Lonely Planet

Editor's note: The following guest post was written by Andy Murdock, the US digital editor for Lonely Planet.

As much as you'll miss your roomies and classmates, the next best thing to chucking your graduation cap into the air is hitting the road and watching your alma mater shrink to a blip in your rearview mirror. For at least a brief moment in time, there's nowhere you have to be, nobody telling you where to go or what to do. The only boss of you is, well, you.

With a few good friends or flying solo, the postgraduation Summer road trip requires distance, new vistas, and time — time for the experiences you set out to find, and more importantly the transformative ones you'll never see coming.

So if it's all up to you, why do what everyone else is doing? Here are a few creative ideas to get you started planning your trip:

Get Your Cross-Country Kicks Out of the Way

If you strategically went to college far away, then a slow, meandering trip back home across the country is in order . . . with the emphasis on slow and meandering. While all of the east-west interstates have their moments, they're about speed over scenery, local culture or adventure. The best of the US for the savvy traveler is on the back roads and the lesser-known north-south highways.

A road trip is a journey, not a destination. Instead of stringing together cities in a cross-country itinerary, plan your trip around the interesting roads themselves, and use the interstates to connect them as necessary. Some roads to aim for: Skyline Drive to the Blue Ridge Parkway, the Great River Road along the Mississippi, US Route 89 (a road-tripper's dream that connects more national parks than any other road in the US), US Route 395 along the eastern Sierra Nevada, or the famously scenic Pacific Coast Highway.

The scenic Pacific Coast Highway

Read on for more.

Editor's note: The following guest post was written by Robert Reid, the US travel editor for Lonely Planet.

The definition of what defines an "adventure" is all over the map. For some, it’s a row in the Thames or a bike ride on Prince Edward Island. For others, it’s something a bit more, well, adventurous. Like taking canoes up Amazon tributaries with a full bottle of DEET mosquito spray, running with the bulls in Pamplona, or eating live bugs. All are good. All test and reward in their own ways. At Lonely Planet, we have just released a book called Great Adventures, a gorgeous pictorial of the world’s best adventures in various categories according to interest. I thought I’d share a few classic American adventures from the book that are somewhere in between — wild yet accessible and possible to do.

Read on to find out what they are.

Editor's note: The following guest post was written by Robert Reid, the US travel editor for Lonely Planet.

I always say the things we do when traveling — going to museums, climbing a tower for a view, sitting in a park, standing below an iconic monument — are simply the way we fill time between meals. It's the food, served in first-class restaurants or on plastic-stool seats on cracked sidewalks, that gives you more of a sense of how a place lives. And anyway, we have to eat, right? If you think this way too, Lonely Planet’s new Food Lover's Guide to the World is perfect for you.

Read on for more.

Editor’s note: The following guest post was written by Robert Reid, the US travel editor for Lonely Planet.

The question Lonely Planet gets the most often — other than “How can I be a travel writer?” — is “Where can I go that’s new and interesting but won’t drain my bank account?” Luckily, each year we put out the book Lonely Planet’s Best in Travel, which includes a "Best Value Destinations" list for the year ahead. We define value as getting the most out of your dollar. We don’t necessarily suggest the cheapest destinations, but rather great value options for travelers who want rich experiences without a rich price.

Safari travelers have long booked trips to Kenya, Tanzania, and South Africa, with Botswana’s Okavango Delta being the more offtrack place for unparalleled access to wildlife. Safari price tags are counted by thousands, but it’s possible to do a DIY safari for a few hundred dollars in Namibia.

Read on for more.

Editor’s note: The following guest post was written by Robert Reid, the US travel editor for Lonely Planet.

This will be my final blog post for you all! And this is your last chance to download any of our 15 free mini-guides off our website so go now and collect them all before they go away on September 5th.

Since this weekend is Labor Day, I’m sure many of you already have your travel plans set. Thus, I won’t give you new suggestions for where to go but rather give some advice that you can perhaps use this weekend, and for years to come.

With rising airfares, hotel costs, and gas prices, people fortunate (and unfortunate) enough to live in destination-friendly places often get a double-dose of cousins and friends dropping by to set up camp for a few days, or more.

But being a good host or guest isn't easy, so how do you make sure you're still friends at the end of the stay, and maybe even have plans for doing it all again next year? We need rules! So, we polled the Lonely Planet staff, and came up with a set of rules for hosts and house guests alike.

Lonely Planet co-founder Tony Wheeler was one of the first to offer a rule for house guests: "The oldest line is still the best — guests and fish begin to smell after three days. Or, like fish, guests should go off after three days." There you have it — Rule #1: Three days max, even for family. If you're staying longer, get a hotel.

A general rule everyone should follow: have fun, but remember to play fair.

For house guests:

• If you borrow your hosts' car, fill up the tank.
• Contribute to food: assist in shopping or offer money for groceries. Or replace things like milk and toilet paper as they are used. If you have dietary restrictions, bring your own food. Do the dishes. Or take your hosts out to dinner.
• Send a hand-written thank you note. It's a nice touch.

Read on for more house guest rules.

Editor’s note: Summer travel is heating up! The following guest post was written by Robert Reid, the US travel editor for Lonely Planet. He will be guest blogging on Savvy for the Summer, helping you find some great ideas of how to get your vacation on this travel season.

Some cities in the US will always be prime-time tourist attractions. The New Yorks, the LAs, the Vegases, the San Franciscos. And they justify their fame. For the penultimate article of Lonely Planet’s 15 Weekends of Summer season, I’d like to pay a nod to five of the most surprising US cities – ones that are sometimes zipped through and given less time as we blaze trails elsewhere. And if you want a free mini-guide to NOLA, we’re giving one away on the Lonely Planet website.

Pittsburgh

No city has improved more in the past 15 or 20 years that Pennsylvania’s burg with the "h." Steel town doesn’t quite describe what you find in this walkable downtown area of golden bridges, with funicular trains going up the Allegheny mountains and a serious investment in art. There are sculptures across downtown, but the best museums are across Andy Warhol Bridge where you can see the Warhol Museum, huge rotating fish on sticks outside the Children’s Museum and the avant-garde Mattress Factory, built from, um, an old mattress factory.

North of downtown, the Strip District is lined with eateries and bars; big for breakfast is the timeless Deluca’s. Frank Lloyd Wright’s famous Fallingwater is near Ohiopyle, a 90-minute drive southwest.

Denver

Long dismissed as just the gateway to the mountains – yes, the mountains! – Denver has never made a better case for sticking around a couple days. They’re easily filled by a visit to the superb collection of Western art at the avant-garde Denver Art Museum. Catch a show at the Red Rocks Amphitheatre and spend lazy hours in the historic LoDo district, which is filled with good restaurants and bars (Denver takes beer very seriously; the governor rose to fame based on his microbrew credentials). Stay at the Brown Palace Hotel, one of the country’s great historic hotels.

And, yeah, there’s always the mountains.

Read on for more surprising US cities.

Editor’s note: Summer travel season has officially begun! The following guest post was written by Robert Reid, the US travel editor for Lonely Planet. He will be guest blogging on Savvy for the next two months, helping you find some great ideas of how to get your vacation on this Summer.

It’s July and it’s hot. Anyone up for some beer?

American microbreweries – so termed after an English term, developed for cask ales in the 1970s – justify a detour in their own right. But not all are equal. So I’ve assembled some of the country’s best. You can also download a free mini-trip of the best beer spots in Oregon at Lonely Planet’s 15 Weekends of Summer website.

Born on the bayou, Abita Brew Pub is in a north shore village outside New Orleans that got on the map over a century ago for its curative (gator-free) waters. Not all the liquids come carbonated. The brewery, nine miles west of town, and the brew pub are both attractions, for a tour and a sip of the nine beers. Work up your thirst – easy in summer heat – along parts of the 31-mile Tammy Trace hiking trail.

Laverne and Shirley, of ‘70s sit-com fame, bottled lesser beers of Milwaukee, but the city’s finest and most loved is from the Lakefront Brewery, which offers afternoon tours and unbeatable fish-fry Friday nights, complete with 16 beers on tap – AND live polka. Nothing makes beer tastes better than oompah.

Read on for more great beer places to visit.

Editor’s note: Summer travel season has officially begun! The following guest post was written by Robert Reid, the US travel editor for Lonely Planet. He will be guest blogging on Savvy for the next two months, helping you find some great ideas of how to get your vacation on this Summer.

Hope everyone had a great Fourth of July weekend! That means summer travel season is stepping up a notch. For most, that means beach time, and on Lonely Planet’s 15 Weekends of Summer, we’re giving away a free itinerary on how to “Escape to the Beach.”

Why just go to a beach, when you can find one on an island? This week I’m giving suggestions of my favorite US islands that won’t break the bank. Some of these are your classic sun-and-swim spots, others are a bit more adventurous.

Florida’s “other coast” is really something special and Sanibel Island is our top getaway for our free itinerary give-away this week. With some 50 miles of accessible coastline, there’s a beach for everyone: from unspoiled ecosystems to fun seaside communities where you can order cocktails and go clubbing, or take in local art and even Thomas Edison’s summer home. The area has all the outdoor recreation you could dream of with mountain biking trails, kayaking opportunities, but also has great shopping, restaurants and nightlife. I visited last year and managed to squeeze in a couple kayak hours to see manatees and dolphins on the way to the airport.

Fire Island is well-known as a popular weekend getaway for New Yorkers but the real beauty of it lies in the east, where most villages are blissfully car-free. At night, you can walk among the boardwalks through the dunes that connect the houses or take advantage of water taxis to take you between villages. Hike the Sunken Garden and Otis Pike Wilderness Area or check out the views from the Fire Island Lighthouse. Try to go mid-week to snag the best rates.

Read on for more islands that won't break the bank.

Editor’s note: Summer travel season has officially begun! The following guest post was written by Robert Reid, the US travel editor for Lonely Planet. He will be guest blogging on Savvy for the next two months, helping you find some great ideas of how to get your vacation on this Summer.

For most of us, July 4 — unlike family-oriented holidays like Christmas or Thanksgiving — is a true Americana community day. It’s when the modern world takes a backseat to simple pleasures like hot dogs and Little Leaguers marching in small-town parades. Basically we all become a bit more like a character in a John Cougar Mellencamp video.

For Lonely Planet’s 15 Summer Weekends website, we’re highlighting a drive that cuts through the heart of Americana — Route 66. But that’s only one of a few classics to consider if your July 4 plans aren’t set in stone. Probably the best place to be – everyone should try it once – is where it all started, Philadelphia, where independence was signed and the first Fourth of July celebrations were staged a year later in 1777. The parade, centered around Independence Hall downtown, is a colorful mix of international dancers, Civil War reenactors, drummers, and the like. At night, homegrown band the Roots takes over the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, capped with a fireworks show. Stick around to July 8 for the reenactment of the first public reading of the Declaration of Independence. I volunteered as a Loyalist last year.

Read on for more places to celebrate Independence.

Editor’s note: Summer travel season has officially begun! The following guest post was written by Robert Reid, the US Travel Editor for Lonely Planet. He will be guest blogging on Savvy for the next two months, helping you find some great ideas of how to get your vacation on this Summer.

There are so many places in the US to spend a long weekend, or even a week or two, that it can become overwhelming to decide. It’s why a lot of people just go to the same vacation rental every year and don’t change it up. But I think it’s a lot more fun to try somewhere new and have unique adventures. We’ve started a website called 15 Weekends of Summer to get you inspired, and every two weeks I’ll pick one of those themes, tell you some of my favorite places to go in relation to that theme and then let you know how to download a free detailed itinerary of our favorite summer trip within that theme. Sound good? Let’s start with “Take Your Clothes Off”."

The US is full of geothermic activity so why not go hot spring hunting this summer? Soaking in hot water appeals to almost everyone and there’s a wide variety of experiences you can have—from spending a weekend at a resort to hiking out to an isolated spring in the middle of nowhere. Hot springs occur when water is heated from within the earth’s crust and then forced up to the surface. Some feel the water has healing properties due to its high mineral content. Most of the hot springs in the US are in the west, so for some of you, a road trip is definitely in order.

In Northern California, you can find affordable resorts within just hours of the San Francisco Bay Area. Wilbur Hot Springs and Orr Hot Springs are two favorites: both provide either indoor accommodation (private rooms and a bunk house) or camp sites with a shared kitchen to prepare your meals. The tubs are clothing-optional and thus your space is respected — any inappropriate behavior will get you kicked out pronto. Although rustic, these resorts have amenities like massage, yoga and plenty of hiking trails to the adjacent wilderness.

For more hot spots you don't want to miss out on, read on.