Travel Smart

Window or aisle? [my preference] Depends how far I'm going and how much water I'm planning to drink. The last thing I ate from a minibar? A very short can of paprika-flavored Pringles in San Jose, Costa Rica. I think it cost five dollars, but it was sort of a chips emergency. I won't leave home without.... A book that I am confident is good. Especially if I'm going somewhere without bookshops. I'm very careful to avoid the dreaded traveling-with-an-uninteresting-book situation. The best trip I've ever taken? And why? I once spent 6 months hiking around New Zealand with a friend from college. We bought a mustard yellow Austin at a car fair for NZ$800 and drove it from the northern tip of the North Island to the southern end of the South Island, fishing in every river and lake we passed. I'm sure there must have been difficult moments, but in my memory every day of that trip was magical: the huge distances, the crystalline streams, the hour or two we stood and watched fiordland penguins waddle across a beach in a rainstorm. My dream trip I wouldn't mind living for a little while in the Maldives. Or walking across Madagascar. The movie or book that inspired me to pack my bags? Strangely, perhaps, it was probably C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia, which is about some children who routinely visit an imaginary realm. My mom read those books to me when I was very young, too young to understand everything, but I remember the power of Lewis' idea¿that you might be able to step through the back of a wardrobe and enter another world. The impulse that sent those kids into Narnia came from the same curiosity about distant places that sends any of us traveling, I think; the conviction that there is always something new to see, someone interesting to meet. My greatest travel pet peeve? Windows that won't open. How I deal with jetlag? I lay awake in bed feeling lost and confused and then complain a lot the next morning. If I could travel with any living person.¿ Any living person? My wife. I'll never go back to ____________ And why? Gosh, everywhere I've been lucky enough to visit or live has been fundamentally interesting in some way. Every place has its own stories, its own marvels, even places that don't necessarily strike travelers as dream destinations, like Puerto Natales, Chile, say, or Detroit, Michigan. Ultimately, the success of any trip has more to do with the heart of the traveler than with the place itself. If you're heartbroken in Indiana, you're going to be heartbroken in Fiji, too. But if you're well-fed, and dry, and curious, every place in the world is worth trying to understand. If I could be anywhere right now.¿ I'd be eating huge spoonfuls of gelato with my family in Rome's Campo dei Fiori.

#10 Last year a director from our local theatre asked me to costume her show. I hedged her off and said I needed to think about it. I ignored her emails hoping she would find someone else. A few months later I traveled from Salem, OR to Phoenix, AZ. I was bumbling around Phoenix and stopped to get a burger. As I was walking into the restaurant, there was the director and her son eating their burgers, also on spring break in Phoenix. I took it as a sign of needing to deal with her request, so we talked, I costumed her show and it was a huge success. Posted by: Lorraine | May 21, 2007 #9 We are Australians now living in Florida. In 1974 we were in a restaurant in Southern England when I heard what I thought was an Australian accent. The man was English, but had lived with Australians in Montreal in the early 1960s. We had lived in an apartment in Montreal in 1958 - the same one he occupied in 1960!!! Posted by: Jean Roberts | May 21, 2007 #8 I was in Hawaii for an annual tour with the Georgia Air National Guard, and couple of friends and I decided to take a dinner cruise. The seas were a bit rough and many of the people on the boat got seasick, so the dining room was not very crowded. As I went up to the bar to order a drink, I noticed a woman that looked somehow familiar to me. It took a minute, but it finally came to me. She had been my 11th grade English teacher in the Florida high school I went to about 16 years earlier. She had failed me too... She didn't really remember me (which is probably a good thing), but she was happy to know that I had made something of myself. Posted by: Rick | May 21, 2007 #7 I had been working as a GO at Club Med Martinique for a few months when I was chatting with a couple over dinner. After the standard questions about what it was like to be a GO, I asked them about themselves. They were on their honeymoon and lived in Yorba Linda, Ca. I asked them where and they said "Oh by the lake". My question was "Do you know the house by the fountain with the two Scotch Terriers?". They looked at each other funny and said "Ummm, yes. We take our scottie to play over to play with them!". Turns out they lived right across the street from my parents!It was a little surreal after meeting people from all over the world, to meet my parents closest neighbor... Posted by: Shawna Esarey | May 22, 2007 #6 I was in Budapest and had just been attempting to use a pay phone to call an arriving friend at our hotel. After dumping more than three euros of change into the phone and getting nowhere, I was frustrated so I gave up and decided to walk back to the hotel. As I was walking I saw a women talking on a cell phone. I looked at her and the ease of her phone with great jealousy. Suddenly I took a closer look and saw that it was Katie Callahan, an old friend from high school who I hadn't seen in almost 20 years! She practically dropped the phone in surprise. I ended up borrowing her phone to call my friend, who had also gone to high school with us and we all went out and caught up at an elegant hotel overlooking the Danube. It reminds me to always look at people when I am walking around, no matter how far away I am from home! Posted by: Cordelia Persen | May 21, 2007 #5 When I was eighteen years old and on my first trip to Paris, I was alone and riding the Metro, when a very drunk man sat down next to me and began to put his hands all over me mumbling, and I didn't understand anything that he said (he was from Corsica). I yelled at him and tried pushing him away, but he kept getting closer & closer. The young man in the seat in front of me turned around & told him that I was "his girlfriend and to leave me alone." He motioned for me to come and sit next to him (in English). When the young man looked up at me we both realized that he had been my camp counselor at a YMCA camp in Rhode Island years before. We spent the rest of the ride talking about the good times we had had years before which helped me to forgot about the "incident on the Metro." Posted by: Zipporah Sandler | May 21, 2007 #4 I was crossing the street in Toronto one evening when the policeman directing traffic gave me a strange look. It took me a second, but as I was crossing I said, "Greg?" and he nodded. Greg and I made friends at a campground in Maryland when we were about 10 to 12 years old. We only knew each other for two days, but I guess we made an impression on each other. Posted by: Jen Katz | May 18, 2007 #3 While having tea at the Ritz in London to celebrate my mother's 85th birthday we started chatting with the people at the table next to us. Recognizing the mutual American accents, we asked each other where we were from. My mom and I were living in San Diego at the time. The couple said they lived in Fresno (a city about 250 miles to the north). I mentioned that the only people I knew from Fresno were my daughter-in-law's family. I told them her father's name and they looked amazed and told me that her father, an obstetrician, had delivered all three of their children. Posted by: Kathy Stafford | May 21, 2007 #2 I had just brought our newborn home from a New Jersey hospital when I received a phone call from a friend in Australia. He called to congratulate me. I asked how he heard the news. He told me that his father was walking down the street in Bangkok, and his father had bumped into a mutual friend of ours from Germany. Our friend from Germany told his dad the news and then his dad called our Australian friend who then called me. It just amazed me that people could be discussing my happiness thousands of miles away! Posted by: Gloria | May 21, 2007 #1 My Uncle & his family were on a driving trip, visiting national parks out west. My then 10-year-old cousin enjoyed signing them in at all the visitor center guest books. At one particularly obscure park in Utah, he said, "hey dad, there was a guy with our last name here today". When my uncle checked, it was the name of his long-estranged father, whom my uncle hadn't seen since his parents divorced when he was only 3. They asked the ranger on duty when that person had been there (it was dated the same day), and the ranger said, "Oh, he left about 10 minutes before you arrived, asked for directions to Dead Horse Point." So they quickly drove there themselves, and had a family reconciliation. This was nearly 30 years ago, and it still gives me shivers! Posted by: Tammy Fine | May 21, 2007 To read some dozens of other stories from readers, click here.

THE WINNER! Whenever my friend Winnie and I go on holiday, we always trade jobs. I'm a photojournalist, and Winnie is a social worker. Both of us prefer to leave our work life behind while we're vacationing, but whenever we meet new people, usually one of the first questions is "What do you do for a living?" Switching jobs keeps the conversation flowing and gives us a fresh perspective when we return. Jody Kurash, Washington, D.C. Jody wins a fabulous girlfriend getaway for two to Miami's Bal Harbour Village, courtesy of the Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau and its partners. The prize includes round-trip airline tickets; two nights at the Sea View Hotel in Bal Harbour; one $500 gift card for the Bal Harbour Shops; one Bal Harbour Passport, offering $2,000 in shopping, dining, and spa privileges; dinner for two at Carpaccio at Bal Harbour Shops; and admission for two to The Fifth nightclub in South Beach, where they'll get a VIP table and a bottle of champagne. THE FINALISTS My girlfriends and I are in our early 50s. Wherever we go, we always take small squirt guns with us. When we see a girl that we consider a Barbie-doll girl--great looking, perfect figure, etc.--we squirt her. She never figures out where the water is coming from, and we enjoy a laugh or two. Rebecca Winchester, Bemus Point, N.Y. Back when we were young and single, my girlfriend Susan and I went on several camping trips and made a lot of s'mores. Now we do short birthday trips. One year, Susan surprised me with a portable s'more maker with a grill. So now, no matter where we go, I take it along, and we enjoy s'mores and lots of reminiscing. Gwen Rohan, Huntsville, Ala. Each year, about 10 of my college friends and I get together for our annual girls' weekend. Regardless of where we go, our friend Wynne packs the Magic Date Ball (similar to the Magic 8 Ball, but it's pink). We spend the weekend touring, talking, laughing, and consulting the Magic Date Ball on all sorts of life decisions. Laura May, Nashville, Tenn. One year, while planning our annual getaway, my mother and I reached a stalemate (she likes the beach, I like Europe). So we drew our destination out of a hat. We've now incorporated that into our decision making...although I caught her cheating last year by putting extra bids for Walt Disney World in the pot. We've been to Hawaii, London, Paris, Tuscany, and, of course, Disney World. Stephanie Marchant, Atlanta, Ga. On our decade birthdays (e.g., 50), we each contribute to a cause by doing something we've never done before. On my girlfriend's 50th birthday, we walked a marathon in Ireland and raised $4,300 each for the Arthritis Foundation. Karen Ideker, Olympia, Wash. At every place we visit, my best friend and I create a thumbs-up, thumbs-down list. We take pictures, too, so that mixed in with the historic sites and beautiful scenery are photos of ourselves giving a thumbs-up to an amazing gelato station or a thumbs-down to the pay phone we couldn't figure out how to use. Julianna Keyes, Medford, Mass. We always take a Where's Waldo?-type picture. We spread out in a crowd in busy places such as the Spanish Steps. When we get home, it's fun to find ourselves in the crowded pictures. Jane Immel, Fredericksburg, Tex. My sisters and I started a tradition by planning a surprise trip for our eldest sister's 60th birthday. We gave her hints and photos along the way so she could try to guess where we were taking her--of course, some of the hints were a little misleading. Since this summer is my 60th, I got a photo of what looked like a ghost of the Virgin Mary, along with a hint that we would definitely be traveling by car and boat. We have as much fun with the hints and guesses as the trip itself. Joyce Lucier, Bangor, Maine Every year, 10 deputy sheriffs from the Waukesha County Sheriff's Department rent a house in Door County. We make a videotaped scavenger hunt and see who can make it to Door County first. Over the years, the group has eaten pickled eggs and chased chickens to grab a feather. We also ask bartenders along the way if they wear boxers or briefs and then ask for the underwear as an article for our hunt. This is our weekend--to abandon the uniform, to talk for hours, but most importantly, since we work in a male-dominated profession, to feel like women again. Debby Vanderboom, Waukesha, Wis. No matter where we go on our girlfriend getaway, we don't leave home without a simple college-ruled notebook. The book is stuffed with six years of gossip, goals, heartbreaks, and dreams. Our diary immortalizes our years of college flirtations and includes inspirational quotes, random musings, and our ever-changing ambitions (of course, we always welcome feedback in the margins). Even after our time at college ran out, the pages in our diary did not. Our freshly updated diary comes with us to each girlfriend retreat. And we can't wait to make new memories together, since we know we'll have very little catching-up to do. Michelle Neyland, Falls Church, Va. We throw a sheet over all mirrors and let go. You let your friends do your hair and makeup, and they tell you what to wear. At first it's difficult to let go, but then you feel so pampered. Rhonda Mello,Mammoth Cave, Ky. Every summer, we take the month of June off and rent a villa, an apartment, a hut--whatever we can get our hands on in a foreign city. Then we shop open-air markets for fresh local ingredients and wine. We go back to our place, and everyone is in charge of making something. It's all simple and fresh, but the ambience and company are the best parts. Shannon Hunter, Atlanta, Ga. I met some of my best friends in an online chat room discussing Diana Gabaldon's Scottish time-travel novels. We now call ourselves The Loopies and meet once a year. Our members come from the U.S., Canada, Tanzania, England, and the Czech Republic, and range in age from 30 to 70. At our gatherings, we always play a trivia game we created based on Gabaldon's books. The winner gets a homemade doll that looks like Jamie Fraser, a character from one of the novels. Diane Everett, Newtown, Conn. My girlfriends and I go camping at a state park located one town away. We always pick the second week in September, when the kids are back at school and we have the park, the ponds, and the grounds to ourselves. We swim, bike, eat, drink, and laugh. Cool showers, no makeup, no fancy clothes. Peg Zaniboni, Harwich, Mass. We take a little hot-pink-haired doll we've named Polly Prissypants on all our girlfriend getaways. We add something to her outfit every time we travel, and she finds her way into just about all of our pictures. In between trips, she even sends e-mails to all the girls to let them know how the planning is coming along. Sarah LaRose, Atlanta, Ga. We always play Girls' Jeopardy. We write down interesting questions on little pieces of paper and put them into a container. With queries like "Name two things you'd change about your husband" and "What would you do if you won the lottery but had only one week to live?" the game sparks both philosophical discussions and all-out gigglefests. The game works best with a pitcher of margaritas nearby. Beth Fernald, Sharon, N.H. We buy the most outrageous date shoes and promise to wear them at least three times over the next year. Pictures are required as proof. If anyone doesn't keep her word, she has to host a catered affair for the girls before the next trip. Elizabeth Musser, Washington, D.C. Since 1998, Angie and I have traveled together once a year. On our first trip, we got henna tattoos at the Renaissance Festival in Minneapolis. Ever since, whether in the Wisconsin Dells or Jamaica, we always get temporary tattoos. Our kids tell us it's pretty funky considering we're middle-aged baby nurses. Beth Gregoryk, Wilton, N.D. Every year, my five best girlfriends and I bring photos when we reunite. We make sure to include shots of the not-so-interesting aspects of our lives--our desks at work, the trainer at the gym who looks like David Schwimmer--so that we can really share one another's lives. Berit Rabinovitz, Boulder, Colo.

When we first came up with the idea of collecting some of the best reader tips in a book, we knew we'd have to create a book proposal that included sample pages of what exactly such a book of tips might look like. In the magazine, we use illustrations to visually liven up the tips, but that didn't seem right for a book, so we came up with the idea of using Budget Travel staffers to act out some of the tips. We hired a photographer and rented a studio, and spent a day taking photos. The publisher that ended up buying the proposal, Quirk Books, liked the idea of the book in spite of our photos, and broke it to us gently that they didn't think the photos were the right solution. Instead, they created a design that mimicked a passport to marvelous effect (and didn't use pictures at all). But we couldn't just throw away the pix—not least of all because we spent a nice chunk of change making them! So we're sharing a choice few in this slide show. We had a blast (as you can tell from the shots), and hope you enjoy seeing them as much as we enjoyed making them. Yes, we know we look like dorks, but so what. Sometimes you have to be a little dorky. If you're interested in buying the book, you can do so here.