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Planning a trip this fall? As someone who's traveled a fair bit in the last year I have a kind of fetish for travel sites. Recently I stumbled across [Realtravel][1] which Forbes magazine calls one of the "essential travel sites" of the internet.
Realtravel is not aimed at finding airfares or buying tickets online, though it does have some links and price listings, instead Realtravel's main focus is on user stories, tips and reviews.
Realtravel offers far too many things to cover in a short post, but my favorite section is the destinations tab. Under destinations you'll get a map with the world broken into regions for easy browsing, or you can pick a country from the "most blogged" list. Once you select a country you'll be taken to that country's page which has a wealth of information ranging from dining reviews to travel ideas and everything in between. From there you can continue to tunnel in a get more detailed information by city.
What makes Realtravel worthwhile for travelers is their user-generated content. Anyone can buy a guidebook, but do you know how long it takes for a guidebook to get printed and onto the shelf? Most guidebooks are hopelessly outdated before they even get into your hands. Realtravel and other sites like it are invaluable for their up-to-the-minute stories, reviews and trip suggestions from travelers who've just been in, and in some cases, currently are in, the places you're headed for.
I wish I could say Realtravel has a great interface for creating your own travel blog and contributing to the community, but unfortunately the sign up process is somewhat long and more convoluted than seems necessary and once you have an account set up the process of posting to it is fairly arduous as well. Still if you're willing to jump through the hoops, you can get a free blog, picture uploads, and more.
[1]: http://realtravel.com/ "Real Travel"
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