US Open Tennis Travel

There is one more Grand Slam to go for 2009 and as far as tennis travel goes the US Open at Flushing Meadows is not really a big one for us. Don’t get me wrong, I would love it to be as big as our Wimbledon Packages or our French Open travel and we definitely get enquiries. Each year we do a limited number of customised individual tennis travel packages built around the US Open, I just want to do more of them. The US Open should be huge after all it is the last one of the year, it is in New York (officially one of, if not the safest city in America) and it is summer time.

I have lived in New York both on Manhattan and in Queens and it is a special place on the planet for the sports traveller, the cultural sophisticate or the fan of popular culture. I love my Architecture and Modernist Art, after all that true Aussie Icon the Blue Polls was painted in New York. As for popular culture, most of us have a soft spot for either Seinfeld, Sex in the City or any of the Dick Wolf crime dramas.

This year you can get to New York for about $1000 as the deregulation of the trans-pacific air routes and the GFC have put fares in a tail spin, it is not too late to go! If you can’t make New York and most of us can’t get in early for the first of grand slam of 2010 The Australian Open. Australian Open tickets with travel packages have been on sale for a while and six months out is not too early to secure a great hotel and Australian Open Finals tickets as 2010 will see more of old guard or the next wave of hero’s.

AFL Grass roots footy

Kids are doing the Kevin Sheedy Footy Camp in Melbourne this week. It is based in Parkville and its kids from tackas to teens and all between. Interesting there is also a residential program at International House for country and interstate kids that seems popular.

So what has a kids Aussie Rules camp got to do with sports travel and sports tours? Well I spend allot of time online at http://www.sportsnetholidays.com trying to sell AFL travel packages to Melbourne and AFL Grand Final Packages, and when I am not doing selling AFL Grand Final ticket packages on the site I am doing it in Google. All in all it is technical and a lot of time. So it was great to see the kids out there having fun in one of the few times that I have seen that grass roots footy comes together with mainstream AFL.

There were a heap of players & coaches there helping the kids and having fun. How often does a kid get to talk to Presty form the Pies or do a ruck drill with Eddie Betts ? It is not often you see Pagan or Laidley looking relaxed but they were (according to my kids). It was bugging me, why is this so different what is the buzz that is so good around the place. I have been to allot of footy with my boys, the feel was not professional footy like AFL home and away or Port Melbourne vs. The Bullants ,and it wasn’t NAB Auskick or Fitzroy Junior Football Club vs. Brunswick or The Community Cup.

I still don’t know what it is but I think it was the real footballers (kids and a few wide eyed Dads) & the young guys running the Kevin Sheedy Footy Camp combined with the professional footballers and coaches together in a non commercial atmosphere. Everyone was having fun, no press, no sponsors, no logos, no booze, no boff heads and hangers on, just youngsters enjoying their footy and grown up youngsters now living the dream as players & coaches.