List of Travel Websites
- Vacation planning in a couple of keystrokes.interest image by Petro Feketa from Fotolia.com
Taking trips, from weekend jaunts to exotic vacations, has become a more and more popular activity, and now with the Internet, travelers have the option of acting as their own agents. Specialty websites enable users to design and plan every aspect of a trip to suit their needs, style and budget, from transportation and lodging to recreational activities. - Kayak has become the one-stop shop for planning a vacation. Here one can book a flight and a hotel room, rent a car and even reserve a spot on a cruise. What makes Kayak so successful at finding the best prices is that it searches not only the airline websites but all the online booking websites to find missed deals. There are also a number of ways to customize one's search, from prices and amenities to including surrounding airports, in order to come up with the most convenient itinerary. Kayak also provides all sorts of combination searches. The vacation search, for example, combines all facets of a trip, including the flight, car and hotel, into one query, ultimately resulting in one set price that summarizes the cost of the vacation.
- Airfare Watchdog is another air travel site that is quickly growing in popularity. It works differently from other sites in that it specializes in providing information about the cheapest flights around the U.S., currently extending to Europe and beyond. Airfare Watchdog is a free service where one can sign up and request to be kept informed of cheap flights either leaving from or landing in a particular city. The site also posts daily updates on the least inexpensive flights between cities, which one day could be a $20 round-trip flight from Houston to Boston or a $10 one-way flight from Chattanooga to Columbus. For those who are always itching to take a spontaneous trip but may not have the budget for it, Airfare Watchdog does all the work.
- While apartment subletting has long been a method of choice for seeking lodging in another town or country, the ways to negotiate deals were never very convenient. That's what makes Air BnB a particularly useful website when it comes to this idea. Whether it's a single room, a studio apartment or an entire country mansion, owners can post the dwelling on the website along with the days it's available and the cost. Customers are then able to peruse the various lodging possibilities to find one that's perfect for them and book it there and then online, using a credit or debit card. Both the customer and the subletter post their own profiles and can communicate through messages, bringing a personal feel to the site.
- Tripadvisor has become one of the essential traveling guides, made up completely of user-generated reviews of nearly everything travel-related, including lodging, restaurants and even the towns themselves. There are no limits to the number of reviews, and some destinations include thousands of insightful comments, both good and bad. Tripadvisor even allows members to post their own photos of these locations, which can be particularly helpful in determining the real look of a hotel or restaurant, using more than just press photos. Members include profiles with their reviews, so visitors to a site can look for others with similar tastes and needs in order to find trustworthy comments.
- With so many seasoned travelers in the world today, there are many who want to avoid the tourist experience at all costs. Instead, they seek to visit a city and immediately mix and mingle with the locals to get an authentic sense of the local lifestyle. For these travelers there is Gridskipper, a site that is part of the hip, urban Gawker company. With Gridskipper and its network of locals in metropolises around the world, one can find all the unknown but great nightclubs, restaurants and art galleries and even very specific information, such as where to find free Wi-Fi. While people of all ages consult Gridskipper before and during their trips, the information on the site is generally geared to the 20- and 30-something crowd.
