Royal wedding dress disappoints me


 I’m back home after my 26-hour flight from Singapore via New York and through blurry eyes I watched the Royal Wedding this morning – damn jet lag has thrown my clock off again.

I’m no fashion critic but after all the hype of who would and would not design the wedding dress worn by the Duchess of Cambridge (formerly plain old Kate Middleton) and what it would look like, I must admit I was somewhat disappointed – a bit too Plain Jane in its design. Maybe Princess Di’s elaborate wedding dress has ruined me forever.

However, London looked radiant!

No other city in the world looks as good as London when it puts on its regal look.

William and Kate’s wedding will certainly help inject new energy into the Royal Family and the wedding ceremony and the pomp and circumstance surrounding it will no doubt have many tourists booking passage to London.

CBC and other networks offered feeds from St. Andrews, where Prince William met Kate while attending the ancient city’s renowned university.

I was there a few years ago and TV pictures today reminded me how beautiful the campus there is. I soaked up the sun in the very courtyard where crowds gathered today to watch the wedding on giant TV screens.

London, St. Andrews and Kate’s hometown of Bucklebury – located 80 kilkometres west out London – will be overcrowded with tourists in coming weeks and months as the wedding ceremony hysteria continues well into the future.

Reminds me that it’s almost time for me to return to England.

Go to http://www.travelife.ca/ for my stories on St. Andrews.

Facts about the Royal Wedding

London is gearing up for the hordes of tourists expected to show up for the Royal Wedding of Prince William to Kate Middleton on April 29.

Don't have a hotel room booked for the big event? Then don't bother showing up. Just about every hotel in the British capital is booked the weekend of the wedding.

VisitBritain, the British tourist authority, is estimating hundreds of thousands of foreigners will book passage and line the wedding route for the biggest event in London since the wedding of William’s father Prince Charles to the late Princess Diana.

Visitors are expected to give the sluggish British economy a $1 billion jolt thanks to Will & Kate Inc.

And over a billion people worldwide will watch the wedding on TV and London police are expecting upwards of 1 million people to line the wedding route.

Others facts and news I dug up about the Royal Wedding:

*When Kate walks down the aisle she will be the oldest Royal bride to get married;

*At the Royal Couple’s press conference Kate indicated that she would like to be called by her given name ‘Catherine’, rather than Kate;

*Prince William’s nickname in college was “P-Willy”;

*If Prince William had chosen to marry before his 25th birthday he would have required the consent of his grandmother, the Queen;

*The Royal Crown Derby porcelain factory, which was on the verge of closing thanks to slow sales and a change in casual dining habits, is back in business thanks to the Royal Wedding. The company, the official maker of Will and Kate memorabilia that has the blessing of Buckingham Palace, has ramped up production of such things as commemorative plates and taken on 150 new workers to keep up with global demand.

*Westminster Abbey, where the couple will take their vows, was not where Prince Charles married Princess Diana in 1981 – that honour went to St. Paul's Cathedral down the street. However, Westminster Abbey was the venue for the funeral service of Diana in September 1997 just days after she was killed in a car crash in Paris.

*Someone wondered if, when he becomes king, Prince William will be called William the Conqueror after one of his ancient predecessors. When he ties the knot with Kate, I think he should be called “William the Conquered.”

Virgin to grow veggies on its flights

Here’s a story that kind of grew on me when I read it - and they assure me it's not an April Fool's Day joke.

Virgin Atlantic will begin growing fresh herbs and vegetables onboard flights for Upper Class passengers starting today.

Richard Branson’s Virgin, which always takes airline gimmicks to new heights, will install a specially-designed vegetable patch in the galley of all its aircraft so Upper Class passengers get the freshest of ingredients for their overcooked steak and soggy lasagna.

Don’t despair you second class economy passengers – Virgin says if the trial is successful, it will offer those fresh herbs and veggies to all passengers.

In Upper Class, fresh herbs will be used to complement drinks and cocktails from the bar area including thyme for Bloody Mary’s and fresh mint for Mojitos, Pimms and tea.

The vegetable offering will complement the in-flight meal with availability of vegetable depending on your destination.

Carrots, baby new potatoes and spinach will be available on flights returning to Great Britain.

Miniature pumpkins and sweet potatoes will be grown on transatlantic flights to the U.S., while Tokyo routes will have the choice of okura (okra) or shiitake mushrooms.

If the initiative is successful, Virgin Atlantic plans to roll the idea out to all routes including the Caribbean, Africa, India, Australia and Dubai.

To guarantee the success of the trial, all Upper Class cabin crew will attend a one day horticultural course at the Royal Horticultural Society in London.

Late breaking travel news

Here’s some travel tidbits I came across today while scanning the Internet:

LONDON: The final piece of turf has been laid on the field of play in the Olympic Stadium, marking completion of construction of the venue. Construction started on the Stadium just under three years ago in May 2008 and has been completed on time, under budget and with an exemplary safety record.

THAILAND: Hundreds of tourists are stranded on the popular Thai resort island of Koh Samui following a torrential downpour. Flights from the island have been suspended indefinitely, with a number of British tourists among those affected.

LONDON: EasyJet, the UK’s largest airline, has formed a partnership with VisitBritain, the UK’s national tourism agency, to jointly market Britain as a tourist destination over the next four years. The deal between the two parties is worth over about $25 million in cash and marketing in kind, and will help boost visitor numbers to the country and capitalize on the unique opportunities provided by the impending Royal Wedding, the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee and 2012 London Games.

WASHINGTON: Despite the lingering effects of the recession, the hotel business actually started coming back to life last year. According to a Hotels.com report released last week, the average cost of a hotel room rose 2 per cent in 2010, the first time it’s risen, year over year, since 2007.

TOKYO: Business travel to Japan has largely dried up in the wake of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear reactor crisis there, and industry experts do not expect it to bounce back until the nuclear problems have been solved. Corporate-related travel to Japan has plummeted 80 per cent since the earthquake, estimates Andrew W. Menkes, chief executive of Partnership Travel Consulting, a Princeton, N.J.-based firm that helps companies manage their travel and entertainment expenses. Business travellers have canceled their trips, he said, “because of potential exposure to radiation, challenges with the transportation and ground infrastructure, and lack of hotel space.”