If you’re visiting a new place, consider investing in a travel guide! Usually, as a tourist, you are looking for a book of information about a place designed for the use of visitors or tourists. It will usually include information about sights, accommodation, restaurants, transportation, and activities. Maps of varying detail and historical and cultural information are also useful pieces of information. When utilizing a travel guide, some narrowing criteria are needed.  First, where do you want to travel- Worldwide, a specific country, which part of the country do you want to see? More questions to consider include what kind of food do you want to eat, what activities do you want to participate in, where do you want to stay, and when do you want to travel?  Those are the main things to narrow down your travel ideas before you start your search.  Or, you could begin with all of these questions wide open and see what comes up in your search.

Once you have decided whether you are traveling in or out of country, determining if you need a passport or not, narrow your ideas down a bit.  For example, if you’re staying in the United States, what locations interests you most – beaches, mountains, desert, crowded or more isolated from people?  Do you want to see several historical sites, amusement parks, or tourist destinations?  Or do you want to get off the beaten path?  The options are unlimited and varied.

If you want to travel the world, check out World Travel Guide. There, you can plan based on country or city guides, determine how you’d like to travel, review food and drink options (because people may make decisions based on their taste buds), and find accommodations.  The ease with which to make reservations makes this website a great resource.

In the Best Travel Guides and Why You May or May Not Want to Pack Them, the author recommends Lonely Planet.  There are a variety of travel guides that narrow ideas down for you.  Plus, they can be downloaded to your device of choice for those times when you do not have internet access, a huge plus I would think! This option is probably for the more traditional or old school planning traveler. 

If you are interested in planning your travel online, with a lot of guiding questions to help make your plans, you should visit Fodor’s Travel. You can choose to narrow your search starting with destinations, cruises, trip ideas, forums also suggesting continents and countries, or hotels, or simply narrowed down to locations in the world or by specific locations.  The possibilities are limitless. 

Traveling has so many exciting opportunities.  In addition to seeing the sites, you get to make decisions on where you want to travel, what you want to eat, how you want to tour, and what experiences you want to have. So get out there and make new memories.