Travelwithus

The discovery of  Endurance , the lost vessel of polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton, 107 years after it was sunk by pack ice during an expedition to the Antarctic, has been hailed as “monumental”.  The sunken wreck has been sitting 3,000 metres in among the iciest waters on Earth for more than a century. Considered among the most celebrated shipwrecks never to have been found, the vessel was discovered by a team of marine archaeologists, adventurers, and technicians as part of the Endurance22 expedition at the bottom of the Weddell Sea to the east of the Antarctic Peninsula using undersea drones. THE 1915 EXPEDITION The  Endurance , a 144-ft, three-masted ship, is revered in polar history as it spawned one of the greatest survival stories in exploration. The crew left for Antarctica from South Georgia on December 5, 1914 with 27 members and a stowaway, 69 dogs and a cat. Sir Ernest, the expedition leader, aimed to establish a base on the Weddell Sea coast and the...

The Kangra district administration in Himachal Pradesh has indefinitely banned paragliding activities following the deaths of two people during an accident, an official said. Kangra Deputy Commissioner Dr Nipun Jindal banned paragliding under the Disaster Management Act, the  Press Trust of India  reported. The district’s tourism development officer has also been asked to ensure that paragliding operators and pilots were registered and unique codes issued to them, the official said. Dr Jindal will review the order to ban paragliding in a fortnight after ensuring that registered operators and pilots had adhered to the directions, the district administration said in an official statement. The move follows the death of a paraglider and a helper on Wednesday. The helper pushing the glider got entangled in the rope, causing the glider to lose balance at Bir Billing, a well-known take-off and landing site in Kangra. The two men fell from a height of 25-30 feet, dying on the s...

Enquiries for overseas travel destinations have picked up after the government announced that scheduled commercial international flights will resume from March 27. With more capacity getting added into the system, there will also be a dip in international air fares, which is expected to give a further fillip to travel. To be sure, the travel industry is hoping for a good season ahead, as search queries have spiked and increasing number of travellers are looking for long haul destinations like Australia, US and the UK. Aloke Bajpai, co-founder and group CEO, ixigo told FE that travel search queries from India for instance, Australian cities like Melbourne, Adelaide, and Sydney have jumped 15-20% this month. “We are seeing a trend of travellers now eager to book long-haul destinations, fuelled by international borders reopening and relaxation of rules across the globe,” he said. Data patterns sourced from MakeMyTrip show that 96% of the searches are for the coming summer holiday seas...