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(CNN) This week in travel news: the best time and day to book your flights, new business and first class cabins for Qantas and Air France, and the only woman living on an island populated by convicted criminals .
When should you book your flights?
With some airfares as low as 50%, it’s more important than ever to be smart about your booking strategy. An expert at travel site Hopper tells CNN you should start tracking your May, June and July vacations now. And there’s a “Goldilocks window” for booking — not too early, not too late — says another expert from travel site Going.
Check out this interactive content on CNN.com
Get your laptop and credit card out on Sunday for the best chance of securing the best deals, says booking platform Expedia. You can refine your search further with flight comparison site Skyscanner’s new savings generator, launched this month. Plug in your departure city, your destination and when you want to travel, and it will help you determine the best time to book and the cheapest time to travel.
New cabins for Qantas and Air France
If you’re an airline planning to launch new 19-hour flights connecting Australia to New York and London, you need to make sure you’re offering your customers a comfortable experience — especially for the higher-paying ones. dollars on the front.
Qantas has unveiled the first business class prototypes for the Airbus A350s that will serve the new Project Sunrise routes scheduled to launch in 2025. The airline says its First Suite will feel like “a mini boutique hotel”.
This follows last month’s unveiling of Air France’s stunning new long-haul business cabin, complete with sliding doors and redesigned seats. It debuted on a Boeing 777-300ER flying Paris-New York and the first destinations it will serve are New York, Rio de Janeiro and Dakar, Senegal.
The prison islands turned into paradise islands
In 2011, Giulia Manca went to an Italian prison island in search of a relaxing vacation. Twelve years later, she is the only woman living on an island populated by convicted criminals and is loving life in the “Alcatraz of the Tyrrhenian Sea.”
In Mexico, one of the country’s most notorious prisons began a new chapter in December as an escape from the Pacific Ocean. The former penal colony in the Islas Marías archipelago now boasts a tourist centre, restaurant and cafe, as well as villas where guests can stay before hitting the beaches.
Seeing the world by bike
Dubai could have a climate-controlled, 93-kilometre indoor cycle highway circling the city if developer URB gets its way. The green-filled corridor “aims to make Dubai the most connected city on Earth by foot or bike.”
The move could potentially secure the Middle Eastern hub a future place on our list of the world’s best cities to see by bike: destinations in North America, Scandinavia and Asia Pacific all make the rounds current.
Two people who have a better understanding of global cycling culture than most are British couple Laura Massey-Pugh and Stevie Massey, who last year became the fastest cyclists to circumnavigate the world on a tandem bicycle.
Summer of ’69
Photos: They met on a boat to a Greek island in 1969. They have been married for more than 50 years
Greek romance: Anthony Sall was an American tourist traveling the world. Barbara Olle was an Air France flight attendant on holiday in Greece. They met on a ferry to the Greek island of Mykonos in the summer of 1969.
Dream job: Barbara loved her job working for Air France, which allowed her to explore the globe. “Meeting people, being in a different place every trip with my airline friends — on safari in Africa, walking the Champs Elysees in Paris, going to my favorite hairdresser in Frankfurt — I could go on and moving on,” Barbara tells CNN Travel. .
To fall in love: Barbara, who is originally from Germany, and Anthony spent a week together, first in Mykonos and then in Hydra. “We both began to realize that we couldn’t just say ‘goodbye’ at the end of the Greece experience and had to start thinking about continuing a long-term commitment,” Anthony tells CNN Travel.
Wedding Day: The couple decided to get married. Here they are on their wedding day in Philadelphia. “We can’t meet across the Atlantic because it wasn’t so easy back then. You couldn’t make phone calls like you do now,” says Barbara. “And so we thought, ‘Well, we’re either going to get married, or we’re going to call it off.'”
Flight career: Barbara moved to the US to be with Anthony. She later worked for National Airlines, Pan Am and now works for Delta.
Importance of travel: Barbara and Anthony have four grown children, all of whom have embarked on exciting journeys over the years. “To this day, they still travel a lot,” says Barbara. “Now they try to teach their children what’s out there in the world.”
Frequent flyer: Barbara is 76 years old and still flies regularly. Here she is posing on a Delta jet last year.
Five decades later: Today, Anthony and Barbara enjoy reminiscing about how they met while traveling in Greece in 1969. “Stories like this are rarely lived and told, but ours is one we both cherish with all our hearts, as how many people can know each other. -other such a short period of time, from opposite ends of the Atlantic Ocean and manage to create a lasting story like this, which is still going strong today,” says Anthony.
Anthony met Barbara at a Greek ferry port in the summer of 1969. He was a 28-year-old American college graduate with a third-class ticket and she was a 24-year-old flight attendant for Air France, traveling to second class.
Like Jack and Rose in “Titanic,” the class divisions of the boat did not stand in the way of love. Here’s how Anthony overcame barriers to meet the woman who would be his bride.
The best budget headphones
What little travel essential are you most likely to miss — and most likely to mourn when you do? For many of us, the answer is headphones.
If you’re someone whose favorite travel companion is a playlist or podcast, but you also don’t like breaking the bank for something that might end up on the floor of a foreign city’s subway system, check out this guide on the best. budget headphones. It was created by our partners at CNN Underscored, a guide to product reviews and recommendations owned by CNN.
Disturbing traveler of the week
After a short hiatus, we’re sorry to say that the irregularity is back. An American Airlines flight was diverted to a North Carolina airport on February 22 because of a distraught passenger. The woman was taken into custody, but the misdemeanor charge was dismissed.
In case you missed it
An Airbnb plumbing disaster led to a beautiful friendship spanning the continent.
Turn on the faucet, it will touch your heart.
This Asian nation has the most in the world “powerful” passport..
So why aren’t its citizens using it?
What it’s like to live off the grid in a traditional Maya village.
And why their way of life is now under threat.
