Conde Nast Traveler
The sophisticated traveler knows that the creme de la creme of travel publications is Conde Nast Traveler. In the archaic age of print and pulp, this magazine was an incredible resource for information on worldly destinations. What individual's travel library would be complete without a large section of back issues as a reference for vacation plans? Now, in the digital age, we don't have room for extensive libraries, or large collections of printed information. Fortunately, Conde Nast Traveler isn't bound to its print past, and now has an online presence that is much, much more than repositioned print content.

The core of the site is an incredible database of vacation spots, which are critiqued with extremely informative qualitative assessments. While many travel-related sites will simply list a bunch of hotels and restaurants to be found in a given city, Conde Nast Traveler offers well-written descriptions of the various aspects of a location. The key areas include Hotels, Dining, Access, and Weather.

The site also offers a number of very intelligent and creative ways to sift through its core database; each way reflects a different intuitive communication model. The Great Escape area is the most obvious road to access. A clickable world map allows you to zero in on a continent, then country, then individual city. This is good for people who "think globally," and like using maps in their everyday lives.

For people who care less about geography and more about amenity, Conde Nast offers Concierge as a navigational tool. This section guides you through a series of forms on which you enter the parameters of your dream vacation. Concierge then returns an increasingly refined list of destinations that match your criteria.

Snapshots is an ingenious navigational device for those driven by visual cues. Four photos are displayed on a page. Clicking on the photo that is the most appealing to you shoots you to information on the illustrated locale. If none of the photos are appealing, clicking a button will load four new images.

The site also includes a good section of travel-related news, all of which is very relevant to planning a trip. All in all, Conde Nast Traveler is the definitive resource for online travel planning.-WKC

A+

007 Travel
Lots of forms. Lots and lots and lots of forms. That's what you'll find at the 007 Travel site, which acts mainly as a device for a crafty travel agency to collect information on your travel plans. Want to know the lowest prices on flights to London? Fill out a form. Renting a car overseas? Fill out a form. Need to know where the 007 Travel agency is located? Sorry, you're out of luck: That information isn't available. You'll find some useful information here, such as a list of moderately priced international hotels and restaurants, but otherwise this is a mess of broken links, missing graphics, and mystery. WARNING: Never send your credit card number to a company that doesn't give *its* phone number or mailing address.-TG

D

American Airlines
Now we know what all those flight attendants do when they're not serving drinks and emptying barf bags: They're writing HTML code. That's the only way American could have produced such a mammoth site, with pages on more than 50 subjects such as flight schedules, fleet composition, and corporate structure. Unfortunately, AA's most useful wing -- the online ticket-booking service known as Sabre -- isn't directly accessible via the Web site.-TG

B+

Bridge
Now that *Monk* magazine and its imitators have gotten some recognition, on-the-road writers are springing up all over the place. But how many of them get around on bicycles laden with 125 pounds of crap? That's what Holly Hughes and George MacLeod have done since 1993, covering more than 35,000 miles, carrying a message of community art to distant towns and writing, writing, writing about it. These folks have real heart, and that's what makes this site great. Be sure to check out Holly's statue/sculpture of Einstein, made of ballpoint pens, tennis balls and 5-1/4" floppy disks: It's great fun, and captures the site's spirit perfectly.-TG

B

GNN Travelers Center
With outstanding feature stories and an outstanding list of travel-related resources, GNN hovers near the top of all travel sites. Instead of breaking down travel into logistical compartments of expense reports, packing lists, and so on, GNN documents traveling from the perspective of the people who do it. The stories are real, often exciting, and offer fresh commentary about life on the road.-LS

A

Life Following the Dead
I've had a fantasy of collecting all my old letters, souvenirs, photos, diaries and tape recordings to definitively archive my life on a Web site. A full life is perhaps too ambitious to fully document, but how about a road trip? That's what Joe Nickell has done, transcribing copious notes of his adventures riding a Magic Bus, following the Grateful Dead. What makes this site great is the minutiae he captured in sound and imagery. Example: You not only read, "Marty curses loudly," you also get to hear him. Awesome. -TG

B

Looking for Lovedu
This is a completely inspired and insightful collection of writings from an African journey, in which Ann Jones searches for Lovedu, a tribe "where women rule." Jones lends a beautiful perspective to the travels. Her words flower as she documents landscapes, personalities and cultures with explicit detail. I'm in love with this documentary, and recommend it wholeheartedly. As an added bonus, you'll find magnificent photography.-SK

A+

Rec.Travel Library: Worldwide Travel and Tourism
Newsgroups often have stewards who are kind and organized enough to encapsulate community wisdom in a relevant FAQ file, but few boast the riches that Internet Solutions has archived for this Web-based rec.travel.* hierarchy. Besides the usual FAQs, it's chock-full of information on lodging, travel, places to go, and things to do. Unlike commercial travel sites, this one's not stingy when it comes to linking outside sources: Thousands of them are spread throughout literally hundreds of useful pages. If you don't find what you need there, check out the rec.travel.* newsgroup archives. And it's all searchable. For its friendliness and its depth, this is one of the best sites I've seen all year.-TG

A

Southwest Adventures
Does the thought of ice climbing appeal to you? How about mountain kayaking? These activities are the purview of Southwest Adventures, a Colorado firm that arranges outings for those sports which "can only be enjoyed in the high mountains." Its products and recommendations are described in exquisite detail, and links connect you to sites and newsgroups of interest to the rugged soul. Despite occasional misspellings (for example, "inable"), annoying blink tags, and naive page design, Southwest Adventures' site does a good job of bringing its offerings to the Net. Durango, ho!-TG

B-

Southwest Airlines Home Gate
Southwest Airlines is famous for having the funniest "hold" messages in the travel business: I once called, and heard, "If you have a touch-tone phone, press eight. It won't make us respond faster, but it'll make you feel better." Similarly, its home page has the same sort of small-company irreverence: How many corporate sites do you know of that feature a cartoon flight gate as its main interface? Click on the cash register, and you find ticket information; click on the wall map, and learn about the amenities at Southwest's home airports; click on the company president's photo, and you get... well, you get the photo. Fun and informative. What more could you want?-TG

B

Tom's Virtual Vacation
This is the singular account of two dudes' collective odyssey across these great United States -- complete with an image map that allows you to easily track their 10-day trip. "Odyssey" may be too strong of a word to use, considering that the duo's obstacles were problems like trying to find a motel room for the night. I'm afraid the writing is dull and witless-- umm, I mean technically oriented. You'll find a lot of thrilling information on interstate highways. -WKC

B

Travel Source
Travel guides are popping up all over the Web, each promising to be the biggest, best or otherwise most superlative. Travel Source is no different. This commercial collection of links is supposedly "The Internet's First Interactive Travel Guide." At first, it seems that its pioneerism has given Travel Source time to build quite a content base, but beneath the 35 categories of travel information (from Wine Tours to Yacht Charters), there are typically fewer than three links per category. Still, what is there is reasonably diverse and interesting, even if it paints an incomplete view of the wide world of travel options.-TG

C+

Travel Weekly
Is this a commercial site, or just the work of some travel agents with too much time on their hands? The confusion stems from the fact that 1) it's really, really well done; 2) it's sponsored by a travel industry magazine; 3) you'll find no ads, and 4) it features fun, sometimes sarcastic writing. So what's to dislike? The site's accessibility, that's what. Several visits on two separate days brought up the "this server isn't accepting any more connections" message. Clearly, demand has outstripped supply. If you can get through, though, you'll find the biggest set of travel links around. If they'd fix a few links and beef up the server, this site would rock.-TG

B

Turtle Expedition
This is the fairly interesting ongoing reportage of a couple's road trip across Russia. Our protagonists have, for the last 20 years, driven beefy trucks through the world's most remote regions. Reports of their trips have regularly appeared in *4x4 Magazine*, and now the Russia trip is accessible online. As of this writing, the last update to their trip was from October. Did Russia conquer this intrepid couple?-WKC

B-

United Airlines
Fly the friendly skies with a friendly Web site. Cliche? Yes. True? Yes. United indeed has a wonderful Web site for all levels of browser capability. Since I'm running on a T1, I opted for high-capability, and it was well worth it -- pretty layouts and creative ideas abound. Load up with flight schedules and travel tips, read the Mileage Plus newsletter, and find out what the United employee-owners have to say. Good stuff.-SK

A

Visit to Nepal
If you're planning a tour of Nepal, visit this site before your departure. It's an outstanding documentary of a one-month trip, and includes an expenses run-down, guide book info, a 70-page travel journal, and dozens of photographs with accompanying text. The overall layout is dry -- standard Netscape gray and prehistoric icon buttons. Still, given the breadth of content, this is a wonderful site.-SK

B+

Walt Disney World
If you know Disney, you know that everything it publishes is the epitome of advertising hyperbole. Here you'll find the Web version: clean graphics, professional (albeit vapid) copy writing, and endless superlatives, all leveraging the highly bankable images of Mickey Mouse and Pocahoozits. In keeping with Herr Disney's vision of a perfectly controlled universe, there are no -- count them, zero! -- external links. It's like visiting the Disney parks: a nightmare of grinning cartoon characters, shiny buildings, clean streets, and no way out. Stay in line, please. Children below this height will not be allowed on this ride. You will be assimilated. Have a nice day.-TG

C

Web Travel Review
Philip Greenspun offers a good deal more than a "we-went-here-and-we-did-this"report: There are travel tips, colorful photos, side stories -- like the fascinating tale of a criminal auto-repair shop -- and lots of downright good writing. In the end, that's what sets this site apart from other, more self-indulgent travelogues: The professional level of the text and photos makes this site a special, moving experience. But what's this guy doing studying artificial intelligence at MIT? Conde Nast, sign him up!-TG

A

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