Category: travel

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A Beagle-Shaped Airbnb Gives ‘Dog-Friendly Travel’ a Whole New Meaning

Do you have a pooch Need a hotel? Man, have we got the perfect Airbnb for you!

There is a beagle-shaped house in Cottonwood, Idaho, available on Airbnb for $132 per night. The house was built by Dennis Sullivan and Frances Conklin, artists who live in another (regular-shaped) house on the property. They started by building a 12-foot beagle named Toby in the late 1990s. It became so popular that they built a 30-foot tall beagle named Sweet Willy to use as a guest house, and that drew enough attention that they decided to rent it out to the public.

“Toby got some attention, but Sweet Willy put us into the stratosphere,” Frances told Roadside America.

The house has two bedrooms: one in the beagle’s belly and a loft in the head. The bathroom is located on the dog’s behind, of course. Nearby, there’s a giant fire hydrant to go with the giant beagle, and the property also features a visitor’s center and gift shop. Dennis and Frances live up the hill, and, since the house doesn’t have a kitchen, the couple prepare light breakfast foods for guests. There are also dog-themed books, games and puzzles for the truly dog-obsessed.

The Airbnb is, of course, dog-friendly, as long as canine guests are “responsible” and get along with the couple’s own dog — who is, shockingly, not a beagle, but a canine retriever.

Ready to book?! Sadly, so is everyone else. The Airbnb is completely filled until April 2020. But with endless 5-star reviews, it appears to be worth the wait.

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Travel Instagrammers Share Helpful Tips for Taking Better Travel Photos

No vacation feels complete anymore without the perfect travel photos these days. If you want to take your travel photography up several notches, these travel Instagrammers have some advice for you.

Part of the magic of photography is all about timing. One Berlin-based travel photographer, Theodora Melnik (@______theo), tells HuffPost that sunrise is the perfect time for a photo.

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Sigh, time to leave Siracusa ???

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“I can’t recommend shooting sunrise enough,” Theodora said. “Whenever I make the effort, I get to explore even the busiest of places practically by myself, which if you’re thinking of the Eiffel Tower or the Spanish Steps is really something.”

And speaking of the sun — sunset is also a picture-perfect time of day, but don’t make the rookie mistake of only photographing the actual sunset.

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Best coast

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“On vacation when you go to the beach at sunset, everyone has their phones pointed directly at the red orb going down over the ocean, which is really pretty and definitely worth capturing. But don’t forget to turn around and see what the sun is shining on,” Tyson Wheatley (@twheat) explains.

Similarly, when visiting a major monument, people tend to snap a photo of it for their records. But Elke Frotscher (@elice_f) recommends photographing the little things that surround the big monuments.

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Galloway House | Ella’s VW T2

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This allows for a more unique photo that truly captures the essence of the place, instead of just a photo of the Eiffel Tower that looks exactly like something you could find on Google.

Have a great trip, and hope the photos turn out great!

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This Non-Profit Recycles the Soap from Hotels You Leave Behind When You Check out

Every time you check out of a hotel, you leave behind a mostly-unused bar of soap. It may even be untouched, if you’re the type of person who has strong soap preferences. So what happens to it?

The answer is pretty disappointing: hotels generally just throw the soap away for sanitary reasons. And all that soap adds up; about one million bars of soap are thrown out every day in the U.S., between travelers and hotels.

One traveler was unhappy to discover this wasteful practice, so he decided to do something about it. Shawn Seipler, a former tech employee who used to travel five months out of the year, thought that he could make better use of all those slivers of soap, so he started Clean The World. The Orlando-based company collects unwanted hotel soap, sanitizes it, melts it down, and redistributes it around the world.

Just last year, Clean The World made over 7 million bars of recycled soap, which were then donated to people in need. Thousands of children die from diseases that are preventable with basic hygiene — or, as Clean The World puts it, “Soap saves lives.” The organization also recycles shampoo, conditioner and body wash for homeless shelters around the world.

Clean The World partners with hotels for the modest price of 50 cents per room per month. There are operating centers in Orlando, Las Vegas, Montreal, India and Hong Kong.

“There’s a whole world of hotels out there we can get to start donating,” Shawn told Thrillist. “Right now we’ve got 20 percent of all hotels in the US. That’s a lot of room to grow, and a lot of soap to make.”

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These Photos Warn Tourists to Stop Riding Elephants in Thailand

Hundreds of thousands of Westerners visit Thailand each year, and one of the “must-try” activities is riding a majestic elephant. But tourists are now being urged to stop, thanks to the revelation of some truly heartbreaking photos.

A Twitter user posted several photos of elephants in Thailand being cruelly mistreated. Their keepers, called mahouts, keep them in line by hitting them with sharp metal hooks, often hard enough to draw blood. Their heads are covered in old wounds.

Around 3000 elephants are currently used for entertainment across Asia, and 77 percent are treated inhumanely, according to the World Animal Protection. Elephants are often ripped from their mothers prematurely, violently broken into submission, then subjected to a lifetime of abuse and isolation.

While Thai government agencies are working to end animal cruelty, officials also urge visitors to boycott businesses that treat their animals this way.

“We never support tourists riding the elephants,” a spokesperson for the Tourism Authority of Thailand told Yahoo! News. “Please don’t ride the elephants and don’t support this business.”

Photo Credit: iStock

There are about 3500 wild elephants in Thailand and about 4500 domesticated elephants. The domesticated elephants are classified as “working animals,” just like livestock. Animal advocates are working to change this classification in order to offer more protections to elephants.

If tourists want to enjoy these beautiful animals, one option is to visit a wild elephant sanctuary. There, tourists can observe and pet the animals, but cannot ride them.

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Miniature Horses Are Now One of the Service Animals That Airlines Must Allow to Fly

Be prepared to possibly see an unexpected animal on your next flight.

The list of service animal just keeps growing, doesn’t it? And specifically, I’m talking about service animals that are allowed on planes. In addition to dogs, we’ve seen ducks and all other kinds of creatures accompanying their human handlers on flights.

Well, it’s time to add another furry friend to the list of animals allowed to fly on planes: miniature horses. The U.S. Department of Transportation is encouraging airlines to allow miniature horses on flights as service animals.

And while it may sound a little odd, miniature horses are actually quite popular as service animals, right up there with dogs and cats.

The official word from the Department of Transportation says, “After reviewing the comments on this issue, we believe that it would be in the public interest and within our discretionary authority to prioritize ensuring that the most commonly recognized service animals (i.e., dogs, cats, and miniature horses) are accepted for transport.”

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A play date that was just her size•We held our first, “Toddler Time” with Martha, last week, giving kids, ages 2-4 years, to come be with Martha•She was the quintessential hostess of her playground ? and all the kids loved petting her fluffy hair•When the goodbyes were said, each child got to choose a button of one of the horses•Surprisingly, there were no duplicates?Such a cute way to share Martha with a tiny little population and add more exposure to kids as we continue our goal for her therapy work?Think about all the good that comes from exposing a child to a horse at this young and how it effects their future feelings towards them?….sound . . . . . . . #miniaturehorse #miniaturehorses #miniaturehorsesofinstagram #horse #horses #horsesofinstagram #dwarfhorse #rescuehorse #adoptdontshop #hunterjumper #dressage #eventing #horseriding #horsebackriding #equine #equitation #equinetherapy #equinephotography #equestrian #equestrianlife #kids

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Airlines aren’t obligated to allow therapy horses on their flights, but if they ignore the new guideline from the Department of Transportation, they could be penalized. And just to get down to the nitty gritty: this guideline does not apply to emotional support horses, only service horses that help people with visual impairments or issues with mobility. Emotional service animals are often times dealt with on a case-by-case basis at the airport.

The guidelines also say what CAN’T be used as service animals: no snakes, rodents, reptiles, spiders, or ferrets are allowed. Thank goodness for that…

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This Is What It’s like to Run a World-Class Penis Museum

If you are reading this article, you’re clearly my sort of people – because who wouldn’t be curious about what it takes to run a museum full of penises?

Luckily, there’s a man with experience ready and willing to let us all in on the family secrets.

Hjotur Gisli Sigurosson curates the Icelandic Phallological Museum, a vocation handed down by a father who indulged a penis fascination by collecting interesting specimens wherever he ran across them.

Hjotur was just 10 when his father, Sigurour Hjartarson, began his collection in 1974. The first specimen was a “pizzle,” or a dried bull’s penis, that was given to Sigurour as a joke. He began a collection that grew until he opened it to the public in 1997.

Hjotur never thought the collection was odd, and recalls time spent with his father fondly.

“I had great adventures going to remote places to harvest organs with my father,” he told Mental_Floss.

The collection includes mostly Icelandic mammal specimens, harvested from dead animals (like beached whales) or given to the family by hunters. Hjotur says, though, that they “never ask for an animal to be killed just to harvest the organ.”

They have one human specimen.

“It was from a 95-year-old man. He signed a letter of donation in 1996, and when he died in 2011 a doctor removed his penis.”

The collection also includes 23 “mystical creature” penises, like “elves, trolls, and mermen,” though Hjotur acknowledges that “some, we suspect, are man-made.”

The museum sells every practical object in the shape of a penis you could ever want – cutlery, lamps, bottle openers, etc – so basically, now you know where to go before your next bachelorette party!

Hjotur isn’t ashamed of the collection, as “there is nothing pornographic or offensive on display,” and he points out that people from all over the world come to visit.

“The reaction is 99.9% positive. Most people see the humorous side and some get very into the scientific angle of it. Most people enter not knowing what to expect and come out smiling or laughing. Last year, we had a little over 20,000 visitors.”

He thinks, too, that seeing the, um, variety might help people understand that when it comes to anatomy, there is no “normal.”

“You’ll learn that as with everything in nature, the diversity in this department is as great as in any other; even within the same species the difference in size and shake is often quite remarkable.”

Hjotur, like his father before him, is always adding to his collection – “a new one, a bigger, better one, a different one” – and he’s open to starting a gallery that honors phallic art in all forms, too.

If you’re looking for something a bit off the beaten path on your next trip to Iceland, well, how can you pass this up? It’s education, it’s entertainment – what more could you ask for in a tour stop?

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Here Are 10 Things You Can Get for Free at Disney World

It’s pricey to visit the Most Magical Place on Earth. So to help you out, we’ve got a list of some freebies you can pick up once you make it in the gate.

Scroll through these 10 things available for you and your family at Disney World. Hey, it won’t cost you a cent.

1. Celebration Buttons

Get these at the Guest Services desk at the parks and wear them to proudly announce your birthday, first time at the park or whatever you’re celebrating. Let the cast members make a fuss over your celebration too. That’s part of the fun.

Photo Credit: Pxhere

2. Maps, bands and passes

These are free and branded and collectable. Free souvenirs!

Photo Credit: Flickr

3. Visit Disney’s Boardwalk

It’s free, and fun, to stroll around in the evening and watch all the street performers.

Photo Credit: Flickr

4. See Disney Springs

Parking is free. Chocolate sampling is free at the Ghirardelli shop. Lego building is free at The Lego Store. Free stuff is the best stuff.

Photo Credit: Theme Park Tourist

5. Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom

Pick up free spell cards at the Town Center’s Fire Station and hunt for villains at portals throughout the park.

Photo Credit: Flickr

6. Pixie Dust

Depending on how you feel about glitter, pixie dust is a fantastic freebie. In the Magic Kingdom, find Tinkerbell at the Town Square Theater for a dust dousing. Cast members at the Castle Couture shop in Fantasyland will also happily oblige.

Photo Credit: Jennifer Lynn

7. Magic Kingdom Fireworks

Disney World is famous for their free fireworks show. At showtime, stand near the Ticket and Transportation Center for the best view.

Photo Credit: Jorge Royan

8. African animal sightings

In an area outside the lobby of the Animal Kingdom Lodge, giraffes and zebras and their friends from the savannah roam freely…and viewing is free.

Photo Credit: Ahodges7

9. Boat and monorail rides

From the Magic Kingdom, hop on a boat or the monorail and visit the various lodges and hotels.

Photo Credit: Flickr

10. Free ice water

Okay, so maybe your kids won’t go gaga over free water, but it seriously beats paying a few bucks for each bottle, and this freebie will keep everyone hydrated – especially important in the Florida summer. Any counter service restaurant will give you a large cup of water with or without ice upon request.

Photo Credit: Pxhere

Did you have any idea there were so many freebies in Disney World? Now, the tickets to get in…that’s another issue.

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15 Funny Photos That Perfectly Sum up Canada

Oh, Canada!

I love Canada! Nice people, beautiful cities, open prairies, and of course, the greatest sport known to man: HOCKEY.

Also, the people are really, really nice. It’s great, eh!

And these pics prove that point, once again.

1. Never see that in the U.S.

Another Canadian thing from pics

2. Don’t worry about it

Meanwhile in Canada… from pics

3. Water fight!

Canadian Police Clash with Citizens from pics

4. Already Great

Found a pretty cool hat at a local store today from pics

5. This is great

Police in Montreal are refusing to wear their work pants as a part of a labor dispute. from funny

6. Thank you!

Canadians are notorious for being kind from pics

7. Honest

Honest Canadian commuters. The workers were missing and the automatic gates were broken. This is the result. from pics

8. Generosity

Everything about this says Canada from pics

9. Please be a nice thief

Canadian victims of theft. from funny

10. Can I come in?

11. Come back later

12. It happens…

Canadian Parking Ticket from funny

13. Canadian graffiti

This bathroom graffiti is positive. from mildlyinteresting

14. All dressed the same

Fashion at my small town Canadian bar. [OC] from funny

15. Shorts?!?! Really?!?!

A guy at my University in Canada walking to class from funny

Oh, Canada, you sure are a gem!

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The Sunscreen You Wear May Be Harming the Environment

There are a lot of sunscreens that are claiming to be “reef friendly” these days.

Photo Credit: Public Domain Pictures

A new label on sunscreens allows consumers to see at a glance how safe the product is for ocean life. If you see the words “reef friendly” printed next to an image of a coral, then the sunscreen should be lacking damaging chemicals. Should be…

A couple of years ago, a report about the effects of sunblock use in the oceans was published by the Environmental Contamination Toxicology journal. According to the study, the common sunscreen ingredients octinoxate and oxybenzone are capable of contributing to bleaching in coral reefs.

Since then, Palau, Hawaii and Key West, Florida, have banned consumer use of these sunblock ingredients. Other tropical locations popular with vacationers, like Mexico, advise visitors about the potential of damage.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Out of concern for the reefs, many companies like ThinkSport and All Good Sport offer coral friendly formulas. Other brands, such as Coppertone (for their Water Babies line) and Alba Botanical use minerals as a blocker. Thankfully, these sunscreen alternatives are easy to find.

Everyone should want to keep coral reefs from bleaching because the phenomenon is devastating to ocean health. But before you throw out all your drugstore sunscreen and suntan lotions, something to note: some environmentalists and scientists have come out against the report.

This is because Coral reef damage is caused more by environmental factors, such as climate change and pollution, than beach-goers slathered in sunscreen. Even if octinoxate and oxybenzone were successfully eliminated from the ocean, the damage would continue.

Photo Credit: Flickr

Also, the reef-friendly labeling itself is an issue. As is typical with other kinds of labeling—for example, food sold as all-natural or whole grain—there are no set standards. Consumers may be misled to believe they are using a reef safe sunblock because any manufacturer can make the claim. Consumer Reports also consistently finds mineral based sunscreens as not matching their SPF claims.

But because tropical beaches and diving spots do test for elevated levels of sunscreen, it wouldn’t hurt to use products without octinoxate and oxybenzone. Even if there are larger issues than sunscreen in the decline of the world’s coral reefs, every little stressor adds to the cumulative effect. So using reef-safe sunblock may not solve the issue, but it prevents you from being a direct contributor. Plus, they’re not even that expensive.

From an environmental standpoint, small changes sometimes result in big wins.

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The Apollo 11 Astronauts Had to Go Through Customs When They Came Back from the Moon

July 20 marked the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11’s famous moon landing. Those brave men did something no one had ever done before, uniting humanity in awe and wonder at the mysteries of the universe.

Apparently, humanity is also united in experiencing the joys of going through customs upon entering the country – even those astronauts.

Just like anyone coming off a long trip—for work no less—the men of Apollo 11 were probably ready for a beer and a nice steak dinner. Instead, a brief interaction with the local, friendly customs agent was in order.

The astronauts declared moon rock, moon dust and other moon samples on the form as they entered the United States through Honolulu Airport, Hawaii, after landing in the Pacific Ocean on July 24, 1969. Their ocean splash-down was the end of their historic voyage to the moon.

All three crewmen—Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin—signed the form. Their point of departure was recorded as Cape Kennedy, Florida, with a stopover on the moon before arrival in Honolulu.

Photo Credit: NASA

Website Space.com found the customs form on the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol site, where it went up as a commemoration for the 40th anniversary of the moon visit. NASA verified that, yes, the form is real. But it was all done in fun.

The actual return to earth happened about 920 miles southwest of Hawaii and only 12 miles from the USS Hornet, the navy ship deployed to pick up the astronauts. The trip to Honolulu would take an additional two days.

As for the declaration of health, Armstrong, Collins and Aldrin were all quarantined inside a NASA trailer on board the USS Hornet to prevent the spread of any moon diseases. They even had to wear special biohazard suits while on deck after getting pulled from the seas.

Photo Credit: NASA

The astronauts, trailer and all, were taken to Houston. Then, three weeks later they were allowed to leave isolation and go to all the parties and parades they were due.

Present day astronauts don’t have to sit in isolation. When they return from the International Space Station, they receive a quick medical checkup before they are free to move about the earth. But whenever they return, they—like the rest of us earthlings—have to go through customs.

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