Category: Been There

Preparing for the T-List – PhocusWright Blogger Summit #ITB09

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Its official: I received my badge:

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Hence I’m an officially “Approved Blogger” and may attend the second Tips from the T-List – PhocusWright Blogger Summit At ITB 2009 in Berlin.

Here below is the provisional list of Bloggers who will attend.

I took this provisional list from the PhocusWright site, but had to edit it heavily, as it appeared that a typo monkey had inadvertently inserted a certain link over 80 times into this page….maybe someone was being paid in kind for his speaking at the summit.

Many new faces to meet. Am looking forward to it.

Many new faces from the German language scene, which is a good thing as they have a circuit of their own and it is time to have them connect to the outside world.

For me it is necessary to do some research on the new faces as I’m planning to take a lot of photos like last year and to publish them more timely than last year. Yes I can!

  1. Kurt Ackermann • AFRIKATOURISM • South Africa and @kurt_a
  2. Michael Fabert • EXPIBLOG.DE • Germany
  3. Klaus Hildebrandt • FVW • Germany and and @fvwde
  4. Martin Stoll • GOSEETELL • United States
  5. Guido J. van den Elshout • HAPPY HOTELIER • The Netherlands
  6. Josiah Mackenzie • HOTEL MARKETING STRATEGIES • United States
  7. Stefan Niemeyer • HOTELMARKETINGBLOG • Germany
  8. Bianca Spalteholz • HOTELMARKETINGBLOG • Germany
  9. Claude Benard • HOTELITOUR • France, who couldn’t make it at last.
  10. Richard Brower • IGLTA TRAVEL & NEWS • United States
  11. Jared Salter • JOOBILI • Hungary
  12. Claus Weber • KINKAA • Germany
  13. Goetz A. Primke • LE GOURMAND • Germany
  14. Olivier Dujardin • MAX MANAGEMENT • Belgium and of @maxmanagement
  15. Nando Llorella • MEGUSTAELTURISMO • Spain
  16. Vasco Sommer-Nunes • MOKONO • Germany
  17. Madlen Ehrlich • MTI BLOG • Germany
  18. Alex Bainbridge • MUSINGS ON TRAVEL ECOMMERCE • England, who recently Twittered that he is NOT COMING
  19. Chris Noble • NEWS OF THE WORLD (NOMADS) • Australia
  20. Abbas Nokhasteh • OPENVIZOR • England
  21. Martin Schobert • OSTERREICH WERBUNG • Austria and of
  22. Timothy O’Neil-Dunne • THE PROFESSOR’S WISDOM • United States
  23. Ludolf Stavenga • REISPORTALS • The Netherlands
  24. Detlef Meyer • ROUNDTRIP • Germany
  25. Aron Hohl • SEE U IN HUNGARY • Hungary
  26. Jens Thraenhart • TOURISM INTERNET MARKETING • Canada
  27. Phil Caines • TOURISM TIDE • Canada
  28. Daniel Amersdorffer • TOURISMUSZUKUNFT • Germany @Daniel_Amer
  29. Florian Bauhuber • TOURISMUSZUKUNFT • Germany
  30. Jens Oellrich • TOURISMUSZUKUNFT • Germany and at @Jens_Oellrich
  31. Stephen Budd • TRACKING TOURISM • Scotland
  32. Ben Colclough • THE TRAILBEATER •England
  33. Steve Joyce • TRAVEL AND TOURISM TECHNOLOGY TRENDS • Canada
  34. Pablo Alvarez • TRAVEL INNOVATION • Spain
  35. Darren Cronian •Travel-Rants.Com • England
  36. Norm Rose • TRAVEL TECHNOLOGY • United States
  37. Adrian Matt • TRAVELBRAIN • Switzerland
  38. Sam Daams • co founder of TRAVELLERSPOINT and Sam I Am • Norway and at @SamDaams
  39. Kevin May • TRAVOLUTION BLOG • England and of @Travolution
  40. Uwe Frers • TRIPSBYTIPS • Germany
  41. Lukas Zinnagl • TRIPWOLF • Austria
  42. Juan Pablo Paradelo • TURISMO RURAL BLOG • Argentina
  43. Ed Wohlfahrt • ED WOHLFAHRT • Austria
  44. Reinhard Lanner • WORKERS ON THE FIELD • Austria
  45. Patrick Landman • XOTELS • Spain, who I didn’t see at all.

Ah and I found back the Youtube footage of an interview with me last year that Phil kindly produced. I have pasted it now in my About page. It needs some more views:-)

Notes to Self

  • Book Hotel
    Yes I know. I announced that I would prebook one of the Motels one, but as usual I’m late and that has nothing to do with the fact that I am usually late, but with the fact that I have to plan around our guests and never know on beforehand how many guests I have to leave in the very capable hands of my DW and our dear Back up
  • Try to get exception to drive in Berlin for the limo
  • Formulate some hard questions for the bloggers community…

#enter09@Amsterdam Mini Bloggers Meetup

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I’m back from the Enter09@Amsterdam conference.

Before posting anything, I had to address a technical problem here, as the electrically opening gate to our backyard doesn’t function anymore. Some of you know that I sometimes describe my job here at Haagsche Suites as a “Jack of all trades and Master of none”.
It appeared that a deliverer of glass to my neighbor (a tenant of mine) has driven against the safety provisions of the gate this afternoon. Nice having a security cam available to prove who did it. The only problem is it takes considerable time to sift through lengthy footage of stills. But I have pinpointed the trespasser. I find it so funny to see my neighbor standing there in person and looking when it is happening and simply not having the decency to warn me what happened. Now I’m really looking forward to a whole weekend without a functioning gate. – It turned out later he had tried to give me notice by telephone on the answering machine -.

Back to Enter09. The Blogger meetup yesterday afternoon turned out to be a Mini Blogging Meetup. Luckily with some beer, chips and a friendly chat.

Now I can prove you beyond doubt with the above photo that Kevin Can Smile. Hurray! (see my 10 Questions (15) For: Kevin May of Travolution)….even when he had just decided to remove Virgin screen grabs from his site (see his Tweet and these posts of: Travolution and of Alex)

The photo shows further Stephen Joyce and Jens Traenhart (he is the one with the really huge smile).

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This photo shows Dimitrios Buhalis, left, who was also conference chair and a young man of the Austrian Tirol Tourist board whom I hope will give us his name when he reads this. Added: I found him out before he me. It’s Hannes Egger, one of the authors of Blog Tirol. Oops I should have known: I’m on their Blogrol…Thanks Hannes and do come to ITB Berlin!

That made up a meet up of 7 6 Bloggers while William got lost in Amsterdam.

Later Stephen offered me dinner that I chose for him to be real Dutch “Suddervlees” (also known as “Draadjesvlees”) at Moeders a decent restaurant in Amsterdam that serves traditional Dutch Food and the name of which means Mothers (or Moms or Mamas) it is fested with photos of moms.

Thanks Stephen and we will meet again in Berlin where I owe you one.

From the conference itself I don’t have much to report to you, as I had a lot of other things to do, so I could not attend, but my own presentation and two sessions. I had especially to finalize my own first ppt presentation. When I have translated it in English (it was for the Dutch Day of Enter09 in the Dutch language), I’ll put it up here.

I posted some more photos at my Flickr set Enter09@Amsterdam

It was mentioned that Jens has new plans wit Tips from the T-List, but I didn’t attend that session. Maybe more somewhere else.

L8ter

Added: Kevin used one of my Flickr set’s Enter09@Amsterdam photos for a Caption Contest

Strassbourg

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During our journey to the Swiss Alps we’ve visited Strassbourg shortly “zum bummln” which is German for doing some shopping.
Usually we tend to race along without paying any attention to this French city bordering on the river Rhine which forms the border between France and Germany.
Its center is well preserved. My first photo shows the cathedral with its characteristic unfinished one spire tower. Apparently the canals are used for cooling some local industries, as they are not frozen and the swans can peacefully use them.

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The second photo shows some of its ancient housing with an almost full moon.

For these posts I’m working on a new eee Asus netbook. First I tried to resize my photos with Irfanview, but that shareware programm crashed time after time. Now I’ve done the resizing with an ACDsee trial version. Not sure whether the photos are sharp enough as my working screen is only 9 inch….

Cultural Travel (1): Dusseldorf K21 Art Collection im Standeshaus – Katharina Fritsch

K21 im Standeshaus, a beautiful Photo of Joerg Dickmann

I’m a bit sad: I remembered a nice Blog writing about cultural traveling in Europe. I had to dig deep in my memory and remembered my friend Karen had referred to the blog in one of her Travel Carnival posts. It appeared to be in her First Travel Carnival:She had pointed me to High Culture on a low Budget. I’m sad because Olivia apparently ceased writing for the Blog Since June 2008. Curious what’s happening.


Katharina Fritsch: Mouse

I have written on other occasions about our little cultural travel group of friends that we have coined “Art en Route” and travels occasionally to see modern art. Recently we visited Duesseldorf to soak up some modern art. For us Baby Boomers art, design, music, dance, but also good wining and dining are excellent excuses to travel. Therefor I introduce a new category to my blog “Cultural Travel”


Katharina Fritsch: Monk, Doctor and Salesman

I have several posts in my sleeve, but will start with a couple of sculptures of Katharina Fritsch that belong to the K21 Art Collection im Standeshaus. The Standeshaus appeared to be a very nice Museum in the middle of a park. Apart from its facade it had been demolished and rebuild entirely and has a glass roof like some other museums have nowadays. Nowhere on its site is there any information about this renovation after which it became the home of the 21st century art collection of the Art Collection of the German Nordrhein-Westfalen state. I like the building, its location and its restaurant.


Katharina Fritsch: Mouse and Man, Monk, Doctor and Salesman

I am impressed by these sculptures and the fact that K21 devotes a whole room to her.
Katharina Fritsch does not seem to have a website. At present she is a Professor at the German Muenster art academy and there is some info about her on Wiki.
If you search her on Flickr, you’ll get a nice collections of her sculptures.

Travel Blog Camp 2008 (#tbc08 02): Photos

I’ve edited and uploaded my photos to Flickr. All in all I’m not very satisfied with the quality. I’ve certainly not shot enough (quality) as Heather from Heather on her travels suggested “to start a Travel Blogger’s society page”. Alas the light circumstances were far from ideal.. The first lesson for the next Travel Blog Camp: more light please – or should I bring more professional lighting?

The first photo is of Karen Bryan’s presentation.

The second photo is of Darren Cronian, who organized the event.

This is Matthew Cashmore of Lonely Planet, one of few who apparently tried multitasking by both listening intensely and Twittering away at the same time. I don’t know who the lady to the left of Mathew is….(added: Thanks to Matthews comment on Flickr (see below) the lady in question is his beloved Mrs Cashmore. Hi Catherine!)

From left to right standing: Unkown, Anthony and Tamara from Mr & Mrs Smith, Detlef Meyer of German Roundtrip and Kevin May of Travolution.

I’ve added here some photos from those I know.

I would like to ask my readers to comment on Flickr and give names and details to the faces, because here is lesson number two for the next edition:

  1. What happened with the name tags?
  2. At least it would be helpful if there is a list with thumbnail photos and names and web presences of those who attended, but Darren informed me that such could be a violation of UK privacy legislation… Can’t we ask the participants to waive this?
  3. Isn’t that what networking is about: Knowing who is who?