Traveler’s Notes ...

Summer vacationers will be able to get from London to Avignon in southern France in a little more than six hours on a new weekly express route run by the high-speed Eurostar train. It will operate once a week in each direction on Saturdays only, between July 20 and Sept. 7, via the Channel Tunnel with one stop, at Ashford in Kent. Advance purchase round-trip fares start at $188.... A slump in American tourists visiting New Zealand since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks has torpedoed a venture offering mini-submarine tours of a scenic fiord, the Associated Press reported. Submarines Australasia LTD says the drop in “high-yield” American tourists will end the venture just three months after it began in Milford Sound on South Island.