“When Paul Grimes, the originator of the Practical Traveler column, turned it over to me 14 years ago, he said the most important task was to read the fine print on everything — tickets, insurance fliers, tour brochures, guarantees. In the big type, he said, everyone fibs. Typical is the ‘nine night’ tour that the small type clearly shows includes one night in an airline seat. It’s a good first principle. And now that it is time for me to yield this space, I thought to compress into the allotted 1,200 words other nuggets I have derived from 613 weeks — I did take vacations — of sometimes furious research. So here goes.”
Vindigo
“Vindigo is a personal navigation tool — tell it where you are or where you’re going and it can find the nearest and best places to eat, shop, and play. Vindigo knows about every great restaurant, bar, movie, and store in your city.”
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Deep Cold
“Coldwar era American and Soviet spacecraft that never flew. Photorealistic 3d computer models rendered in high resolution. Quicktime movies of the spaceraft in action.”
ExitCoupons.com
This looks cool. Find out what’s available at U.S. highway exits. “eXitSource is a leader in the mobile information business. There are over 2.4 million data points in the current database, which includes over 20,000 exits within a quarter mile radius of either side of the every interstate highway exit in the U.S., with over 130,000 individual businesses organized into categories such as Food, Gas, Lodging, Retail, Medical, etc.”
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ITA Flight Info System
“ITA’s Trip Finder gives travelers a powerful, easy-to-use tool for quickly finding the travel option that best meets their needs.”
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KWIKPOINT
“The International Traveler’s Visual Language Translator Card. KWIKPOINT is a picture card of over 600 color illustrations designed to help an international traveler communicate. It is easy to use; travelers just point to a picture indicating what they want to communicate. KWIKPOINT’S visual vocabulary includes FOOD, EATING OUT, SHELTER, TRANSPORTATION, SHOPPING, SERVICES, and CUSTOMS.” Note: The drawings won’t win any awards but it would be a handy thing to carry around.
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Mir may become space hotel
Walt Anderson, 46, a US-based venture capitalist who has made a fortune through telecommunications companies told the San Jose Mercury News on Thursday, “Mir, which was about to be thrown away, was a huge opportunity. Yes, it’s old and yes, it has a few problems. Yet any old building has that. You don’t tear down an old building because it has a few heating and air-conditioning problems. You renovate it.” Launch: 11 Feb 2000, 11:30 a.m., CST.
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SuperShuttle.com
Make reservations for shared-ride door-to-door ground transportation to and from 21 airports in the United States.
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geektools.com
“UltraDNS, Whois, Traceroute, Calculators, Software, Spam Tools, Geek Hotels, Domain Registration, Copyright… It seemed to us that we were always looking for a way to have all the external resources we use often, at our fingertips. And there were all sorts of cool tools that seemed to be in different places that kept moving and disappearing as people moved around the net, from company to company.” Here they are, and, hey, the hotel pages are nice; they list places to stay with internet connections.
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SignMaker
“This Java applet formats freeway signs for you. You provide the route numbers, town names, exits, and your choice of arrows — and SignMaker draws a sign for you. Since SignMaker uses the authentic ‘freeway font’ (FHWA E(M)), provides over 40 route markers to choose from, and mounts the sign on metal supports against a blue sky, the effect is quite realistic.”
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