Travel Tips - The Internet is Key

I've been traveling a lot lately. I love to travel - it's one of the reasons I do what I do. I love checking in and out of cities, hotels and law firms. I consider myself a savvy traveler and much of that is thanks to the internet and technology.

A couple of months ago I was traveling to Martha's Vineyard; taking the last flight out to Boston. Once at the gate, we were told there would be a two hour delay (departing at 6:45pm). Two hours was plenty of time to leave the terminal, eat dinner in the main part of the Orlando Airport and get back thru security. No sooner had we ordered an appetizer when I received a text message from Delta letting me know that the flight was now scheduled to leave at 5.45pm. When I booked my flight I had signed up for "flight alerts" that offer up to the minute text messages about the flights on my itinerary. We laughed and commented about how great technology is, how would we have known otherwise? As we were joking about missing the flight ANOTHER text message came in announcing a departure time of 4.4pm! The original time! Well as you can imagine, we had to race to get the bill, get thru security and to the gate in 15 minutes. Fortunately, security was a breeze thanks to the Fly Clear program that was launched in Orlando and is expanding to other airports. If you use any of the following airports on a regular basis, this program is a LIFESAVER - Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG), Indianapolis International Airport (IND), New York JFK International Airport British Airways Terminal 7 (JFK) and San José Mineta International Airport (SJC). It's a "trusted passenger" program not too difference from a VIP pass thru security - you still have to go through the hassle of taking off your shoes, taking out your laptop and emptying your  pockets but YOU DONT HAVE TO WAIT IN LINE!! How great is that? Check it out and sign up to be notified when your airport gets in - even sounds like some Canadian terminals are in the que (pun intended).

Planning for a trip is 'nothing but net. I book all my flights online thru the homepage of the airline or by one of the aggregators such as Travelocity or Orbitz. But keep in mind that Southwest and Jetblue do not participate in those services, you have to remember to check those sites directly. There's a new site called FareCast that aims to predict how much a ticket will cost you and when.

While you're booking and choosing your seats, be sure to check out Seat Guru. This site is brilliant. It gives you detailed information about specific seats on planes. I love the idea behind this site, regular people contribute details about planes and seats and we all benefit. Similar sites include: LoveMySeat and SeatExpert.

I'm getting ready to escort my grandmother to Uruguay on Copa Airlines - which I've never flown. I used Airline Quality and WebFlyer to set my expectations. Webflyer is a great site that rates and reviews all sorts of things related to travel. I like TripAdvisor most to read real-people reviews about airlines, hotels and travel destinations. There's even a site that ranks the food on airplanes! Check out Airline Meals.

So, in the end, we got to The Vineyard as planned. We arrived by ferry but left by plane (if you want to call it that). The airport on Martha's Vineyard is quite something. The flights off the island are something else. This is a pic I took with my Treo, you'll notice that I could reach out and touch the pilot (Shawn) - and that body sitting next to him - not the co-pilot. Just another passenger, Shirley. Shirley she was having the same anxiety attack as I was having.