High-Tech Travel Tips

High-tech is everywhere; it accompanies us everywhere we go, even when we travel. Here are a couple of tips I use to encompass high-tech in my travels in a positive way.

When trying to book our room stays in a couple of convents out side of Madrid, Spain I encountered a major communication problem. They did not speak English and I did not speak Spanish. After a number of attempts without success I came up with a workable solution. I visited Google's Translate Web site (translate.google.com) and input my English reservation request into the translate box. I had it translate my request into Spanish and then I faxed a copy of my translated request to each of the convent locations offices. They responded with faxed back reservation confirmation in Spanish. I took their confirmation and translated them into English at Google Translate to confirm our room reservations were on the books. Google Translate is a handy little tool to have access to when there is a language barrier. I am going to try it while on vacation with my iPhone if I encounter a similar situation.

Because of the popularity of Twitter, every body, every place, and every business has a Twitter account. I have found this helpful when planning my travels. A few days before I leave for an intended destination I sign up for Twitter feeds from some of the local radio stations, television stations, and newspaper publications. This provides me with information on the weather conditions, any special events which will be taking place, gives me a feel for the area's traffic flow, and supplies me with information on what is happening in the community. It sort of eliminates traveling blind to a destination. Once the trip is over, I unsubscribe from the unnecessary Twitter accounts.

Protecting a digital camera can be a little bit of a problem during your travels. To prevent scratching the lens and the viewing screen the best protection is the camera bag. But the camera bag is generally too bulky to fit easily in a pocket or a purse conveniently. An easy solution for this problem is the use of an extra wide tennis wristband (the ones tennis players wear around their wrist to wipe their brow while playing). Slipping the tennis wristband over the camera will protect the lens and viewing screen while keeping the package small enough to fit in your pocket and/or purse.

Everyone travels with their laptop computer today. At the airport's security checkpoint that can create a bit of confusion when a couple of similar laptop computers are all waiting at the end of the X-ray examination station. To make it easy for me to identify my laptop computer, I always turn it upside down before placing it in the plastic tray prior to letting it enters the X-ray tunnel. None of the other travelers will have taken this action.