While you were away: This week’s top travel stories

Skynrd tops the road trip charts.

Life is “Sweet”
The Lynyrd Skynyrd song “Sweet Home Alabama” is the ultimate road trip song, Business Insider reports. According to a poll conducted by consumer automotive website Edmunds.com, Americans prefer the classic rock anthem over jams by the likes of Katy Perry and Taylor Swift. Too bad most they won’t be listening to the song while driving through Alabama. The state was recently ranked among the worst places to road trip, according to a survey conducted by social network WalletHub.

Poor Richard
Virgin Airlines CEO Richard Branson recently shared his “biggest travel disaster,” according to USA Today. It turns out the Brit billionaire’s worst nightmare was having to fly anywhere before he launched his own airline 30 years ago.

She said yes!
A man has proposed to each Disney princess at Florida’s Disney World. According to E! Online, Magic Kingdom visitor Blaine Gibson got down on one knee with a ring he purchased from Walmart and then proposed to Cinderella, Ariel, Tinker Bell, Jasmine, Rapunzel and Beauty and the Beast villain Gaston. Tinkerbell said yes. Apparently, those tiny fairy eyes can’t spot a cubic zirconia when they see one.

What are you doing in my cab?Want to see the world through the eyes of a taxi driver? A new tour operator is giving visitors a chance to do just that. According to CNN,  Taiwan-based Topology allows thrill seekers a four-hour ride along with a real cabbie to wherever the taxi is called upon by its regular customers—at a cost of $33. Sign us up. We’ve always wondered what drunken Taiwanese bachelorettes are like!

Fast track
California Governor Jerry Brown won a major victory this week when a panel of appellate court judges ruled that the state need not show in advance how it will pay for the $68 billion required to connect Los Angeles to San Francisco via high-speed rail, says the San Jose Mercury News. Next time we need a loan, we’re definitely going to call those judges first.

Tagged: California, Disney