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Letters
from around the world An exciting new book on
Ethiopia from a talented Vancouverite Greetings
from the Travelin' Cheezhead: My
6 day trip to Whistler, BC, earlier this month took
me to the Adventure Travel Trade Association's
annual Summit conference. Yes, the ultra cool
mountain ski village is beautiful in the fall, and
a great relaxing place for a meeting. I attended
the meeting to learn more about the growing niche
market of Adventure Travel & to make job
contacts there. Attendees included tour operators,
travel agency specialists and travel media from all
over the world. The
weather was typical mountain fall, including rain,
mist, fog, sunshine, and even a few great views of
the nearby mountain peeks. I stayed at the Pan
Pacific Mountainside hotel, about a minute away
from the gondola to the top of the extremely steep
mountain. The hotel gets rave reviews & high
stats as a resort from publications like Conde
Naste. We got really good rates as association
members. My
hotel included an Irish bar with lots of good
music, Irish & folk, sung by Guitar Doug.
Whenever Doug asked if everybody was tired yet, the
crowd enthusiastically yelled, "No!!", so he kept
on singing. The halibut, salmon & corn beef was
delicious. Since the bar got some bad beer kegs,
the usually great tap beers, Harp & Molson,
were not available. Eeeeeeekkkkkkk! I spent
every night in the cozy Irish pub, with a nice warm
fireplace, before going to bed. We
had 3 nights of entertainment & specialty foods
at the conference including a Canadian night &
Alps night (featuring France, Germany, Italy &
Switzerland). My favorite party was hosted by
Brazil, which included a fabulous Samba band &
dancers. The conference was held at the convention
center located in the Village Stroll area, about a
10 minute walk through the picturesque
town. There
wasn't much time for enjoying the area since the
Summit meeting did provide a lot of information
packed sessions on trends & marketing in the
Adventure Travel business. The gondola ride to the
top of the mountain took 25 minutes where I
traveled through rain, snow and fog to the snow
packed top of the ski area where the Olympics will
be held in 2008. ON AIRLINE
FOOD Dear Air Higfhways: I e-mailed
Air Canada and they told me that you make their
food i am doing a food tecnology project on airline
food and i would really appriciate it if you could
send me some information on the kind of food you
make,what the ingredients of a typical meal is,what
the food is ,the nutrisional value,the size of the
tray,the cost of the meal and a picture would
really help if thi is possible please could you
email me back and I will send you my address
thankyou for your help Victoria Dear Victoria, The
catering company is CARA ,a Canada wide
organization. We wrote a profile on the company,
which is on the following page:
http://www.airhighways.com/cara.htm It has Cara's
website, and from that you will have their e-mail
address. We had a tour of their facility at Vanc
ovuer International Airport and it was very
impressive. Good luck on your project and let us
know how you make out. Editor I'm a Canadian aviation
historical researcher and am presently
researching the activities of Canadians in the
Korean Air War (1950 - 1953). This is a broad-based
topic but involves the nearly-700 charter flights
by Canadian Pacific Airlines from Vancouver to
Tokyo via Anchorage/Shemya(in the Aleutians)
/Tokyo. On 20 July 1951 one of CPA's DC-4s with a
crew of 7 and 31 passengers disappeared near Juneau
and after an extensive search - was never
found. The aircraft
departed about 7 PM Vancouver time and flew the old
radio range system "Amber One" route between
Vancouver and Anchorage - it first stop for fuel.
At 11PM it checked in near Spencer Bay AK - all was
well but missed the next radio check at midnight at
Yakutat AK - it was never heard from again. I'm
trying to find a set of the old maps that will
clearly show the Amber one route up the coast to
Anchorage - do you know where I could find these???
\regards, Carl Mills, Toronto, 416-495-0907,
mailkto:bansheepublications@rogers.com Dear Muguette, Thank you very much for writing
and sending the magazines to me to share with
members of First Presbyterian Church of Cunnecticut
Farms. I will update you with our future travel
plans to Cameroon. I will also forward your email
to our Pastor especially regarding your offer to
inform the ministry of Tourism. If you will be in
the New Jersey area on Sunday, April 25, 2004,
please join in church service and immediately
following the service, we have "A Taste of
Cameroon" get together. Expected start time for the
after church event is 12noon on Sunday April 25,
2004. We will be delighted to have you or your
representative at the occassion if you can make it.
My home phone number is (973) 597-9229, office is
(862) 778 8572 and cell is (201) 306-1912. Thanks
again and best regards,. Ephraim Samarkand, The Great Silk
Road and Points East: We are pleased to have an
opportunity to introduce to you our company "KO'
HINUR". We are a travel agency in the Republic of
Uzbekistan with the headquarters in Samarkand; we
offer diverse range of tour packages (tours onthe
Great Silk Road, cultural and historical tours,
exotic tours (includingcamel and horse riding
tours) within Central Asia (Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan). In May
2001 our company became an agent of "Uzbekistan
Airways". We would be much obliged to you if you
provide us with the list of outgoingtour operators
working in your country, which will be used in
order to develop relations between our counties and
to get mutual benefits from our cooperation. Uzakov
Akmal. General Manager From a viewer: I was
wondering if you had any information regarding
abandoned railways in B.C. ? If you do or know of a
url could you please pass it onto me..... Any info
you can share would be greatly appreciated. Thank
you in advance. Linda Dear Linda: The
best known abandoned railway in the province of
British Columbia, Canada is the famous Kettle
Valley line, which a lot of people from here
and around the world enjoy for hiking adventures
and cycle trips. Here is a brief introduction of it
from the web: "The ribbons of steel that made
up the Kettle Valley Railway are gone. All that is
left are 16 km (9.9 mi.) of track, the odd station
house and out buildings, a few relics and the
history. The Kettle Valley Railway was the tie that
bound the Kootenays to the rest of British
Columbia. The Kettle Valley Railway started at Hope
and went all the way to Midway, zigzagging
throughout the south western sections of B.C. From
Hope, the KVR made its way through the Coquihalla
River gorge. It continued onward to Princeton, West
Summerland, Penticton, along the south side of
Okanagan Lake and finally south to Midway, for a
total of 525 km (325 mi.). They constructed branch
lines to Merritt and to Osoyoos, making the line
complete. " There's more about this historic
railway line on the web site: http://www.bcadventure.com/adventure/explore/ok/trails/kettle.htm There is also a working short
line steam railway in the Okanagan Valley operating
for tourists from Summerland, BC. http://www.kettlevalleyrail.org/ If you get a chance to visit the
area and explore the line, please send us your
comments. Regards, Jerry W. Bird, Editor Travel Posters of Africa Dear Kathleen.
Please visit our Africa Travel Association (ATA)
web site, which has a page listing the main
contacts in the USA for African National Tourist
Offices, with links to embassies and airlines
serving Africa from the USA and Canada.
http://www.africa-ata.org/african_tourism.htm
. We've also passed on your request to ATA head
office in New York City. Open Skies to Canada- USA
Our newest BC web
site
http://www.bcscene.com
has general business and investment information.
Toll Free
Phone Line: 1-800-HELLO-BC
(800-435-5622) Loveboats on BC's Shuswap
Lake Dear Folks: Here are two
connections to follow up: Waterways Houseboat
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