News and notes from around the interweb:
- I would visit Cap-Haïtien. I’ve never been, and it is not Port-au-Prince. And I would love to see Citadelle Laferrière.
Our Newark–Cap-Haïtien route is officially in the air. Thank you to everyone who has been part of this journey, and to everyone already booking their seat home.
More flights. More connections. More family.
Book yours at https://t.co/WFSlzPFaTN
📹Video credit: Tele Image… pic.twitter.com/ku0d9WFWW5
— Sunrise Airways (@SunriseAirways) June 4, 2026
(Cover photo credit Rémi Kaupp via Wikimedia Commons)
- SFO Airport has released an RFP for a Terminal 3 East Video Game Lounge
- “Wash outs”
View on Threads
- I wonder if this is true.
Dear @AmericanAir do you realize that due to the proliferation of “junk” PA announcements on your aircraft about credit cards, AA rewards and other garbage, nobody listens to any announcements anymore? Intercom should be for important stuff only. #EndSpam #SafetyNot
— Eric W (@ericrwaller) June 5, 2026
- After installing Starlink in 5 of 12 Boeing 787-8s, British Airways has paused installations for the rest of the fleet until October.
- Restaurant shut down at Pretty Woman hotel due to vermin infestation. Hector Elizondo told Julia Roberts, “Things that go on in other hotels don’t happen at the Regent Beverly Wilshire” but that apparently is not true.
The Four Seasons Beverly Wilshire, located at the intersection of Rodeo Drive and Wilshire Boulevard, has been featured in countless television shows and films, most notably Beverly Hills Cop (1984) starring Eddie Murphy and Pretty Woman (1990) starring Julia Roberts and Richard Gere.
…In late May, inspectors with the L.A. County Department of Public Health shut down two restaurants at the hotel due to “vermin infestation,” meaning rodents, insects or birds were found in food preparation or dining areas.
- United Airlines: there’s room for only two premium carriers in the United States. Also United Airlines: we’re not sure we’re one of them.
@united come get your plane, it’s drunk pic.twitter.com/NpjIE2bV6G
— Sean Buchanan (@seanpbuchanan27) June 7, 2026
- Capital One lounge cookies really are quite good.
Cap-Haïtien! @drrichard, I recall you once visit, right?
People are going to be commenting about not going to Haiti, and they are probably quite right. But when things were quieter 14 years ago I did go to Cap-Haïtien, took the bus from Santo Domingo, walked over the border (a little creek) and continued on to the city. It was poor but not desperately so and at the time peaceful. I’ve been in parts of Asia, Africa and South America that looked almost as poorly off, though economically there seemed to be more going on in those places.
And Citadelle Laferrière was fascinating. Picked up a local guide and we took a taxi there–the driver stayed in a locked cage so nobody could murder him and take his vehicle. We climbed up to the top and toured this immense fortress, even going into the dungeon. It is an astonishing structure on a mountaintop.
Was I glad to go? Yes, would I return? Very unlikely. At the border life expectancy dropped 10 years and compared to Dominicans everybody suddenly looked small and very thin. This is sad and it is not getting any better. But it is what I expected. Years earlier I’d been on a cruise ship, Miami to the ABC islands, and we passed Haiti. From the deck you could see poor people in tiny fishing boats, with onshore a deforested landscape and a tiny, pathetic looking village. I turned around and could see my fellow passengers ignoring all this and stuffing themselves with bad pizza. And just like that the division in the modern world was starkly illustrated.
@1990’s information retention is undefeated! Very interesting anecdote, @drrichard.
Capital One Lounge cookies are indeed very good. I haven’t been to DFW in a long time, but I’m hoping they are still offering the cream puffs there. I randomly crave those from time to time.
My siblings and I spent a summer with our grandfather in Cap Hatien when we were under 10. While it was a different time, being under Baby Doc, we never had any real safety issues. I later realized that if we had been mugged or what not the Tonton Macoute would likely have burned the instigator alive.
We lived in a colonial two story building. Despite having no refrigerator we were very rich as we had our own well for water. Even so, the poverty was breathtaking. One day we were on our second story balcony blowing up balloons and a crowd of children gathered below us. We wondered why. Then it struck us that they had never seen a balloon before. We started throwing the balloons down to them and from the expressions on their faces we had just given them a priceless gift. It still makes me want to cry just thinking about it.
If you go, try to take care of your health and your safety but it can be a fascinating place.
drichard: The situation in Haiti is absolutely awful. Agreed, but what does passengers eating (“stuffing” themselves) pizza actually demonstrate. Should they have fasted in penance while sailing past Haiti? Held a ceremony on desk acknowledging their guilt? Offer to donate their pizza in order to have the ship take it ashore for the hungry natives? Haiti has been badly governed and highly dysfunctional to varying degrees for over 200 years without any apparent international solution being available. It’s a real shame and I personally know some wonderful individual Haitian immigrants who belong to our local church, but the fundamental problem is Haitian society and their inability to effectively govern themselves, not the material success of the US and other countries, including neighboring Dominican Republic.
Nice catch with Cap Hatien. I visited the country in 1999, during a notable if brief period of calm, when US troops were helping to build roads. Cap Hatien was lovely, relative to Port-au-Prince, and the climb to the Citadelle a peak travel experience.
@L737 — It was memorable! (And, I actually do read and remember what folks share, especially if it’s interesting. And, often, anytime @drrichard says something, it is, in fact, usually very much worthwhile.)