Next weekend I’m going to be in Asheville NC. I’ve never been there, but I have seen the town and area written up in many magazines. In fact it has been listed by Outside magazine as one of their “Best Outside Towns”. And Backpacker magazine just listed it as a “Best City To Raise An Outdoor Kid”.
Asheville is set in the Blue Ridge Mountains and is just hours from the Great Smokies and the Pisgah National Forest with 950 miles of trails, waterfalls and backcountry camping. My time is limited. I’m only going to be there for a day and a half.
So what do you do when you’re unfamiliar with an area but want to get the most from your trip? The internet can be an amazing tool for such a task.
When booking air fare and hotel I recommend www.tripadvisor.com. This website gathers prices from the major travel “discount” sites. These include quotes from Travelocity, Orbitz, Priceline and Hotels.com. So you can comparison shop.
As far as outside activities I go to Outside magazine’s site, www.outsideonline.com. They keep an archive of their past articles and I can find plenty of information from where to get a good breakfast to who I should rent a mountain bike from. I really like Backpacker’s www.backpacker.com. You plug in the city you’re going to and they present you with a topographical map of the area and show you where to find hikes of various levels of difficulty. They also include descriptions of the hike. All of his can be downloaded to your 3G iPhone, GPS phone or computer. You can also e-mail the information to yourself or your friends.
If you’re feeling exotic and traveling outside of the country a great site to visit is www.alpineascents.com. This site includes trips to Mount Kilimanjaro and Mount Everest. Heck, a guy can dream can’t he?
So what do you do to prepare for a trip? Do you plan every detail out? Or do you throw caution to the wind and rely on instinct when you arrive at your destination?
In a future post I’ll let you know how our trip went. But always remember for more Health & Fitness information visit our ongoing blog at www.longevitypt.com.