【推荐1】People travel for a lot of reasons. Some tourists go to see battlefields (战场) or other historic remains (历史遗址). Others are looking for culture, or simply want to have their pictures taken in front of famous places. Most European tourists are looking for a sunny beach to lie on.

Northern Europeans are willing to pay a lot of money for the sun because they have so little of it. People of cities like London, Copenhagen (哥本哈根) and Amsterdam (阿姆斯特丹) spend much of their winter in the dark because the days are so short, and much of the rest of the year in the rain. This is the reason why the Mediterranean (地中海) has always attracted (吸引) them. Every summer many people travel to Mediterranean resorts (度假胜地) and beaches for their vacations. They all come for the same reason: sun!

The huge crowds mean lots of money for the economics (经济) of Mediterranean countries. Italy’s 30,000 hotels are booked without a break every summer. And 13 million people camp out on French beaches, parks, and roadsides. Spain’s long sandy coastline attracts more people than anywhere else, 37 million tourists there yearly, or one tourist for each person living in Spain.

But there are signs that the area is getting more tourists than it can deal with. The Mediterranean is already one of the most polluted seas on earth. None of these, however, is ruining (毁灭) anyone’s fun. Obviously (显然地), they don’t go there for clean water. They allow traffic jams and seem to like crowded beaches. They don’t even mind the pollution. No matter how dirty the water is, the coastline still looks beautiful. And as long as the sun shines, it’s still better than sitting in the cold rain in Berlin, London, or Oslo (奥斯陆).

【推荐3】A young woman traveled and stayed in a hotel. All the rooms in the hotel were singles(单人间). So she lived in a single room.

Just when she was going to bed, there was a knock at the door. She had no friends in the city. So she was quite surprised but still opened the door.

The man who was standing at the door looked a little nervous. “Oh! I’m sorry. I thought this was my room,” the man said and walked away in a hurry.

The woman called the police at once. Soon, the man was caught. He was a thief(小偷)! But how did the woman know that?

All the rooms in the hotel were singles. Who would knock at his own door if he was staying alone? Only a thief would do this. He wanted to see if anyone was inside before he broke into the room.