Michael Douglas must love Mallorca very much to have agreed to help promote it. He has struck a £3.3 million deal with the Mallorcan tourism authorities which will see him turning up at 'international tourism fairs' over the next four years to encourage tourism to the island.
Does he have any idea what this really involves? As a veteran of tourism shows, such as the World Travel Market in London in November and the ITB in Berlin in March, I would have thought he'd pay NOT to appear at them.
Take ITB. It is the size of a small city with the bustle of Bangkok. Almost every sweaty-suited businessperson in the travel industry is there standing under the artificial lights at counters handing out brochures and offering warm sticky champagne in plastic cups. If someone 'important' is expected at the stand, then you will find dozens of jumpy looking people standing anxiously around awaiting the Tourism Minister/celebrity's arrival. The star/Minister then turns up, says a few words about how their particular country of interest is the biggest in tourism num bers/most beautiful and best and then vanishes to less feverish quarters.
I remember one year turning up to interview the Minister of Tourism for Israel at WTM. The Formica table where I was due to interview him was fresh with slops of coffee and sprinkles of sugar on it. In a rage the Minister stormed off and got a minion to wipe it up. He was obviously not used to such indignities.
The other problem is that stars can almost be ignored in such places. I once bounded up to a lonely Viv Richards at WTM one year, who had been gracing a stand watching the world of vultures tramping by with their freebie badges/biscuits/balloons, oblivious to the famous cricketer's presence.
Michael Douglas's love affair with Mallorca goes back 20 years ago when he bought the S'Estaca estate in the north-west of the island with his former wife Diandra. It is understood that the couple, now divorced, have an agreement where they take six- monthly turns at having the place.
New wife Zeta Jones is said to have the house refitted with her own taste in interiors each time she and Michael take the property over.
Michael Douglas is good news for Mallorca. But I hope his love affair with the island won't be soured by being paraded around sweaty trade shows. He certainly doesn't need the money.
Cassani leaves juggling tale untold
I've just come to the end of Barbara Cassani's new book Go: An Airline Adventure about her four years as boss of the low-cost airline.
I had been hoping she would share some of her secrets about juggling an airline, two children and a husband. But apart from a couple of brief references such as pointing out that women on £20,000 with husbands working shifts are more admirable than she is, she ignores the subject.
Instead she details launching Go, overcoming debts, facing opposition from rivals, steering the company through airline disasters and disruptions, leading a management buyout from BA and getting the airline through the aftermath of 11 September before the eventual takeover by EasyJet. Her story is impressive and her dedication to her work outstanding. But, unlike Richard Branson and James Dyson who describe their working achievements in their autobiographies within the context of their family lives, she doesn't.
She describes being irritated by the Sun's headline 'Mother of Two Launches Airline'.
It's a shame she refuses to acknowledge her achievement. It is like a black person making it to the higher ranks of the police force, or an openly gay politician reaching the Cabinet and expecting everyone to ignore the fact that they have blazed a trail or achieved something that, like it or not, is still exceptional.
In the context of our story last week about the Tourism Society starting a mentoring scheme whereby senior travel industry women share their experiences with those on the way up, it is a disappointment that Cassani won't share hers in her book.
Nanny knows best, even at 35,000ft
A centimetre more legroom, champagne, chocolates or goody bags. Who needs all that fluff when you could be offered the ultimate airline stress-buster - a Sky Nanny?
Norland nannies (the crème de la crème beloved by royals and celebs) will start flying on Gulf Air flights between London and Sydney via Bahrain from 23 November.
The clever thing about having a trained nanny available to all classes, who is skilled in comforting wailing babies, and making sure the children are fed, watered and entertained on this gruelling 24-hour flight is that it benefits everyone, not just parents, but their harassed neighbours too. Something tells me these flights are going to be bestsellers.
