T A B L E_T A L K Have e-mail, will travel. Share your favorite Internet bars from around the world in the Wanderlust area of Table Talk ___________________ Making travel plans? Visit barnesandnoble.com for all kinds of great travel book bargains! ___________________   R E C E N T L Y Not finding God in Rome By Zachary Karabell At Christmas in the Eternal City, a seeker of truth discovers that sometimes the answer you don't get is the one you need (12/23/98) An innocent abroad, Part Two By Bill Barich A young writer in Florence encounters enduring lessons in art and love (12/22/98) An innocent abroad: Part One By Bill Barich A semester in Florence shapes a young writer's life (12/20/98) If you film it, they will come By Steve Rushin A passionate sports fan begins his cross-country pilgrimage with a visit to Iowa's Field of Dreams (12/18/98) Christmas in Germany By Deanna Hodgin A family visit to Nuremberg's Christkindlesmarkt turns into a lesson for adults and children alike (12/17/98)   Browse the Wanderlust Feature archives     Wanderlust's Official Travel Book Partner		____hot spots OF THE MILLENNIUM Australia, South Africa, Cuba, the Middle East and more -- __travel experts predict the destinations of choice in 2000. BY DON GEORGE | We all know the big travel news stories of 1998 -- economic crises in Asia and Russia, the Swissair crash, hurricane devastation in the Caribbean, the bombing of Iraq, the growth of the Internet for travel planning and booking. So rather than re-tread that familiar ground in this end-of-the-year report, we decided in true Wanderlust fashion to venture boldly where no one has gone before: the year 2000. Where will people be traveling at the start of the new millennium? We asked a select group of travel visionaries -- a dozen airline and cruise line executives, tour operators and packagers, travel agents and travel industry analysts, writers and editors -- what they thought. Many of our experts said the earliest winners in the 2000 sweepstakes will be the islands of the South Pacific. This region, of course, is where the sun will first rise, literally, on the new year, and the tour packagers and travel promoters are already hard at work tempting people to be the first to welcome the new millennium. And they're having remarkable success. From luxury hotels to bare-bones huts, accommodations are selling out all across the impossibly convoluted squiggle of the International Date Line. Just about every island group in the area is laying claim to catching the millennial sun's first rays (what if Jan. 1 is cloudy?), but the big winners are likely to be the "second-string islands" (in the phrase of Lonely Planet's Tony Wheeler) such as Samoa and Tonga. Personally, it's hard to imagine a finer place than Fiji to start the next thousand years, but if you're looking for an alternative to islands, a number of cruise lines are offering itineraries designed to let passengers pop the bubbly and warble "Auld Lang Syne" at midnight right on the elusive line. Or if you're the urban sort, Gisborne, New Zealand, is proclaiming itself the "first city to see the new millennium" and is planning an appropriately sophisticated "24-hour light and sound spectacular." That takes care of Day One. But when midnight's a mere memory, where will people go to get away in 2000? According to our highly subjective poll, the five hottest spots in 2000 will be Australia, Italy, South Africa, Cuba and the Middle East. Australia's easy. Can you say Summer Olympics? The country's already unfurling the five-ringed flag around the globe and gearing up a massive marketing campaign to urge visitors to explore beyond the urban centers after they've seen the synchronized swimming and the 100-meter dash. Plus, the language and customs are familiar, the prices are reasonable, and the range in everything from accommodations to activities can satisfy backpack snobs and cultural elitists alike. Italy has been surfing a wave of popularity in recent years, and our experts just see that ride continuing in the new millennium. One big factor in Italy's favor: It's an ideal spot for the kind of baby-boomer soft adventures that have been burgeoning the past few years -- strenuous hiking and biking by day, sumptuous wines, meals and beds by night. Jim Sano of Geographic Expeditions singles out Sicily as the place to go ("undiscovered and off the beaten path"). And Joan Tapper of Islands magazine predicts travelers will "push out from Tuscany, first to Umbria and then to other flavorful provinces." But you may want to wait until later in the year to visit, says David Downie, Wanderlust's Paris correspondent, who warns that il Giubileo, the millennial celebration, "promises to be a right mess" due to "lack of hotels, information services, public transportation and so on." South Africa is also high on just about every list, and no wonder. For decades an alluring but off-limits destination for travelers of conscience, South Africa is poised to see an explosive growth of tourism in the new, apartheid-free millennium. As Cari Gray of Butterfield & Robinson enthuses: "The hotels are fantastic, the levels of comfort and service are high and the qualities of a very good lifestyle are affordable. Cape Town is especially beautiful. And all around it are fantastic vineyards and wineries, penguin colonies, a great nature reserve and terrific Dutch colonial estates." John Lampl of British Airways also touts the country's still relatively unspoiled wildlife areas -- "the safaris are spectacular" -- and beaches. Continuing the theme of previously off-limits places, Cuba is another big winner in our poll. Americans have been visiting Cuba, legally and illegally, for years, but as restrictions are relaxed, our experts foresee a veritable flood of capitalists crashing on Cuba's shores. The culture is congenial, the prices are enticing and the first-on-your-block factor is strong. And finally, many of our seers selected the Middle East as one of the prime hot spots in 2000. "There's a great deal of interest in the Middle East," says Lampl of British Airways. "People have just been waiting for the region to stabilize. Israel, Egypt and Jordan are especially attractive -- Petra and some of the other ruins are absolutely fantastic." Wheeler of Lonely Planet goes even further: "My prediction is that Iraq will finally sort itself out and intrepid visitors will go in search of Nineveh, the Marsh Arabs, Babylon and even Baghdad." (Although he then adds: "Or was that Afghanistan finally sorts itself out and ...") N E X T+P A G E | Intriguing predictions and comments from the panel