Internet resources while travelling<br><br>
The Internet is a great resource while travelling overseas.
Every country that I have travelled to has Internet at varying
reliability, speeds and price. Nearly every city I have been in
has an Internet access point. Usually they are located all in the
same area but the prices can vary from shop to shop. I like to
do a little price comparison before I choose a place. Some
places charge by the minute or every half hour, hour, etc. Just
be careful and do the math to find the best deal.
The best place to use the Internet is where it is free. If there is
a library or university near by it pays to walk inside and find
the computer room. At the library you usually have to ask at
the front counter. Even if you don’t have a library card and
you’re not a resident of the country, you can, more often than
not, get a computer for usually half an hour to an hour. At the
university, find out where the computer lab is and just start
using the Internet.
<br><br>
Here are some of the resources that may be useful to you when
travelling:
<br><br>
Consulates: Sometimes you need to contact your Consulate,
get a visa or other information on a foreign country. In many
cases, your guidebook has the list of which Consulates are
present in a particular city but the complete list is on the
Internet.
Search Directory:
<br><a href=http://directory.google.com/Top/Society/Government/Embassies_and_Consulates/> Consulates from Google </a>
<br><br>
Newsgroups: Ask a question, anything you want about
backpacking, and someone will answer it for you. These are
special newsgroups that are populated by newbie to veteran
backpackers to share information and give recommendations.
Many times when I couldn’t find a particular answer, I posted
the question to a newsgroup and it was answered by other
backpackers who have “been there, done that.” This is a great
resource for anyone to use.
<br><br>Internet Address + Search Directory:
<br><a href=http://thorntree.lonelyplanet.com> Lonely Planet Backpacker Forum</a>
<br><a href=http://dir.groups.yahoo.com/dir/Recreation___Sports/Travel/Backpacking> Backpacking Forums on Yahoo</a>
<br><br>
Hostels: Many public and private hostels have websites where
you can check location, bed availability, and prices. Some of
them even allow you to reserve online.
Internet Search Directories:
<br><a href=http://directory.google.com/Top/Recreation/Travel/Lodging/Hostels/> Hostel listing from Google </a>
<br><a href=http://dir.yahoo.com/Business_and_Economy/Shopping_and_Services/Travel_and_Transportation/Lodging/Hostels/> Hostel listing from Yahoo </a>
<br><br>
Maps: Internet maps are nice if you need to find a place. I
don’t spend a lot of time on this one myself, but I have seen
other backpackers with printouts of the location of their next
hostel on one of them.
<br><br>Internet Search Directories:
<br><a href=http://directory.google.com/Top/Reference/Maps/> Internet Maps from Google </a>
<br><a href=http://dir.yahoo.com/Science/Geography/Cartography/Maps/In
teractive/> Internet maps from Yahoo </a>
<br><br>Currency converters: It is always nice to know how much
your currency is worth compared to the current currency you
are using.
<br><br>Internet Address:
<br><a href=http://www.xe.com/ucc/> Universal Currency converter </a>
<br><br>
Tour operators: If you want to put your feet up and let
someone one else do the hard work for you and loose a little
freedom, a tour operator could be the thing for you.
<br><br>
Internet search directories and addresses:
<br><a href=http://directory.google.com/Top/Recreation/Travel/Specialty_Travel/Backpacking/Tour_Operators/> Tour Group Operators from Google </a>

<br><a href=http://dir.yahoo.com/Business_and_Economy/Shopping_and_Services/Travel_and_Transportation/Tour_Operators/Bus_To
urs_and_Charters/Hop_On__Hop_Off_Buses/> Tour Group Operators from Yahoo </a>


<br><br>
Pay your bills: Many banks offer Internet banking to check
your account balances, pay bills, transfer money, etc. I would
be cautious of using this service in public Internet cafes
because it is easy for a person to place a keystroke logger or
another means of recording the current session and saving it
all for review later.
<br><br>
Internet Search Keywords:
{your bank’s name}
<br><br>
News: I like to be informed about what is happening in the
world while I am travelling. If there is going to be another war
happening, I want to know well before they start and steer
clear of that country for a while. I try to find a nongovernment
sponsored news website that can give me an
unbiased view of the current country. Any governmentsponsored
news agencies tend to distort the news and be
overly nationalistic in their reports. Try to find the local
newspapers or local news on line to get the best and most
detailed information.
<br><br>
Internet Search Directories:
<br><a href=http://directory.google.com/Top/News/> News Directory from Google </a>
<br><a href=http://dir.yahoo.com/News_and_Media/By_Region/Countries/> News Directory by Country from Yahoo </a>
<br><br>
Burning CDs: I have taken over 4000 pictures with my digital
camera and the majority of Internet cafes were able to take my
pictures from my camera and burn them to a recordable CD
(CDR). Make sure that you bring all the cables, and software
that came with the camera. To save some money, drop by a
local computer store and buy one blank CDR there. The
Internet cafes usually charge you a premium for blank CDR’s.
When you burn a CD, do a single session burn instead of a
multi-session burn. A single session burns copies all of your
data to a CD and then finalizes the disc so that it can be read in
other CD-ROMs. A multi-session burn allows you to keep
burning information to the CD but it may not work in other
CD-ROMS and if you don’t use the same software to finish
off the CD, you may destroy all the contents on the CD. When
you finish burning a CD, put it in a safe place in your pack and
forget about it. When the time comes to burn another CDR,
buy a new CDR and use that one to store your pictures. This
way, if you lose a CDR, or it gets damaged, you only loose
100 pictures instead of 1000s.
<br><br>
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