Provincetown: Summer’s Must-Do Events

OMG, Miss Richfield 1981

This just in highlights from the Provincetown Business Guild 2013 Calendar. For great trip-planning information, check out our Provincetown Long Weekend article in our September issue. (Download the magazine here.)

• June 26-30: Provincetown International Film Festival. The 15th annual Provincetown International Film Festival is dedicated to showing new achievements in independent film and honoring the work of acclaimed and emerging directors, actors and producers.
• July 1-7: Independence Week 2013. World-class DJs and parties make this the most popular July 4th destination on the circuit.
• July 23-27: Girl Splash. The destination summer event for lesbians. Pool party, clam bakes, dune tours, and white hot dances. Come play at the beach!
• August 3-10: Family Pride Week. A chance for children to meet other children with LGBT parents and for parents to meet other parents and share experiences. A parade and plenty of activities for all ages.
• August 18-24: Carnival Week celebrates its 35th birthday! A week-long celebration of the 2013 theme “Viva Las Vegas” that transforms Provincetown into one big party. Boat cruise, inn stroll, music, special events, and of course, the famous carnival parade on the 22nd that attracts over 65,000 viewers and marches the length of Commercial Street.

The Undisputed Queen of the High Seas to Visit New York

Picture me on this ship on August 28

The Queen Mary 2, the largest ocean liner** ever built, is scheduled to cross the Atlantic Ocean from New York City to South Hampton in seven days, departing the Big Apple on Tuesday,  August 28 and arriving in Southampton, England, on Tuesday, September 7.

And I’ll be on board.

There are larger ocean-going ships but the QM2 is the largest cruise liner (**see below) and by all reports one of the most elegant vessels on the high seas. If placed vertically next to the Empire State Building, it’d rise just over a 100-feet shy of New York’s most storied skyscraper.

Cunard Line, the company that operates the QM2, Cunard’s flagship, and her sister ships the Queen Elizabeth and the Queen Victoria, has been in continuous operation from 1840. My paternal grandparents arrived into the New World from Italy on a ship. With the barest of necessities on board—not quite the same level of luxuries as the QM2. That is the last time anyone in my family crossed the Atlantic by ship. I’ve always wanted to take the QM2 across the pond and I’m delighted to do it a century after the Salvatos established their family name in the U.S.

I’ll be traveling with a colleague and we plan on Tweeting, blogging and Facebook posting our experiences (before, during and after). I wonder if the experience will be:

• Overwhelmingly straight (we hear that it’s gayer than you’d expect);
• Too formal (there are two balls planned during the week); or
• Too stuffy (the people in the photos sure look relaxed!).

So be sure to follow me here, on Twitter and via Facebook to get a sense of a cruise on the QM2 and if it’s the right kind of experience for you.

**What’s the difference between ocean liners and cruise liners or ships? Turns out there’s a subtle but  significant difference according to Cunard publicist Laruel Davis:

“A cruise liner/ship is made to do just that: cruise at lower speeds. An ocean liner such as Queen Mary 2 is made specifically to cut through major bodies of water such as the Atlantic at higher (read: non-cruise) speeds. This is why she, more than any other ship, is so well suited to regular Transatlantic service.

Montreal Launches 3rd Annual Queer of the Year Contest

Competitors from last year’s Queer of the Year competition

Montreal Tourism and business partners announce the kick-off of their third annual Queer of the Year competition including online voting and in-person competitions among five lucky finalists flown into Montreal during their Pride celebration (August 13-19) to compete for the title of Queer of the Year.

For more information, prize info, rule:

• Visit Tourism Montreal “Queer of the Year” Facebook page
• Visit Tourism Montreal’s Gay Life blog
• Follow Tourism Montreal “Queer of the Year” on Twitter

What Do You Call A Bear In Turkey? Why Not Find Out?

You probably think bears are a uniquely American phenomenon. You’d be incorrect!

Bears are everywhere. BearArabia.org is organizing a bear cruise around the Turkish islands.

This 7-night tour, organized by IGLTA member LebTour, disembarks September 1.

For more information, click here.

World’s Only Floating Gay Film Festival Sets Sail In June

Some sun between films.

The third annual Pride of the Ocean film festival, the only LGBT film festival held aboard a cruise ship unspools on the high seas on the Celebrity Summit June 10-17, 2012 (from New York City to Bermuda and back).

This is a gay/lesbian group aboard a mainstream cruise. Organizers expect over 50 guests. According to John Scagliotti, organizer of the event:

“One of the most important missions of Pride of the Ocean is to increase visibility of the LGBTQ and Alliance Community.”

He continues, “For this reason, we choose to host our film festival aboard ships with a diverse group of passengers, so that we are able to do our part in putting out a positive, constructive, example of our community to society at large.”

Check here for trip details and for a line up of the films.

What’s So Gay About Wine? Find Out Here!

Disco balls as grapes. Nice!

The wines aren’t gay, silly. It’s all about celebrating Pride with Out in the Vineyard, the first Wine Country events and travel company dedicated to the LGBT community.

Out in the Vineyard presents Gay Wine Weekend, taking place Friday, June 15 through Sunday, June 17, 2012 in California Wine Country (Sonoma).

Here’s a line up of events:

Friday, June 15th

• V.I.P. Host Hotel Guests’ Reception – 3:00 PM – 6:00 PM - El Dorado Hotel on The Plaza
• Winemakers’ Dinners – Experience the food and wines of Wine Country – 6:30 PM – ESTATE, the girl & the fig and El Dorado Kitchen
• Come to the Cabaret – An evening of song featuring Katya Smirnoff Skyy – 9:30pm - Sebastiani Winery - $20 Admission

Saturday, June 16^th

• Winery Tours – Wine tasting and lunch at some Sonoma Valley’s Finest Wineries.
• Twilight T-Dance – Atwood Ranch, Glen Ellen, CA
• VIP Reception 5:00pm – 7:00pm/T-Dance 7:00pm – 11:00pm
• Twilight T-Dance VIP – $150 – Twilight T-Dance General – $75
• After-Twilight Party – El Dorado Kitchen – 11:00 PM – 1:00 AM – $20 Admission

Sunday, June 17th

• Wine Auction & The Big Gay Brunch sponsored by Benziger Family and Imagery Wineries of Sonoma Valley – Ramekins – 11:00 AM – 2:30 PM  $50 Admission

All monies raised at The Big Gay Wine Auction will benefit Face to Face, Sonoma County AIDS Network.

Full Details:        www.outinthevineyard.com/events/gww2012/

In LA Saturday Jan 28? Come to the LGBT Travel Panel 2:15pm-2:45pm

Yours truly is organizing an LGBT travel panel at the upcoming L.A. Times Travel Show tomorrow, Saturday, January 28, 2012 from 2:15pm to 2:45pm  in the Travel in Style Pavilion.

 

 

 

 

UPDATE SATURDAY, JAN 28.

Click here to download the information to be presented at today’s travel show:

• Travel Show presentation PDF
• Lesbian Travel Resources

If you are anywhere near the Los Angeles Convention Center in downtown L.A., please stop in. You can find more information about the travel show by clicking here. You can obtain a 20% discount off the $10 entrance price by purchasing your ticket here and using the code EARLYBIRD.

We’ll talk about hot new destinations, events, and cruises to make your gay/lesbian travel planning just a tad easier. Come with questions. I’ll be moderating a panel that includes:

• Shannon Wentworth, founder and CEO of Sweet, cruises and tours for lesbians and their friends;
• Duane Wells, contributor to MoxieQ, which promises a “gay for every girl” and numerous LGBT travel publications; and
• Andy Bender, blogger for Forbes.com and contributor to numerous mainstream and LGBT publications.

The panel is brought to you in part by the International Gay & Lesbian Travel Association, which is active in over 80 countries. Discover more about this nearly 30-year-old organization by clicking here: LGBT.Travel.

Miami Beach Gay Pride + Gay Cruise = A Whole Lotta Gay!

If you are looking for some great gay fun in the sun this spring, consider the Miami Beach Pride Cruise setting sail from Miami April 16 (through April 20), 2012 following the festivities of Miami Beach Gay Pride on Sunday, April 15.

The four-night, five-day cruise aboard the Norwegian Sky, is organized by Source Events with prices starting at $329 per person double occupancy plus taxes and fees.

According to the cruise organizers, “The event also represents an opportunity to “cruise for a cause” as a portion of all tickets sold through Source Events will be donated back to Miami Beach Gay Pride.”

Regarding Pride, In addition to the parade moving to Sunday, the expanded line-up of Pride activities will include a Thursday night kick-off party, Friday night block party along Lincoln Road, a Saturday pool party at the Surfcomber Hotel, a Saturday Voters’ Rally on the beach, a Saturday evening movie on the beach, a Saturday night VIP fundraising event and a Sunday night closing party after the parade and festival.

For more information about the cruise, click here.

For more information about Miami Beach Pride, click here.

Carnival in Berlin: Do Take Candy From These Strangers

Oh my, did she run out of candy?

Wear a warm costume. Carnival in Berlin takes place February 12, 2012.

Then again, you may warm up from friction as you rub up against spectators and participants. Organizers are expecting more than 1 million spectators and participants at the 11th annual Berlin Carnival Costume Parade. (Break out your German dictionary for this site.)

According to Berlin Tourism:

With an expected 3,000 participants in 100 groups, 60 floats, and numerous marching bands, the frolicsome parade will start at 11:11 am, and move through the Western center of the German capital. More than 600,000 spectators, most of them in colorful costumes, line the streets every year to watch the parade and collect sweets.

Yep, that’s right. Spectators yearn to receive candy from strangers wearing very odd, sometimes disturbing costumes. It’s just little hard-candy sweets but, like those plastic beads in New Orleans, somehow they’re worth much more when received from wild revelers marching along the street.

 

High Seas Hijinx: We Can’t Even Cruise Straight

Actual guests on an Atlantis cruise

After a welcome but almost scarily mild (global warming?!) December, rigid weather gripped the Northeast just after New Years.

Of course, that propelled our thoughts to warm-weather getaways, including gay and lesbian cruise vacations. This season’s aqueous getaways range from the offbeat (scuba diving in the Republic of Palau with Undersea Expeditions) to the romantic (Danube riverboat excursion with RSVP Vacations) to the humungous and fun (the Caribbean with Atlantis Events).

Check out the websites of these companies and the following for this year’s line up of water-based fun including all-gay or all-lesbian charters and gay or lesbian groups on mainstream cruises:

• Alyson Adventures
• AquaFest
• Coda
• Concierge Travel
• Hanns Ebensten
• Olivia
• Pied Piper
• R Family Vacations
• Source Events
• Sweet