Travel Calendar

Trick question! You do both — if, that is, you have an all-wheel-drive four-seat Ferrari FF. Which you probably don’t, because the FF’s base price is $302,450. And you’ll never see one that cheap, because buying a Ferrari with no options is like building a Hamptons dream house without the outdoor kitchen.

Come on, man. Don’t be a skinflint.

Three hundred grand is a lot of money, but look at it this way: thanks to the 2012 FF’s beguiling mix of pedigreed performance and down-to-earth practicality, you can sell your fair-weather 458 Italia and your winter-beater Porsche Panamera Turbo S and just drive this.

Honey, according to my numbers, it makes solid financial sense to buy a Ferrari FF.

The FF’s mandate is to meld the performance of a Ferrari supercar with the four-season utility of an all-wheel-drive luxury wagon. Thus the hatchback body, which identifies the FF with a once-popular class of sporting wagon known as the shooting brake.

Under the hood lies the most powerful engine ever installed in a road-going Ferrari, a 6.3-liter V-12 that belts out 651 horsepower at 8,000 r.p.m. There is a passenger-side speedometer that you may dub the nag-ometer depending on who’s riding in the passenger seat. With the transmission in automatic mode, the FF is a serene daily driver. One that can, when asked, race from 0 to 60 miles per hour in less than four seconds.

One morning, I employed the FF’s heroic power plant on a preschool run, my 2-year-old strapped into a car seat in the back. The FF was very likely the only vehicle in the school parking lot that day with a quoted top speed of 208 m.p.h. Does FF stand for “family fun”?

Actually FF stands for “Ferrari four,” a reference to the four seats and four-wheel drive. Which is actually all-wheel drive, under the usual definition, at least up until about 130 m.p.h., when it becomes rear-wheel drive. The power distribution gets quite complicated, but if you like transmissions you’ll love the FF, because it has two of them.

Like the 458 Italia, the FF’s electronic aggressiveness is controlled via the manettino, a small red switch on the steering wheel. Unlike the 458, the FF’s manettino has no race mode. Which is too bad, because on the 458, “race” sets the active exhaust to its most vocal setting, and you want to hear the FF’s song as often as possible. Conventional V-12 engines are renowned for soothing, buttery power, but the FF’s flat-plane crankshaft imbues the exhaust note with a hard-edge malevolent bark. If the FF’s 12 pistons were a jury, they’d never reach a verdict.

To its everlasting credit, Ferrari programs its engine-management electronics to let you rev the engine in neutral. This sounds juvenile and pointless but is something you find yourself doing surprisingly often, possibly in the garage while your children are napping inside the house. Were napping, that is.

To better enjoy the V12’s comely song, I drove around with the windows down most of the time. Which meant I couldn’t really hear the stereo, and that was all right, because the FF uses the same stereo and navigation system that you find in a Jeep Wrangler (an odd bit of corporate synergy from a fellow Fiat brand).

Of course, nobody buys a Ferrari for the stereo, but maybe someone at Bang Olufsen or McIntosh needs to make a cold call to Ferrari headquarters in Maranello, Italy. Until then, I’m sure you have the option to just cover the thing with a nice piece of leather.

I get the impression that anything in the FF can be covered in leather, possibly including the inside of the windshield. (Just leave me a small portal, Signore Schedoni.) The car I drove had a leather headliner and smelled like a winning lottery ticket. Which, if you’re wondering, smells like the inside of a Ferragamo store.

That leather ceiling was but one option on a dauntingly vast list. This particular FF in Grigio Abu Dhabi paint (what the peons call “silver”) was stocked with $74,891 in options, bringing the tab to $377,431. That works out to less than $100,000 per passenger, since the FF can actually seat four adults.

NEW YORK |
Fri Jun 1, 2012 12:18pm EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Summer is just around the corner in the northern hemisphere, now that June has arrived. The arrival of the sun and warm weather means the great outdoors beckons and you might actually feel like answering the call of the wild. With that in mind, the experts at online travel website Cheapflights (www.cheapflights.com) have come up with a list of top 10 camping destinations. Reuters has not endorsed this list:

1. Lake District National Park – Cumbria, England

The largest National Park in England, Lake District National Park brings together majestic green mountains and clear, glassy lakes for a one-of-a-kind camping experience. Whether you’re a rustic camper or you gravitate toward luxury, there are a variety of campsites to choose from in every direction of Lake District. And once you’re there you won’t run out of activities to do: swimming, canoeing, rock climbing and loads of other activities are close at hand.

2. Cotopaxi National Park – Cotopaxi, Ecuador

If you’re thinking about taking your outdoor adventure south of the equator, consider Cotopaxi National Park, located just outside of Ecuador’s capital city. The snow-capped Cotopaxi volcano sets the scene, along with wild llamas and gently rolling hills. Hiking is most popular, whether it’s a short trip or a multi-day hike, but there’s plenty to do in the way of horseback riding and mountain biking too.

3. Pacific Rim National Park – Vancouver Island, Canada

Encompassing three major regions – Long Beach, The Broken Group Islands and the West Coast Trail – Pacific Rim National Park is an exciting destination for camping enthusiasts. Set your site up in the wilderness – along the sandy beach or in a formal campground with fellow adventure travelers – and get ready for world-class hiking, swimming, kayaking and even surfing.

4. Sangla Valley – Sangla, India

In the forested valley of Sangla, Banjara Camps Retreats transforms camping into a comfortable and luxurious experience. Choose the accommodation that’s right for you, whether it’s a fully furnished tent or an enclosed cabin, and enjoy the pastoral beauty of the Baspa River and the majestic Himalayas. When you’re not hiking or fishing, a trip to the Buddhist temples and monasteries is a perfect addition to your relaxing retreat.

5. Glacier National Park – Montana, United States

Glacier National Park sweeps across the U.S.-Canada border, taking over two mountain ranges, hundreds of lakes, and an incredible array of flora and fauna. Camping in the park is on a first-come, first-served basis, so visitors should reserve campsites well in advance. The wait is definitely worth it. Fly-fishing is a popular pastime, but if you love to hike, there are upwards of 700 miles of exciting trails.

6. Blue Mountains National Park – New South Wales, Australia

Just a short trip from Sydney, arguably Australia’s most hot-and-happening city, Blue Mountains National Park tops the list of Australia’s favorite camping destinations. What is actually an uplifted plateau, the park offers much in the way of jagged cliffs, waterfalls, rock climbing and mountain biking. There are several options for camping with some grounds holding as many as 35 sites and others as few as two.

7. Haleakala National Park – Maui, Hawaii, United States

Most might head to the nearest beach resort in Maui, but for the adventure traveler, we suggest pitching a tent in Haleakala National Park. The highlight of the park is the Haleakala volcano, which offers a great space for stargazing, hiking and watching the sunrise. Farther into the park is the rainforest region of Kipahulu, where visitors can hike to the Waimoku Falls and swim the pools of Ohe’o. Cabins are also available in the park through a lottery system.

8. Jasper National Park – Alberta, Canada

The largest of the Canadian Rocky Mountain Parks, Jasper National Park was deemed a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1984. It is now a hot destination for visitors looking to camp, hike, raft, kayak and fish. There are plenty of campgrounds to choose from, all of which have firewood and bear-proof lockers. Insider tip: Make time to visit the Miette Hot Springs and the Athabasca Falls.

9. Maasai Mara National Reserve – Kenya

A bit more unconventional than simply pitching a tent in the middle of the woods, camping out on the Maasai Mara National Reserve is an extraordinary adventure of a lifetime. Accommodations range from budget campgrounds to luxurious tents, and most come as a package deal with safaris and meals. The Mara is known for its population of cats, but zebras, giraffes and gazelles also call the area home.

10. Denali National Park – Alaska, United States

Alaska is known as America’s last frontier, and Denali is at the center of this incredible oasis. Visitors can stay at one of seven campgrounds throughout the park and bear witness to a pristine landscape with glacial mountain ranges, alpine forests and clear rivers and lakes. The wildlife in Denali is rampant with black bears, grizzlies, moose, sheep, marmots, wolfs and loads of other animals.

(Editing by Paul Casciato)

It is almost a rite of passage: As soon as the dorm room is packed up, college students and recent graduates start packing again to head overseas to study, teach English or just travel, sometimes for a year or more.

But with foreign-transaction fees on credit cards, stiff fees on ATM withdrawals and loopholes in health insurance, families ought to consider more than transportation and the weather as they plan.

According to the Institute of International Education, more than 270,000 U.S. students studied abroad in the 2009-10 school year, the latest period for which figures are available. The yearly total has more than tripled over the past two decades and still is growing, despite the sluggish economy.

While Europe remains the most popular destination, more students are heading to places like China, India, Brazil and New Zealand. Others travel to do missionary work, teach or volunteer.

Here are some tips for keeping costs down while young people explore other cultures.

Credit cards. In many parts of the world, credit cards are as widely accepted as cash, making them a flexible choice for purchases. But most U.S. banks add foreign-transaction fees of as much as 3% on each purchase, which pumps up your costs, especially if you use your credit card a lot.

American Express,

J.P. Morgan Chase

and Citigroup

offer a handful of reward cards without transaction fees, but the cards usually are aimed at consumers with top-notch credit and charge an annual fee. Those factors make them more appropriate for parents, who can make their kids authorized users on the account.

Students and recent grads with less-than-stellar credit should consider Capital One Financial,

since the bank doesn’t charge foreign-transaction fees on any of its cards, including its card designed for students. Bank of America’s

new Travel Rewards Card has no annual fee or foreign-transaction fees, and its interest rates range from 14.99% to 22.99%.

Be wary of merchants who offer to ring up a transaction in U.S. dollars. Typically, they will use a less-favorable exchange rate, meaning you will pay more than you should. And your U.S. card, with its magnetic stripe, might not work at European train stations, which require cards with embedded chips and a personal identification number, or PIN.

Bank accounts. The more rural the areas you visit, the more cash you will need, as fewer merchants accept plastic. But cash might be harder to get, since automated teller machines aren’t as plentiful. On top of any ATM fees assessed by the machine’s owner, you might pay foreign-transaction fees of up to 3% and other charges.

Bank of America offers free ATM use through an alliance with certain banks in Europe, China and Mexico, such as Barclays and China Construction Bank. But travelers who use other ATMs will pay $5 plus a 1% currency-conversion fee.

If you plan to change banks anyway, note that credit unions (which often restrict membership), small banks and online banks tend to charge lower fees and some reimburse other financial institutions’ ATM fees. For instance, USAA’s free checking account charges 1% on foreign debit transactions and reimburses others’ ATM fees up to $15 a month.

Even with all the charges, you probably are better off getting cash in the local currency from an airport ATM once you arrive at your destination than converting cash at a bank or currency-exchange desk.

Card-comparison site CardHub.com last year compared currency-exchange rates at 15 banks and found the average total cost was about 8% of the transaction. So even if you pay a 3% fee on a card, “you’re still going to be saving money,” says CardHub CEO Odysseas Papadimitriou.

Because card companies sometimes block accounts if they see charges that might be fraudulent, you should call your bank and credit-card issuer before you go to tell them what countries you will be in and for how long.

Health insurance. Many U.S. health plans offer little or no coverage when you are outside the U.S. or may impose time limits on coverage, so most formal study-abroad programs include a health plan. If your time abroad is more open-ended, you might need to purchase travel insurance or international medical coverage, which generally costs a young person a few hundred dollars.

Regardless of the health plan, look to see what is covered. Many plans exclude treatment for pre-existing conditions or mental-health issues or reimburse you only after treatment. If so, you will need to be ready to pay cash for your care. Many plans offer emergency medical evacuation, but might transport patients only to the closest “appropriate” hospital rather than bringing them home.

You also might want to see if nonmedical evacuations are covered, such as after an earthquake or amid political unrest. Last year, some insurers chartered planes to get students studying in Egypt out of the country after the uprising there. You can compare plans and terms at websites like Squaremouth.com or InsureMyTrip.com,

HTH Worldwide, which provides insurance to about 100,000 students in study-abroad programs, advises checking your prescriptions before you go. Some common U.S. drugs, such as Adderall for attention-deficit disorder, are illegal elsewhere, so substitutes might be necessary.

—karen.blumenthal@wsj.com

Write to Karen Blumenthal at karen.blumenthal@wsj.com

SALEM, Ore., May 31, 2012 — /PRNewswire/ – Travelers arranging their summer vacations have a new set of digital tools to make planning an Oregon getaway easier, according to the Oregon Tourism Commission (dba Travel Oregon). Visitors can now access Travel Oregon’s new social-enabled website, online help and trip planner and/or enter to win an Oregon adventure.

“Knowing that online travel planning can be overwhelming, we combined the latest technology with an old-school human touch to meet our consumers’ evolving needs,” said Mo Sherifdeen, Travel Oregon Director of Integrated Marketing and Publishing. “By combining our digital offerings – tourism listings from partners, inspirational stories and videos, suggested itineraries – and adding ratings and blog posts from locals, we made it so travelers can count on personalized, inspirational and informative content to help them during every stage of the trip planning process.”

With a goal to be the trusted and authentic resource for exploring Oregon, Travel Oregon developed a digital platform that offers trip inspiration as well as on-the-go information for those already traveling in the state. Features include:

• Curated, collaborative and integrated content: Research shows that website users are looking for inspirational material like videos, story-based narratives and itineraries, as well as trip-planning tools like hotel and restaurant listings. The new TravelOregon.com groups this information, developed in partnership with community experts throughout the state, into user-friendly views based on travelers’ interests, whether that’s an activity like golf, bird watching or a town such as Bend.
• Tailored advice: In response to consumer demand for genuine personal advice, Travel Oregon incorporated Trip Advisor reviews, added the ability for visitors to rate Oregon places and developed the “Ask Oregon” ambassador program. Volunteer ambassadors are passionate Oregonians who have deep knowledge about relevant destinations and/or niche activities like cycling, family travel and wine. To receive personalized, unbiased recommendations, visitors can easily contact the Ask Oregon ambassadors by tagging questions with #AskOR on Twitter, inquiring on the Travel Oregon Facebook page (Facebook.com/TravelOregon) or posting a question on TravelOregon.com.
• Social media: Travel Oregon continues to integrate its content with popular social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Visitors can inspire friends, plan trips together and engage with others for travel recommendations. Until June 17, thrill-seeking travelers can log on to Facebook.com/TravelOregon to create their own “Oregon Bucket List,” enter to win an Adventurecation in Oregon and see which of their friends’ adventurous affinities best matches theirs.
• Responsive design: The new TravelOregon.com displays on any device, so it’s easy to read and navigate on the road or at home. Whether it’s displayed on a computer, smartphone or tablet screen, the layout evolves to give readers an easy and efficient way to find the content they care about. Location-based information allows visitors to find nearby attractions while on their trip.
• Robust search: Smart search functionality returns options that build on users’ interests, helping travelers round out itineraries with ideas they may not have considered in addition to their specific query results. A search on an experience – for example, cycling, fly fishing or wine tasting – results in a combination of stories, blog posts, events,  suggested itineraries, outfitters, retail establishments, deals and answers to questions asked by others, all in one place. Additionally, the search bar auto-suggests other terms as the user types, making it easier to explore the vast wealth of material on the site.

“We’re using technology and the digital medium to bring the Oregon story to life,” noted Sherifdeen.

Travel Oregon works with a team of creative agencies, including Substance, Wieden+Kennedy, MEDIAmerica TenBridges and Sparkloft. Since the launch of its website in 2006, Travel Oregon has won six awards and honors and continues to lead the way in tourism industry web technology.

For a screen flow view of TravelOregon.com and to read more about the creation of the site, go to: http://travel2dot0.com/destinationmarketing/behind-the-making-of-traveloregon-com/

The Oregon Tourism Commission, dba Travel Oregon, works to enhance visitors’ experience by providing information, resources and trip planning tools that inspire travel and consistently convey the exceptional quality of Oregon. The commission aims to improve Oregonians’ quality of life by strengthening economic impacts of the state’s $8.8 billion tourism industry that employs nearly 92,000 Oregonians. www.TravelOregon.com

SOURCE Travel Oregon

As a Bay Area luxury travel agent for more than three decades, Lynda Turley Garrett never thought she’d be selling trips to outer space.

For the past five years, however, the president of Alpine Travel in Saratoga has been doing just that as an accredited space agent — one of five in the Bay Area.

Through Virgin Galactic, which has been testing rocket flights for spacecraft WhiteKniteTwo and SpaceShipTwo, Garrett has sold three tickets to future astronauts.

Although the date of lift-off for the craft, which can carry six passengers and two pilots, is uncertain Garrett said space travelers should expect the suborbital trip to blast off within the year or so.

In a historic moment today and for the future of private space travel, SpaceX Dragon successfully sent equipment to the International Space Station and returned back to earth.

Alexander Zwissler, executive director of Oakland’s Chabot Space and Science Center, called this morning’s water landing in the Pacific Ocean an historic event and “just the beginning of the commercialization of space.”

The Hawthorne, Calif.,-based company SpaceX is headed by Elon Musk, who has supported the East Bay museum, and is working to take astronauts to the ISS now that the unmanned capsule delivered materials to the station, paving the way for future private travel.

Space travel provider Virgin Galactic has been ramping up efforts to send tourists to space, with more than 450 passengers already booked for the $200,000 flight, with a $20,000 deposit required up front, according to Garrett.

Although pricey, the deposit grants access to visit the spaceport in New Mexico; a meeting with Richard Branson, and the chance to see the progress of the spacecraft — alluring benefits for the future “astronauts.”

Branson, the head of Virgin Group, will be a passenger on the craft’s inaugural flight, once safety tests have been completed.

To become an agent booking clients for the 2.5-hour trip to space, Garrett had to apply to become a contractor, showing she could sell luxury travel and that she had a passion for galactic tourism.

“I pinch myself that I’m able to sell space travel,” Garrett said.

The travel agent plans to eventually join her clients and jet off on the spacecraft and was able to experience 6 g-force, or a strong, space-like gravitational force, on a flight simulator at the NASTAR Center in Philadelphia, which prepares astronauts for the journey.

Another Bay Area space agent Tony Cardoza, president of Cardoza-Bungey Travel in Palo Alto said he too is interested in making the suborbital flight.

He took over his mother’s travel agency when she died a few years ago and took on her work to send people into space. Two clients have signed on since through his agency.

Cardoza has been in training to prepare for selling space tickets and said there is the “feeling you are part of the next push into space.”

As to Garrett’s three clients ready for the out-of-this-world experience, weightlessness included, the agent said they are in their 20s, 40s, and 50s, with two from the Bay Area and another in Toronto.

Cardoza said his two clients, both women, are very different ages but have both been fascinated with space travel since a young age.

One of the oldest people who signed up for a flight through Virgin Galactic hails from Japan and is in her 80s, Garrett said.

Garrett believes “in our lifetime going to space is going to be as simple as taking a flight to Los Angeles,” although she admits that it currently is “hard for us to fathom.”

Cardoza sees those who are signing up as space tourists as pioneers, “making possible the next wave of space exploration.”

For more information about space travel visit virgingalactic.com.

Local Travel Agents Booking Space Flights for $200K

–Bay City News

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Thirty years ago, “mired in a deteriorating marriage” and on the cusp of 50, Edward Hoagland met a 30-ish nurse in Fairbanks, Alaska, and leapt at the chance to join her on her medical rounds throughout the state. The result is ALASKAN TRAVELS: Far-Flung Tales of Love and Adventure (Arcade, $22.95), a rhapsodic account of their journeys by single-engine Cessna to a series of remote settlements. “I . . . was plenty content with starlight round the clock,” writes this celebrated author and essayist, who finds that subfreezing temperatures and spartan conditions can act as a kind of aphrodisiac, “sleeping catch as catch can on a clinic or schoolroom floor with my friend, while she tested the populace of the hamlet for tuberculosis.”

When not watching his lover take sputum samples from the locals, Hoagland fills his notebooks with material gathered from the Kenai Peninsula to the Arctic Circle to the Yukon River. He finds a land awash in oil money and opportunity yet blighted by pockets of poverty and desolation. His encounters with indigenous people — like the polar bear hunter who “pursued his passionate specialty far out on the pack ice solo” and boasts of having shot 36 of the creatures — illuminate a fragile culture struggling to hold on to its traditions. He also meets many transplants from the lower 48, some lured by the chance for adventure, others fleeing broken lives: “A marital or business tailspin, some stinging dismissal or ill-healed wound, even a motorcycle accident, could have propelled people here.”

Hoagland captures a world of extremes where alcohol abuse is rampant, violence breaks out in places miles from the nearest law enforcement agent and the harsh climate permits no mistakes: “In the winter, a drunk could stumble home, forget to light the fire in his hovel before passing out” and be found dead in the morning. “Alaska plays for keeps,” Hoagland observes, “with its whiteouts and fog multiplying the ordinary factors of luck and risk.”

Hoagland climaxes this memorable odyssey with a summertime float on the Tanana River on a tugboat pushing barges loaded with airplane fuel and equipment for an Air Force base in the interior. Reflecting on his adventure three decades later, Hoagland, now almost an octogenarian, remarks that Alaska is “a kind of coccyx on the body politic, reminding us — if we dream on it — of a Lewis-and-Clark past. . . . a national dreamscape severed from the hourly news.”

Benjamin Taylor’s NAPLES DECLARED: A Walk Around the Bay (Marian Wood/Putnam, $26.95) pays homage to a beautiful yet hard-edge city. From its early days as a colony of ancient Greece, Taylor traces Naples’s successive incarnations as a Roman summer retreat, a Norman dominion and an incubator of Renaissance geniuses like Caravaggio. Later it became a battleground between 18th-century royalists and republicans, a city struggling under Nazi occupation and a modern-day haven for the southern Italian Mafia, the Camorra.

Taylor’s tour is a bit static, bogged down by a few too many visits to monuments, palaces, fortresses and other spots that evoke the city’s turbulent past. But his encounters with quirky Neapolitans — a die-hard Communist still seething over his party’s 1948 electoral defeat by the Christian Democrats, a Buddhist taxi driver who enlightens Taylor over dinner at a dive cafe — inject some spontaneity into the proceedings. And he serves up some morbidly entertaining nuggets of Neapolitan history. One concerns Francesco Caracciolo, a naval commander under the Bourbon kings who rebelled and helped found a brief, unsuccessful republic. After his capture and execution by the Bourbons’ ally, Lord Nelson, Caracciolo’s corpse was dumped into the bay. “In the surreal aftermath,” Taylor writes, “Caracciolo’s body, though weighted at the feet, resurfaced . . . and seemed to all who saw him, including the newly returned king, to be making his way back to Naples. Terrified, Ferdinand ordered a Christian burial.” No wonder Henry James described the city as “at the best wild and weird and sinister.”

Joshua Hammer, a former Newsweek bureau chief, is a freelance foreign correspondent. He is writing a book about German colonialism in southern Africa.

LONDON |
Fri Jun 1, 2012 10:31am EDT

LONDON (Reuters) – Got an extra long weekend to explore the British capital where Queen Elizabeth II will be celebrating her 60th year on the throne with a massive Diamond Jubilee party? Reuters correspondents with local knowledge help visitors explore London amid the royal hoopla.

Friday

6 p.m. You’d better arrive at least a day or two ahead of the main festivities. Many people will get to London even earlier and will already be staking out places for Sunday’s 1,000-boat flotilla along the Thames, Monday’s pop concert outside Buckingham Palace and Tuesday’s royal procession along the Mall. For a full official guide look on: www.thediamondjubilee.org/

Why not familiarize yourself with some of the local culture and go for a pint first. Friday night before a national holiday means the pubs will be buzzing.

Ditch the ubiquitous lager dens dotted around the capital in favour of a visit to the 2010 “pub of the year” as chosen by Britain’s Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA).

The Harp in Chandos Place lies in the shadow of Nelson’s Column in Trafalgar Square, near Covent Garden shopping, dining, Leicester Square, the theatre district and the pubs and clubs of Soho.

8 p.m. Dine with the ruling class at Rules restaurant (www.rules.co.uk) in Covent Garden. It’s old, it’s grand, the food is traditional English and it’s a popular dining spot for the privately educated elite. This gastronomic institution has been reviewed by Kingsley Amis, defended by John Betjeman, immortalised by Graham Greene and frequented by Edward VII and his lover Lillie Langtry.

Top up at the bar with a pre-dinner drink from the Royal Collection Cocktails menu: One recipe for every one of the 16 countries where Queen Elizabeth is head of state.

10 p.m.

Throw some regal shapes at one of the clubs favoured by the young royals. Cut loose at Whisky Mist (www.whiskymist.com), get your Middleton mojo on at Mahiki (www.mahiki.com) or shake your aristocratic booty at Boujis (www.boujis.com) until the wee hours. Plenty of Sloane Rangers and Hooray Henrys to choose from here. But remember: keen royal watchers are already standing five deep at the barricades.

Saturday

Unless you have tickets for the Epsom Derby, where Queen Elizabeth will kick off jubilee celebrations by indulging in her passion for horse-racing, today is the best of two days to get your sightseeing in before the pageantry of the coming days.

9 a.m. Head to the Tower of London (www.hrp.org.uk). Founded by William the Conqueror after his 1066 invasion of England, the Tower, with its strategic location on the River Thames, has been a royal palace, a place of execution, a prison for traitors and still holds Britain’s Crown jewels.

12 p.m. Cross over Tower Bridge, turn left and go for lunch at one of the many restaurants on the South Bank. For top dining try Le Pont de la Tour which overlooks the Thames, or the slightly less formal dining at the Chop House and Blueprint Cafe. They are all found at one website (www.lepontdelatour.co.uk/)

1 p.m. Head back toward Tower Bridge and keep walking past it. Here are the Mayor’s round and gleaming glass and steel offices. There is a broad walkway beside the Thames that is popular with both locals and tourists.

As you stroll along you’ll pass the Clink museum (www.clink.co.uk), Vinopolis (www.vinopolis.co.uk) — a wine-lovers’ emporium of all beverages related to the grape — a replica of Francis Drake’s globe-circumnavigating ship the Golden Hinde (www.goldenhinde.com), and a lovely bankside pub called the Anchor Bankside before arriving at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre (www.shakespearesglobe.com).

The thatch-roofed, oak-beamed Globe is a faithful reconstruction of the open-air playhouse designed in 1599 and a unique international resource dedicated to the exploration of Shakespeare’s work and the playhouse for which he wrote.

Take in nearby Tate Modern Museum (www.tate.org/modern/), housed in an imposing converted power station. Further along the river you can go for a ride on the giant London Eye (www.londoneye.com) Ferris wheel or cross the Millennium footbridge just opposite the Tate for a visit to Christopher Wren’s magnificent St. Paul’s Cathedral (www.stpauls.co.uk), where Charles and Diana were married.

If you’d like to recreate last year’s royal wedding of Prince William to Kate Middleton – now known as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge – wander a bit further on and cross over Westminster Bridge for a visit to Westminster Abbey (www.westminster-abbey.org).

Here is also where England’s monarchs are crowned and many put to eternal rest alongside the graves of the unknown warrior, Geoffrey Chaucer, Alfred Tennyson, Robert Browning, Charles Dickens, Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy, George Frederic Handel and Laurence Olivier.

Sunday

7 a.m Get up! Get out! If you want to catch even a glimpse of the royal flotilla as it passes through London on the River Thames, you’d better make your way to a viewing spot soon alongside a million expected spectators.

A Chinese junk, Venetian gondolas and a boat rowed by Olympic champions will be part of the 1,000-vessel flotilla, where the queen will also be accompanied by a host of musicians playing everything from Bollywood songs to James Bond tunes.

London mayor Boris Johnson has said he expected the flotilla to be “like Dunkirk except more successful”, a reference to the evacuation of British troops from France during World War Two.

Olympic and Paralympic champions including five-time rowing gold medal winner Steve Redgrave will lead the flotilla in a vessel also manned by soldiers injured in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The first Chinese junk to visit London since the Great Exhibition in 1851 will join the flotilla, as well as several gondolas, passenger ships, kayaks and lifeboats.

The flotilla will be over seven miles long and travel 25 miles of the Thames, passing every bridge in central London, some of which will be open to spectators at each end. For help with finding a spot to watch, click on: here

4 p.m. After the procession, Go for tea. Claridges (www.claridges.co.uk) was named by the United Kingdom Tea Council as London’s top afternoon tea place for 2011 and it’s just around the corner. Make sure you book in advance and obey the dress code: Elegant smart casual; no shorts, vests, sportswear, flip flops, ripped jeans or baseball caps.

6 p.m. Head back to your hotel for some rest.

8 p.m. Now that you’ve tasted a bit of royal hoopla, you might also be hungry for dinner. There are some 140 restaurants in Britain with Michelin stars, four of which have the highest accolade of three stars. Two of those are in London.

One is Restaurant Gordon Ramsay on Royal Hospital Road (www.gordonramsay.com) in Chelsea, the other is Alain Ducasse at The Dorchester hotel (www.alainducasse-dorchester.com).

Monday

10 a.m. Have a lie-in. You might not have tickets for the pop concert at the palace tonight here . But you can be in the vicinity to soak up the tunes and the vibe.

In the meantime, take the opportunity to visit the London dungeon experience (here) near London Bridge. Scare yourself with the prospect of transportation or execution, take the rat walk or the Traitor; Ride to Hell as you experience 1,000 years of the darker side of British history.

12 p.m. Go for lunch at the George Inn, a 17th century pub which earns a mention in Charles Dickens’s “Little Dorrit” and is London’s last remaining galleried coaching inn. Dickens used to come here for coffee.

The George’s aged two-tiered balconies overlook a courtyard set aside for patrons to enjoy beer, ale, porter, stout and all other manner of drink as well as a hearty menu of pub food. This London treasure was rebuilt in 1676, after a fire destroyed the original. Shakespeare was another well-known regular.

2 p.m Take the Underground to the Imperial War Museum near Westminster. Winston Churchill was the queen’s first prime minister and it was from here that he directed the Allied Forces which defeated Nazi Germany in World War Two.

The original Cabinet War Rooms – today part of the Churchill War Rooms – which sheltered the people at the heart of Britain’s wartime government during the Blitz, lie beneath London’s bustle.

In 1940, shortly after becoming Prime Minister, Churchill stood in the War Cabinet Room and declared: ‘This is the room from which I will direct the war’. Today, you can step back in time to explore the secret headquarters where Churchill and his staff changed the course of history.

4 p.m. Head to the nearby Strand and Covent Garden for a bit of early supper or a late tea in one of the many restaurants and cafes.

6 p.m. You have three choices. If you have tickets for the party at the palace, get over there and have a mooch round the royal gardens and then take your place for a gala pop concert which will include Paul McCartney, Stevie Wonder, Elton John, Ed Sheeran, Jessie J, JLS, Kylie Minogue and Robbie Williams on a spectacular stage built around the Queen Victoria Memorial, right in front of Buckingham Palace.

If you don’t have tickets you could join the thousands of people who are likely to be in the vicinity, head back to your hotel to watch it on the BBC, see it on a BBC big screen outdoors (here) or find a local pub holding a jubilee pop concert party.

Tuesday

6 a.m. By now you must be royally exhausted. Nevertheless, today is THE day. The royal procession, the horse-drawn coach, the guards on horseback, a thanksgiving service at St. Paul’s Cathedral and the royal wave from the balcony of Buckingham Palace, a flypast and a feu de joie (celebratory rifle salute).

Get your sandwiches, thermos of tea or coffee, bottles of water and a spot along the royal process route and hang onto your view.

A timetable can be found on: here

4 p.m. Go home.

(Reporting by Paul Casciato, editing by Steve Addison)