Month: August 2007

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Blog

The writer’s electronic resurrection

After a summer when we totalled a car and then my laptop totalled itself, I am ready for fall.

The good news is that we did replace the car, no one was hurt, and today I just picked up my replacement laptop, with all my old data loaded onto it, from the genius geeks at Austin’s PC Doctors.

After I clean up my writer’s work desk (where I’ve been piling things since I was displaced across the room to hog the family desktop) and then load up the anti-virus software, spyware software and that cool Desktop Earth NASA thingie I was using on my old ‘puter, I’m good to go.

All of those pictures that I took on recent road trips are back, so now I can crank up the Virginia and Midwest posts.  

Hurray!

Happy Labor Day weekend….

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Tips

Get clean water anywhere

Rather than slugging down the contents of those plastic water bottles and then tossing them (and heck, some are just tap water anyway) consider the SteriPEN.

Tim Leffel’s Cheapest Destinations blog has a SteriPEN giveaway contest going on right now to help you snap up one of these wonders. 

All you have to do is peruse an upcoming edition of his great online travel magazine, Perceptive Travel, answer a couple of questions, and you’re in the hunt.

If you travel a little off of the beaten path with your kids, this sounds like a terrific idea.

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Tips USA

Labor Day travel round-up

The Labor Day holiday is this coming weekend in North America, and if you’ve already made plans then I commend you.

I’m just trying to figure out what’s for dinner tonight and when I’m going to get out today and pick up some more cat food.

Still, for the last-minute planners among us, here are a few ideas:

**   Are you a golf enthusiast and anywhere near Boston?  There are family programs and kid viewing areas associated with the Deutsche Bank Championship golf tournament at TPC Boston, part of the first-ever PGA Tour playoff.  Children 15 and younger receive free grounds admission when accompanied by a ticketed adult.  My own 7 year-old son enjoyed a golf day camp at our local Forest Creek course this past summer; I’m waiting for the big money payoff if he turns pro. 🙂

**   In San Francisco, hurry and check out the Marvel of Manga exhibit at the Asian Art Museum, before it closes on September 9th.  Don’t forget to gaze at the Golden Gate Bridge with the Silent I.

**   Kids like Japanese anime?  AnimeFest runs all Labor Day weekend in Dallas TX.

**   New York City’s Mommy Poppins says to get the heck out of town and take the kids to a New York county or state fair. 

**   In the Texas hill country vineyards (yes, there is such a thing) there’s the family-friendly Grape Stomp and Harvest Festival at Fall Creek Vineyards, near Lake Buchanan. 

**   If you live in the Southeastern US (Virginia, North & South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia and Kentucky) check out the About.com’s guide to Labor Day weekend in the Southeast.

**   The DC Traveler blog has the details on Saturday’s Planet Arlington World Music Festival.

**   If you’re thinking of a road trip, the new bloggers at Kango scoured the Web for their top 5 blog posts and sites about car games for kids. 

**   Check out the searchable calendars at GoCityKids for more ideas (not all cities are covered.)

**   One of my favorite travel blogs, Gadling, has a post with suggestions for Labor Day outings. 

Now that I’m inspired to do something with the family this Labor Day weekend, I’m off to get that cat food.

Technorati tags: travel, family travel, Labor Day

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Blog

Family Travel hosts the Carnival of Cities

                                Carnival of Cities logo

Many of you know that I work with Home Turf Media on its Carnival of Cities, a blog carnival with posts that each feature some aspect of a specific city.

A blog carnival is just a roundup of different writer’s posts about a particular topic, hosted on one blog.

For the first time, the Family Travel blog is going to play host to the Carnival of Cities, and I’m really looking forward to serving up the urban literary tidbits (drinks and nachos will be right over, as Successful Blog’s Liz Strauss says in her Friday SOB Business Cafe.)

To participate, use the blog carnival submission form to submit ONE post that relates to a particular city. Any angle is fine as long as it is related to a specific city (or fair-sized town.) Comment on a local politician’s latest blunders, share a favorite restaurant review or present the city from a tourist’s point of view.

To see how it’s done, take a look at this week’s Carnival, the Hot August Night edition.

Normally this carnival posts on Mondays, but because Monday, September 3, 2007 is the US Labor Day holiday, we’ll post on Tuesday, September 4, 2007 instead.

Deadline to submit, however, is the usual:  2 pm Eastern on Sunday (Sept 2, 2007.)

Thanks also to another carnival this week:  Sandier Pastures (based in Dubai) featured my Perceptive Travel blog post, Traveling parent faces hotel reality check in the Carnival of Family Life.

Technorati tag: blogging, blog carnival, travel, family travel

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Tips

Worldwide screams for ice cream

Even dragons like ice cream (courtesy _gem_ at flickr's Creative Commons)

It’s the dog days of August, and the heat has me and the kids thinking about ice cream.

Here in Texas, we’re only an hour or so away from the Little Creamery in Brenham, home to fabulous Blue Bell Ice Cream, so I have access to really good stuff. 

Their Cookies n’ Cream is the best, period, and they also make unique seasonal flavors like Cantaloupe ‘n Cream, from fresh Pecos cantaloupes.

Of course you can visit the Brenham facility, as well as Blue Bell Creameries in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma and Sylacauga, Alabama.

Visitors to New England have often made the detour to Vermont to stop in at Ben & Jerry’s for their factory tour, but let me also take this opportunity to rave about one of their new flavors with Texas ties, “Willie Nelson’s Country Peach Cobbler,” which is peach ice cream with cinnamon-sugar shortbread bits mixed in.

I’m telling you, I almost ate an entire pint in one sitting.

How about ice cream elsewhere?

That intrepid guide to the urban jungle, Gridskipper, offers up their views on New York’s best ice cream, complete with a handy map. There are suggestions from readers down in the comments, too.

The adventurous can check out green tea ice cream in Japan (I did, and I vote for drinking said tea rather than eating a cold version of it.)

Conde Nast Traveler magazine recently featured a wonderful Gully Wells article about the islands of Paris (“The Cradle of Paris“) but the important thing is that she mentions that French ice cream temple, Berthillon, on Ile St-Louis.  Fair warning — it’s closed during parts of August, when all of France seems to go on vacation.

If you’re eating your ice cream at home, check out the foodie Web site CHOW; it has the scoop on snazzy ice cream tools like waffle cone-makers.

Yum.

Technorati tags: travel, ice cream, family travel

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Blog

Build a better travel blog: go offline

You have the power (button) to build your community (photo courtesy yum9me at flickr's Creative Commons.)

What makes a travel blog worth reading?

That’s something that I consider each time I sit down to write up a post, and assess whether a particular subject is something that my Family Travel readers would enjoy and find useful. 

Not everyone wants to read about the same topics. 

Some folks are excited about side trips from Tokyo, or side trips in Oklahoma.  Some would rather hear about side trips from London, and some just wonder why the ‘bleep’ would I want to go there at all?

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about blogging, what with speaking at BlogHer in Chicago, my upcoming blogging panel for the Austin chapter of the Association for Women in Communications (AWC) and my prospective travel blogging panel at the South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive tech conference.

How can I do this better, and also reach more people who might enjoy reading about travel with kids?

Good thing that I just stumbled upon the latest ProBlogger project; 31 Days to Building a Better Blog.  Aussie professional blogger and writer Darren Rowse periodically does these group events where people write up posts about a specific topic on their blog, and he links to them on his, for massive link love and a ton of useful info from around the world. 

This post is my contribution, but I’m not going to talk about monetizing or better photos or Search Engine Optimization, or put up a list of bullet points on better travel writing.

I want to think about going offline to build readership.

News flash — I’ve noticed that a lot of people do not spend a bunch of time on the computer, but they’re still pretty smart, they lead full lives and oh by the way, they love to travel.  A lot of people don’t give a rip about Technorati.  They go to a few favorite Web sites, do a little online banking, Google for directions to a restaurant and that’s about it.   To paraphrase the pre-wardrobe malfunction Janet Jackson, what have you done for them lately?

The answer is to go where they go, and convince them that your blog is worth adding to their list of things to read online.

  • Offer to speak to community groups and professional organizations about blogging.  For my blog’s subject, for example, a great place to start might be a YMCA “Mom/Dad & Me” playgroup.
  • Give a class about getting started as a blogger.  Try your local community college continuing education coordinator, find out about teaching blogging at the senior center (those elderbloggers are fired up!) or at your local high school.
  • Remember that many may still consider bloggers some sort of strange, Mohawk’d, ultra-geek faddish bunch who prattle on about obscure tech topics or detail the daily activities of their cats.  Show the doubters that there are “regular” people who write about useful, interesting things every day in blogs, and you’re one of them.  Don’t make fun of your audience if you must start out just defining “blog” for them; I’ll bet there are subjects that they know about that would stump you. 
  • Contact the staff writer at your local paper who covers your blog’s area of interest, and let him/her know that you’re a blogger who’s willing to be interviewed for an “online” view of your topic.
  • Send out an old-fashioned press release if something significant happens that relates to your blog (an award, perhaps.)
  • Put your blog’s URL in the signature line of your emails, or even on your business card, if appropriate.
  • And for the really old school among you, tell everyone including Aunt Mabel about your blog in your annual Christmas/holiday letter.  You do one of those, right? 🙂

Build a community through people-to-people links, not just online links.

Some of my most loyal readers look at very few blogs, but they are kind enough to look at mine because they love travel.  A few dedicated people like that are a precious audience, much better than someone who just surfs through from a random link and never returns.

So, get out more, willya?

Technorati tags:  travel, blogging, ProBlogger

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Tips

Kids and cruises

I’m no cruise expert, unless it’s how to steam around in the Persian Gulf or Sea of Japan on a Navy ship, but the consumer travel editor for Conde Nast Traveler magazine, Wendy Perrin, is the 1000-Pound Cruise Brain.

The August 2007 issue of the magazine features her section about cruising with kids, plus links to other Perrin articles like “Customizing a Big-Ship Cruise,” which is great because a big ship is what most can afford.

Those of us who followed her family’s cruise on her Perrin Post blog got an as-it-happened saga of the trials and tribulations of kids on cruises; the upshot is that ships can be a lot of fun, but there may be unexpected pitfalls that, uh, torpedo the good times.

Any tips from cruise enthusiasts out there?

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Blog

We’re gonna talk about travel at SXSW

SXSW banner at Austin Convention Center (courtesy skunks at flickr's Creative Commons.)

I’m infiltrating.  It’s time for more regular folks to attend tech conferences.

No, I’m not a tech geek, whatever that is (so many of us use technical devices and do Internet stuff that I’m not sure what “geek” means anymore.)  I do know that I enjoy the Internet community and the possibilities of online communication, and I’ll bet that you do, too, so let’s infiltrate.

One of the biggest blowouts of the year is just down the road from me in Austin, Texas:  South by Southwest (SXSW.)  It’s actually a three-parter conference of Interactive/tech, Film and Music. 

The organizers describe Interactive as a conference for “digital creatives,” including bloggers, so last year I decided to jump in and attend even though I found it laughable that I would enjoy or have much to contribute to a tech conference.

Still, I registered anyway.  Technology is changing the world too much, including the travel world, for anyone to remain intimidated by the pocket-protector crowd….and as far as I could tell at SXSW, there wasn’t a single pocket protector, just a lot of interesting people with a lot of laptops. 

I had a blast — who knew that so much of Interactive was panels about blogging, podcasting and online media?  As a writer, I was in heaven.

This year, when the call went out for submissions for panel ideas for SXSW 2008, I thought….why not propose a panel on travel blogging? 

Lots of people get started online by blogging about a trip or vacation;  maybe I could help them and anyone else interested in writing about travel.  There are also some great travel bloggers that I would kill to have on the panel with me, but I had to get through Step One.

The good news is that the SXSW organizers thought the idea had merit, so this week my panel suggestion went up for comments and votes, along with, oh, 687 other panel proposals.  The “Panel Picker” process lets future SXSW attendees indicate which panels really interest them, and that weighs heavily into whether a panel is ultimately scheduled for the conference.

Yes, this is one way that people get to speak at a conference: they ask.  Just be ready to stand up and talk if you ask and someone says, “OK!”

If you’re thinking about infiltrating SXSW (and there’s something for everyone, including pet lovers and crafters) then complete the quick/free registration process and vote for my panel:

Blog Highways: Travel Blogging for the Wanderer 

Either as a speaker or audience member, I still plan to attend and get my geek on.

(This is cross-posted on the Perceptive Travel blog.)

Technorati tags: travel, family travel, SXSW, blogging

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Tips

Guidebooks: my travel buddies

Lonely Planet guidebooks on a shelf (courtesy jasonnolanplymouth at flickr's Creative Commons.)Sainted Husband and I did some of the usual weekend yard work, but we also decided to get into the garage and bring in the last book boxes from our Summer 2006 move to Texas from Florida.

What the heck’s in those slightly misshapen boxes?

The answer is that I knew we needed to buy more bookshelves, but I didn’t quite realize just how much we needed more bookshelves! Still, if I’m going to have anything piled up around the house that doesn’t bother me, it is books. Neatly arranged and stacked up against the walls is better than hidden in boxes in the garage.

The travel guidebooks, however, are another matter.

Those babies get bookshelf space right away, no matter what. I was able to open up a little territory on my “guidebook shelf” when I discovered that I have two copies of Road Trip USA and two of Roadfood, but it was a squeeze to pack in everything from around the globe.

I am absurdly pleased to have Suzy Gershman’s guidebooks for shopping in London & Paris next to “TimeOut Tokyo” next to Lonely Planet’s “Louisiana and the Deep South” (an invaluable reference a few years back, during our Great American South Road Trip.)

All but the most recent of these are out of date; in fact, parts of every guidebook are out of date as soon as it’s printed. That’s why the best travel research is a mix of thoroughly reading a good guidebook, coupled with some Internet work for the latest info and different opinions. You can save weight by tearing out only the guidebook chapters that you need, or downloading just your specific requirements. When they depart a destination, many travelers then leave their books in their hotel lobby or other public spot like a library, so someone else can use them.

When I leave a place, I usually keep the guidebook as a memento. Sure, if I ever return to Bali I’ll pick up the latest Lonely Planet guide (plus peruse the BootsnAll Bali Blog) but I still like my own old copy of “Bali and Lombok” sitting on the shelf.

It keeps Maastricht, Hong Kong and Florida company — they’re like a bunch of old, experienced, crumple-paged wanderers hanging out together, swapping tall tales about who used the worst squat toilet or found the best seafood restaurant.

What a nice way to spend a Sunday evening; returning old guidebook friends from Garage Exile to the Travel Guidebook Shelf of Good Memories.

Technorati tags: travel, family travel, travel guidebook

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Tips

Finding the best airfare prices

Plane in flight (courtesy )Leo('s photostream at flickr's Creative Commons)

I often find some of the best travel advice in personal finance magazines like Money and Kiplinger’s.

In the August 2007 issue of Money, there’s a helpful article about “capturing a fare deal” when booking air travel. 

It includes a tip from one of my favorites, George Hobica at Airfarewatchdog, about the best times to find the largest selection of airfares (Saturday morning 7-9 am.) 

He also recommends looking for domestic fares weekdays noon-2 pm, 2:30-4:30 pm and 10 pm-midnight. For international fares, try weekdays 7:30-9:30 am and weekday late afternoons.

Now you have another reason to poke around airline sites during your work hours. 🙂

I’ve gotten away from using Expedia, Travelocity and Orbitz since they now tend to tack on service charges.  Instead, I surf over to Kayak (some prefer similar sites like Mobissimo and SideStep) and plug in my search info.  Kayak checks a whole bunch of individual company and travel sites with one click. 

When they come up with a combination that I like and select,  I’m redirected from Kayak to the individual airline’s Web site, where I don’t have to pay extra charges.

I use Kayak to search for hotels as well (they can’t, however, help me keep track of all of those “frequent hotel guest” programs that I register for, but then never get the card or membership packet.)

More and more, it pays to skip the middleman sites because the individual airline and hotel Web sites offer up goodies that you can only get on their company sites, as an incentive for you to shop directly with them.

The Money article continues with other tidbits; I felt pretty good that I already follow most of the suggestions:

**  Be flexible with your travel dates and times if possible (some times, days and dates are less crowded.)

**  Consider nearby airports, but factor in the aggravation/gas cost of driving there, plus garage and hotel bills that may negate your savings.

**  Check budget airlines, although I always seem to find the best prices on Southwest, for example, for flights that are very early in the morning or late at night, which means exhaustion or a hotel bill — not always worth the savings to me.

Thanks, Money.

If you find a good airfare one day, but return later to find it no longer listed, clear the cookies from your computer.  It may “magically” re-appear when you are seen as a “new” person to the airline (or hotel) Web site. 

I’d love to have a Web or marketing guru explain to me why sites do this. I hate clearing all of my cookies because then I have to log into all of my fave sites/forums again, and remember all of my usernames and passwords.  To avoid that, I search for prices on my family desktop and then later dig up the same fare on my laptop, since it won’t have the cookie that they’ve put on my desktop.  What a pain.

For more good guidance, click here for links to Kiplinger’s magazine articles that are travel-related, including great values in overseas trips.

Technorati tags:  travel, budget travel, family travel, cheap airfare