– Doug McConnell

I hope you enjoy prowling around OpenRoad.TV for stories and tips about travel in the West, and that you pass along to us descriptions of your own journeys in the wide and wonderful West… all the way out to Hawaii.

I was asked by some friends who’ve developed another extraordinary travel site to write about my favorite places in this huge region of ours. It was tough to choose just five spots to describe, but I did somehow and here’s a link. I hope you enjoy it and then discover the terrific values of NileGuide along the way.   It will be a superb travel resource for you wherever in the world you decide to go.

– Jim Wirth

I had the pleasure of meeting Anne McAlpin at the Bay Area Travel Show in Santa Clara, California this past January.  Anne is known as “The Packing Expert,” and her website www.packitup.com is a wealth of information about how to make the getting from here to there a lot easier.  If you are anything like me, you hate packing for a trip.  Well thanks to Anne’s packing tips and tricks, packing is no longer the most dreaded part of my trips – sitting for 5 hours on a plane with two boys ages 11 and 6 has moved up to pole position in the stress category.

One of my favorite things from Anne’s website is the downloadable Traveler’s Checklist, which eliminates those difficult discussions with my wife on the way to the airport… “you packed the extra camera battery right?”  “… and the kids’ toothbrushes?”  “What about the extra headphones?”

You may have seen Anne sharing her helpful travel tips on Oprah, CNN, The View, and HGTV.  If not, then jump over to her website and start taking the stress out of your travels.