Lyn Edwin Cathey is a veteran of 28 years in the travel industry - holding positions within the industry such as trainer, educator, agent, consultant, agency owner/manager and product specialist. For 15 years prior to joining the travel industry, Lyn worked as a full time entertainer/comedian, performing on banjo & guitar - often as a featured act on cruise ships. He created and currently maintains several websites including TripFinder.com.
Recently, my spouse and I found ourselves at the epicenter of a masterfully orchestrated convergence of three great loves – music, cruises, and of course, each other. The venue was a premium class cruise ship full of dedicated music lovers and a dozen well-known jazz virtuosos. Living in this magical sweet spot of almost continuous concerts, seminars and socializing for seven days proved to be a life changing experience.
First the backstory –
Music-themed cruises …
As if getting old wasn’t enough! The seventy seven million people born between 1946 and 1964 – already hobbled by such lifestyle inhibiting afflictions as restless leg syndrome, over-active bladders and waning libido – now have another debilitating condition to cope with – Boomer Nostalgia, or ‘Boomer-stalia’. (Cue the violin music here.)
The symptoms as this reporter observes them are manifest as a deep longing to reconnect with free spirits of the past…those with whom …
Nestled in the rolling hills of central Arkansas, this little burg should be on everyone’s quick-get-away list…from infrequent travelers to euro-snobs to jaded jet setters. Here’s a dozen reasons why:
Three beautiful lakes – All are man-made, created by building hydro-electric dams in sections of the Ouachita River (pronounced ‘wash–ah–taw’ – the French spelling of an Indian word meaning “good hunting grounds”). The smallest is Lake Catherine at 1,900 acres and five miles long. …
It is easy to romanticize the past, making it out to be even more enjoyable than it was in reality…and I’ve been known to indulge in a harmless bit of embellishment myself now and then…so it is with conscious effort to keep hyperbole to a minimum that I continue.
During my years living in San Francisco, I was a member of what can only be described as a loosely organized street gang. I ran with …
They’ve been testing for years, looking at it upside down, backwards, inside out and sideways. They begged already survey weary cruisers to please, please, please turn in one more evaluation form. And still there is no consensus on exactly what to call it…or how it fits into multi-zillion dollar advertising and marketing campaigns. But one thing is for certain…passengers can’t get enough of this stuff!
Regardless of which term you use – Enrichment Program, Edu-tainment, …
Americans love fake experiences. We love authentic fake food at fast food outlets, authentic fake socializing online via Facebook and Twitter, authentic fake Rain Forests at shopping malls, authentic fake politicians who pretend to govern, authentic fake travel writers who…wait…scratch that last item. To paraphrase the great P.T. Barnum –“No one ever went broke by over-estimating America’s appetite for authentic fake travel experiences.” Which leads me to today’s subject…ORLANDO!
This year the Hilton World …
