I just switched on the new Travel Channel show, 1,000 Places to See Before You Die. I got a few minutes into it and just had to stop and rewind for comment. Yes, it’s bad, really bad. I didn’t have high hopes for this show, but I didn’t expect it to start out by immediately jumping into a pond of scum.
Not the place, which was Alaska, but by the collection plate obviously being passed during the production phase. First, the couple (cute but amazinlgly dumb newleyweds Alvin and Melanie) won the trip through a contest, so they didn’t have to pay and neither did the producers it seems. No expense is spared (by the PR folks anyway) to make sure these clueless fresh faces get the best experience flackdom can muster. Courtesy of the wonder of TIVO, here is the opening line: “Getting to Alaska is the easy part. Alaska Air offers several direct flights from many cities in both the U.S. and Mexico.”
A few seconds later, “After reading several pages of the 1,000 Places to see book, Alvin and Melanie begin their adventure…”
“For a reasonable $300 [the guide being interviewed] will fly you to the Chugach Glacier.” (Just an aside, but why is Celtic music playing in the background?) When they get out, everyone is wearing a North Face coat. I certainly understand that travel entertainment and promotion are intertwined, but do you have to make it all so painfully obvious in the very beginning of the series? At least The Apprentice waited until Season 2 before turning it into one giant ad campaign.
But I’m sure the author got an offer she couldn’t refuse. “Hmmm, should I slave away trying to create a good follow-up to this fluke best-seller, or should I go back to doing freelance magazine articles, or should I deposit this TV deal check sitting in front of me that will allow me to sit on the beach drinking mai tais for life if I want?”
“Has anyone seen my deposit slips?”
It’s easy to make fun of the book 1,000 Things to Do Before You Die , not least because there are so many luxury hotels listed. I’m all for a bit of luxury travel myself, especially if someone else is paying for it, but is any hotel really so fantastic that you have to see it before you die? Especially these days, when yuppie parents are building swimming pools with waterfalls, boulder slides, and six-person hot tubs in their back yard. When there are a few hundred thousand millionaires in just the U.S. alone and a 10,000 square-foot house is no longer considered ridiculous for a couple or small family. What can possibly put a hotel on par with the Grand Canyon or Machu Picchu, even when it’s in Dubai?
But really, it’s not a bad book. It does at least filter out the noise and tell you what places have become icons and attractions deserving the crowds. The fact that Conde Nast Traveler was paying most of her expenses shines through, but then it again she couldn’t have researched it without that kind of backing.
It’s no surprise, but once again, the book is better than the TV show.
