👨‍✈️ The Briefing Room:

Notes and open topics from the editor’s desk.

Welcome Departures. The place to be for where to go and what to see. As Asian countries continue their slow but steady post Covid recovery, Japan seems to be the next major destination setting themselves up to reopening its borders to tourists. So on this edition’s Bucket List highlight I share a few of my favorite memories from my last trip to the country. Stick all the way to the end where I share an update on the best hack to skip the queue at US Border Control.

So now without further ado, let’s take it away!

Alvin

📰 This Week in Travel:

A TLDR approach to some of the week’s most important headlines.

• Japan to open its borders for tourists as soon as May. In what is being called an experimental move, the announcement as reported be the Fuji News Network came a day after Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida declared in London his plans to ease the country’s Covid entry restrictions in a effort to restart the the tourism industry after over 2 years of hibernation. The soft opening will initially be only for small tour groups of triple vaccinated foreigners and is expected to gradually ease in restrictions in the coming months.

• There is a new US Mobile Passport Control App. For those who might be heading out internationally for the first time or not done so since the start of the pandemic, make sure you are aware that the US Customs and Border Control has a brand new Mobile Passport app that effective February 2022, replaced the old one. If it sounds a bit confusing or you never heard of the app before, I’ll dive in with some more details on this weeks Travel Hack. It is the best way to save time when reentering the country.

• The European Union continues its path to fully reopening and although there are still few countries with some light entry limitations. The following 15 countries have fully lifted all entry restrictions: Bulgaria, Czechia, Denmark, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, Sweden and Switzerland.

📸 Destination Deep Dive:

Comprehensive multipart series on a single destination.

France Part 12

Last week on Destination Deep Dive: France Part 11 we visited the Champagne Bar on top of the Eiffel Tower. The most touristic roof top bar in the entire city. This week we continue our Parisian rooftop binge to one of the most luxurious.

L'Oiseau Blanc & Le Rooftop

Located steps away from Arc de Triomphe, at the top of the beautiful Peninsula Hotel in Paris, L'Oiseau Blanc (restaurant) and Le Rooftop (bar) offer panoramic views of the city and Eiffel Tower in a chic atmosphere. The 2 Michelin Star restaurant serves traditional French lunch and dinner options curated by resident Chef David Bizet in a comfortable climate controlled room and impeccable service that ensure you have a first class dining experience every time. The bar located on the same level as the restaurants offers al fresco seating and is one of the best places to enjoy a sunset on a clear day.

For reservations: The Peninsula Hotel

About Destination Deep Dives

Destination Deep Dives offer a more immersive look at one particular destination in a recurring format over a several editions of the newsletter. It is where I give myself room to explore a broader set of points of interests, for all travel styles and budgets. Think of them as small parts of a larger travel guide. Even though I will be publishing them all together as one guide at the end of the series, you may access them all as individual articles inside their corresponding Departures edition here:

• France Part 01 // Notre Dame

• France Part 02 // La Tour d’Argent

• France Part 03 // La Samaritaine

• France Part 04 // Shakespeare & Company

• France Part 05 // Café Le Procope

• France Part 06 // Square du Vert-Galant

• France Part 07 // Montparnasse Tour

• France Part 08 // Printempts Haussmann

• France Part 09 // Le Ciel de Paris

• France Part 10 // Khayma Rooftop Bar

• France Part 11 // Champagne Bar at Eiffel Tower

🗺 Bucket List:

Short highlight of a dream destination.

Japan: The Land of the Rising Sun

Some time late 2015 as Mercedes-Benz was pulling out of its Fashion Week sponsorships around the world, I got an email invitation to what would be the new Tokyo Fashion Week sponsored by Amazon. Needless to say I jumped at the opportunity with both feet. In contrast to all my previous trips to Japan though, this one would be documented completely on film. I had been toying again with photographic film for a few years then and had even pulled some of my old cameras from storage to produce a couple of film first projects. But this trip would be the first one I would go completely old school and leave all my digital cameras behind. So this week, instead of going to granular on the country, I’m taking a trip down memory lane and leaving you with a few film scans from that trip. Hope you enjoy!

🧳 Carry-on Only:

Travel experience, tech and accessory reviews.

Every once in a while I come across a piece of travel tech that just leaves me puzzled how no one ever thought of it before? The collapsible German made Pull-Up suitcase is designed to compartmentalize all your items into its own packing cubes and onto individual shelves. As someone who lives in and out of hotels and AirBnb’s, I can not tell you how much time and hassle this level of organization saves. The Pull-Up Suitcase is one of those items that once you use it for the first time, you’ll wonder how you’ll ever travel again without it.

via Pull-Up Suitcase

🛠 Hack of the Week:

Tips and tricks for better travel quality of life.

For several years the US government has offered a trusted traveller program called Global Entry that after paying a $100 application fee and going through a special screening process, unlocks special lanes at major ports and drastically speed the entry process when coming from abroad. Well in what seems like a bit of administrative redundancy, the US Customs and Border Protection offer lesser known alternative called Mobile Passport. This one come in the shape of a free mobile app you download from the Apple App Store or Google Play Although both products definitely have some crossover, for the purpose of this hack I will summarize it by saying Mobile Passport features what in my opinion is the best feature of Global Entry: the special fast lane at the port. All without the application fee, in person interview, screening process and months long approval wait time. Here is a short video from CBP that explains how it works:

But as if the closely similar programs were not enough source of confusion, the initial Mobile Passport app, run by a company called Airside, has been recently superseded by the new Mobile Passport Control app listed above. Though they both offer almost identical functionality, you will need to make sure you have downloaded the correct app as the old one (still listed for download on all platforms) will no longer work effective February 2022.

🛫 About Us:

Departures is a free newsletter about photography, travel & lifestyle. To find out more about what this is, who I am and why should you be here, visit our dedicated about page here:

About Departures