There are now so many pretty travel zooms, of which I also have some obsessed. Camera manufacturers own, as well as excellent "foreign" manufacturers such as Sigma, Tamron, Tokina Nikon etc. The show is not just the newest, but like many, even more recent review, it reflected still very good. The revision of VR (Vibration Reduction) is well done. A recalculation of the optics did not exist.
A 12x zoom can never reach the performance of a single-focal length, which is physically impossible.
The chromatic aberrations talk but clearly limited. A stopping down to about f8 ensures almost always sharp images. Vignetting is often visible. Distortions are perceptible in the minimum and maximum focal length.
BUT: All this holds for a lens in this performance class in remarkable limits, so you can really with good conscience deny his travels with this push and - without Lens case - with good results coming home.
Who takes his photography seriously, should anyway take pictures in RAW format, because that can be for example in Adobe Lightroom 3 eliminate all of the above "problems" without any problems, especially Lightroom lens "knows" and an automatic correction - if desired - makes.
I shoot for about 40 years and am semi-professional working.
