Peter Odle, owner and managing director of the 76-room Mango Bay Hotel in Barbados, is taking the reigns as president of the Caribbean Hotel Association (CHA) for the two-year term beginning June 2006 through June 2008. The gavel was passed from Berthia Parle, of Bay Gardens Inn in St. Lucia, at CHA´s Annual General Meeting during the Caribbean Hotel Industry Conference (CHIC) 2006 in Miami, Florida. Mrs. Parle will assume the role of Chairman of CHA for the next two years and continue to assist in the running of the association.

The July/August issue of Global Finance, a publication read in over 158 countries, announced the San Juan Marriott Resort & Stellaris Casino as the best hotel in Puerto Rico for business travelers. The award is based on a survey sent to 15,000 of the publication´s readers around the world, asking about their travel preferences and experiences, along with their nominations for the awards. San Juan Marriott came in as number one in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.

Bad business decisions, economic problems in Brazil as well as changes in the world air transportation market have all contributed to sending airline Varig, one of the largest in Latin America, into a tailspin. A Brazilian court last Friday cancelled the sale of the bankrupt airline to an employees group for $449 million after it failed to make a deposit on time, and delayed a decision on the carrier´s fate until next week.

Spanish airports operator AENA will offer 28 percent more landing and takeoff slots during the 2006-07 winter season, thanks to more capacity at Madrid´s new T4 terminal and at Barcelona´s El Prat Airport, the company said on this week. Low-cost carriers easyJet and Ryanair had been granted a limited number of slots to offer domestic flights, in addition to their international routes.

The Kuoni Group has taken a further step in its declared acquisition strategy within the specialist travel segment: Kuoni Switzerland has acquired Kontiki Saga AG, the Swiss market company for travel to Northern Europe. The acquisition enables Kuoni to further expand its leadership of the Swiss travel market. Kuoni Switzerland is acquiring Kontiki Saga AG from its owners and top management. Kontiki has been operating in Switzerland for 30 years, and is the market leader for travel to Scandinavia, Finland and Iceland.

Americans continue to visit Egypt in numbers not seen since record setting 2000. The trend continued in May 2006 when 18,935 Americans visited Egypt, a 16.3 percent increase over the same period in 2005. Egypt has continued to experience double-digit growth, over 2005, from American tourists. In 2006, 98,388 Americans have visited Egypt, an extraordinary increase of 20.9 percent over last year´s 81,398 for the same period.