I just got back from a few weeks of being an active travel writer, which is in contrast to being an active traveler. For one thing, I stayed in some very swanky hotels in the line of work, while staying at some not-so-swanky ones at other times. In contrast, I have to admit that the …

Can you find Bali on a map? Or Bosnia? Or Boston? A few weeks ago I was interviewed by a journalist who was doing a travel story on destinations in Asia and we were making jokes about how tourists were probably avoiding Bali because they thought it had been hit by the tsunami in December. …

A walk through the rarefied air of luxury travel magazines. As a travel writer, I feel like I need to be up on what’s going on, so I read a ton of magazines. Even when they seem downright silly, which is how I often feel while leafing through many of them. Why do I always …

What do Chinatown buses, independent hotels, and back street restaurants have in common? Well, once upon a time, I was fortunate enough to see a speaker/author named Roger Von Oech talk about creativity. He has published some neat books and even a pack of cards that help you break your brain out of its complacency …

If you want to really stretch your travel budget, you need to uncover the local “screaming bargains” for each location. When you are traveling to a foreign place, it is sometimes hard to get your bearings and you end up spending lots of money on things you didn’t realize were expensive until it was too …