{"id":34306,"date":"2019-02-13T06:00:24","date_gmt":"2019-02-13T12:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs2.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/?p=34306"},"modified":"2019-02-11T14:29:44","modified_gmt":"2019-02-11T20:29:44","slug":"travel-talk-researching-your-trip","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/travel-talk-researching-your-trip\/","title":{"rendered":"Travel Talk – Researching Your Trip"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Hello Travel Fans! This month we’re tackling one of my favorite things about travel – planning your trip!<\/p>\n

I admit, I’m pretty organized and enjoy the process of research (Hey, I’m a librarian! No surprise there!) and list making and exploring ideas. It’s akin to daydreaming, imagining all the possibilities. Of course, at some point reality takes over and you realize a sunrise hot-air balloon ride or a week at the Ritz is not going to happen. That’s when research comes to the rescue.<\/p>\n

Before you get started, decide on a few basics. Know where you’re going (hopefully somewhere that you’re very excited to see), know what you’d like to do there (museums, historic sites, unique experiences) and what time of year you’re going. Have a rough idea of your budget (Ritz or hostel?). Are you going on your own (we’ll talk more about solo travel later this year), with family or friends or with a tour group?<\/p>\n

OK. You’ve got a handle on the basics. Here are some resources.<\/p>\n

Mango<\/strong>. If you’re going to a foreign country be sure to go to our Online Resources from our home page and navigate to Mango (listed here<\/strong><\/em><\/a>), an awesome language learning program that’s FREE! It’s simple and intuitive to use and will give you a strong grounding in the basics. It’s always smart to know a few common phrases. (You will need your Davenport Library card number to access Mango)\u00a0 Michelle adds:\u00a0After you create a profile, download the Mango app to take your language on the road!<\/em><\/p>\n

The library<\/strong>. Yeah, you saw that one coming, didn’t you? We have lots of travel guidebooks at the library. While there is a ton of information online, there’s still something about leafing through a book, finding something that catches your eye, or for studying a map. If you can’t find the area you’re planning to visit, check at the desk and we’ll try to find something from another location.<\/p>\n

Instagram.<\/strong> This might seem like an unusual place to research a trip, but I can personally vouch for it. Go on Instagram and do a search for your vacation spot and you’re likely to find several hashtags to follow. You can refine your search to special attractions too (#chicago #artinstituteofchicago #thebean). You’ll also probably find the local chamber of commerce or tourism board which are, of course, going to post lots of glamorous photos. For a more realistic look, dig a little deeper and look for people who actually live in the city or country you’re visiting (this will be easiest with big cities like New York or London) Before I went to Paris I started following accounts such as @paris.with.me<\/strong><\/a>,\u00a0@everydayparisian<\/strong><\/a> @lostncheeseland<\/strong> <\/a>among many others. @davidlebovitz<\/strong><\/a> was especially helpful since he’s not afraid to show the nitty gritty as well as the beautiful all with dry wit. Accounts like these will give you a glimpse of the current weather, what people are wearing, ideas for what’s currently going on. And after your trip, they can be fond reminders of favorite memories.<\/p>\n

More ideas from Michelle:<\/p>\n

Flight trackers<\/strong> \u2013 A good way to find a reasonably priced ticket is to sign up for a flight tracking alert.\u00a0 I have used Google flights with great success.\u00a0 You type in your dates and location where you want to go and Google will email you when a fare decreases or increases in price.\u00a0 With help from Google flights<\/strong><\/a>, I recently got a round trip to Europe for $513.00.\u00a0 The decrease in fares are usually short-lived so you have to act fast.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Email newsletters<\/strong> \u2013 Prior to your trip, sign up for travel newsletters that will provide tips and tricks on a specific region.\u00a0 For European travel as an example, try EuroCheapo<\/strong><\/a> by Tom Meyers.\u00a0 His newsletter covers relevant topics for a first time travelers and for those who are looking for more out of the way spots.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hello Travel Fans! This month we’re tackling one of my favorite things about travel – planning your trip! I admit, I’m pretty organized and enjoy the process of research (Hey, I’m a librarian! No surprise there!) and list making and exploring ideas. It’s akin to daydreaming, imagining all the possibilities.[Read more]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4827],"tags":[4858,4857,4856],"class_list":["post-34306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-travel-talk","tag-planning-a-trip","tag-researching-your-trip","tag-travel-talk"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd0CXx-8Vk","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34306"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34306\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34334,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34306\/revisions\/34334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}