My friend and fellow aviation and travel writer Harriet Baskas reports on a survey that shows the majority of travelers think air travel is stressful. Not exactly surprising news, but the results of the HNTB study could help the aviation industry enhance how it interacts with its customers, which I suppose is the goal. What ticks travelers off? Oh, you know, the obvious: invasive security, long lines to check bags, that sort of thing. Here at GO HOW, I’m proposing that we take a glass-is-half-full approach to getting where we’re going by concentrating on all the great experiences we have in transit because I know… Read More…

Like the opening scene in the Mel Brooks comedy, High Anxiety, where all the passengers on the airplane have their faces plastered to the windows so they can look at the scene below, I too, kept my eyes outward on my flight on Thursday on Ethiopian Airlines. I was flying from the capital, Addis Ababa to Harare in Zimbabwe. This would be my first time visiting sub Saharan Africa so I was very excited, very eager to get an eyeful ASAP. Unfortunately, the view of Africa from 37,000 feet doesn’t look that much different from the 37,000 foot view over other continents. Still, my Ethiopian experience,… Read More…

Good travel is highly dependent on bringing along a good attitude. It is a  self-perpetuating circle and it’s the GO HOW philosophy.  This is why I was so enchanted by the story today of airline passenger Rowland Wickes Forensbee who learned how powerful simple gratitude can be. While presumably cruising above 30-thousand feet, he posted on the Facebook page of Southwest Airlines, how much he appreciated the excellent service he was receiving from flight attendant Holly Hansen on flight 913 to Phoenix. Obviously he was hoping that someone at company HQ would see his post because he was agitating for something special for Holly’s arrival… Read More…

Like the perfect hostess she is, Lina Abdo can see the connections most folks miss. God bless her. On Friday,  she found a way to link chocolate, Veterans Day and travel at the 14th annual New York Chocolate Show. Hundreds, nay thousands were packed into the Metropolitan Pavilion for the show, sampling chocolates in every conceivable size, color and flavor. But the two marines who wound up at the display belonging to Lina’s little business, Les Cinq Amandes, were treated to sweets, sweet thanks for their service and made to feel like rock stars. Les Cinq Amandes, (French for the five almonds)  makes customized gift… Read More…

One of my all time favorite books is Earth From Above by Yann Arthus-Bertrand, which presents a pilot-eye view of the earth. It’s remarkable that even from great heights, Bertrand’s photographs reveal the subtle characteristics of land-dwelling humanity. Living in New England, this is the time of year when I most want Bertrand’s thousand-foot perspective because my little corner of the world is just the most remarkable place right-this-very-minute. Tomorrow, If the day is clear, I’ll go flying with my friend David Paqua in his Acro Sport, a biplane he built on the second floor of his glass shop in Stamford, and we’ll zoom around… Read More…

I can’t say who is right; airline passenger Jill Tarlow or airline executive John McDonald. Both tell contradictory versions of the same story. Did US Airways allow a man to board an airplane and sit conspicuously in the first class cabin wearing only ladies’ panties, a jog bra, thigh-high stockings and a see-through shrug while all manner of passengers walked past to get to their seats in economy? That’s what Ms. Tarlow says happened. Or is John McDonald, spokesman for US Airways correct? He says the first-class, cross-dressing, Dividend miler, was asked to cover up sometime after Ms. Tarlow snapped his photo in the San Francisco… Read More…

All this talk of chocolate and coffee has me thinking about Geneva; because no matter where you go in this city, you are never far from either. In keeping with the theme of GO HOW,  that is how you get where you go matters –  I want to stress that sweets notwithstanding, Geneva is a city for people who like to be on the move. They’ve got trains, they’ve got buses, they’ve got boats and (my personal favorite) they’ve got airplanes! Boy oh boy do they have airplanes. EasyJet has a hub here and fifty-nine other airlines serve little Geneva Airport. And not only that,… Read More…

I’ve made no secret of my affection for Singapore’s Changi Airport. But perhaps you don’t know that I also love chocolate. Which is why I was intrigued by a press release sent to me by the airport today announcing that when Americans pass through Singapore’s airport, the thing they most often buy is, you guessed it, chocolate. My fellow Americans – we are so out there in our obsession with chocolate,  that we purchased 1.35 million boxes of chocolate at that airport last year. I’ve been to Changi airport 3 or 4 times. I don’t remember buying chocolate there, ever. I do, however remember buying… Read More…

There’s no shortage of long lingering camera views in ABC’s new television show Pan Am, which airs for the first time Sunday September 25th and which I was allowed to preview recently. Views of what you ask? You know, the schtick that evokes the glory days of aviation, sleek and shiny airframes, smooth and super cool flight crews. The two vie for camera time in the hour-long pilot (cool your jets, “pilot” is TV speak for the first episode). I can assure you there’s enough visual candy in this show to make it appealing beyond the airplane geek, the travel nut and the romantic which… Read More…

GO HOW is all about the way we get to the places we go, but don’t be confused, actually getting there is sometimes beside the point. There are few vehicles less likely than a hot air balloon to actually transport you somewhere – literally transport you that is. Hot air balloon pilots are the only aviators who “don’t know where they will launch, how long they will fly or where they are going to land,” according to Daniel Cave, a retired balloon pilot and “balloon meister” at the Plano Balloon Festival underway this weekend in Texas.  “Most of us are not type A personalities.” This… Read More…