Navigation Salon Salon Travel email print
Arts & Entertainment
Books
Comics
Health & Body
Media
Mothers Who Think
News
People
Politics2000
Technology
- Free Software Project
.Travel & Food
_______
Columnists

 

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Travel Services

Articles by Region

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Also Today

For a full list of today's Salon Travel stories, go to the Travel home page.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Search Salon


  
Advanced Search  |  Help

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Recently in Salon Travel


Rendezvous of the sun and the moon
Our eclipse correspondent witnesses ancient treasures and a modern miracle in Iran.

By Jeff Greenwald
[08/11/99]


Total eclipse
Encountering Iran on the cusp of change.

By Jeff Greenwald
[08/11/99]

Vagabonding
Searching for Binh Hoa
Hoping to find an obscure Vietnam War killing field, our correspondent discovers that some lessons of history teach themselves.

By Rolf Potts
[08/10/99]


China good? China bad?
Nothing is simple in Tibet.

By Hank Hyena
[08/07/99]

Wanderlust
Seduced in Bologna
Like the Bolognese towers in the background, we inclined toward each other for two and a half blissful days.

By Tom Di Egidio
[08/06/99]

Complete archives for Travel

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Travel
by e-mail
Sign up here to receive our weekly e-mail newsletter listing recent and upcoming articles and events in Travel.

 
Unsubscribe

- - - - - - - - - - - -




On location
Our expert steers you toward those famous movie settings you've always wanted to see, plus offers the lowdown on travel insurance, accessibility information and that elusive Dutch B&B.

Editor's Note:Donald D. Groff welcomes questions of general and not-so-general interest. Send questions and comments to TravelAdvisor. A selection of them will be answered each week in this space. He cannot reply personally.

- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Donald D. Groff

August 12, 1999 | We enjoy stumbling onto old movie sets in our travels. Can you suggest guides to old movie locations?

Visiting the locations of movie settings has become a serious niche in the travel business. In Iowa, Madison County's annual bridge festival took on a new life after "The Bridges of Madison County" became a hit, and the baseball field from "A Field of Dreams" also remains one of that state's major attractions.

More recently, Tunisia has tried to capitalize on the desert scenes filmed there for the "The Phantom Menace," the latest "Star Wars" movie.

A good guide to U.S. locations is the book "Shot on This Site" by William Gordon (Citadel Press, 1995). Its state-by-state chapters provide a guide to hundreds of films and their on-site shooting locations around the country, as well as TV locations and other points of interest.

Other movie-location books are "Hollywood East: Florida's Fabulous Flicks" (Tribune Publishing, 1992) by James Ponti and "Hollywood Goes on Location: A Guide to Famous Movie & TV Sites" (Pomegranate Press, 1988) by Leon Smith.

Movie-setting guides often can be obtained from tourism offices in movie-rich areas. The British Tourist Authority has an extensive brochure covering movie settings in the United Kingdom. Even Moab, Utah, has a brochure directing visitors to locations for numerous westerns and movies such as "Thelma and Louise."

Is it true that trip insurance doesn't protect you if a travel agency or tour company that you've given money to goes out of business?

Don't count on trip insurance bailing you out if your tour company or travel agency runs into financial trouble and closes. Trip insurance protects you if something goes wrong and you can't make the trip for some reason -- but it doesn't cover a customer's losses caused by a travel agency or tour company going out of business.

If you're truly worried about the solvency of an agency or tour company you're considering using, get a new agency. If you simply want to be cautious, there are several things you can do.

  • Check if the agency is a member in good standing with a trade association such as the American Society of Travel Agents. If the company once belonged to the group but has let its membership lapse, ask why.

  • Use a credit card for all your payments. This protects you if problems arise before you take a trip.

  • Use a tour operator that belongs to the United States Tour Operators Association, which has a $1 million consumer protection plan covering its more than 50 members. The National Tour Association also has a protection program, and ASTA has an endorsement program that recognizes companies that meet certain minimum requirements.

    . Next page | Why not mention accessibility consistently?



  •  

    Salon | Search | Archives | Contact Us | Table Talk | Ad Info

    Arts & Entertainment | Books | Comics | Life | News | People
    Politics | Sex | Tech & Business | Audio
    The Free Software Project | The Movie Page
    Letters | Columnists | Salon Plus

    Copyright © 2000 Salon.com All rights reserved.