Cool Travel Information Websites

We've provided a series of travel tips and cool websites for Cross-Culture Journey's E-newsletters. Here are some interesting websites that we've discovered for casual travellers and road-warriors. Some have made their way to E-News. Others are sitting amongst my bookmarks.

Airlines and Airports

Today in the Sky. USA Today's well-written air travel blog by Ben Mutzabaugh. On Wednesdays, at 1PM ET, Ben hosts a chat, where people can ask about airline news, trends, and commentary. http://blogs.usatoday.com/sky/

Skytrax. Frequent fliers globally rate the airlines, airports, flight itineraries, meals, airport lounges and more. http://www.airlinequality.com/

Flight On-Time Arrival/Departure Information. For most airlines and airports around the world. http://www.flightstats.com/go/Home/home.do

Airport Wireless Internet Access Guide. If you're travelling with a laptop, you can surf the web for free or next-to-nothing at many airports, who now offer wireless connections in the terminals. We found two good resources for airports with WIFI. TravelPost.com has an Airport Wireless Internet Access Guide. www.travelpost.com/airport-wireless-internet.aspx

WIFI Freespot Directory also has an airport guide. www.wififreespot.com/airport.html

Airline Route Maps: Who flies where in graphic terms: www.airlineroutemaps.com/

The Airchive: Something Old In the Air: Once upon a time, air travel was adventurous and glamourous. The Airchive is a web museum of commercial aviation travel with airline memorabilia from old timetables and route maps to display advertising that captured the excitement of real first class air travel. Revisit Eastern Airlines "Whisperjets" or the days of PanAm's "Flying Clippers". http://airchive.com/SITE%20PAGES/index.html.

Public Transportation To/From Airports: www.apta.com/links/airports.cfm

Trains, Subways and Metros

Subway Maps Online. We found a site with numerous rapid transit maps for many global subway and commuter rail systems ready for download. http://people.reed.edu/%7Ereyn/transport.html
And, another site has several which can be dowloaded to an iPod. http://www.coolosxapps.net/2007/04/30/isubwaymaps-subway-maps-for-your-ipod/

The Man in Seat Sixty-One. Mark Smith is a British career railwayman who developed a travel web site about passenger rail service throughout the world, from the Orient Express and the Eurostar trains, to local routes. From Albania to Zimbabwe, there's a rail adventure waiting.
http://www.seat61.com/index.html

For American Rail Buffs. Here's a fascinating website where a railway fan took photos of all 528 Amtrak depots in the USA. You can chart the depots by route, state, or city. http://www.trainweb.org/usarail/stationlist3.htm

Commuter Rail Systems: www.apta.com/links/transit_by_mode/commrail.cfm

General Travel

The Menu Collection of the Northwestern University Transportation Library currently includes more than 400 menus from 54 national and international airline carriers, cruise ships, and railroad companies, with coverage from 1929 to the present. http://www.library.northwestern.edu/transportation/digital-collections/menus/

Old and Abandoned Airport Terminals. Airports in olden days. http://oldterminals.topcities.com/index.html

World Hum is an ever-changing boutique collection of travel blogs from people who get into the spirit of the travel experience. It's not a collection of "what to do" and "where to go" features, but the kind of travel portraits that redefine travel. Among our favorites in the current editions: "10 Sizzling Hot Travel Tips from Sir Francis Bacon", Rolf Pott's repackaging of the 17th century philosopher's "Of Travel" essay for 21st century travellers and Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom's "Sipping Starbucks from Bloomington, Indiana to Shanghai, China". Is a Starbucks a Starbucks a Starbucks ? www.worldhum.com

Minimus.biz is a great new online travel store that sells a wide variety of approved travel-sized toiletries, food and drink, and more that meet the TSA's 3-1-1 carry-on rule (3 ounce containers in a 1 qt. plastic bag per 1 passenger). They have extensive selections of items with brands not always available in the "trial size" bins at local pharmacy and supermarket chains. They sell beverage kits, domestics, food, personal care items, colognes, after-shaves, and pharmacy products featuring many popular domestic and imported name brands from Tom's to Calvin Klein. www.minimuz.biz.