TRIP TIP
How to snag a hybrid
With gas prices going ever higher, travelers are nabbing what few hybrid rental cars are available. If you want to rent a hybrid while traveling, book as far in advance as possible and choose a non-weekend day for your pickup. If you're traveling out west, reserve from a lesser-name agency, such as Fox Rent a Car (www.foxrentacar.com), which serves nine airports, or its partner EV Rental Cars (www.evrental.com), which serves six California airports and the one in Phoenix. Reserve a hybrid at a neighborhood rental car office instead of the airport, because there might be better availability.
WASHINGTON POST
DISCOUNT SITES
Oops, for their eyes only
Charles Kelber of Rockville, Md., paid $925 to Cheaptickets.com for three nights at the Westin Colonnade in Coral Gables, Fla. He was shocked to see on his bill that Cheaptickets had paid the Westin only $747 for the room. Kelber had run into a common practice among discount travel sites. They negotiate prices for blocks of rooms and probably wouldn't be allowed to pass on the full discount they receive even if they wanted to. Major hotel chains require third-party distributors to keep prices at a certain level. That's a nice windfall commission for agencies, but don't conclude that you paid more than you could have elsewhere. Prices at the Colonnade suggest the Cheaptickets price was in line with prices available at other online sites, including the hotel's.
WASHINGTON POST
BOOK BRIEF
New York freebies
"The Cheap Bastard's Guide to New York City," by Rob Grader ($14.95, Globe Pequot): You've got to love the name, and the idea is pretty nifty, too, with more than 1,000 listings for freebies you probably didn't know about. Included are health clinics, open mike nights in comedy clubs, theaters, museums, walking tours. Some of the options listed do charge a small fee, but most require no cash.
MCCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS
TRAVEL TIFF
Chinese shun France
France seems to be falling off the itinerary of Chinese tourists, in a display of China's pique at French support for protesting Tibetans and angry demonstrations against the Olympic torch on the streets of Paris. Some Chinese travel agents have stopped selling tours to France in recent weeks, in some cases removing offerings from their websites. Others said demand for such trips had plummeted by 20 percent or more. France's Foreign Ministry said this week that Chinese officials had issued a verbal order to travel agents to remove France as a destination and stop offering package tours to the country. The China National Tourism Bureau declined comment, while the Beijing Tourism Bureau denied there was such an order.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
