Winter 2019

You’re packing your bags for the best trip of your life. You freak out when you realize you don’t have enough space for your DSLR camera. Or maybe you don’t even have a cool camera and you just don’t want your Instagram trip photos to suck. Never fear, camera-less traveler. You only need one thing, and it’s something you already have: your smartphone. Here are just a few apps—and tricks within the apps—that you can use to make your mobile trip photos go from meh to Mona Lisa.

Most people spend their entire lives in one place. Either they settle where they get a job or they stay close to where they were born. But recently, social media has thrust an alternative way to live into the public eye. Individuals, couples, and families are exchanging everything they own for life in a van, bus, or RV.

If you had asked me when I was younger what my favorite place in the world was, I would have told you Rock Mill Park. It was a small park no more than three miles from my house with a quaint pavilion and cement trails that wound through the woods. It was somewhere I could go alone, and I went there often—to read, to bike, to run. That little park was easily my favorite place in the world. Back then, my world was pretty small.

It’s a common enough story. You’re out on the road, in the middle of nowhere, and you want to listen to music, but there’s no data service. Then tragedy strikes! You get a flat tire and the situation is made worse by the fact that you can’t make a phone call on a single bar of service.

The language barrier is one of the greatest concerns of aspiring international travelers. Even with pocket dictionaries, Google Translate, and multi-lingual tour guides, being in a country where you don’t speak the primary language can be uncomfortable, scary, or even dangerous.

During every road trip, there comes a point where the whole car is bored. You’ve been driving for hours, the next stop isn’t for another fifty miles, and there are only so many cornfields you can take before even Disney World isn’t worth it. When that point comes, rather than throwing yourself headfirst out the window, try playing one of these road trip games.

You’ve been planning this trip for weeks. You can’t wait to jump in that car and take a road trip to that family reunion in the mountains. You’re excited to bring your three-year-old to a part of the world she’s never seen, to introduce your twin sons to their great-grandmother. The problem is, you’ve never taken a serious trip with your kids, and you’re terrified of being stuck in a car, trying to entertain them, as you take them far out of their comfortable element, all while trying to enjoy the trip yourself. Well, fear no more! Here are a couple of the best tips to keep you sane and your kids happy.

At Dismals Canyon, a small reserve in northern Alabama, worms glow. Commonly known as “dismalites” in the area, the worms are not only a local attraction but also an international anomaly. Glowing worms exist in only three places in the world: New Zealand, Australia, and Alabama.

Netflix is the most popular streaming company, with about 137 million subscribers as of October 16, 2018, more than double the runner-up (Amazon Prime, 66 million).Though Netflix had over 300 original titles in 2017 and that number is only growing, two of the most watched shows are still The Office and Parks and Recreation. Though the imagination is a great place to be, sometimes it’s just special to visit real places from a favorite show.

Every year, more than a thousand of the popular Pokémon Pikachu march in perfect sync through Yokohama, Japan, as part of a week-long festival. You may have seen some videos of them on YouTube, perhaps with the “Imperial March” playing in the background. This procession took Japan by storm for the first time in 2014 and has since become a major tourist attraction for Pokémon fans around the world.

Photo courtesy of Cambodian Children's Fund

Photo by Alan LevineSt. George Utah is known for its red rocks, hikes, and amazing weather. It’s the perfect place to go if you want to escape the winter months. However, the biggest gem there is the Tuacahn Center for the Arts.

For many, the airport is the most stressful and chaotic part of traveling. The lines are long, the food is expensive, and the security agents vary wildly between helpfully cheerful and bitterly grouchy. However, there are plenty of ways to prepare that will ease your airport experience and save you some exhaustion.