Our editor, Ed Salvato (below right), was a guest of Derek and Romaine on their eponymous show on Sirius OutQ (Sirius 109; XM 98).
It
was a lively 45 minutes with lots of calls from listeners.
They discussed a wide range of travel topics from an assortment of
Sirius OutQ listeners: gay men, lesbians, singles and couples Here are a few topics
they touched upon:
Travel to India and Sri Lanka
Washington, D.C. hotels
San Juan, Puerto Rico gay scene
Gay-friendly Istanbul
Punta del Este, Uruguay for an older lesbian
Best getaway for New Year's, where to go for Thanksgiving and much more!
Click here to listen to the show. (It's in four parts)
Located on the island of Ambergris Caye in Belize, the Brahma Blue luxury resort presents an Out Traveler exclusive deal to those looking for an idyllic getaway in the Caribbean. When you book the Suite Life, the Divers Delight, or the Give Thanks packages by November 1st and mention the code OT Belize, you will receive a %15 discount on the package price.
Suite Life ($2,798 for 7 days for a party of four) offers accommodations in a three-bedroom penthouse suite, which can house up to five additional guests. The suite comes with a personal butler/chef, who will prepare breakfast, which is included in the room price, and dinner according to your wishes.
Divers Delight ($2,198 for 7 days; based on double occupancy) includes daily diving trips to the Blue Hole barrier reef at Turneffe Atoll. The two-bedroom, high-ceilinged condo is equipped with a fully-furnished kitchen and sunset and sunrise views. Continental breakfast sans chef is included.
Give Thanks ($250 per night; based on double occupancy) invites you to enjoy a tropical Thanksgiving in a two-bedroom condo with a fully-furnished granite counter-top kitchen. During your stay you can snorkel the local barrier reef -- which happens to be the second largest in the world, -- dive the world famous Blue Hole, visit the ancient temples of the Mayan civilizations. Continental breakfast is included in the room price.
Daily complimentary yoga class, led by an instructor at the pool or on the beach, takes place every morning. The Brahma Blue grounds include the water-top Blue Lotus Restaurant. Found on the edge of a pier and giving out to a clear view of San Pedroacross the water, it serves Caribbean cuisine.
Travel tip: It's hard to pack lightly when you must bring enough changes of clothes to last you your whole trip. Consider packing less clothing and using local Laundromats or even hand washing smaller items in your hotel room to replenish your wardrobe; it'll save on packing space!
Take a dip offshore in the U.S. Virgin Islands to savor perfect year-round temperatures and a gay-friendly vibe. For travel through Oct. 31, each of the three major islands -- St. Croix, St. John, and St. Thomas -- have two specials for visitors.
The Intimate Treasures promotion highlights the islands' boutique hotels and includes a $50 dining coupon, $50 in attractions and activities coupons, and an eco-friendly gift bag with a bottle of rum, T-shirt, and other giveaways. Gay-owned Villa Greenleaf and gay-friendly Hibiscus Beach Hotel on St. Croix are among the small hotels that are participating. The full list can be found on the Visit USVI site. The package must be booked directly with the hotel or through your travel agent; when booking, use code SHP2009.
The Sizzlin' Sampler promotion also offers a $50 dining voucher and $50 off attractions and activities, but amps it up with a $300 discount on airfare, a $500 coupon booklet, and your fourth hotel night free. Gay-owned Sand Castle on the Beach, also located on St. Croix, is included in the promotion; find out more through one of the USVI's booking partners, such as American Airlines Vacations or Spirit Vacations, or view the full list on the Visit USVI site.
A minimum stay of four nights is required for both promotions and bookings must be made by Oct. 15.
Travel tip: Not all hotels feature wake-up calls, and using your cell phone alarm means leaving the phone on and vulnerable to middle-of-the-night calls (that come with international charges when you’re traveling abroad). Pack a small, battery-powered alarm clock for your trip instead.
My friend Maggie and I are getting increasingly excited
about the prospect of joining 1900 other women on the first everSweetcruise (November 8-15). We’ll be galloping up the
gangplank inNew Orleanson our way to Roatan, Honduras; Belize City; Cozumel and
Costa Maya, Mexico.
As well as sashaying all around the most scintillating spots
in the Caribbean, Maggie, our 1900 new friends, and I also have the option of
joining apre-cruise voluntourism
package. Those who opt to hit the Crescent Cityearly can spend three days working with a wetlands
restoration project designed to prevent future flooding of this resilient city.
It’s not all hard work, though – French Quarter accommodations are luxurious,
there’s a LGBT history tour, a party, and a tasty cooking demonstration.
Neither of us has been to any of the ports of call, so
we’ve been doing a bit of research in order to make the rest of our friends
even more envious of our itinerary. Today we’re getting enthusiastic about Belize
City.
The perfect gateway to the country’s archeological and eco
sites, Belize City is home to around
70,000 people and basks on the country’s central coast. Originally a Mayan city
called Holzuz, it now sits amidst a scatter of Creole villages with names such
as Double Head Cabbage and Crooked Tree.
It turns out that half of Belize is jungle – jungle teeming with jaguars, pumas,
ocelots, armadillos, tapirs, toucans, hummingbirds, parrots, macaws and
thousands of species of tropical flowers. The nation is also confettied with
over 600 Mayan ruin sites. If we can tear ourselves away from the longest
barrier reef in the Western Hemisphere we’re planning on visiting Altun Ha,
once a ceremonial center for most of Belize’s Mayans.
About: True to its name, Spirit Journeys strives to not only provide memorable trips to exotic locales, but also to create opportunities for mental, emotional, and spiritual growth. The company offers gay travel adventures lasting 12 to 16 days that are filled with visits to off-the-beaten-path parts of the destination, and weeklong retreats or workshops that focus on creating a community within the group, with the tour guides acting as teachers. In addition to soul searching and yoga, there are also ample opportunities for poolside tanning and shopping.
Price range: $995-4,095
Upcoming trips: "Together" is the first retreat for gay male couples, set for April 24-May 1, 2010 on beautiful, secluded Thatch Caye Island off the south-central coast of Belize. The goal of the 10-couple retreat is "to connect deeper with the man you love, as well as a chance for relaxation and play." Days are filled with outdoor activities such as fishing, snorkeling, scuba diving, and kayaking (daily and other trips included in package); there are also daily exploratory group sessions dealing with the subjects of unconditional love, acceptance, etc. You have the choice of staying in one of the five Thatch Cabanas or one of the five elevated Thatch Casitas (little homes); the group is taking over the island in its entirety.
Deals and steals: When you register early for any of the trips offered by Spirit Journeys, you will save $100. Deadlines vary by trip. Register for the featured couples retreat by November 1, 2009 and you'll pay as little as $1,595.
Our editor, Ed Salvato (below right), was a guest of Derek and Romaine on their eponymous show on Sirius OutQ.
It
was a lively 45 minutes with lots and lots of calls from listeners.
They discussed a wide range of travel topics from a wide range of
Sirius OutQ listeners: gay men, lesbians, singles, couples and even a
straight couple looking for a great weekend getaway from Dallas! Here are a few topics
they touched upon:
Jay in California asked about Egypt
Bill in Arizona asked about Greece
Michelle and her boyfriend asked about weekend getaways
Nicholas asked about Belgium
Michael asked about South Africa
Others asked about Mexico, upgrading, gay dude ranches and much more!
Click here to listen to the show. (It's in three parts)
Puerto Vallerta was our last port of call, leaving us with just two “at sea” days before returning to Los Angeles. I expected to spend both of these last days just sitting by the pool, soaking in as much sun as could before returning to work, but now that we’re heading north (and into the wind), it’s a little cold and blustery outside. So while I did get outside for a couple hours (for my morning run around the 400-meter track and for a some time by the pool), I spent most of the day enjoying the indoor entertainment that RSVP had lined up for us.
Yesterday’s headliner was one I’ve been looking forward to since seeing the itinerary weeks ago: Debbie Reynolds. And it was clear as I took my seat in the two-deck, filled-to-capacity theater that I wasn’t alone in my anticipation. Granted, there were a few guys on the ship who had no idea who Ms. Reynolds is (although they had a better idea when I explained that she played Grace’s mom on Will & Grace), but Reynolds took that question head-on almost as soon as she came on stage.
“I know some of you are too young to know who I am, so let me introduce myself. I’m Princess Leia's mom.” Whether or not you knew her, you had to love her performance, which was filled with show tunes, stories from her days in Hollywood (“Clark Gable, he was straight -- but you guys could have had a chance with Cary Grant.”), and impersonations (including a right-on performance as Barbra Streisand). The highlight of the show was Reynolds’s tribute to her old friend and neighbor, Judy Garland. She brought the house down with “Over the Rainbow,” which seemed like a perfect ending to our lovely second-to-the-last-day on this delightfully gay cruise.
Jon Barret, the Editor in Chief of The
Advocate and Advocate.com(the
world’s
leading multi-platform news provider directly targeting the
LGBT audience) has agreed to experience his very first gay cruise and
send us back these periodic reports. Check here all week and be on the
lookout for his article about first-time gay cruising scheduled for
later this year in the Advocate.
Story and photos by Jon Barrett Photos from top: Carnival in the distance; the hills of Puerto Vallarta; Puerto Vallarta's gay beach; friends Casey and Ira
It was another beautiful day -- this time in Puerto Vallerta. The boyfriend and I again took the very good advice of RSVP’s Charlie Rounds and headed directly to the Blue Chairs Resort as soon as we hit town. Blue Chairs is ground zero for gay here in PV -- and for good reason.
It’s a great way to spend the day at the beach, parked in a blue chair and under an umbrella while drinking very cheap beers (we had five Pacificos and a heaping plate of nachos for just $22). I definitely hope to return; cobblestoned and quaint, PV is my favorite of the three ports of call.
Drinking beer under a beach umbrella is what I expected from the cruise. But just as I reported about the burning bus in Mazatlan yesterday, I’d again like to tell you about one of the more unexpected moments: Soon after we docked in the harbor this morning, Carnival Cruise Lines’ Splendor pulled up directly behind us.
As I watched the Splendor come in, I realized it was perfectly positioned for the Carnival passengers to get an all-day eyeful of our ship’s “freestyle sunbathing” (read: nude sunbathing) deck. The juxtaposition was a great example -- for better or worse -- of how gay cruises (and gay cruisers) can’t help but get in the face of straight locals and tourists. (Can you spot the gay cruiser in the picture above?)
Jon Barret, the Editor in Chief of The
Advocate and Advocate.com(the
world’s
leading multi-platform news provider directly targeting the
LGBT audience) has agreed to experience his very first gay cruise and
send us back these periodic reports. Check here all week and be on the
lookout for his article about first-time gay cruising scheduled for
later this year in the Advocate.
I woke up this morning to the sound of roosters waking up the people living across the harbor from this Pacific Coast city of about 650,000. But I didn’t have much time to soak it all in because my boyfriend and I needed to prepare for our shore excursion to a zip line in the Sierra Madre Mountains (about an hour’s drive outside of Mazatlan), which we signed up for at the very helpful suggestion of RSVP president Charlie Rounds.
If you’ve never heard of a zip line, check out this video (it does a much better job of explaining the concept than I do). Huana Coa, where we went this afternoon, is a series of nine zip lines high above (and sometimes through) the trees in the Sierra Madres. I expected it to be more jungle like (the tour guide even told us on the way up that she had recently seen a baby tiger there, which is very doubtful), but the trees were still mostly bare and there was nary a tiger, monkey, parrot, or tarantula in sight. Still the experience of zipping through the air was exhilarating and exactly the sort of thing I hoped to get out of this trip -- my first-ever gay cruise.
But as it turns out, the zip line won’t be what I’ll be writing home about. On our hour-long journey back to the boat (on a lonely, dry, dusty two-lane Mexican highway), the bus caught on fire. And -- it gets better -- our only warning that we should probably get off the bus was when the driver charged out the front door with fire extinguisher. If only the bus had been equipped with a working fire extinguisher. So, after the rest of us piled off the bus, the tour guide and the sole woman (and only lesbian) in our group rallied the rest of us to dig out the bottles of Evian we’d purchased on the ship that morning and to pour them on the flames -- as if we were some kind of French Alps fire brigade. It still wasn’t enough. Neither were the bags of dirt we then tried to smother the fire with.
Finally a truck driver tossed his own -- working -- extinguisher our way as he drove by, and our bus driver was able to put out the fire. The charge I felt this afternoon on the side of the highway as the bus was burning was as strong -- if not stronger -- than I felt on the zip line just hours before. Still, it wasn’t quite enough to keep me entertained for the next 45 minutes or so, as our group waited (next to two grave markers and a stinky animal carcass) for a new bus to arrive. Sitting there on the side of the road, I couldn’t help but wonder two things -- What in the world must all the people in the passing cars think of us -- a couple dozen flamers sitting next to a burning bus? And, Where are those Y Tu Mama Tambien boys when you need them?
But burning buses aside, I’m having a blast on the cruise -- and am really looking forward to Puerto Vallerta tomorrow!
Jon Barret, the Editor in Chief of The
Advocate and Advocate.com(the
world’s
leading multi-platform news provider directly targeting the
LGBT audience) has agreed to experience his very first gay cruise and
send us back these periodic reports. Check here all week and be on the
lookout for his article about first-time gay cruising scheduled for
later this year in the Advocate.
Story and photo (los Arcos, Cabo San Lucas) by Jon Barrett
Greetings from Cabo San Lucas, the first port of call on my first-ever gay cruise, the seven-day RSVP Mexican Riviera cruise. OutTraveler.com's editor in chief (and Advocate's travel advocate) Ed Salvato wanted me to hit the high seas so I could better understand this staple of gay travel -- the gay cruise. I’m not certain how close this cruise is to the typical gay cruise -- there are only about 1,300 of us (compared to a 2,240 capacity) on this ship (NCL’s Norwegian Star) and, now that I’m able to access the Internet, I’m able to back up my suspicion that this isn’t just a gay cruise, it’s a bear cruise. (Editor's note: It's not really a bear cruise, it just seems that way.)
Typical or not, I’m having a great time. My boyfriend and I enjoyed a terrific performance by Amy Armstrong and Freddy Allen (very popular gay cruise performers, for good reason) and we just returned to the ship after a day of traipsing the white-sand beaches of Cabo San Lucas while telling vendors that I have no use for a silver chain, a Harley Davidson shirt, or a pair of pink sunglasses. Jon Barret, the Editor in Chief of The
Advocate and Advocate.com(the
world’s leading multi-platform news provider directly targeting the
LGBT audience) has agreed to experience his very first gay cruise and send us back these periodic reports. Check here all week and be on the lookout for his article about first-time gay cruising scheduled for later this year in the Advocate.
Out Traveler G.P.S offers dispatches from the ever-expanding field of gay and lesbian travel -- as soon as we know, you know. Check back frequently for updates, insider information, advice, and offers brought to you by our ever-roving band of gay travel experts and by readers just like you.
OutTraveler.com Editor in Chief Ed Salvato and his team travel the world for you. Occasionally we miss something. If you don’t see your favorite destination, tip or deal featured here, tell us about it!
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