Tell us some of your savvy travel ideas–the latest and best place you just visited, how you upgraded your hotel room, insider spots in your hometown, your favorite airline, how you pack and bring just what you need, or tell us your worst travel story.

Give us a list of places you want to visit. The 4-S beaches (surfing, snorkeling, swimming and sunbathing) that you have found. Favorite mini vacation spot. Have you been to Paris (or Rome) and want to share an “off the beaten track” restaurant, wine bar or some other fabulous place to see?

Simply email us at savvytips@travsavvy.com today.

On the right side of www.travsavvy.com, you’ll see a number of affiliate banners. Our affiliates are carefully chosen to assist you with all your travel needs; from travel planning, hotel and airline reservations, guidebooks, luggage and backpacks, shoes and travel apparel….essentially any product that you’ll need to make your trip safe, fun and easy. You can be sure that you are getting the best in products and services when you choose a TravSavvy vendor. We make online shopping a one stop experience. Designed to save you money and time. So give our travel and photography related online stores a “shop.”

So, I’m thinking about summer travel and where to go next. I know, a good problem to have. The first thing I do is head to Lonely Planet Guides site. On their site, I shop for destination, activity, or digital guides. If I know exactly what I’m looking for, I can buy just a chapter from one of the guides.

For example, I’m thinking of a trip to Mexico — in particular Ixtapa. I looked up their Planning Guide (free PDF) for an overview and some recommendations regarding best time to travel, what to bring, events that are happening.

The beauty of this is that you can use a trusted source to give you up to date planning information. Give it a try! Click on the link in this article to get there.

The Days of Yore

I grew up in the water. Seriously, my Dad was an Olympic-class swimmer and he dunked me in the Atlantic before I was three. By the age of five I was body surfing. Our family moved to California and, naturally, I wanted a surfboard so I could really ride the waves like the cool kids. For some unknown reason, my parents obliged and I spend all day every day during each summer on one surfboard or another (begging proved a very effective way to coerce a new board out of my parents).

Read the rest of this entry »

Blogging is now a multifaceted activity. Everything you can blog about, people will blog about. So what does that mean in the context of a travel Web site? It means articles can be more current than in some other Web publishing schemes. It also means that you get to participate by adding your own comments.

Here are the “rules” for this site:

• Behave. We’re trying to provide useful information, but don’t want to serve as a forum for rude or obnoxious comments.
• Participate. If you have information to add, please add comments.
• Become an author. Feel free to contribute by commenting on articles and tips, or by emailing your own tips to our savvy editor.

Enough of the administrative stuff. Enjoy reading about travel and sharing your own experiences.

Admit it, you’re tired of the self-serving “best of” polls that are published around this time of year. You want to know about the companies to avoid. Specifically, you want to know which airlines to stay away from.

A few weeks ago, my friends over at TripAdvisor sent me the raw data from their Fall Travel Survey, and I’ve taken the liberty of doing a little number-crunching.

Read the rest of this entry »