Affordable Europe: Check Auto Europe for car rentals

It seems wrong to gripe on a Friday, but… Yesterday, I had one of those crazy business-travel days with a lot of travel for very little business: I flew from New York City to Albany, rented a car, drove to very pretty Lake George for an hour-long conference appearance, then returned home the same way. Anyway, my gripe involves the car rental. This will be the last time I rent from National unless the company learns to go easy on the air "freshener." I spent the entire time I was in the car trying desperately to breathe (and leaving the windows open didn't help at all). I wouldn't normally whine about this (publicly, anyway), but when I returned the car, the attendant said that I wasn't the only person to complain. Apparently it's a policy to over-perfume the cars. Anyone else have this problem with National? (It's that same smell that trash-bag makers and other household-product companies call "fresh scent" but it's just disgusting—at least to my nose.)

We've all known that Europe is at its most expensive during the summer. But tour operator Trafalgar is now trumpeting the flip side of things: All the savings you receive if you travel to Europe during the rest of the year. And to make winter in Europe ever more appealing, Trafalgar has renamed the period between November and April 2009 its “value season.” Booking tours during this time will net you an average 20 percent discount off the cost of summer tours. As an extra incentive, Trafalgar is adding early-booking savings: Passengers who book and make a deposit on a tour by July 31 will receive a free pre- or post-night, or double your Trafalgar Club Discount and save an extra 10 percent; if you book and pay in full at least seven months out, you'll save an additional five percent off; pay in full at least four months in advance and get 2.5 percent off. Read the details on trafalgar.com. [hat tip to Travel Weekly] MORE ON AFFORDABLE EUROPE Florence discounts.

You probably already have a favorite travel search engine, such Kayak or Mobissimo. But a revamped and renamed website has debuted today with a clever twist on travel planning. UpTake is a new name for Kango.com, which used to merely archive travel reviews from hundreds of websites and guidebooks to help users plan trips. UpTake has now become much bolder. It scours more than 1,000 travel sites and filters millions of opinions to have edited lists of advice on what do do and where to stay in the U.S. Uptake also makes it easier for you to do "theme-based" travel searching, such as a search for "“girls-getaways” or “pet-friendly" in, say, Las Vegas. This may be a more intuitive way for some people to search for travel. The site says it has listings for 400,000 hotels and activities, culled from multiple sources. It only covers the U.S., though. [Uptake.com] Below, you'll find a two-minute video from the company explaining how to make the most of the site, such as by how to plan a trip to Monterrey, Calif. The narrator is a bit stiff.* But overall, the two-minute video is helpful, and it includes a sneak peak of what's going to be rolled out on the site within a couple of months. *the description of narrator has been modified since this item was first posted.

If you've ever stood in line at U.S. Immigration and wondered if the agents feel a bit too comfortable in their power--I know I have--then you should absolutely read this story in today's New York Times. (Actually, it's even more imperative that you read it if you don't think immigration agents are abusing their power.) To sum it up, an Italian man flew to Dulles airport outside D.C. to visit his American girlfriend. He ended up being detained in jail for 10 days for no apparent reason. (Agents claimed he asked for asylum; as the man's girlfriend says, "Who on earth would seek asylum from Italy?") Whether or not this is truly an isolated incident remains to be seen. But even if it is, the federal government must set up some kind of basic protection for travelers visiting the U.S. (because they have no rights at all). At a bare minimum, they must have the right—if refused entry—to communicate with whomever they choose (an embassy, family, the person they're visiting), and they must be given some sort of due process, including an explanation of why they're being held. What's more, U.S. immigration should have to regularly publish (daily? weekly?) a list of who's being detained and for how long.