40 most useful travel websites

i have discovered a new website that lists 40 useful travel websites. check it out..

http://www.wisebread.com/travel-resources

photo of the week: April 6, 09 - Anapaca Island, California

If you have ever glaced at a map and seen, there is in fact a chain of islands off the cost of California. They span from Ventra to Santa Barbra, and they are called the Channel Islands. As a child, i visited Oxnard, which the islands are visible from. I did not realize that you could in fact visit these islands. One of the channel islands is home to many seal lion rookies, including fur seals, which are a rare sighting if you ever catch a glimse of one.

My family and I decited to take a boat and visit the smallest of these islands, Anapaca. There are literally no trees there and also, no challangeing hiking grounds. There are however, lots and lots of seagulls. In fact, Anpaca island is the breeding ground for seagulls. If you go, make sure you miss the bird season if you're not into them. 

There are also camp grounds on site, which is perfect for kaykers and scuba divers, for the rich marine biodiversity.

picture of the week for 3.30.09

This week's picture comes from my weekend travels in DC. This is probally a really cliche picture of the jefferson memorial. The flowers have not bloomed in this picture, but if it was, it would be spactular. This week is the start of the Cherry Blossom Festival. 

One thing that i absolutly LOVED about DC was that you had a buncha trees that were bare from the winter frost. Some of the trees had a million buds on them, and some of them were in full bloom. Just imagine a tree with JUST flowers. it was an amazing sight.

In addition, I got to see the cherry blossoms, something that is quite a treat for me.

picture of the week of 03.23.09

Red Hook New England Brewery: Portsmouth, NH  (live free or die!)

One fun place to visit is breweries.  Tours are typically either free or else don't cost much at all. The Red Hook Brewery (the east coast one) costs $1. It was free for us thou, because my sister gave the bartender her Obama button.  And one main upside to tours are always BEER SAMPLES! 

Tours always give you a history of the company as well as a look at how they make the beer. Did you know that there are 2 differnt Red hook factories? one in Seattle, WA, and another in NH. They calim that coast should not matter: in fact, most batches are usually compared side by side to ensure that the taste and quality are the same.

Filling up kegs  for bars :0)

Bottling up beers and packing them up

new website discovered!

As a frequent traveler (I have a tendency to hop onto a plane every 3 months or so and go somewhere, usually the east coast), I'm always looking out for great deals. Frequent flyer miles are something awesome to rack up (which reminds me, I really should sign up). 

When looking for an airline ticket, Its always good to use multiple sources. I have found that expedia and orbitz tend to give the same results. I have recenlty discovered farecast.com. This website is better than Orbitz or Expeida (which I'm used to using) in  that it searches all of those budget websites and finds the best deal out of all of them. One of the features that I find helpful is the "time grid"

As you can see, it gives you the TOTAL price it would cost if you left early morning and late afternoon, etc and all of your different time possiblities. This helps at a glance if you were debating between early morning or red eye.

For those with a thin wallet, farecast will also provide a grid of the airline prices and also pojects if the prices for a certian ticket will go up or down. 

another great thing about this site is that it shows you right off the bat the price of the entire trip, verus some sites which give you the price per ticket, vs the round trip price (which can be shocking to find at the end). 

one thing that i did not find easy to use was the sliders on the side options in which you can change your perfered arrival/departure time and the min and max prices. It does a realtime update (read: everytime you slide it to a new position, it updates the website), and i find it rather tedious, espeically if you have a slow running computer.

happy hunting ladies and gentleman!

travel photo(s) of the week

So, Because I have soo many photographs from my past travels (Hey, after 27 counteries, I MUST have something to post). These photographs will include any places I have been. this will include any spactular places in my nation and maybe city of residence.  

This week i'm featuring Central Park in New York City- one of the most well known parks in the world. This place is as magical as it seems in the movies.  These pictures are taken from my fouth New York Trip (yes, read fourth) back in Nov 2007 RIGHT after our historic election season. The colors were amazing in Central Park, and the fall color displays were everywhere. This was a great treat from me, being from California, our fall color displays are not as good as they are in the east. 

a typical NYC/ Central Park shot with the buildings in the background

Marking the entrance to the park on our Sunday morning stroll. Say hello to my partner in crime on this NYC trip-- she even drove into the city. Brave!

Signs

As a foreigner in many places, I feel like some places just have a sense of humor. Other places don't. I have a very offbeat sense of humor, so sometimes I think even the wierdest things are funny. I have always been intrsted in signs, for some reason. I found that I had a particular faciniation with them. It because conclusive durning my freshman year of college when i began stealing signs. anything that would seem funny, or else stole signs and put them in places that would seem alomst ironic. For instance, i've been putting a "this is not an exit" sign that i stole from the univeristy library above the exit of my door.
while traveling around, when i'm most likely to have a camera, I took a picture of cool or funny signs.
Here are just a plethra that I have seen:


A sex Shop in Amsterdam. Who woulnd't be happy going into there?




















Bratslavia: It's amusing to combine a Pension AND a Jewish restraunt in one place!





















Bratslavia: Man at work! It also accompanies a bronze statue.




















Amsterdam: this man thinks he can save us!




















Amsterdam: Apparently Herbs from the gods are shrooms.





















Green Island, Taiwan: apparently, they really want to voice how the weather is!