Journeys Near and Far

Vacation lists make packing easier

Does packing stress you out? It does me.  I actually dread it.  Which is why I've started using lists.

I don't mean the scribbled-on-a-piece-of-paper or two kind of lists, but prepared lists I've saved on my PC.  I've created several, for different types of trips (i.e., overseas, domestic, cruise, roughing-it). 

Before a trip, I customize each list, then print out a copy and place it alongside my suitcase or backpack, crossing off each item as I put it in the bag. 

This is pretty basic, but having a list ready to print out has saved me a lot of time and stress.  I don't have to worry about forgetting something important now.

Become an Untourist and Live Like a Local

Buenos Aires City Hall 

Do you want to live in another country, rather than just traveling through it?  If you're short on time, Untours has the solution.

I first heard about Untours from a seminar travel guru Arthur Frommer gave at the Adventure Travel Show in New York City. 

What's an Untour?

It's an interesting concept, especially for people who like to have a bit of help planning their vacations but don't want to be constricted to a tour bus. 

Untours provides your vacation essentials, namely, a vacation rental, flights, transportation at your destination, a local contact and information on what you can do while you're there. I haven't done an Untour yet, but it sounds like a relaxing way to go on vacation and still be in control of what you do once you get there.

While browsing their site this morning I found several Untours I'm interested in, including a cute apartment in Nafplio, Greece, which includes a "stash of groceries" upon your arrival.  How cool is that?

Five Websites for Travelers who Love the Outdoors

Mirror Lake, Yosemite National Park

Do you love outdoor adventures?  Whether you're journeying near or far, if you're an outdoor enthusiast there are some great websites to help you find the perfect day out. 

Next time you want an impromptu day with Mother Nature (or if you want to plan one), try a few of these sites:

Gorp

Gorp offers information on a variety of outdoor activities, such as hiking and camping as well as  gear and weekend guides.  Under their network they've got several other outdoor/travel related sites as well:

• Away.com
• Outsideonline.com
• Adventurefinder.com
• Trip.com

Between all of these, you could probably plan an entire trip. 

Monday Site: Spotted by Locals

With the tagline "Experience cities like a local," I had high hopes when I visited this site. It turns out my expectations were met.

I love original content created by people who really know an area well.  And that's exactly what Spotted by Locals delivers.

I learned about the website while in Copenhagen last November for the TBEX Europe conference, where I met one of the site's creators, Bart van Poll, as well as several of the site's Spotters.

European Cities

With a focus on 33 European cities, including,  Ljubljana, Zagreb and Bucharest, I was happy to see (I will be traveling to these cities soon), Spotted by Locals has won numerous awards such as the Guardian and Observer “Best Travel Website” award and the Lonely Planet "Best Group Authored Travel Blog."

How does it work? The site is actually a series of blogs, iPhone apps, and PDF city guides which are kept up-to-date by local bloggers known as 'Spotters'.  The Spotters live in their city and speak the local language, and are all hand-selected by Bart and his wife, Sanne.

Sunday Site: Viator.com

 
 

Book tickets for tours, sights and attractions before you leave home to save time and avoid waiting in line.

Viator  offers travelers the chance to book their tickets for tours, sights and attractions in advance, a pretty helpful concept considering how much time it can take to get your tickets once you arrive at your destination.  Why spend your hard-earned vacation time trying to find ticket offices, making phone calls or waiting in line at attractions when you can take care of all this in advance?

I found out about Viator in a very useful book called Ask Arthur Frommer & Travel Better, Cheaper, Smarter written by -- you guessed it -- travel guru Arthur Frommer. 

Viator isn't one of the really well-known travel sites so you may not have heard of it, but I recommend you head over there for a look if you are planning on traveling anywhere soon. 

For journeys near or far

That doesn't mean that you have to be traveling far away, either.  I'm heading to New York City next weekend for the Vogue Knitting Live show, just a two and a half hour drive from my house, so I decided to check out Viator and see what I could use it for while I'm in this nearby city. 

I'm a near-native, so I won't need to book tickets for things like the Hop-On-Hop-Off  Bus Tours or the ride up to the top of the Empire State Building, but even so, I found a slew of slightly discounted things to book in advance through Viator:

• Tickets for The Lion King and other Broadway shows
•  Tickets for a New York City Pizza Tour to Brooklyn and Coney Island (Mmm, now that sounds good)
• A New York City Wall Street Insider Tour, which could be pretty educational for me
• A New York City Nightclub tour, definitely high on my list since I'll be alone and it would be nice to do this with others

Just for fun, I checked out Viator's offerings for Edinburgh and London.  There was a really  nice selection that had me wishing I'd done this before I went to these two places last year.

A wealth of options

The site allows you to create a wishlist and sign up for a newsletter to keep up with the latest deals.  Users can search for tours, attractions and shows by place and category.  For example, under New York, I clicked on Food, Wine and Nightlife but users can also check out twenty-some other categories such as Walking and Biking tours, Cultural and Theme Tours or Shows, Concerts and Sports, etc.

I've definitely added Viator to my list of must-visit travel planning websites.

 

Twitter's Follow Friday: My Picks for October 16, 2009

This week's traveling Twitterers

It's Follow Friday on Twitter again, and this week I have two travel Twitterers I'd like to recommend. 

If you're not using Twitter, I suggest you try it out -- it's free, and a great way to gather cool travel tips, connect with others who have similar interests and, in general, just have fun. 

But it's not necessary to join Twitter to get to know these travel folks -- you can always visit their websites or blogs.

EarthXplorer

The first travel Twitterer I'd like to recommend is JD Andrews, a producer of travel and other types of videos who is known as

EarthXplorer on Twitter. 

Based in Miami, JD  is popular in the Twitterverse, with more than 26,000 followers, and he's an experienced traveler, having spent 19 years traveling to 71 countries in 6 continents. 

In the bio on his web site, EarthXplorer Productions, you can learn more about JD's work.   He showcases some nice travel videos  there and posts interesting videos on his blog of the same name.

I like following JD because he tweets a good mix of travel information, links and retweets, as well as inspiring quotes, and he interacts frequently with other Twitterers. 

You can follow EarthXplorer on Twitter @EarthXplorer. 

Twitter's Follow Friday: My Pick for October 2, 2009

A Traveling Twitterer to Check Out

I've been on Twitter for some time now,  it's become my favorite way to keep up with travel news, to find out about new travel blogs and websites, and to communicate with other travelers. 

If you're not familiar with Twitter, it's a micro-blogging site where users enter "tweets" of less than 140 characters answering the question "What are you doing?" 

This, of course, could lead to some pretty mundane tweets -- we usually don't want to know what people ate for breakfast, for example, unless they're dining at a really amazing restaurant.

But Twitterers have taken it way beyond that.  They: 

• Post links to fabulous content they find on the web
• Share titles of interesting books they're reading
• Recommend hotels and restaurants to people who are tweeting from the road

The idea on Twitter is to build a list of followers -- people who want to read your tweets, and to follow people whose tweets you want to read.

#FollowFriday was begun so that each Friday on Twitter people would recommend interesting Twitterers.  Since you can trust your friends to recommend people worth following, it's a great way to find new people to follow.

According to Mashable, the Social Media Guide, the #FollowFriday trend began with a single tweet last January: 

"I am starting Follow Fridays.  Every Friday,  suggest a person to follow, and everyone follow him/her..." 

And this "trend" has been going on steadily ever since. 

Pretty cool, huh? 

I'd like to take #FollowFriday a step further (and I'm not the first to do this but would like to add my two cents worth) by posting  -- on Fridays, of course, and in more than 140 characters -- about travel people I like to follow on Twitter and why.

Volunteering Global

So who do I recommend this week?    I'd like to recommend Sarah Van Auken ( @VolunteerGlobal on Twitter), the creator of Volunteering Global, which teaches about service trips and general travel worldwide. 

Sarah started her website in 2005 to educate people about international service trips.  The site has grown and now also offers prospective, current and former volunteers a chance to connect with each other and share up-to-date information about their experiences, current volunteer openings and pressing news.

Morocco Therapy: An Antidote to the Economic Crisis

Find out what ails you!

Do you suffer from Acute Furiosis?  Miserableitis?  What about Severe Gloomalgia?

If you do, don't worry!  The Moroccan National Tourism Office has just launched a new site called Morocco Therapy, and it's sure to offer you the solution to your problems. 

I read about this clever new website in the June issue of the UK's Real Travel Magazine.  In the hopes of helping travelers beat the credit crunch, Morocco Therapy is offering bargain trips to Morocco, especially geared for UK Travelers. 

I wanted to share this with you because Morocco is one of my favorite destinations, and the site is fun and entertaining. 

You begin by taking a five-question test to determine which "illness" you suffer from -- but don't worry - it's easy.  You'll be laughing before you reach the end.  Then the site will offer some "cures" for what ails you.

According to Real Travel Magazine, Morocco Therapy will offer an array of good deals for budget-strapped consumers.  They are planning to feature more than 30 UK tour operators, as well as extra touches that add vacation value such as free spa treatments and complimentary transfers from hotels.

[Tip:  Real Travel Magazine, by the way, is fabulous.  If you live outside the UK you can subscribe to the digital version to avoid high postage costs.]

Photo:  The Drâa River Valley, Morocco

Explore 3 New Social Networking Sites

Make Friends While You Plan Your Trips

No one knows if they'll become the next MySpace, but these three social networking sites I read about in the February, 2009 issue of  Budget Travel magazine sound interesting. 

So even though my little black book is overflowing with email addresses of all the friends I've met on my journeys, I couldn't stop myself from checking out something new.  Here's the scoop on some lesser known places where you can make friends while planning your trips:

GeckoGo

GeckoGo is a collaborative travel planning resource for independent travelers.  Begun by a group of friends who quit their cushy day jobs, moved to a new country and worked full time without pay for 12 plus months straight, Geckogo has grown into quite a large travel community.    On this site you can:

• Get travel tips
• Get answers to your questions
• Contribute to the community
• Get recognition by earning points for sharing what you know

The site has a nice forum and I like their destination pages, where you'll find detailed maps and information on the area you are interested in and its attractions.  Just remember, though,  that, like Wikipedia, anybody can update this information so you might want to check another source or two to make sure the information is correct.

I like the site's blog, GeckoGoneBlogging, and even if you do nothing else, I recommend you pay it a visit.  It has some nice interviews, such as with Christina Heyniger of Off the Radar and Polar Explorer Børge Ousland.

20 Travel Blogs You'll Love

Since you all love reading about travel...

I wanted to let you know about a list of the year's top travel blogs posted by Viscape. 

Viscape, a travel blog written to help its readers visualize their escape, explore their dreams and pursue their passions, has written a post called the Top Travel Blogs of 2008.  From the big blogs such as National Geographic Intelligent Travel to some of the smaller individual bloggers who write to share their love of travel, this comprehensive list of 15 blogs should keep you in travel reading for quite some time. 

In addition to Viscape's list which you'll find via the link above, I've added five of my own personal favorites below: 

1.  Smarter Cruising - Travel writer Clark Norton is a cruise expert who has cruised Alaska, Hawaii, Northern Europe, the Mediterranean, the South China Sea, the South Pacific, the Amazon, Patagonia and Cape Horn, and many points beyond.  His blog covers all kinds of cruising tips, news and information.  If you want to take to the seas, be sure to visit this one. 

2.  The Tranquilo Traveler- If you're interested in Central America, you must visit travel writer and guidebook author Joshua Berman's blog, The Tranquilo Traveler.  With its lush photography, travel writer interviews, book reviews and all kinds of travel advice, I know you'll enjoy this one.

3.  Rolf Potts' Vagabonding - I'm a big fan of travel writer Rolf Potts and can always find something interesting and unique posted on his blog.   From topics such as "Packing, Digitally" to "How do You Handle Leaving Life Behind?" there's a wealth of travel advice there.

4.  Johnny Jet's Travel Blog - It's always fun to see where in the world Johnny Jet is.  Between his website, JohnnyJet.com, and his blog, it's easy to keep track of him.  This prolific travel writer reviews travel websites, products and more on his blog on a regular basis - check it out.

5.  Cool Travel Guide - I  like Lara Dunston's blog.  This perpetual globetrotter who is based in  Dubai has traveled to more than 60 countries, is the author of numerous travel articles and guidebooks, and writes in her blog about all that is cool and inspiring about travel.

Photo:  The city of York, England at Christmas.  Courtesy of Freefoto.com, photographer Ian Britton.