Month: March 2014

Last night my staff and I met at a local restaurant for drinks and appetizers to celebrate an amazing-to-me milestone: We just sold a Rick Steves Tour to our 16,000th traveler this year–the most ever! What was supposed to be a quick, work-night happy hour became a celebration with many of us toasting late into the evening. My web producer (you know who you are!) even confessed to being a little hungover this morning.

I feel honored to be surrounded by talented professionals who I also consider friends. This video–taken at a staff party a few years ago–shows just how much fun we have together. This milestone would not have been possible without their dedication. I’m grateful they’re also a lot of fun. And I’m grateful we can still get out of the office and let our hair down. (After all, as a traveler, you’d want nothing less for your tour guide.)

I’m one of those 16,000 travelers. And, in a little more than a month, I’ll be meeting my guide, our bus driver, and my group somewhere in Europe (I’m keeping the tour I’m signed up on a bit of a secret) and kicking off a delightful European vacation.

If you can’t see the video below, watch it on YouTube.

I have a lot of fun and rewarding projects on my desk–and one that I am particularly passionate about is our free app, “Rick Steves Audio Europe” (shown in this video). Why am I so in love with this thing? Because it’s packed with practical information (both self-guided audio tours of Europe’s greatest cities, galleries, and museums, and the very best of our radio interviews organized in country-specific playlists) that will make people’s trips more meaningful. It’s free. And tens of thousands of travelers are using it. Any time I drop into the Pantheon in Rome, St. Mark’s in Venice, or Versailles outside of Paris, I see travelers using our app. They’re having a great time immersed in the cultural wonder of the sight…and I am literally in their ear (my voice is anyway).

Each year we add to the material already available with Rick Steves Audio Europe, and last week we spliced in about 20 new tours and interviews. We added three new self-guided audio tours covering Prague, Berlin, and Edinburgh. This brings to 44 the number of guided tours on the app. And, after reviewing last year’s weekly, hour-long public radio programs (“Travel with Rick Steves” can be enjoyed weekly on over 200 public radio stations around the USA or as a podcast), we chose to include the interviews listed below.

Learn how to download the (free and easy) Rick Steves’ Audio Europe Travel App. It is such a treat for me to be able to interview such beautiful minds and inspirational travelers and an even bigger treat to be able to share these conversations (so beautifully edited by my radio production team) with you.

New radio interviews spliced into all the existing ones on the Rick Steves Audio Europe app include:

“Ever-Evolving Berlin” – Fabian Reuger
“Beauty in a Broken World” – Terry Tempest Williams
“Another Helping of Italian Culinary Favorites” – Fred Plotkin
“How to Eat Like a Parisian” – Mary Bouron
“A Taste of Basque Country” – Francisco Glária and Agustín Ciriza
“Living as an Italian Woman in the 21st Century” – Francesca Caruso, Nina Bernardo, and Lisa Anderson
“Joanna Lumley’s Nile” – Joanna Lumley
“Rome after Dark” – Francesca Caruso and Gene Openshaw
“Destination Space Station” – Cady Coleman
“Modern Sweden” – Åsa Danielsson
“Italy’s Decadent Desserts” – Fred Plotkin
“Respecting the Pasta” – Alfio Di Mauro
“Food Markets of Paris” – Marjorie R. Williams
“Walking Budapest” – Eszter Bokros and Cameron Hewitt
“More Loire Valley Chateau Country” – Danielle Farineau
“Exploring Brittany” – Virginie Moré and Mark Seymour
“The French Cheese Plate” – Kathe Lison
“The Mountain” – Ed Viesturs
“Italian Rails” – Tim Parks
“Amalfi Coast” – Ann Long and Aldo Valerio
“Madhur Jaffrey’s Curry Nation” – Madhur Jaffrey
“Monuments Men” – Robert Edsel
“Doc Martin’s Cornwall” – Martin Clunes
“The Whole Fromage” – Kathe Lison
“Marrying into France” – Sarah Turnbull and Nina Sovich

If you can’t see the video below, watch it on YouTube.

Mark your calendar for tomorrow’s live streaming travel classes (March 22, 9:00 a.m. until 9:30 p.m. Pacific Time). While I’m teaching Spain, Germany and Britain, a talk I’m particularly excited about is Cameron Hewitt’s amazing cruising talk. It’s actually three classes (roughly an hour long each) starting at 1:00 PST and taught in rapid succession: Cruising 101 (travel skills), Mediterranean Cruise Ports, and Northern European Cruise Ports.

A few years ago, after decades of having a bad attitude about cruising, I noticed cruisers using my guidebooks in European ports. I was impressed by these smart travelers’ determination to have a meaningful and culturally engaging experience while taking advantage of the economy and efficiency of cruising.

So I sent one of my co-authors, Cameron Hewitt, on several cruises to research and help write two guidebooks: Rick Steves’ Mediterranean Cruise Ports and Rick Steves’ Northern European Cruise Ports. Retooling our existing chapters on the great ports and adding everything a cruiser would need, Cameron did a great job. I followed after him to put my own touches on his writing. And the resulting new guidebooks are among our most popular.

Tomorrow, Cameron’s cruising talks will be jam-packed with practical tips about how to get from the port into town, and what to do with your limited time once there. While I’m proud of all of our travel advice, I think our cruising material is especially important. Cruise lines have no incentive to help you have a good time on your own in port. They’d rather you buy an excursion or stay on the ship to spend more money. So if you’re a Rick Steves traveler who wants to enjoy a cruise, you have to arm yourself with good information before you set sail. That’s where this class comes in.

If you or a friend plans to visit Europe on a cruise, don’t miss this talk.

Check out the full schedule!