Gettin’ Carried Away

I don’t think any of you need me to point out that we’re facing some pretty tough times right now. My hours at work have been cut to the bare minimum (there’s just no work to do), and everyone in the world is vying for the same jobs we’re all trying to get to supplement our incomes. However, I’d be doing you a disservice if I didn’t tell you that it really is the perfect time to travel.

Here’s why you should travel RIGHT NOW:

Tourism is hurting in some places. When certain locations are hurting for visitors, they’ll do anything to get them. Hotel rates drop, airlines offer cheap fares and attractions create free days or inexpensive package deals. Remember when I posted about the Lake Chapala Inn in Mexico? A room is currently going for $45 a night. Rooms used to be priced well above $100 a little over a year ago.

Traveling doesn’t mean leaving the country… or even the state. Simple day trips get you off the couch and out there into the world. And again, local attractions will most likely offer exceptional deals this time of year. Why? For one, it’s summer vacation for lots of people. And as I previously stated, money is tight. If no one is coming to the amusement park, it’s probably because no one can afford the $60 pass for the day. Six Flags Great America in Gurnee, IL has tons of discounts: Coca-Cola can prices, BOGO (buy one, get one free) online, etc.

Basic supply and demand. Once the economy improves, prices will go up. As jobs are created and people start making more money again, the demand for travel will increase. If there’s a greater demand for flights to Fiji or boat cruises to the Mediterranean or train rides to New York, then you will encounter competitive prices.

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I’m not saying that you should drop everything and head for a round-the-world excursion right now. However, with a bit of research, you can plan a nice little getaway this summer. Fellow blogger, Hilarye Fuller, also encourages you travel. There are only three reasons you shouldn’t embark on the journey of a lifetime. Check them out by visiting her blog: Dotting The Map.

Chapala is actually not one of the first places I visited in Mexico. However, as I mentioned in yesterday’s post, I left my camera cord at home, so I want to hold off on posting about some cities until I get my pictures uploaded on my computer. After a few days, I finally remembered that my iPhone takes pretty good photos, so I snapped this amazing shot of Lake Chapala earlier this afternoon.

While there are a lot of Mexican residents in Chapala, the city is also home to many American and Canadian retirees. Some of the B&B’s and hotels are even owned by foreigners. And speaking of hotels, Lake Chapala Inn, which overlooks the beautiful lake pictured above, costs about $45 a night. What. A. Steal.

I have to admit, the cobble-stoned streets of Chapala lose their charm after awhile, once you’ve been driving over the bumps for about 10 minutes or so. Walking is the way to go in this town; you’ll find quaint shops and affordable restaurants, but I think the lake is really the place to be.

In 1956 and 2003, due to a lack of rain, the people of Chapala feared the loss of this gorgeous body of water. Today, it stands about eight meters close to the shore and about 17-20 meters near the two islands out in the middle of the lake. City workers are renovating the beachfront, adding boardwalks and patching up old stonework. All the renovations are expected to be finished by December 2009. They have already come a long way, so I highly recommend visiting Chapala any time you like!

While battling my old LG flip phone and its (lack of) Internet capabilities, I began to crave a better phone so I could do all my social networking on-the-go. My hunger to access Facebook, Twitter and Myspace as quickly as I could on my MacBook at home led me to purchase an iPhone.

While the iPhone is unable to send multimedia text messages (until June, I hear), you can upload pictures to all the hip social networking websites. And that’s the reason I got the phone in the first place. However, I didn’t realize how many useful travel applications are floating around in cyberspace. There are so many, I tend to spend at least an hour searching for travel apps to download to my iPhone.

~* Photo courtesy of Inked Up *~

My absolute favorite travel app so far is the one for Urban Spoon. First of all, it’s free. Second, it finds places for you to eat, no matter where you are in the world. Third, not only does the app tell you the name/location of the restaurant, but it also gives you the price. Here are the specs:

• Once the phone locates your city, you just give it a little shake. The columns then begin to shuffle, as if you were playing a slot machine in Vegas.
• Once it stops, you’ll see name of the restaurant on the bottom. Up top, you are given the neighborhood in which it’s located, the type of cuisine offered (American, Italian, etc.) and the price range ($ = affordable, $$$ = pricey).

The next travel app I love comes from the King (or Queen?) of online search engines, Google. Free Translator does, well, exactly what it says. You type in a phrase, let’s say, “Where is the bathroom?” in English. If you want it translated to Spanish, the app will tell you, “¿Dónde está el baño?” And, honestly, you could type a whole paragraph to be translated and this app will do the job!

• Translate from English into 1 of over 25 languages!
• While the results won’t make you sound like a fluent native, they will allow you to be understood by them.

Living in Chicago, I have yet to find a flawless app for the CTA. However, since I frequent London, England, I downloaded the TubeDeluxe app. Oh. My. Gosh! This application has it all!

• You will see the status of each Tube line.
• You may change the order that the list of Tube lines appear, putting the ones you frequent more at the top.
• There is an entire Tube map available, and you can pinch-zoom in and out like you normally would on a website in Safari on the iPhone.
• A built-in function for route planning? Check!

Keep in mind, your iPhone needs to access the Internet for many of the applications you download. However, it’s a lot easier than lugging around a bunch of heavy books, maps and magazines!