EASY RIDER

Fifty years since the film was released, jump on a Harley and hit the road from LA to New Orleans. Go on, start the adventure you’ve always wanted…

Iceland’s tourism boom that saw the island nation’s visitor numbers more than quadruple in just seven years has shown signs of slowing down as its tourist board announced a fall in arrivals for January.

The 5.8 per cent decrease is only the second year-on-year monthly fall the country has seen since 2010, when just 459,000 people travelled to its other-worldly shores. By last year this number had risen to 2.3 million.

Kristjan Sigurjonsson, editor of Icelandic news website Turisti, says the financial troubles of Icelandic low-cost airline Wow Air and an absence of other major European airlines from Keflavik International are worrying. “This lack of interest from the foreign airlines makes tourism on an island in the middle of the Atlantic very vulnerable,” he said.

Clive Stacey, managing director of travel specialist Discover the World, says the winter has seen “a significant decline in UK visitors”. Figures show a 7.6 per cent fall in British arrivals in 2018. “There is still a very large number of tourists coming to Iceland,” he said, “but visits are becoming shorter and most travellers only get to explore Reykjavik and areas along the south coast.”

“Many of the most celebrated parts of the rest of the country are uncrowded and still offer the visitor a wonderfully uninhibited holiday.”

BANGKOK SMOG ALERT

Tourists are being advised to wear respiratory masks in Bangkok as a toxic haze, which descended on the city in December, shows no signs of moving. The smog is caused by high air pressure, pollution and wind conditions.

On Jan 30, pollution in the city reached 200 micrograms per cubic metre on the World Air Quality Index, a level rated as “unhealthy” by the US Environmental Protection Agency scale.

A study by the Bangkok-based Kasikorn Research Centre warned that such pollution could put holidaymakers off visiting the city, and Thailand altogether, should the problem persist.

SKIPLAGGING LAWSUIT

Lufthansa is seeking legal action against a customer who did not travel on the final leg of their flight, believing the passenger exploited a loophole known as “skiplagging”; purchasing a cheaper ticket through its multi-trip fares system with no intention of flying on the last leg.

The passenger is said to have booked a ticket from Seattle to Frankfurt and then on to Oslo, but failed to board the connecting flight, instead flying to Berlin on a separate ticket.

Passengers are using sites like Skiplagged.com to uncover cheaper hidden fares. On the website’s home page it reads: “Our flights are so cheap, United sued us… but we won”, in reference to a 2015 court case.