Where will you "Stay"?

Wouldn't it be nice to log onto some travel website, look up a city and all their attractions, and magically create your very own itinerary?

Well, look no further!  Stay.com is a website designed just for that, not magic necessary.  Once you have navigated your way to this website, create your personal account in just seconds and begin planning your "fit-for-you" vacation.  Create a romantic escape for you and your other half, or create a family friendly experience of a life time.  Whether you're looking for all the tourist spots, or a way to live it up, Stay.com will help you create your trip just for you.

If you need help creating an itinerary, there are already many out there created by other users.  Once your itinerary is complete to your perfection, print it off and on your way!  Or, for the smart phone lovers, download the new app to always have this helpful site at the touch of your fingers.

With all the good, there may be things you don't enjoy.  It has been about 8 months since I've last taken a good look at this website, and since then the site has expanded more than before!  Some destinations may not be found, especially if they are not an extremely popular location.  This is why Stay.com offers you to give feed back on their forum and blog!

Overall, take some time to check this website out for your travel planning worries.  Having your plans organized on one site will ease your stress of  creating the perfect trip.  A great site for all types of travel!  Thumbs up to Stay.com!

Website:  http://www.stay.com/
Twitter:  @staydotcom
Facebook:  Stay.com

Travel Tip #4: Look for the diamond in the rough.

So I'm a little behind on blogging, the semester is winding down and I'm getting ready to graduate (yippee!)  I will be combining my travel tip and website favorites together today because they go hand in hand.

The other day, the Travel Channel posted a tweet to find out what are some favorite travel tips of their followers.  I got excited because I had a few up my sleeve that would hopefully gain some attention.  Much to my surprise, one of my tips go retweeted, which brings us to travel tip #4: looking for the diamond in the rough.

When traveling near or far, you may really want to see the glamorous, tourist attractions, but don't be afraid to go with the flow.  You may stumble upon a hidden gem in a small town or big city.  I continuously find exciting places and outdoor places local to me that very few people know about, and I love it.  While abroad in Australia, I found numerous hidden gems--mostly found by my professors taking us around.  This is a short and simple tip, but a very wise one none the less.  You will get more out of your traveling adventures if you go with the flow and discover something ten times more astounding.

I will leave you with one of my favorites gems from Australia, North Stradbroke Island.  Geology research is done here, and it is also thriving with their small local population and coal mines.  Very few know about this island, but not many venture there unless they have a reason.  It's a quaint island thriving in aboriginal culture along with some of their more modern day residents.  Koalas run wild and you will not find an ounce of light pollution at night.  In the later hours of the night away from public shores, by light of a small flash light you will find dolphins coming up to the shore line.

Above:  A beautiful view of North Stradbroke Island

Left:  Sunset on Straddie
















Stay up to date with the Travel Channel!
Website:  travelchannel.com
Twitter:  @TravelChannel
Facebook:  facebook.com/travelchannel

Living on a 'Lonely Planet'

Looking for a website that not only books your flights and hotels, but plans your stay as well?  Look no more!  Lonely Planet is a great travel website featuring travel guides and options to book your trip all in one stop.

I found this website on accident, randomly searching for a new travel site to check out.  As I began to explore the website, I found it to be one of those sites that just draws you in.  This site gives you suggestions on where to travel, some "best kept secrets" of different countries, and travel guides to help you choose your trip.  Options to choose itineraries for specific cities, as well as tips on what time of year is best to travel in a specific country or city.  Once you have found your destination of choice, scroll over to booking flights and hotels.  Many options are available when booking, at it is also powered by Kayak.com--another popular website used for booking trips.

You can always keep up to date with Lonely Planet via Twitter, Facebook, Blogs, and numerous travel forums found on their website, as well as apps available for smart phones.  Sign up for a subscription of their magazine to learn more about new cultures, top vacation sites, and other exciting tips and information.  This website is designed for the new and experienced travelers both in mind!  A perfect site to make your travel planning simple, efficient, and even affordable.

I'm glad I randomly came across this site, it is a very exciting site with plenty of information to start planning for your next trip!  Take a few minutes and check it out!


Website: www.lonelyplanet.com
Facebook:  www.facebook.com/lonelyplanet
Twitter:  @lonelyplanet

Orbitz: Assuring you with a great vacation?

Orbitz has been my go to site for quite a while now, and I have had many good experiences with this site, so I felt this would be the perfect website to discuss first for Website Wednesday.  Orbitz is a large, well known site that offers travel variety.  It is found to be user friendly, easy to navigate, and a great database for booking trips.  A great, new feature are the apps available for smart phones allowing travel planning to happen at the tips of your fingers.

Why I love this site:

1. If you're looking for a package deal, this is great!  You can look for just a flight or just a hotel or you can look for a flight, rental car, and hotel all in one click.  This is a great option for those of you out there who would rather package every all together or don't have the time to browse everything piece by piece.
2. Daily deals every day!  There are always new advertisements on the website for new ways to save or special deals on exotic vacations.  I get email alerts sent to me every time there is a new special.
3. Price Assurance is highly advertised with the company, assuring you that what you see is what you pay.  Another feature I have discovered is the Deal Detector which allows you to set a price you want to pay and Orbitz will find it for you.
4. The flexible flight option is my personal favorite if you are able to have flexible days or times for a trip.  It will compare the same flight you want for different departure dates combined with the length of your trip.  It will find you the best deals to fly out.
5. Orbitz also allows you to check out attractions, cruises, and gives you popular searches to help guide you to a perfect trip.

Why this site may not be the best:  Overall I have little to complain about with this site.  Only one time I had to book through a different website because Orbitz was down for website construction for a day or two, but I typically have no problems.  One frustrating item I have stumbled upon has been times when I have searched for flights and I get a response of "no flights found to match you search."  This is a major travel website and they should be able to fulfill every request or at least suggest an alternative method to arrive at a destination. 

Orbitz is a site I encourage a lot of my friends and family to use since it is so easy and upfront.  I have also found it to be very reliable and credible.  As much as I'd love to critique some more, this is a site for you to personally explore.  So click away and check out Orbitz.com today!


website:  www.orbitz.com
twitter:  @orbitz
facebook:  www.facebook.com/Orbitz

Cabin Fever & Future Friday

With the feeling winter is never going to end and spring break popping up on college campuses nationwide, it's not surprise cabin fever is here!  Living in the glorious state of Ohio, or should I say SNOWhio, the cold and snow really never seem to end.  I'm getting the extreme itch to travel, but unfortunately that college kid budget interferes with brilliant travel plans I've thought of.  So instead of gearing up to go out and explore, I figured I'd just talk about travel some more! (Yes I just made a cheesy rhyme.) 

What I really want to talk about is the blog.  I've finally come down to some ideas to keep the blog evolving.  My habit with any social site, or journals for that matter, is that I am terrible at keeping perfectly up to date on it.  I really would love to write everyday, but I get distracted easily or usually have about 5,000 other things to do.  With this in mind, I am going to attempt to abide by some fun plans I have to keep consistency, new entertainment, and hopefully staying current with everything.  I've thought of corny subjects for each day of the week, travel related of course, that will bring new topics within in the travel world each day (if I can keep up!):

Snoozy Sunday--Sunday is a lazy day, this day is open to whatever really!  I'll probably just cover things going on, or maybe a trip that I can't stop thinking about.  Sunday is really a wild card day.

Manic Monday--Since Monday is always a crazy day to swing back into things of a work or school week, why not write about some crazy and "manic," experiences that have happened during a trip?

Tip Tuesday--Every Tuesday receive a travel tip!  Plan exciting, affordable, and sensible trips.

Website Wednesday--Oh the world wide web, so many hidden treasures and flops.  There are good travel websites, mediocre travel websites, and sadly some horrible travel websites.  Which ones should you stay true to?
Throw-back Thursday--THROW-BACK!  Reminisce on previous trips!  Now this may seem redundant since I obviously talk about trips I've been on, but I'm talking years and years ago.  I'll talk about silly trips I went on when I was younger, fun memories and scary memories.
Future Friday--Where in the world will I travel next?
Silly Saturday--Funny and silly moments from trips, or even planning trips.

Of course I may not be on everyday, but at least topics will change and make what you're reading a little more exciting (at least I hope so!)  So in honor of Friday, I'll take a brief moment to talk about one future trip.  I'm excited to announce that I will be heading to Washington D.C. for time number 5 or 6 this April!  Actually, I'm going for scholarly, nerdy purposes which makes the trip more exciting.  I'll be presenting research with my research group at a communication conference which I think is pretty exciting.  It's also a really great excuse to get out of school and work for a few days.  Plus we get to explore our nation's capital, which is no doubt one of my favorite things to do!  I started visiting Washington D.C. when I was in 5th grade, and actually have two trips coming up this year.  There's just something I love about visiting D.C., I find something new every time.  Here are some pictures from some of the more recent trips (if only I had the embarrassing pictures of me in D.C. back in 5th and 7th grade near by!):

Memorial Day Weekend 2008



Memorial Day Weekend 2010

 

And my favorite view...

Photo taken Memorial Day Weekend 2008--Arlington National Cemetery --over looking the capital.

(not the best picture, and definitely doesn't give this view justice)

And on a sad closing note--please keep Japan in your thoughts and prayers after dealing with a tsunami and an earthquake.  Also keep Hawaii & California in your thoughts and prayers as well, the tsunami waves may be heading their way.  That's all I have today--have a fantastic Friday :)