Wow! What a week!

Sorry, I haven’t been around much this week. My post on Monday got a ton of traffic and I appreciate the private messages, e-mails and phone calls. Every so often you write something that strikes a nerve and you learn to just ride that wave of traffic. I also enjoyed the break. It gave me an opportunity to do some additional reading, planning, and finish some projects that have been sitting on the back burner – but needed to get done.

As a result, I’m feeling pretty refreshed and eager to get going on some new projects that fell into my lap during the week. It’s amazing to me how you finish something up; something else opens up to fill that space. We’ll be writing more about them as the week’s progress.

I wanted to do a quick post today about a new program that I’m pretty excited about. I have a relative who’s disabled and this type of thing always peaks my interest because of it. Being disabled doesn’t mean you can’t experience life. Yes, it can make things a little more difficult, but as I’ve seen time and time again, it’s all about how you perceive things that can make a disability an obstacle or advantage.

It’s nice to see this type of program in our industry. While it’s not a niche that I’m actively involved with, I do know a number of people are. I did a search on it last night and only found one other link to it, so I thought I’d promote it, so all of you know about it in case it comes up in your dealings with clients.

Oh, and yes, that’s a real cat! (In other words, it’s not some Photoshopped prank.)

~ Guests of Beaches Turks & Caicos can now become Handicap Scuba Association (HSA) certified at the property ~

Beaches Turks & Caicos Resort Villages & Spa has expanded resort programming for persons with disabilities and now offers a tailored disabled scuba diving program. A team of twelve dive instructors from the resort, under the guidance of Mark Rausch of Poseidon Handicap Scuba Adventures, underwent an intensive training course that will allow guests to participate in three specialized programs. Through the Handicap Scuba Association (HSA), guests can become certified in the HSA Basic Open Water Scuba Diving, the HSA Junior Open Water Scuba Diving and the HSA Open Water Dive Buddy. The resort will continue to offer the Professional Association of Diving Instructors (PADI) certification in addition to the Handicap Scuba Association certification.

Michael Clark, Beaches Resorts Water Sports Manager, stated, “Scuba diving is the sport where gravity is not an issue,” he further stated, “we are delighted to be able to offer our disabled guests the full value of our ’Luxury Included’ facility including equal water sports opportunity that caters to their special needs.”

Handicap Scuba Association is made up of over 4000 underwater educators, with disabilities and supporting members, located in over 45 countries. Beaches Turks & Caicos is the first in the Beaches Resorts chain, as well as the island of Turks & Caicos, to receive HSA certification training and marks an important milestone in disabled programming at the resort.

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How cool is that? (Thought you’d like it!)

Have an awesome weekend!

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I lost count how many times I’ve said this…but I’m gonna say it again.

A cruise is the best vacation money could buy.

It was nice to have family (including extended family) together for another cruise. Our daughter called it “The best birthday EVER!” and our son has caught the same bug we did some 12 years ago when Ronda and I took our first cruise.

I did hit the internet for a grand total of 25 minutes, but didn’t even open the laptop until almost the very end of the cruise to download a couple gigs worth of pictures that I took. (Some 400 shots all together on a Fuji S9000 camera I just love.) I uploaded about 60 of them on my Facebook page and will get around to putting more up on Webshots at some point. (Then again – I still have pictures from our last cruise I haven’t uploaded.)

The kids have really gotten the hang of cruise thing. Brittany thoroughly enjoyed dressing up for formal night. (So much so, that she had to get all dressed up for her birthday night.) Brian found the ice cream machines and the 24 hour pizzeria and hardly ate anything else the entire week. Camp Carnival was FABULOUS for both kids. When they ask if they can go, you just know it’s a hit. (Which impressed both Ronda and I.) They really had a great time and our hats are off to all the counselors who took great care of our kids.

Our daughters birthday was an exceptional day in Gran Cayman. The entire family got involved on the Cayman Pirate Adventure as the kids and I were recruited to swab the deck (I was given a tooth brush) and “Mommy Spank Bottom” was tied up and forced to promise to never spank the bottoms of our kids again. Afterward, everyone walked the plank and enjoyed the warm tropical water.

Later that evening we celebrated Brittany’s birthday with the family and wait staff of the Universe Dinning room. Brittany loves to be the center of attention any other time, and handled her birthday no differently. The entire ship was told it was her birthday and she ate up all the attention. (As she always does.)

It’s still amazes me how many first time cruisers I continue to run into. We talked with a number of first time cruisers on this trip who raved about the service, the food, and the size of this floating resort. Non of them had any idea what they were missing, and have all been transformed into cruise-a-holics like we are.

While it’s nice being back, I miss the romance and relaxation of the sea. I bit warmer down in the Caribbean as well. We’re already planning our next cruise and may turn it into a neighborhood event. With another Carnival Sail-A-Thon coming up next week, it would be a perfect time to get the neighbors together to discuss the option of going. (More on the Sail-A-Thon here later, and in this weekends newsletter.)

A trip like this one is part of my “why” I stick with YTB.

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Pleasant Holidays is celebrating it’s 50th year in business. When the doors first opened in 1959 their specialty was Hawaii and this privately held company has turned into one of the largest tour operators with destinations to Mexico, Costa Rica, Las Vegas, Caribbean, Europe, Asia and the South Pacific offering a comprehensive range of products and destinations. Pleasant Holidays has long-term partnerships with some of the world’s leading airlines, hotels, car rental companies, cruise lines, travel agencies and is also the official travel provider to the NFL Pro Bowl annually in Hawaii. (With the possible exception of 2010 when it’s hosted in Miami, but will once again say Aloha in 2011 and 2012.)

Tonight starting at 8:00PM Eastern (7:00PM Central, 6:00PM Mountain, and 5:00PM Pacific) YTB Travel Network will host it’s fourth Sale-A-Thon with YTB’s third supplier Pleasant Holidays. The webniar which can be viewed from the comfort of your own home is designed to educate viewers from the best, most knowledgeable Manager Pleasant Holidays has to offer. The hour long broadcast will offer insight about the Pleasant Holidays product and exclusive specials for some spectacular deals to destinations they specialize in.

What kind of specials will you find if you click in? As an example you’ll be offered $100 off any 3-star property or $200 off any 4 or 5 star property in Hawaii, Mexico or the Caribbean for travel dates from April 22 through December 15, 2009. (Vacation package must be a minimum of 5 nights with air and hotel accommodations.)

You can view our webcast at http://travelshow.ytb.com or by clicking on the link from BandBVacations.com tonight starting at 8:00 Eastern, with a rebroadcast again at 9:00PM and 10:00PM Eastern Standard Time. Phone lines will be open from 8:00 to 11:00PM Eastern toll free at 866-400-9382

This is the perfect opportunity to invite friends, and family over to see if something might fit for your summer vacation. What could be better than a great tropical getaways to Hawaii, the Caribbean or Mexico? You really need to see the incredible properties shown during this Sale-a-Thon to see how incredible these sale prices really are.

So take some time and click to see what Pleasant Holidays has to offer, direct from…well…Pleasant Holidays!

Hope to see you there tonight!

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There has been much debate and confusion about the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative and requirements for Passports when traveling outside of the US. So much so, many of the trade magazines that I subscribe to (Agent at Home, Travel Weekly, and Vacation Agent) have dedicated entire articles to keep us informed in an effort to keep our clients informed about what’s going on. Confusion about the program’s deadlines caused panicked travelers to swamp passport offices, which quickly became overwhelmed by a volume of passport applications for which officials were unprepared. Eventually relenting to all the backlash from both business travelers and those that would have to cancel personal vacations, a proposal was adopted and passed to let U.S. residents and citizens arriving at airports from travel in Canada, Mexico, Bermuda or the Caribbean region re-enter the United States if they could show they had simply applied for passports.

Initially, the drop dead date was January 1st, 2007, but when both the cruise industry, and US Government realized that literally millions of Americans still did not possess the proper Passport for travel outside of the US, our current Administration postponed the date until today, October 1st, 2007. If you are planning a trip outside of the country past today via air travel, you need to have a passport in hand in order to get back into this country if traveling outside of the US.

I have to admit, what they feared was true due to many of our clients applying for and waiting anywhere from 6 to 9 weeks, sometimes even longer for their passports to be processed and in the hands of our clients. The US Department of State experienced a backlog of some 18 Million applications being processed over the last several months and times have been very stressful both for us as Agents, and our clients who were traveling abroad.

If you find yourself stuck without realizing that you need a passport or yours has not arrived due to the backlog with everyone else scrambling you can have your Passports Expedited for a nominal charge.

As a Travel Agent I know there are still some loopholes when traveling outside of the US via land and sea ports right now, but that will soon change and as your travel agent, you should have one anyway, so do yourself a favor, put this whole mess behind you and get a passport for yourself and your family so that when you do have a chance to travel outside of the US, you’re ready.

PS - If you're involved with YTB, sign up for our FREE Newsletter. As a Website Owner or Website Seller, we'll keep you up to date with all the latest news, acquisitions, and developments with YTB.

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Do You ZamZuu?