Some of the more obvious places:
Thailand
China
Japan
Egypt
Ireland (He's Irish after all.)
Germany
England
Various little countries in Europe, Italy, Greece, etc...
Every single one of the 50 United States.
Now obviously, we don't have the money to do anything right now, and of course, we're not doing ANYTHING until we get a trip in to visit my family.
In an effort to get to know the states better, I've started ordering Travel and Tourism Guides from each of the states. I have to tell you, some of their websites are SO frustrating.
So far, I've ordered 15 in the last 8 days. Spreading it out so we don't flood our tiny mailbox.
Moving along alphabetically, at this point, Georgie and Hawaii have the most irritating websites. They all ask for your address of course. Some ask short multiple choice survey questions. When are you coming; how long are you staying; how many are you bringing; what lodging are you considering; etc.... Where is the "I'm just curious" box?!? Only one state so far had something like that, and honestly I can't recall which one it was.
The ones that ask for an email address so they can send you a ton of needless junk, and a phone number, so they can call and harass you, are super annoying. I have a junk email address though, and have no issues with providing a fake phone number. Hawaii's site even goes as far as to provide travel agent information for reps in your area. Which is great if you're looking for one, but this leads me to believe that those agents have also been provided my information. Wonderful.....
Georgia's site. There are no words to aptly describe how irritated I got. Vacation guide, Travel guide, tourism guide. All searches brought me to the same page. Four pictures and bunch of random links. Click on a random link, and it takes you to another not-so-informative page about Georgia, and there's a nifty link to the right that says "Vacation Guide", that leads you right back to that four picture page again. Took me almost 5 minutes to find the right spot to click on. Because Georgia probably believes that most of their travel site visitors know how to use the Internet and flash videos with psychic powers. It's like asking for directions from a backwood's swamp redneck. They're sayin' a lot, but you're goin' nowhere.
Iowa's site was awesome until the survey at the end. Simply enter your shipping information. Phone and email address were asked for, but not required. You hit submit, and you're done. Oh, but hey, here's our optional survey if you want to fill it out. I'm nice, so opted to fill it out. I got all the way to the end, and it asked for my address information again. Sorry guys. If your web-guys don't know how to carry information over from a previous page, then you need new designers/developers.
There are sites that are done completely in Flash. So there is no tabbing to the next space. You have to remove your hands from the keyboard and move the mouse to get to the next space. For those of us who feel the keyboard and it's wonderful short-cuts are highly underrated, this is most annoying. And frankly, anyone who designs a website completely in flash needs to be shot. (Points to Disney)
Now, some of these sites are put up by state travel agency organizations or not-for-profits(only online) that want tourism. Indiana's site is actually on the state government's domain. That was impressive. The site still sucked though, as it crashed my browser three separate times. So, I'm betting someone took the extra money for the site and got themselves a pretty new boat. I am determined though, and on the fourth try, I got my guide ordered.
I should have all 50 of my state books in the next couple of months. Quite the collection it will be.
Even if we never get to visit all 50 states, we'll be able to see things in the books that we never would have even known about otherwise. Niceguy and I are huge fans of history, so these books will allow us to plan out amazing historical trips. Museums, forts, battlegrounds, monuments,
etc.... And always a favorite with us, cemeteries. Yes, we are an odd pair!
Can you tell I'm a little excited about this? lol
Oh, and we have maters!
Love to all!
~~~
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