Travel news: Custom igloos are in, paying for your own trip is out

Sweden’s ICEHOTEL

Use it or lose it
Overworked? You probably need a vacation. According to CNN, a new study indicates that Americans today are using less vacation time than they have in four decades. In 2013 alone, U.S. workers forfeited $52.4 billion in time-off benefits and an average of 169 million days of paid time off which is the same as working for free. Don’t look at us. Let the record show that we definitely use all our time off.

Eat. Pray. Ask.
Dreaming of an overseas trip you can’t afford? Easy, just hit up your social networks. According to the Wall Street Journal this week, travelers are increasingly turning to crowdfunding sites like IndieGoGo.com and GoFundMe.com and using them to ask their friends and family members to help pay for pricey trips. There was a pre-Internet strategy that’s very similar and it was called “Daddy, pleeeeeaaase.”

Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous
The super rich are taking conspicuous consumption to dizzying new heights (literally in some cases). According to FOX News, high-end luxuries aimed at the millionaire and billionaire travel set include custom-made igloos at the ICEHOTEL in Sweden that retail for $231,000, private jets costing as high as $54.5 million and cupcakes at a Dubai-based bakery that are going for a cool grand. Suddenly, Whole Foods seems like a bargain.

Capital idea
According to Yahoo!, Lonely Planet, the popular purveyor of authoritative travel tomes, has named Washington, D.C. the best place in the world to visit in 2015. It claimed the top spot in part because numerous events will pay tribute to the 150th anniversary of the assassination of President Lincoln including a funeral train which will recreate the trip from D.C. to Springfield, IL. This is the part where we act surprised that D.C. beat out Springfield.

The S is for Super, the U is for unique
Gawker Media’s Flight Club reported this week that plans for a new supersonic “Mini Concorde” business jet may have wings after all. The proposed plane, which is expected to hit a top speed of Mach 1.6, is a joint effort between Airbus and Aerion. If they’re looking to do a test run to Paris, they can count us in.

Tagged: Europe