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Scroll down or click to
jump to each section
Note - Link pages used to be a big
thing, a couple of decades ago. These days, not so much. So I've
been deleting old links here that no longer work, but not adding new ones.
Say hello to Bing and Google instead! :)
Accommodation
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Bed and Bed
Directory (UK) |
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Large
listing of many different B&Bs spread throughout Britain. |
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Lastminute.com |
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Great rates
on hotels and packages, especially for Britain, if you're booking in the
last three weeks or so before arrival. |
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Laterooms.com |
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Another good
site for booking accommodation in the last three weeks before arrival. |
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Leading Hotels of the World |
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A group of very high
quality hotels - if you want to be assured of a deluxe experience,
choose one of these hotels. |
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Wotif.com |
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A primarily
Australian site, but now expanding to the rest of the world as well,
with excellent rates for stays at hotels in the next two weeks. |
Airlines and Aviation
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Air Ambulance
International |
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If something
goes wrong and you need to be flown back home, or to anywhere with
quality medical care, these are the people to talk to. |
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Air Times |
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Great amount
of historical information on airlines |
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Airline Links |
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Over 150
different links to airline websites |
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AirSafe.Com |
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This has
both information about air crashes and also interesting information
about fear of flying and air security. |
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Aviation History |
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A useful
site with a lot of information about early planes. Covers planes
that were first built prior to the 1960s. |
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Aviation Safety
Network |
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A database
of airline accident information going back to 1943. Easy to find
the information you want, and very helpful. |
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FlightStats |
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Perhaps the
best source of data about flights - are they on time, etc. Can be
better than the airline sites directly because it also uses FAA and
other data. |
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FlightView |
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Type in an
airline and flight number and it will tell you when it is expected to
take off and land, and, if in the air, will show you where the plane is,
how high, and how fast it is traveling. |
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ICAO Airplane Type
Designators |
| |
Gives
standard designators/abbreviations for most common current airplane
types |
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Kayak.com |
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Great
website for comparing airfares from many different carriers. Works
for both domestic and international travel, and roundtrip, multiple
city, and open jaw itineraries. |
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LowCostAirlines.org |
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A fairly
complete listing of low cost airlines that may not appear when you're
using a normal website to research airfares. |
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Plane Crash Info |
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Another site
with rather gruesome but fascinating information. Find out how
safe the airline you'll next fly is. |
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SeatGuru.com |
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A very nice
site with extensive information and very well laid out seat maps with
recommendations about where better and worse than normal seats can be
found on planes operated by AA, CO, DL, UA and US. Caution, not
all information is necessarily exactly correct, but it gives you a good
feel for these seating type issues. (Also view
our own page on airline types and
seating layouts). |
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SkyTrax Airline &
Airport Quality Rankings |
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An
interesting site with lots of information and opinions about things
related to airplanes and airports. |
|
SleepingInAirports.com |
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Helpful
information if you ever have the bad luck to get stuck, overnight, in an
airport. |
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SpaceA.net |
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Very helpful
information for people who can qualify to fly space available on
military transport flights. |
Cars
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Car Rental
Express |
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A site which
accesses smaller rental car companies that often have better rates than
the major national companies. |
Cruise
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CDC Vessel Sanitation Program |
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All cruise
ships that carry more than 12 passengers and visit US ports with foreign
itineraries are given unannounced inspections twice a year by the CDC
and given a rating for their hygiene/sanitation standards. Read
reviews of which ships pass and which fail. |
|
Cruisemates |
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An extensive
website with ship reviews and an excellent newsletter. |
Electronics
Government
Departments and Services
|
CDC Travelers' Health |
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An
encyclopedic reference to travel related health matters. Perhaps a
bit overly conservative in some areas, but still a great source for
information for things like if you should get vaccinations prior to
visiting somewhere. |
|
National Transportation Safety Board |
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These are
the people that, amongst other things, get to investigate airplane
crashes. Sadly, their safety recommendations are just that -
recommendations rather than legally binding regulations, and by the time
the FAA ever gets to implement them in a legally binding form (if it
ever does) years and years have passed. |
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Passport
Information and Applications |
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All you ever wanted
to know about how to get a US Passport.
Includes printable application forms. |
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State Department Foreign
Per Diem Rates |
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A huge list of
countries and cities around the world, along with official daily
allowances for hotels and meals costs. Rates range from enormously
higher than reality (which would allow you to live in five star luxury
and indulge in gourmet dining) to fairly realistic, with usually the
meal rates being further above reality than the accommodation rates.
I understand that the IRS will allow
these levels of claims as being fair (if you don't have receipts) but
don't know this for sure. |
|
State Department Travel Warnings and Consular Information Sheets |
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A useful service with
excellent summary fact sheets for all countries in the world, plus
warnings on those countries which warrant them. |
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Transportation Research Board |
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Part of the
National Academies; has some useful research and reports on all types of
transportation issues |
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Transportation Security Administration |
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Yes, the new TSA
might not have achieved much in the airports, but they already have a
website up and running! |
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United States Code |
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The federal
laws of the US. Note that this does not include the
Code
of Federal Regulations or the
Federal
Register. It also does not include state or local law, |
Phone and Fax Services
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GetHuman.com |
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This website
tells you how to get through automated phone systems and directly to a
real live human being.
A sad commentary on modern
business practices that it is necessary to visit a website to find out
how to actually contact a real person, isn't it! |
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K7.net Free Fax and Voicemail |
| |
Don't ask me
how these people make money, because their service is totally free!
I've used it for over a year and it is flawless.
They give you a phone number
which people can use to send you faxes and voicemails, and you can then
have the faxes and voicemails forwarded to your email account.
Once you've started getting electronic faxes, you'll never want a paper
one again! |
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Kall8 |
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A low cost
(800) service that will give you an (800) number for as little as
$2/month. You can forward the (800) number to anywhere in the
country or anywhere in the world, making it into a true and convenient
'follow me' number so that people can always reach you. Offered by
the same company that provides the K7.net service. |
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Packet 8 VoIP Service |
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A low cost
alternative to regular phone service, offering unlimited long distance
service too. Reviewed here. |
Rail
Singles Travel Resources
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Singles Cruises and Tours |
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Well established
operator that operates a variety of tours for singles each year.
Reportedly slightly more women than men participate, general age range
from 30-55 but with some older and some younger. Free newsletter. |
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Cruise Mates |
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A cruising website
that has an excellent and extensive section for singles. Has a
great newsletter, too. |
|
Journeywoman |
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An excellent and
slightly quirky site for women travelers. Includes a newsletter
and lots of content and resources.
Has an associated site,
HERmail.net, that enables women to
match up with other women as travel partners. Both sites are
excellent examples of the tremendous benefits and empowerment of the
internet. |
|
Singles Cruises |
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This company seems to
be focused more on the social aspects of helping people meet other
people on the cruises that it blocks group space on. |
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Singles Travel International |
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A company with a good
range of tours and related resources for single travelers. |
Tour
Operators and Travel Agents
Miscellaneous
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Airline Meals |
| |
What will they think
of next! Here's a website dedicated to pictures of airline meals -
a mix of airline promotional pictures (that never look anything like the
food on my plate, no matter if I'm in First class or Coach) and real
pictures taken by travelers of the food in front of them.
No real practical value, but if
you're wanting to do a bit of semi-random surfing, it is a nicely
presented site. |
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Mayer Nudell - Specialized
Consulting Services |
| |
Mayer Nudell
is a former US diplomat, published author, and expert in the field of
aviation, international and travel security. He provides a range
of services probably aimed primarily at larger corporations. |
|
Privacy
International |
| |
An
organization that is trying to combat the merciless increase of invasive
anti-privacy measures that are offered in the name of increasing our
security but which in truth do nothing of the sort. |
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Terra Fly |
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This is an
amazing site. Type in an address and you get a satellite picture
of the location. It includes amazing data for the area if you
click on a data point, including even homes for sale.
Satellite photos may be some
years out of date (I estimate the satellite picture of my house is 5+
years out of date). Image resolution is 1 meter on the free site,
but 6" resolution photos can be ordered. |
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Wayback Machine |
| |
Wow.
Who said that web pages don't last for ever! This site has an
archive of many pages of many websites dating back to 1996, so here is
your chance to look at the websites of now defunct airlines, or just
about anything else! |
Other Travel
Informative/Consumer themed Web Sites
|
Bidding For Travel |
| |
This
excellent site helps you understand the type of rates that you can
successfully bid at on Priceline.com.
If you plan on buying travel
through Priceline, you should visit this site first to check what the
best going rates are. |
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Europe for Visitors |
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A massively
comprehensive website with almost 3500 pages of information about
Europe. |
|
Gemutlichkeit Travel Letter |
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A monthly
newsletter focused on travel to Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
Reviewed in my article
here. |
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Johnny Jet |
| |
This site
bills itself as 'the ultimate travel portal' and its claim seems
reasonably accurate. Whatever you're likely to want in terms of
travel websites, you're likely to be able to find it here.
Amazingly, this site is the
work of a single individual ('Johnny Jet') and done on a part time
basis. |
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JoeSentMe.com |
| |
My own site would not
have been possible if it were not for Joe Brancatelli's support and
encouragement. You
definitely should go visit his site, and sign up for his excellent
weekly newsletter. |
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Manatee Press |
| |
Travel
guides to Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Costa Rica, and Barbados.
Travel tips, information, mailing list, and photos. |
Reference
|
Area Code Lookup (North America
only) |
| |
I used to have all
the area codes pretty much committed to memory, so as to recognize the
state and sometimes the city that an area code related to. But
with the explosion of area codes over the last ten years, that has
become impossible, and this site is a convenient way to find out what
state an area code belongs to.
The interesting thing about this
listing is to see how few remaining area codes there are. What
will happen when they are all used up? (The answer to this
pressing problem is complicated and, of course, very expensive!) |
|
EmbassyWorld.com |
| |
Wow - a massive list
of foreign embassies and consulates plus some other international themed
services and resources (eg some maps, power/voltage info by country,
etc). |
|
Great Circle Mapper |
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Allows you
to measure great circle distances between airports, to check range
radii, and a bunch of other neat things. |
|
The Lonely Planet |
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Companion
website for the excellent travel books. Lots of good information. |
|
Maps - Mapquest |
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Excellent
maps and driving directions for the US, also has good maps for many
international countries too. |
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MSN Maps |
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Has a very
useful world atlas that enables you to find where just about any town or
city is in the world. |
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Sunrise and
sunset times - another site |
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A possibly
simpler site that gives similar information to the site above. |
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Time Zones for World Cities |
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This is invaluable.
Not only tells you the current time, the time zone the city is in, but
also has information like when daylight savings starts and finishes,
sunrise/sunset times for both the present day and future dates, and lots
more. |
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Weather |
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This
excellent site offers information on today's weather, the forecast for
the next several days, and, best of all for people planning a trip, also
gives historical average daily and monthly high and low temperatures.
Has data for most US
locations and also a huge number of international cities, too. |
|
White Pages |
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This site,
calling itself 'The Ultimate White Pages' gives you immediate access
into six leading white pages sites. |
|
WorldClimate.com |
| |
This very
helpful site enables you to specify any location in the world and then
get month by month average temperature data. Very helpful for
planning a trip. |
|
World Fact Book |
| |
This CIA
publication gives you excellent general information and country maps for
just about everywhere in the world. Great for general reference. |
Services to Help your Travel
Booking and Management
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Kayak.com |
| |
My favorite
service for shopping automatically across dozens of different websites
to find the lowest airfares. Not perfect, but a good start to
understanding the best fare to where you want to go. |
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