PBS' own Samantha Brown, host of "Places to Love", was our guest this week, in celebration of her 25 years as a TV travel show host.
Foreign.
Speaker B:Welcome to the Fromer Travel Show.
Speaker B:I'm your host, Pauline Fromer.
Speaker B:We have a very special guest today.
Speaker B:She is Samantha Brown.
Speaker B:You know her from tv, you know her from the travel shows.
Speaker B:She has one of the most storied careers in the travel industry.
Speaker B:Welcome back to the Fromer Travel Show.
Speaker B:Sam.
Speaker C:Well, it's great to be back.
Speaker C:Thank you for having me.
Speaker B:Of course.
Speaker B:So I have a bone to pick with your publicist.
Speaker C:Got it.
Speaker B:Because they are spreading the most vicious lies about you.
Speaker B:They are saying that you have.
Speaker B:This is your 25th anniversary as a TV host, and I know for a fact you did not start at the age of 10.
Speaker C:Yes, it is.
Speaker C:It is true, Pauline.
Speaker C:It is my 25th year, and it snuck up on me as well.
Speaker C:I think it was last year, I was like, huh?
Speaker C:Someone's like, well, how many years you been doing this?
Speaker C:I'm like, well, I mean, you know, carry the two.
Speaker C:And like, oh, my.
Speaker A:Oh.
Speaker C:Oh, my gosh.
Speaker C:Oh, my gosh.
Speaker C:It's going to be my 25th year.
Speaker C:I'm like, I mean, that's huge.
Speaker C:So, yeah, I feel like I've been doing this for five and you look.
Speaker B:Like you've been doing it for five.
Speaker B:I mean, where is that picture?
Speaker B:In the attic, you know, stored.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker C:The portrait.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker B:So 25 years.
Speaker B:How has travel programming changed in that time, do you think?
Speaker C:Oh, huge.
Speaker C:I think just from my own personal experience, when I started out with this job, we always went to the greatest hit cities and we did what everybody knew happened in those cities.
Speaker C:So greatest hits within the greatest hits.
Speaker C:And if we did anything that ventured off sometimes we would get some pushback, like, whoa, how could you go to Rome and not show this?
Speaker C:How could you do this and not go here?
Speaker C:And that has completely dissolved.
Speaker C:Everyone wants to know places that go beyond, you know, these top destinations.
Speaker C:They want to know the smaller cities, the hidden gems, and they want to find out what they don't know.
Speaker C:They want to be surprised.
Speaker C:They still remain curious.
Speaker C:And so I've really felt a change, a real shift in what people expect.
Speaker C:If we did what everyone knows about a place I know, people would be disappointed.
Speaker B:Huh.
Speaker B:That is a big, big change.
Speaker B:Do you think it's because your viewers are getting much more traveled?
Speaker B:Do you think it's a difference in that there's so much media around travel, or do you think it's really that the viewers have been getting out there?
Speaker C:You know, I think it's a little bit of both, but I know that certainly media, social media has Changed the game in that people see these places coming into their feeds every single day.
Speaker C:And where maybe you got a really great book, or maybe you read the newspaper that week or maybe that month, or only when you thought about the place, if you saw it in a movie or it was a background in a book that you loved, would you start to learn more.
Speaker C:And now it's just coming into our lives, whether sometimes you like it or not, depending on the algorithm of that day.
Speaker C:And so people.
Speaker C:Okay, people know that.
Speaker C:Okay, this is what.
Speaker C:This is what you do.
Speaker C:They're seeing people out there.
Speaker C:What they want to know what else is.
Speaker C:They're inundated with those images of.
Speaker C:Of, say, the Trevi Fountain.
Speaker C:I don't know why I'm picking on Rome.
Speaker C:I just am.
Speaker C:But, you know, like the Trevi Fountain.
Speaker C:And people are just like, I don't.
Speaker C:I don't want that.
Speaker C:I'd like something else.
Speaker C:Or maybe since I've seen it and I've seen it again and again and again, it loses some of its specialness, and people want to understand what's special.
Speaker C:But on top of that, Pauline, it's absolutely that more people are traveling.
Speaker C:And I don't have any numbers to back that up, per se, but I just feel it myself that everyone wants to travel.
Speaker C:It is an absolute aspiration in life, and people make it a reality.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And those numbers are out there.
Speaker B: my father started writing in: Speaker B: I think in: Speaker B:A couple of weeks ago, I think there were 3 million Americans who would travel every year.
Speaker C:Okay.
Speaker B:Now it's.
Speaker B:Now it's tens of millions.
Speaker C:Wow.
Speaker B:Who get out there and hit the road, and they do that often.
Speaker B:Following in your footsteps.
Speaker B:So you have a wonderful show on pbs.
Speaker B:It's called Places to Love.
Speaker B:So what places are you loving this year?
Speaker B:What are you going to show to your viewers?
Speaker C:Well, we really wanted to focus on places that, if it's known, well known, maybe a different time to go, because I think travelers are fed up with excessive prices, crowds, heat.
Speaker C:And so, for instance, internationally, we went to Costa Rica, a very popular destination, especially in the winter, when everyone wants to escape these cold temps, but people avoid it in July when it's their rainy season.
Speaker C:And so we went as a crew, and we shot it then.
Speaker C:And it was beautiful.
Speaker C:Sure, it rained, but it always stopped.
Speaker C:And we found the temperatures lovely, and we were still able to enjoy everything that you.
Speaker C:I feel.
Speaker C:I mean, okay.
Speaker C:You can't lie on the beach if you're a beachgoer.
Speaker C:No, that's probably not the time to go.
Speaker C:Who wants to be worried about, you know, rain when you want to get a tan or you want to play in the ocean or the, the sea.
Speaker C:But we were there to experience its natural beauty and the animals and, you know, the, the, the just the, the tropical experience that Costa Rica gives, that really natural experience.
Speaker B:What part of Costa Rica were you in?
Speaker C:We were in what's considered the north, so sort of right there in the middle.
Speaker C:So Rio Celeste and La Fortuna, which is a popular spot for spa.
Speaker C:And even though we were there, we didn't show La Fortuna that much.
Speaker C:We, we used it as a place to kind of go off because we felt La Fortuna got a lot of press.
Speaker C:So let's go somewhere else.
Speaker C:So we went to Rio Serapiqui and we went to the, the Tropical, sorry, Tropical Organization.
Speaker C:The name is escaping me, but yeah, but so it just, we, we did a lot of things and I always like to, to point out that when I go to a place, I'm there with cameras and equipment.
Speaker C:And so the worst thing that can happen is we're just wet.
Speaker C:And yet we enjoyed it and it was fine.
Speaker C:So I just feel like if we can do it with cameras and really expensive equipment, I think that the average traveler is going to love it even more.
Speaker B:So how wet was it though?
Speaker B:I mean, what percentage of the day did it rain while you were there?
Speaker C:30 to 40%.
Speaker B:Well, that's not too bad.
Speaker B:And was some of that while you were sleeping or was it daytime hours?
Speaker C:I would say daytime.
Speaker C:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker C:And I was surprised because we were always able to shoot around it because, I mean, at times we can't be shooting in pouring rain and we would just have a cup of coffee and we would wait and then head out and, and a lot of times when you're in that tropical rainforest, you're being protected by the rainforest itself from all the rain.
Speaker C:And so the only reason why we stopped is because we had the equipment.
Speaker C:If I was a traveler, I would have kept going.
Speaker C:Absolutely.
Speaker B:The rain, it's still warm, so it's not like bitter cold rain.
Speaker B:It's probably felt good.
Speaker C:No, you, I brought a rain jacket and I felt stupid because if you're hot, you don't want a rain jacket on.
Speaker C:So you just, you just, you know, you're in this beautiful rain and then it dries off and it was, it was lovely.
Speaker C:I loved it.
Speaker B:Now you also went to I hope I'm getting this right.
Speaker B:The Crystal Cape, is that correct?
Speaker C:The Crystal coast of North Carolina.
Speaker C:So you fly into Charlotte and it's like a three hour drive due east, straight shot east.
Speaker C:And because of that drive, it really only gets a real local population visiting it.
Speaker B:I'd never heard of it.
Speaker C:It's not.
Speaker C:Yeah, it's not inundated with lots of outside travelers.
Speaker C:And that makes it an absolute gem.
Speaker C:It's beautiful.
Speaker C:Like it has a few real wonderful experiences that make it totally unique within the world.
Speaker C:One, it's an international dark sky.
Speaker C:It has that designation only one on the eastern seacoast from Florida, which I was so shocked.
Speaker C:And they have to, to be an international dark sky.
Speaker C:There are things you have to do to protect your night sky, which I think is beautiful.
Speaker C:And because of that, they have a very active stargazing population.
Speaker C:So we joined them.
Speaker C:And then also a wild horse population.
Speaker C:They have Shackelford Banks, which is for all intents and purposes an island, a bank, and these wild horses.
Speaker C:And they don't know exactly where they came from.
Speaker C:Colonists could have brought them, but also the Spanish, they could have arrived even earlier than that.
Speaker C:But they are managed by the national park system and they keep them wild.
Speaker C:They have a, you know, they have someone who checks up on them.
Speaker C:But if there are, there's an injury, these horses, they duke it out because there's a harem and there's the stallion, but they do not come in with medication or anything.
Speaker C:They really leave them wild.
Speaker C:So again, it's just a really, really two, you know, just experiences that you didn't think you could have so close on the East Coast.
Speaker B:How do you shoot wild horses?
Speaker B:Do you have to know where they are?
Speaker B:Are you tracking them via satellite?
Speaker B:I would think it would be hard to, to know how to get them or where to get them.
Speaker C:Yeah, great question because the bank was pretty large.
Speaker C:There's 118 of them.
Speaker C:But when we were with the national park ranger, her, she was saying, we don't know, we'll, we'll go to the spot where we think they're going to be.
Speaker C:It's like an open meadow where there's lots of grasses and we just hope for the best.
Speaker C:And you can absolutely walk the entire bank.
Speaker C:But it's a nine, it's a, like a three, four mile bank.
Speaker C:I mean that's, that's a, that's a lot of ground to cover.
Speaker C:So we were lucky.
Speaker C:We stumbled upon four of them.
Speaker C:And then I think our drone was able to pick up a Few more, but.
Speaker C:So, yeah, yeah, it's.
Speaker C:It's kind of serendipitous if you meet up with them.
Speaker C:And of course there's all these rules of keeping your distance, which we, you know, had no problem doing.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So that's two nature destinations.
Speaker B:Did you also do an urban destination this year?
Speaker C:We.
Speaker C:We must have.
Speaker C:Oh, yes, we did.
Speaker C:We.
Speaker C:Because I love urban destinations, I think are my wheelhouse.
Speaker C:I just love going to cities.
Speaker C:We focused this year on sort of unknown cities in Germany.
Speaker C:Germany is a hot spot.
Speaker C:Getting.
Speaker C:Well, it's a hot spot because it's not so hot, I guess.
Speaker C:Yeah, I think people are starting to maybe rethink Italy, Spain, Portugal in the summer and go further north.
Speaker C:But so we visited the cities of like say Leipzig, which doesn't get a lot of, I would say American travel love, but fascinating.
Speaker C:This is where Johann Sebastian Bach went to be the, the Sir Thomas, the Thomas Church cantor.
Speaker C:So he created some of his best, you know, masterpieces while in Leipzig.
Speaker C:It has a fascinating East German museum all about that time.
Speaker C:And what I had no idea, Pauline, is that it was the people of Leipzig and their peaceful protests that brought down the Berlin Wall.
Speaker C:It was them that kept it up.
Speaker C:And they came out hundreds of thousands after like 10 years of just maybe 6 people gathering and 10 people and 20 people.
Speaker C: And then I believe it was it: Speaker C:Is that my.
Speaker C:Getting that right when the Berlin Wall.
Speaker B:I think it was because I was actually in a two year acting program and there was this guy Ennis in our program who when the wall went down, he left without permission and went to see it because he wanted to be where history was being made.
Speaker B:And I thought he was crazy at the time because he risked getting kicked out of school.
Speaker B:But now I look back and think, wow, wish I had done.
Speaker B:Wish I had gone with him.
Speaker C:Exactly.
Speaker C:But it was funny, Pauline, because while we were there, what makes it a really neat city to travel to waste is it's.
Speaker C:It's got the nickname called Hypzig and this is something that Germans call it because everyone who kind of got priced out of Berlin artists moved to Leipzig.
Speaker C:And so it has a very young population, very creative.
Speaker C:It has the largest, I think it was a wool spinning factory in Europe, was decommissioned in the 90s.
Speaker C:And then it just filled in with amazing artist studios.
Speaker C:And it's where there's dance and theater and art and glass.
Speaker C:And so you go there and you're just sort of a part of this great creativity.
Speaker C:So it's got the, you know, the classical music of Mendelssohn Bach, and then it has the creativity and the art of the sort of the younger generation.
Speaker C:So just a lot, a lot to appreciate.
Speaker C:But I think the Cold War is, to me, just fascinating.
Speaker C:We grew up during the Cold War, and there's still so much that I find like, wow.
Speaker C:And so to go around the East German museum and see their perspective, the Eastern perspective, which is of course different from the Western perspective.
Speaker B:Did you meet people who had grown up in that time or were alive and had insights to give you about living in eastern Germany?
Speaker C:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker C:Actually, the curator of the museum, a lovely woman my age.
Speaker C:And so it was great talking to her.
Speaker C:And she was actually.
Speaker C:She said the biggest misconception the west had with the east was that we were starving.
Speaker C:So we weren't starving at all.
Speaker C:We had to line up for our food, but there was plenty of food.
Speaker C:There was always one brand of anything we didn't have, you know, 10 brands of this.
Speaker C:And she said, and also, you know, they wanted everyone to work.
Speaker C:So women held jobs, they held important jobs.
Speaker C:And she said, and women, she had a lot more than here in the United States.
Speaker C:And they had days off and they had childcare and they had all of this stuff because they needed the women to work.
Speaker C:And so it was a little bit more equal than people give it credit to be.
Speaker B:Interesting.
Speaker B:No.
Speaker B:I hear there's a lot of nostalgia in the east for, like, the products that were around at that time, and some of them have even come back.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And I, when we were in Berlin, I.
Speaker C:Again, it was great perspective because there is a nostalgia for the east and there is these sort of rumblings there.
Speaker C:And how it was described to me is that, you know, and this was a West Berliner talking, saying, you know, when the.
Speaker C:When the wall came down and Germany reunified in one year, basically that reunification wiped out any of what the people of the east had worked towards.
Speaker C:Whatever they did, it was seen as not as good as West Germany.
Speaker C:So whole histories, whole efforts were just seen, you know, you're not good enough.
Speaker C:And so he said it was unfair and maybe if there was more time incorporating both, maybe we wouldn't see this sort of acrimony that we're.
Speaker C:That they're.
Speaker C:They're experiencing now.
Speaker C:And again, that's what I love about travel.
Speaker C:It's a perspective we wouldn't have known unless you ask the people who live it.
Speaker C:Right?
Speaker B:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker B:So your.
Speaker B:Your show is called Places to Love.
Speaker B:Is there any destination that you think either this season or A previous season that a lot of people would say, places to love.
Speaker B:I can't believe she picked that place.
Speaker C:Oh, my gosh.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:I think the one that we.
Speaker C:Huntsville, Alabama, that's still a place that people are like, huh?
Speaker C:Okay.
Speaker C:And then when they see the show, they're like, wow.
Speaker C:And that's what I love to do is people have no expectation, actually a low expectation, and then they're very much surprised.
Speaker C:So Huntsville, Alabama, I've always loved because it's the home of NASA.
Speaker C:It's where they built the Saturn 5 rocket, the one that brought man to the moon.
Speaker C:And so it has a real, you know, scientific.
Speaker C:There's the.
Speaker C:The Smithsonian rocket.
Speaker C:Space Museum is there.
Speaker C:Space camp is there.
Speaker B:And you get to do Space Camp.
Speaker C:I did not get to do that.
Speaker C:A few things that I guess at Space Camp you would get to do, which is you get suited up and you do.
Speaker C:You work on the.
Speaker C:The International Space Station.
Speaker C:And that's pretty cool.
Speaker C:You get the whole hat and everything, helmet.
Speaker C:So that was cool.
Speaker C:And anyone can do that.
Speaker C:You don't have to be a part of Space Camp.
Speaker C:You can sign up for that.
Speaker C:But because.
Speaker C:So it has this whole scientific, you know, very, very.
Speaker C:For lack of better word, nerdy scientists.
Speaker C:Rocket scientists.
Speaker C:Everyone's.
Speaker C:Everyone's a rocket scientist there.
Speaker C:It's crazy.
Speaker C:And.
Speaker C:But then because Huntsville is an affordable place to live, it has a fantastic art scene as well, a lot of creativity because artists can afford to live there.
Speaker C:So you really see that juxtaposition and how they come together.
Speaker C:There is the Low Mill Arts, which is the largest privately owned building in the United States.
Speaker C:And it's.
Speaker C:It was used to be a factory that made military boots for the Vietnam War.
Speaker C:And the person who bought it opened it up to artists.
Speaker C:So it's all artist studios, and you can just walk the halls and enjoy.
Speaker C:And I met a lovely man named Danny Davis, who hand makes guitars.
Speaker C:He only makes 12 a year.
Speaker C:And he was a rocket scientist, of course, and he builds each guitar based on what he did to test a rocket.
Speaker C:So I mean, I just like.
Speaker C:So it's fascinating to see these two, you know, environments kind of meld together and how they.
Speaker C:How they complement each other.
Speaker B:Amazing.
Speaker B:You've made me want to go to Alabama or go.
Speaker B:There's a lot of stuff in Alabama.
Speaker B:When.
Speaker B:Back when we were both actors, I performed at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival, of course.
Speaker C:It's a fun, fantastic Shakespeare.
Speaker B:It was amazing.
Speaker C:It was amazing.
Speaker C:Where is that held?
Speaker B:Well, it's in.
Speaker B:That is in Montgomery.
Speaker C:Montgomery.
Speaker B:Another Very beautiful, friendly, wonderful city.
Speaker B:I learned to love country music and barbecue and just had a ball when I was there.
Speaker B:All right, so before I let you go, nitty gritty information.
Speaker B:Because it can be hard to know what is on PBS when.
Speaker B:So how can people watch your show?
Speaker C:First of all, they can go to my website, samantha-brown.com and we have a how to watch tab.
Speaker C:And basically you plug in your type in your zip code, and then the entire schedule appears in your zip code.
Speaker C:All PBS stations are local in a sense, and so it's a different time period, no matter depending on where you live.
Speaker C:So that's the easiest way.
Speaker B:Oh, good.
Speaker B:Well, thank you so much, and congratulations on 25 years.
Speaker B:What an accomplishment.
Speaker B:Amazing.
Speaker C:Oh, my gosh, it feels good.
Speaker C:It feels good to be here.
Speaker B:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker B:All right, thanks, Sam.
Speaker C:Bye, Ali.
Speaker C:Bye.
Speaker C:Bye.
Speaker B:I have a bit of housekeeping before I say goodbye for this week.
Speaker B:It is travel show season, and I'd love to meet the listeners to this podcast at the travel shows.
Speaker B:So by the time you hear this, I will be winging my way to Chicago.
Speaker B:I will be speaking at the Chicago Travel and Adventure show, which is actually in Rosemont, Illinois, which is a suburb of Chicago, very near o' Hare Airport.
Speaker B:It's a nice convention center, you know, and there's a lot of people who are going to be there, experts alongside myself, giving great travel advice.
Speaker B:There are discounts that you can only get at the show.
Speaker B:There are cultural performances, and there will be me standing all day at the bookstore ready to help you plan your next vacation and also speaking each day.
Speaker B:I'm actually, I am honoring my father with this speech, talking about his life and legacy.
Speaker B:And because he was always a big proponent of affordable travel, I'll be digging into that as well, talking about some of the sneaky ways the industry is getting you to pay more than you'd like to right now and potential ways to save money.
Speaker B:It's getting harder and harder because of AI, but it's an interesting subject, so please come.
Speaker B:We'll also talk about great places you should be traveling.
Speaker B:And I won't.
Speaker B:And wait before I leave that.
Speaker B:And if you want to get in free, go to the website travelshows.com that's the travel and adventure shows website.
Speaker B:You'll find a link there for tickets.
Speaker B:Click on the link.
Speaker B:And when it comes to the time, you need to put in a code, the code you put in to get your free tickets, as many as you want, is fromersvip.com that's F R O M M E R S V I P actually not dot com, just fromersvip is the code as well for those folks in the Chicagoland area, not in Chicago proper.
Speaker B: pm it's at: Speaker B:It should be a great time.
Speaker B:I'm going to be doing a slightly different speech because they don't have audio visual capabilities there, so I'm not going to be able to show slides.
Speaker B:So I'm going to tailor a completely different speech for that event.
Speaker B:But it's always such a delight to go and support a local bookstore, especially Barnes and Noble.
Speaker B:Barnes and Noble has been doing an excellent job in recent years of expanding the chain.
Speaker B:You know, everybody thought bookstores were dead.
Speaker B:Nope, don't count them out yet.
Speaker B:They're wonderful community centers.
Speaker B:They're centers of intellect.
Speaker B:I love Barnes and Nobles.
Speaker B:I love indie stores.
Speaker B:I think it's great to just go to a place where the art of reading and the art of writing is celebrated.
Speaker B:So I hope you'll join me in Skokie.
Speaker B:I hope you'll join me in Rosemont.
Speaker B:You can go to both if you like.
Speaker B:And that is it for this week's show.
Speaker B:Thank you so much for listening to those who are traveling, and that includes me this week.
Speaker B:May I wish you a hearty bon voyage.
Speaker A:Sour candy on the table Lazy afternoons in your sweatpants watching cable well it feels so far away all the channels seem the same Trying to remember all the songs we like to play Cause those lazy afternoons don't come so frequently these days oh it's been so long and I cannot help but wonder Are you ever coming home?
Speaker A:I like you with your sour candy in the boathouse on the lake oh but I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate the way it tastes I can't get you off of my mind Looking out the window where we spend so much of our time Cause I miss the way you feel But I guess you can't control those damn cards with all the both of us are happy when we're free but would it be so hard to find your freedom here and me?
Speaker A:Oh, it's been so long and I cannot help but wonder Are you ever never coming home?
Speaker A:I like you with your sour candy in the boat house on the lake But I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate the way it tast and I I hate the way it tastes?
Speaker A:But I love it all the same?
Speaker A:And I?
Speaker C:I.
Speaker A:Hate the way it tastes?
Speaker A:But I love it all the same?
Speaker A:Oh, I know it's been, it's been, it's been, it's been so long?
Speaker A:And I cannot help but wonder?
Speaker A:Are you ever coming home?
Speaker A:I like you with your sour candy?
Speaker A:In the boathouse on the lake?
Speaker A:But I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate the way taste it's been, it's been so long?
Speaker A:And I cannot help but wonder?
Speaker A:Are you ever coming home?
Speaker A:When I see you with the sour candy?
Speaker A:Don't want it any other way?
Speaker A:Oh, I just hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate, I hate the way it tastes?