TRAVEL AGENCY

LOOKING FOR A LADY'S LEG LAMP? 50,000 people from all over the country will tour Ralphie's house from THE CHRISTMAS STORY. Located in Cleveland, it is the actual house where they filmed the movie. A San Diego entrepreneur bought it sight unseen from an auction on EBAY, then remodeled it to look exactly like it did in the movie. He had to change the interiors because they were different than what was filmed on a soundstage in Toronto. You can also eat at the official Chinese restaurant where Ralphie's family had to eat Christmas dinner after the Bumpass's smelly dogs destroyed the turkey. Waiters recreate the famous movie scene by bringing the duck to the table then chopping off the head with a giant cleaver. You can buy an elf hat from the actress that played Santa's worst helper ever. She hand sews them. If you can't make it to Cleveland you can order an actual size LADY'S LEG LAMP to set in your front window just like Ralphie's dad's major award. This year there is a second Ralphie's house in Toronto. Looking for a vacation spot with plenty of nighttime entertainment? Plan a stay at The Smuggler's Inn- an eight guest room bed and breakfast in Blaine Washington. The hotel's front lawn touches the Canadian border. The only thing that demarcates the border are a British Columbia road named Zero Avenue and series of evenly spaced stones in the front yard. When the owner mows the yard, he has to venture into Canada. Each room comes with night vision binoculars and a giant flashlight that you can use to watch for people (mostly drug smugglers) sneaking across the border. Over 126 border jumpers have been arrested in the front yard. The Smuggler's Inn was most likely used to help smuggle in liquor during prohibition. The owner Bob Boule has named the rooms after famous smugglers. Two room choices are the Joseph. P. Kennedy room or the Dirty Dan Harris room. Call for reservations, now. LIFESTYLES OF THE RICH AND SPITEFUL If you ask someone to name a hotel in New York City, most would immediately answer- The Waldorf-Astoria. The Waldorf=Astoria was built because of an Astor family feud. The Astors acquired their fortune buying up most of the land on Manhattan Island. They were known as "the Landlords of New York." Caroline Astor was the wife of the grandson of John Jacob Astor, the founder of the family fortune. Caroline was the grand dame of New York City society. She is famous for hosting extravagant Balls limiting the guest list to 400 from old money New York City families. She started the closed society to keep her daughters away from newly rich uncouth ruffians. Some would go out of town the weekend of the Balls to avoid the embarrassment of not being on the list. Caroline Astor insisted on being called "the Mrs. Astor". This upset her nephew who complained his wife was a Mrs. Astor, too. To hack her off he built a huge hotel, The Waldorf, next to her house. Caroline's son threated to build a stable right next to the hotel to treat his cousin's guests to the fumes. He thought better of it, moved his mother to a bigger house and built another hotel next door to the Waldorf. He built it taller so the Astoria would cast shadows on the Waldorf. Business is business and they eventually built a corridor called Peacock Alley connecting the two hotels. The hotel was later moved to its current location and the land of the original became the site for the Empire State Building. SPEAKING OF SPITE A SPITE HOUSE is a house built for the sole reason of getting revenge. Many were built during the 1800s by folks rich enough and mean enough. Some are still standing. They tend to be very narrow, 6 or 7 feet wide and were built on some kind of disputed land. They were built because of a fight between neighbors, families, someone and a church, to stop shortcuts through adjacent alleys, and to stop roads from being built. Some Spite houses you can still stop by to see: The Skinny House in Boston, Hollensbury Spite House in Alexandria, Virginia, Tyler Spite House (now a bed and breakfast) Frederic, Maryland, and Edleston Spite House in Gainford, England. The SKINNY HOUSE was built in the 1870's. Two brothers inherited land from their father. They didn't bother to divide the property, and while one brother was away in the military, the other brother built a large house on it. When the traveling brother returned home,he saw what his brother had done and out of spite built a small house on the land that was left. It measures 6.2 to just over 10 feet wide plus it blocked his brother's nice view. WANNA GET AWAY? Do you need to escape the depression of the after holidays blues? Travel experts say you can take off to these new travel hot spots- Libya, Mongolia, and Minneapolis. SPAM SPAM SPAM SPAM SPAM The original slogan for SPAM was "The miracle meat in a can". There are no pig snouts, lips, ears, tongues or hearts in a can of SPAM. The oldest can ever safely eaten was 25 years old. You can plan your vacation for a stop at the SPAM museum in Austin, Minnesota. WHAT'S FOR SUPPER? The Big Apple Inn in Jackson, Mississippi has been serving their specialty since they opened in 1939: PIG EAR SANDWICH The sandwich consists of 1/2 Boiled Pig Ear topped with cole slaw, mustard, homemade hot sauce on a soft dinner biscuit. They go through about 300 pig ears a day. ONE MILLION BAGS LOST BY AIRLINES EACH MONTH If the airline loses your luggage forever they will not reimburse you for some premium items. Don't pack antlers in your suitcase because if they lose it you are out of luck. The airlines pay a flat $9.07 a pound for luggage never returned to its owner up to $640.00. Do you know where all lost airline luggage goes? There is a magical special place and you can go there and buy other people's stuff for a bargain. Their loss is your gain. For those with a compulsion to look in your hosts' medicine cabinet, you can go there just to touch other people's stuff. Read more-- WHERE LOST LUGGAGE GOES EVERYDAY IS XMAS IN THE CARGO HOLD $31 million worth of valuables have disappeared from checked luggage on planes in the past three years since the TSA started its no-lock policy according to TSA figures. An anonymous baggage handler claims to have never pilfered but has HEARD THINGS. She says one way to get away with it is to rifle through a bag and then put it on the wrong plane headed to the wrong city. When they finally find the bag, nobody can pinpoint the scene of the crime. BATHROOM INSPECTORS When my daughters- Spike and Rocko- were small and we were out somewhere they always seemed to need to go the bathroom. They have been in every nasty dirty bathroom on the highway. I always wanted to publish a travel guide with their picture in front of an establishment's bathroom door giving their thumbs up or thumbs down. There is a huge gas station-junk shop on Interstate 10 at Luling, Texas called Buc-cees. Their billboards advertise "Fabulous Restrooms". Spike and Rocko would give it thumbs up. Alabama has the nicest rest areas and Texas has the worst. ONE OF TEN BEST IN AMERICA Hearst Castle is not the only major tourist attraction near San Obispo, California. Another is the men's restroom at the Madonna Inn. Honored by the Travel Channel as one of the ten best bathrooms in America, the urinal is a Waterfall with laser eyes to make sure the water is pouring when someone is standing there. Men relieving themselves often find themselves surrounded by giggling women that barge right in. WANT TO GET AWAY? The most remote inhabited spot on earth is in the Atlantic Ocean halfway between Brazil and South Africa. It is part of the United Kingdom, but is almost impossible to visit and the residents won't allow you to move there, It is the volcanic island named Tristan da Cunha. Tristan da Cunha was named after the Spanish explorer that spotted it in 1506 but didn't bother to stop. All of the 271 residents are British citizens and descendants of shipwrecked sailors who arrived there in the early 1800s.. There are only seven family names on the island. The original settlers were from England or the U.S. except for one Italian. There isn't much choice for finding someone to marry so most are married to a second cousin which has caused a high asthma rate. Most of the island is a cone shaped volcanic rock except for a small patch of flatland on the northwest coast. There is no airport and ships stop there only about eight times a year. They only get their mail once a year. Tristan da Cunha's main industry is fishing lobsters and printing Tristan da Cunha postage stamps that are collected around the world. They raise their own food by grazing cattle in a communal pasture and grow potatoes in a potato patch. Tristan da Cunhans got television in 2001 and internet in 2006. Tristan da Cunha has a semi-tropical climate with a near constant temperature. The islanders frequently feel the brunt of Atlantic storms. The gusts of wind once were so strong that they blew the cows and sheep from the pasture and into the ocean. It is almost like a real life GILLIGAN'S ISLAND or Tom Hanks in CASTAWAY. I don't know if they talk to volleyballs.

copyright 2008 Michael Dunn