With age comes great wisdom. Ahem, of course we'd all like to nod sagely in agreement with that. The truth, of course, is often rather different. However, one thing that one does acquire with age is a certain savvy – the smarts one gains through repetition and, at times, bitter experience. A case in point? Packing. For all the joys of travel, packing is more often an elaborate form of torture. 

For travellers looking to fly between Vienna and Chicago (or connect therein), there's good news: Austrian Airlines has just introduced long-haul service between the two Old and New World cultural destinations. The nonstop service operates five times per week aboard a Boeing 767.

Meanwhile,Turkish Airlines has reached a milestone, adding Valetta, Malta as the 100th country in its network when thrice-weekly service from Istanbul launches on Saturday. The Istanbul-based air carrier will also be introducing flights to Salzburg (four times a week) on May 28th, and began operations to Spain's Santiago De Compostela yesterday. What's more, the airline is upgrading its popular Istanbul–Edinburgh route from four flights a week to daily service.

It's the ultimate travel fantasy: just you, a small group of elite travellers, and travel pundit Geoffrey Kent sharing a private plane and jetting from one exotic location to another. It's about time that travel fantasy came true.

For luxury cruise enthusiasts across Europe, the wait is over: Hapag-Lloyd will christen the MS EUROPA 2, the newest addition to their exclusive cruise ship fleet, in Hamburg today. VIP guests, top-tier chefs and high-profile personalities will take part in the festivities, which begin at 7 pm (CET/GMT+2) and can be viewed live starting at 9 pm here: www.taufe.mseuropa2.de (site in German). Tomorrow the ship embarks on her maiden voyage, a 14-day cruise that will take in such charming cities as Amsterdam, Bordeaux and Lisbon.

Those who won't be setting sail tomorrow, however, may consider joining one of her other luxe voyages later this year – one major highlight being a lineup of cultural cruises that will host the likes of actor Joachim Król and author/singer Hera Lind for literary salons.

Virgin Galactic, Sir Richard Branson's enterprise that hopes to provide the world's first commercial space travel, broke the sound barrier in its first rocket-powered test flight earlier this week. SpaceShipTwo (SS2) and its carrier aircraft WhiteKnightTwo (WK2) took off from Virgin Galactic's Mojave Desert air base, releasing SS2 from WK2 at 47,000 feet. Once the rocket motor was triggered, SS2 catapulted to 55,000 feet. The engine burn lasted 16 seconds as planned, and the craft reached Mach 1.2 in its 10-minute supersonic flight test.

Further tests and development are planned for the coming months, the goal being to launch full space flight by the end of the year.