spectacular financial crash. It quotes an Icelandic woman named Hronn Helgadottir who points out that she can no longer afford to travel. She describes a recent trip to Amsterdam, purchased before the krona's collapse, during which she and her husband kept a very tight budget. From the article:

They ate as cheaply as they could and bought nothing. “It was strange to stand in a store and look at a bag or a pair of shoes and see that they cost 100,000 kronur, when last year they cost only 40,000,” she said.

What's remarkable about this description is how it matches my own experience as a visitor to Ms. Helgadottir's Iceland. On both of my visits (in 2001 and again in 2004) the general cost index was terrifying. I ate enormous hotel breakfasts in order to stave off hunger until the afternoon and kept to an extremely parsimonious budget. Hot dogs and supermarket items saved me. I harbor no Schadenfreude in sharing this—it's ironic, in other words, but not funny.

Elsewhere in the Times: a feature on dining in Cartagena by Danielle Pergament—there's that increased attention to Colombia again!—and a round-up of Caribbean hotels and venues by Austin Considine. The latter is weak on affordable hotels, though two shine through: Sea Cliff Cottages in Dominica (from $90 in high season) and Virgin Islands Campground on Water Island in the U.S. Virgin Islands (from $75 in high season).

The FT online carried an interesting piece by Rob Blackburn on Friday on the ambassadors at small embassies in London. It profiles the missions of Andorra, Eritrea, Fiji, Malawi, and Montenegro. The most surprising revelation within is that Andorrans apparently need visas to study and work in the UK.

Lastly, I'm happy to see that a song by Alesha Dixon, one of my favorite gossip column fixtures from this past summer in London, has entered the UK top ten. "The Boy Does Nothing" is at Number Eight this week. Bubblegum fun.

Weekend over and out.

Colombia: Cartagena and the Mystery of the Missing Cheap Guesthouse

Back in March I predicted that Colombia would garner more attention among travel industry forecasters over the following months. The November issue of Budget Travel, which arrived today in my mailbox, would seem to support my hunch. The issue sports a gorgeous feature on Cartagena by Liz Ozaist that makes a great case for a visit. The article's blurb on the magazine cover even touts Cartagena as "The Next Buenos Aires!"

Nonetheless, I'm disappointed to note that the cheapest hotel profiled in the article costs $165 per night, with two other hotels listed in the article running $189 and $279 per night. These rates are annoyingly dear for inclusion in a feature in a budget travel magazine. I wondered if Cartagena might be a place with particularly expensive hotels and immediately got down to some cursory research. It would appear, in fact, that Cartagena is not such a place. With minimal research effort I came across a beautiful guesthouse that charges $81 for a double room from mid-December through mid-January and $66 at all other times.

I haven't visited this guesthouse. It might be far less charming than it looks. But times are tough, and people throughout the US are all very likely cancelling their vacations right now because they're not sure they can afford them. The last thing that budget travelers need to see in a magazine feature ostensibly tailored to a pennypinching demographic is hotel recommendations that begin at twice the nightly rate of charming local accommodation alternatives.

None of this is to suggest that hotel splurges are not worth writing about in budget travel magazines. Indeed, a well-placed hotel splurge can make an otherwise shoestring vacation extra special. But splurges shouldn't form the backbone of a budget travel feature. In my book, $165 isn't cheap—and $279 certainly ain't budget.

Colombia's Good Press

In the English-language travel and lifestyle media, Colombia doesn't get a lot of play. In fact, it's been regarded for years and years now as something of a no-go zone. You can go right ahead and blame violence and kidnapping.

Given this background, I was interested to note the splashy attention given Colombia in the April issues of both Monocle and Wallpaper. The former covers the property outlook in Cartagena's El Centro 'hood, while Wallpaper churns out a 14-page feature on Bogotá.

A coincidence, perhaps, but I'll be surprised if travel forecasting types don't chat a bit more about Colombia over the next year.