The travel logs at Real Travel.com are sure to energise holiday plans and daydreams alike.
Whichever needs a bit of inspiration, the travel diaries and photographs created by people who have been where you want to go – or to places you haven’t yet heard about – won’t disappoint.
This California-based blog platform believes in the wisdom of the crowd. It operates with the belief that the best travel advice comes from people who have already been where you’re going.
So, in the spirit of Web 2.0, nearly all of its content is user-generated. It hosts free travel blogs – on which diarists can write about their trips, as well as post maps and photos.
This content is searchable via tag clouds, by individual blogger, by destination – however you like, really.
There are also forums, a price-comparison section where aspiring travellers can cross-check airfare and hotel prices, a vault of the latest deals on travel, editor’s picks - highlighting particularly well-done blog posts and photos – as well as a trip planner section where users can organise their next vacations and then share the plans.
Besides its original content, the strength of Real Travel lies in its organisation - content is extremely easy to search – unlike some other travel sites which host user-generated content. Yahoo, for example, allows users to post about their travels, but the content is not as well-organised.
TripHub also hosts user-generated content and provides a trip planner. But you have to register before you can view any of the content.
Then there are forums of sites of popular guidebooks: Fodors, Let’s Go, Lonely Planet. All have spots for feedback, for user-generated content, but the format is that of a traditional guidebook.
Plus, in Real Travel has a partnership with Frommer’s Guide, which it began in 2006, so the richness of user-generated content is bolstered by material from Frommer’s – making Real Travel truly a one-stop shop for about 500,000 unique viewers each month.
K.Clore

Published: September 3, 2007