The Car Entertainment Organizer Keeps Your Stuff Organized

by Willy Volk on

I always begin every road trip with the best intentions: magazines go here, maps go there, the cooler goes in that spot over there. However, after only a few hours — faster, maybe, if we’re traveling with our dog — the car’s a mess, and nothing is where it’s supposed to be. If you’re like me (God help you!), then maybe you need a car entertainment organizer.

Essentially an open-faced suitcase that straps to the rear of a car seat, the organizer features 7 mesh pockets, including a dedicated space for tissue; small, mesh pockets for storing easily-lost items (crayons, dog treats, and lottery tickets); and larger pockets (for stuffing CD cases, maps, or candy bars). Made from reinforced 600 denier pack cloth, the organizer runs an affordable $15.

If only it would repel dog hair…

8 Ways To Save Money On The Road

by Jonathon Morgan on

Ah, the road trip. In the U.S. it’s practically a rite of passage — whether it’s with family, friends, or riding solo down one of the nation’s seemingly endless Interstate Highways. While it can certainly be fun, it can also be expensive. To cut costs on your next trip, try to avoid the major ways in which travelers waste money.

For instance, be careful when using your credit card in foreign countries. Most credit card companies charge a 2-5% transaction fee on international purchases. Also try avoiding discount hotel Web sites — or even avoiding hotels altogether. By going through a hotel directly, you might discover a last-minute deal that you won’t find when using a “discount” middleman, and in some places, renting a home or villa works out even cheaper — especially for extended stays. You can also try using buses and trains to avoid renting cars (and paying all the hidden fees), steering clear of pricey restaurants, and maintaining your normal spending habits while on vacation.

For a full list of tips and more in-depth explanation, check out this post on Fodor’s Travel Wire.

Gadling Podcast: Mike Marriner of Roadtrip Nation

by Erik Olsen on

What do you do for a living? Do you have the job you love or did you join a career for financial expedience? Perhaps you chose your job as a result of family pressure? The big questions is: do you do what you love? Did you take the time to think about it? (OK, that was two questions).

No matter. The point is that we sometimes rush into big life decisions without the kind of careful consideration that would help us be more happy. This exact thought was on the mind of Mike Marriner and his friends when they graduated from college, and rather than make a rash decision about what to do next, they did the sensible thing: Road Trip.

In this new podcast I talk with Mike about how he took the road trip that changed his life and that led to the creation of Roadtrip Nation, a massive national roadtrip program that seeks to get young people to think before they leap into the great, slimy, deep, cold, creature-infested pond of life (or the warm, bubbly, Swedish-model-filled jacuzzi of life in you happen to be Hugh Hefner). As Mike explains, Roadtrip Nation exploded from a cross-country Winnebago ramble into a full fledged national program with TV shows and books attached. It is very cool and very inspirational and, well, why don’t you just go ahead and listen.

Oh, by the way, we are also on itunes, so feel free to subscribe for your ipod.

And if you’re interested in any of our other previous podcasts besides those mentioned above, here is a quick list

-Diver and explorer John Chatterton
-Undersea explorer Fabien Cousteau and, most recently Josh Davis, author of The Underdog.
– James O’Reilly, Executive Editor of Traveler’s Tale
– Lonely Planet’s Don George
– Eric Stiller, kayaker and the author of Keep Australia on Your Left
– Jim Benning, co-editor of the online travel site Worldhum
– Dean LaTourrette and Kristine Enea, travel authors
– Cafe Reggio

Great American Road Trip Redux

by Erik Olsen on

Just before making this post, I decided to check how many times we’ve used the term “Road Trip” on gadling. So I decided to do a search and so many results came up, that I lost count at 40 or so. Well, here’s another. But let me say up front that this is a particularly good road trip entry. Or at least, the article that I am referencing is particularly good. It comes from our friends at Worldhum and was penned by co-founder Michael Yessis. Yessis attests that we are in the midst of a new road trip era, with more people hitting the road than ever before, and doing so imbued with the ethic of finding something out there, call it freedom, call it a break from the tedium of a desk job, call it love for the open road or a passion for fried food. Something is making us hit the road.

Yessis hit the road with his dad, a la Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and perhaps it was this trip that made him aware of his own road trip fever…or perhaps he is right, and there is something happening here. Take, for example, Oprah’s recent gallivant across the nation with her best friend (and a score of cameras and crew). Or take Rocketboom babe Amanda Congdon who, after being abruptly fired from her sit in front of a map job has taken to the road with AmandaAcrossAmerica, a site chronicling her own cross country journey. Of course, then there is RoadTrip nation, the TV show, book and (soon, right here!) podcast with one of the founders. I could go on, and Yessis does so in his article, which I suggest you check out…check out, perhaps, before planning your own Great American road trip.

Passport Rules Changing

by Erik Olsen on

Making my way to Canada this year to spend a week in the gloriously beautiful Canadian province of Newfoundland, I discovered a nasty little surprise. My wife and I got to the airport and discovered that Newfoundland requires Americans traveling there to bring a passport or birth certificate to enter by air from the United States. I had no idea. For years living in Seattle I came and went to Canada and needed only to show my drivers’ license. I was pretty damn upset because no one told us that the rules had changed, and so we had to go back and get our passports and needless to say, we missed our plane.

Well my hardies, the rules HAVE changed, although they have not taken effect Canada-wide quite yet, and when they do take effect, they will cover Mexico as well. Yes, visitors to the NAFTA states North and South will soon have to bring along passports to cross the country’s borders…well, the key is really getting back in. The rules take effect December 31 for air travelers to and from the Caribbean, Mexico and Canada.

A year later, on Dec. 31, 2007, the requirement will be extended to all land-based border crossings as well.

Now, this could be either a good thing or a bad thing.

It’s certainly a bad thing in that it makes going to Mexico and Canada a bigger pain in the buttocks. I keep my passport in a safe, locked place in my home, and I am just not sure that if I decide suddenly to take a road trip to Montreal that I’m going to remember it. I suppose I’ll have to. It may also be bad in that it might discourage Americans who want to travel “abroad” from going because they either a) don’t have passports or b) forgot them.

But perhaps we should look on the bright side. Maybe the new rules will inspire people who don’t yet have a passport to go out and get one. Given the rather awful statistics that say only 20 percent of Americans carry a passport (thus speaking loudly and clearly to our deficiencies as an internationally-aware, culturally sensitive nation) putting them in more Americans’ hands could very possibly help improve our awareness of those “others”, AKA foreigners, on the other side of the border.

By the way, Lonely Planet has been pushing this whole idea for a whle, and ,in fact, THIS is National Passport Month. So how’s that for good timing?