This is another Tourism and Geography in the News episode, with a focus on two topics: Travel/Geographic Literacy and Physical Geography.  In the travel and geographic literacy news stories, both the American Automobile Association and the National Geographic Society held their geography contest these past couple of weeks, and  issued their geographic/travel literacy survey results, which once again showed how dismal  geographic knowledge is among Americans.

The physical geography news stories include volcanic activity at Mt Merapi in Indonesia and Mt St. Helens in the US, the May 27th earthquake in Indonesia, flood warnings to recreationists in California, and the world's largest artificial reef off the coast of Florida.

I close with a couple of not quite physical geography stories about futuristic proposals for New Orleans and an upcoming UFO Festival in New Mexico.

Show Notes at http://travelgeography.info
Show length: 22min, 41sec

Today is Mother's Day here in the US and I start with a story about the Best and Worst Countries in the world to be a mother today.  Not really tourism, but the list of worst countries turn out to be mostly in Africa, which is also where half of the countries are located that are on the current list of Travel Warnings on the US State Department's website.  Columbia is also on that list, but it is also on the Lonely Planet's list of Hot Destination for 2006.  I then talk about the recently released international arrival statistics for US States and Cities.  The last two items discuss agritourism at the last tea plantation in the US, and Dubai's plan to build the world's larges airport, along with a massive new city.  Finally, I discuss the geography implication of these varied news items.

Links to these stories are listed on the show notes page at http://travelgeography.info

Length: 23min, 29sec
Promo: TravelCommons podcast