Spend three nights at a 5-star resort in buzzing Seminyak, before heading to a deluxe jungle retreat in the cultural hub of Ubud for four nights for only £515pp.

As well as a villa with private pool at each resort, all your breakfasts and transfers are included in the price—all you need to do is book your flights!

Find this offer and more in the Travelzoo Top 20 →

After all the fuss surrounding an air traffic control shutdown, you might be wondering what exactly the good folks over at ATC actually do, and why it caused such mayhem. We understand that they tell pilots where to fly and keep planes at a safe distance from one another, but that’s about as far as most of us can go.

In a previous life, JFC Flight Finder Alyssa had to know a thing or two about the hows and whys of ATC, and luckily, she’s on hand to share all the secrets. Well, probably not all of them, but we travel nerds will take anything!

“There are invisible highways in the sky

While it might look like there are hundreds of planes flying around randomly, there’s actually a surprising amount of organization in the sky. Think about how we travel by car. We use roads to get us from A to B, and there are specific rules we all follow to get around safely. Well, when airspace was being organized, let’s just say our forebears were inspired by the way we get around on land.

Of course, if you look up, you won’t see any actual roads and street signs in the clouds ( insert Doc Brown’s wisdom here). Instead, planes use designated airways (called routes) and points of reference marked by geographical coordinates (called significant points).

Unfortunately for the air traffic controllers who have to memorize them all, these airways don’t have catchy and simple names like “Birch Road” or “Maple Street”. Instead, they are usually named a letter followed by one to three numbers. So you might have, the P732 (Papa-seven-tree-two) or the W59 (Whiskey-fife-niner).

The significant point naming rules are simple. As long as the name has five characters, is unique and is easy to pronounce, it’s fair game. Most of the time the names are just random, pronounceable combinations of letters (think OMSUK, north of Cancun, or ZADON over Seattle). But with all that freedom, they’re also fair game for paying homage to local celebrities or other cultural icons. Three guesses which Florida airport has HKUNA (Hakuna), MTATA (Matata) and RFIKI (Rafiki) on its arrival route.

Put the routes and significant points together, and it becomes way easier for pilots and ATCs to talk about where the plane is heading.

Everybody speaks the same language, and it might not be the one you think

ATCs and pilots are about as international as they come. After all, aviation does connect the world more than any other form of travel. You might have a German pilot pass through the airspace of French ATCs, while flying the same routes as a pilot from India.

To overcome the language barrier, English is the de facto universal language of the skies.

While one language makes communication possible, different accents or interference might still cause plenty of confusion in radio transmissions. It’s also really important to be able to convey a message quickly and accurately without rambling through a whole speech in someone’s second language.

For these reasons, ATCs and pilots communicate with special phraseology, or a language made just for them. Even the numbers are said and pronounced in specific ways to make sure they’re as clear as possible in radio transmissions.

CC image courtesy of EUROCONTROL.INT on Flickr

Other examples include words and phrases like:

— Break, break: Indicates separation between messages transmitted to different aircraft in a very busy environment.

— How do you read?: How clear is my transmission?

— Acknowledge: Let me know that you have received and understood this message.

— Wilco: I understand your last message and will comply with it.

— Correct: True and accurate

— Affirm: Yes

Having specific phrases like this allows for clear communication in as few words as possible. Some words, like the response, “correct”, also prevent ambiguity.

In general usage, we might confirm that something is true by saying “right”. But imagine if a pilot heard “right” over a spotty radio transmission. They might interpret it as an instruction to turn to the right—and maybe turning right at that moment could be the worst possible move for the pilot to make. Phraseology takes care of that problem, and makes communication in the skies clearer.”

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To make sure you’re getting the most authentic taste of California, we turned to our native Californian Flight Finder Olivia for this one. Here’s her rundown of what you absolutely need to know:

One of the biggest US states and by far the most populous, California is nearly its own country. In fact, there have been numerous attempts to either break it into smaller chunks or secede from the US entirely. It would have the fifth largest GDP in the world if it stood alone!

It also holds the record for the most National Parks in the country, with a grand total of nine. They’re a good cross-section of California’s super-diverse natural landscape: the soaring 300 ft-tall redwood forests, the scorching Mojave desert, and the grey cliffs and waterfalls of the Sierra Nevada are all protected and open to visitors.

Yosemite alone sees nearly five million visitors annually And it’s not hard to see why – these old growth forests, glacial formations, and crystalline lakes are so gorgeous that it led to the creation of the National Park Service itself.

But perhaps California’s most famous natural wonder are those 840 miles of coastline. The best ones (according to this very biased San Diegan) are in SoCal and include blue-and-gold gems like La Jolla Cove and the iconic Santa Monica/Venice boardwalk. Think classically Californian beach vibes, with sunbathers, surfers, and roller skaters.

NorCal, however, has no shortage of stunners with the rocky cliffs of Big Sur and the sea lion-covered harbours of Monterey and San Francisco Bay. In Sausalito, you can even dip your toes in black sand.

And here’s another spot where NorCal and SoCal divide – the state’s North is economically based around the Bay Area and Silicon Valley. The modern tech industry was built here in the mid-to-late 20th century with the help of Stanford University, and today you can find the headquarters of basically every big name tech giant from Facebook to Google.

Meanwhile, LA is the place to move for those with stars in their eyes. SoCal has been the entertainment capital of the US since the time of silent films, and the mouth of the beast is still Hollywood. There you can read the stars on the Walk of Fame, or find your fave icon’s handprints at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre.

But one thing that unites all of California? No, it’s not saying “hella” (that’s a NorCal thing) or calling I-5 “the five” (that’s mostly SoCal).

Nope, besides fear of wildfires and raising rents, the main thing we all agree on is that locals never say “Cali.”

All the important (or silly, or strange) travel news from across the web this week.

• Residents in the Austrian town of Hallstatt have taken to the street to protest mass tourism in the area. With only 700 inhabitants, it’s understandable that the 10,000 daily visitors over summer could get a bit much!
• Corendon Airlines have come up with a new optional extra to cash in on. Aiming to recreate a train “quiet carriage”, passengers will soon be able to pay £38 to sit in special adult-only zones.
• We’ve tried letting ChatGPT plan our trips (with mixed results), so now it’s time to let TikTok guide us. One journalist decided to use her mindless scrolling time wisely and find all the best things to do in Tenerife beyond the beaches and bars.
• And finally, you’ll want to grab your hankies. Footage has been circulating of a United Airlines pilot making a heart-warming speech before taking off to Madrid. In the speech, he thanks his mum, a member of the cabin crew, for all her support during his career, and says how honoured he is to be able to fly her for the first time.

  We’re not crying, you are!