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TRAVEL - CATH URQUHART

Each week, Cath Urquhart fronts the Saturday Travel Supplement of The Times, this section of the newspaper, if nothing else, is a must read for intrepid adventurers and package holiday makers alike...


Cath Urquhart: OVER the past two years, the way I plan my travels has changed dramatically. As Steve Keenan writes on these pages, using the Internet for research has become an automatic reflex; the question now is not whether you use the Internet, but which sites give the best information. This week (Saturday 21 July 2001) I’m heading to Singapore and Bali, so I started with some general sites: the Foreign Office (www.fco.gov.uk) to check on possible safety concerns, www.travelmole.com for the latest industry news from the region, and www.e-med.co.uk for free health advice. Then to the destinations. I find www.economist.com/cities has an excellent feature on Singapore. The hotel I’m staying at is described as “decadent” — I can’t wait. Then I uncovered a raft of sites on Bali, including www.baliandbeyond.com, an online magazine with features on such subjects as the island’s weaving traditions, and www.balidiscovery.com, which offers a regular newsletter, a good selection of “what’s on” info, and tips such as how to deal with hawkers and why you shouldn’t buy coral or shell products. Then it’s off to www.lonelyplanet.com for everything from its news archive to the latest update for its Bali guidebook. Finally I used www.amazon.co.uk to buy a copy of Colin McPhee’s book A House on Bali to read on the plane. But where did I learn about these Bali websites? From guidebooks, of course. Up-to-date guides know that they must work with the web, and so they list the best sites. AT a recent conference on backpacking, I was chatting to Tony Wheeler, founder of guidebook company Lonely Planet, when his phone rang — it was his daughter in Bali, calling him in London to ask for some advice. Well, I guess if Tony Wheeler’s your Dad, you don’t need to carry a guidebook. MIND you, Tony carries them. He told me he’d just returned from Spain and in a bar in Cordoba, he got chatting to some tourists who were all, like him, consulting their LP guides, and he modestly mentioned he worked for the company. This prompted one tourist to start complaining about the guidebooks’ maps. “Oh, don’t hassle him,” said another, “it’s not as if he owns the company.”
More... Steve Keenan - Best Websites \| Tom Chesshyre - Good Web Guide

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