假日漫游（陈继龙 编译）
Nov 30th 2006
From The Economist print editionWHEN Melissa Mahan and her husband visited the Netherlands, they felt imprisoned by their tour bus. It forced them to see the city according to a particular route and specific schedule—but going off on their own meant missing out on the information provided by the guide. On their return home to San Diego, California, they started a new company called Tour Coupes. （1）Now, when tourists in San Diego rent one of their small, brightly coloured three-wheeled vehicles, they are treated to[1] a narration over the stereo system about the places they pass, triggered by Global Positioning System (GPS) satellite technology.
梅利莎•马汉和她的丈夫到荷兰游玩时，感觉当地的旅游巴士就像囚车一样。它按照特定路线和日程安排“押”着他们在城里观光——而他们如果不坐车自己游玩的话，又听不到导游的讲解。回到加利福尼亚圣地亚哥的家后，他们开了一个公司，名为“旅游马车”（Tour Coupes）。现在到圣地亚哥的游客开着从他们公司租来的五彩斑斓的三轮小汽车，每到一个景点，都可以享受由（车载）立体声系统提供的讲解服务。启动讲解系统的正是全球定位系统（GPS）卫星技术。This is just one example of how GPS is being used to provide new services to tourists. “What we really have here is a technology that allows people to forget about the technology,” says Jim Carrier of IntelliTours, a GPS tourism firm which began offering a similar service over a year ago in Montgomery, Alabama. （2）The city is packed with sites associated with two important chapters[2] in American history, the civil war of the 1860s and the civil-rights movement a century later.Montgomery has a 120-year-old trolley system, called the Lightning Route, which circulates around the downtown area and is mainly used by tourists. On the Lightning Route trolleys, GPS-triggered audio clips point out historical hotspots.
这只是GPS提供新式旅游服务的一个范例。GPS旅游公司IntelliTours一年多前开始在阿拉巴马州首府蒙哥马利市提供类似的服务，该公司的吉米•卡里尔说：“让游客们忘记技术的存在，这才是我们真正拥有的技术。” 蒙哥马利到处都是美国两个最重要历史时期（即19世纪60年代的南北战争及一百年后的民权运动）有关的遗址。蒙哥马利的有轨电车系统——“闪电线”已有120年的历史，它环绕市区运行，乘坐的大部分都是游客。在“闪电线”有轨电车上，GPS启动播放的声频剪辑会及时告诉你到了哪一个历史胜地。Another GPS-tourism firm is GoCar Rentals, based in San Francisco. It provides open-air vehicles, using a scooter engine with a fibreglass frame, similar to those used by Tour Coupes. Customers must follow a prescribed route to hear the GPS-triggered information. This limits the scope for exploration, but Nathan Withrington, the firm's founder, says that people tend to visit the same few sites.
还有一家GPS旅游公司是位于旧金山的Gocar汽车租赁公司。它提供采用小轮摩托发动机和玻璃纤维结构的敞篷车，与Tour Coupes公司的车类似。租车人必须按照指定的路线游览，才能听到GPS启动播放的信息。这就限制了游览范围，但该公司创始人内森•惠特灵顿却认为人们往往都喜欢游览相同的景点。Other firms, such as CityShow in New York and GPS Tours Canada in Banff, Canada, offer hand-held GPS receivers that play audio clips for listening to while walking or driving. In South Africa, Europcar, a car-rental firm, offers a device called the Xplorer. （3）As well as providing commentary on 2,000 points of interest, it can also warn drivers if they exceed the local speed limit.
此外，诸如纽约的CityShow和加拿大班夫的GPS Tours之类的公司则提供便携式GPS接收器，游客在步行或开车时可收听到它播放的声频剪辑。南非有一家Europcar汽车租赁公司，它提供一种名为Xplorer的设备。这种设备不但可以针对2000处名胜古迹进行现场讲解，还可以提醒司机不要超速。If such services prove popular, the use of dedicated audio-guide devices could give way to a different approach. A growing number of mobile phones have built-in GPS or can determine their locations using other technologies. Information for tourists delivered via phones could be updated in real time and could contain advertisements. “Location-based services”, such as the ability to call up a list of nearby banks or pizzerias, have been talked about for years but have nevertaken off[3].（4）But aiming such services at tourists makes sense—since people are more likely to want information when in an unfamiliar place. It could give mobile roaming a whole new meaning.
如果这类服务确受欢迎的话，那么音频引导专用装置有可能被另一种不同的方法所取代。越来越多的手机中都有内置GPS或者采用其它技术进行定位的功能。经手机发送给游客的信息可实时更新，其中可能还包含广告。多年来人们一直在谈论“定位服务”（如告诉你附近的银行或皮萨店分布情况），但它始终未曾得到广泛应用。不过，由于身处陌生之地的人更有可能需要“定位服务”信息，因此以游客为“定位服务”对象可谓明智之举，它可能会为手机漫游赋予一个全新的内涵。 [QUIZ]
英译汉（将划线部分英文翻译成中文）：
[NOTES](LONGMAN)
1. treat sth. to sb. to buy or do something special for someone that you know they will enjoy招待，款待；送礼
2. chapter n.a particular period or event in someone's life or in history历史时期；人生的一个时期
3. take off to suddenly start being successful 发迹；大受欢迎
