Dollars in Demand

In letters to travel editors of newspapers and magazines, Americans are either complaining about something experienced or relating unpleasant events that took place. Many of the things that go wrong are of their own doing. If they would make all arrangements through reputable travel agents and do a little research on their own while still at home, their trips would be much more pleasant.

The letter in the Oct. 20 Travel Section by Colleen Farley complaining about no value to the U.S. dollar in Europe, no one to accept her American Express card and the fact that no one would redeem her traveler’s checks because of dollar fluctuation is a perfect example.

On our recent trip to Europe, we knew in advance that traveler’s checks were not popular so we took very few and used the last of them to pay our hotel bill at the Novotel in Bordeaux, France, where they happily took them. Visa and MasterCard seem to be accepted everywhere and we easily obtained cash advanced on our MasterCard for a very small fee. Granted, our dollar didn’t buy what it does at home when we were in England, but in France we were always pleasantly surprised by value received.

DIANE OHANIAN

San Diego