Hooked on Travel? - Browse the Best of MyTripJournal

As a source for travel information, personal trip blogs are finding a role alongside the trusty guidebooks. But mining blogs for information is like searching for gold. You have to go through a lot of rubble to find the nuggets -- travel blogs that are well-written, with information that's interesting and useful to a general audience.

To address this problem, MyTripJournal.com has unveiled its "Best Personal Websites" feature, an innovative way to allow eavesdroppers to explore the most interesting personal travel experiences from their desktops.

"Over the past two years, the MyTripJournal Personal Travel Website System has been used to create many thousands of websites. We've searched through every one of them and identified those that have great writing and photographs and are of interest to the general traveling public," said Dan Parlow, head of business development. "Participating travelers include Lonely Planet authors on tour, professional road-trippers and many amateurs with a knack for the pen and the shutter."

"Unlike other travel review services that focus on hotel and restaurant reviews, our focus is to select great stories and photos of real traveler experiences," said Parlow.

The Best of MyTripJournal is available for anyone to explore at http://www.mytripjournal.com. It is also available from partner sites including Lonely Planet, the Good Sam Club and the International Student Identity Card (US).

Quality is assured because each site is hand-picked for participation in the Best of MyTripJournal. Potential privacy concerns are addressed because travelers must personally accept an invitation. Sites are then sorted for interest by the intensity of travels within a geographical region.

MyTripJournal -- developed by world adventurers Dan and Faye Parlow in concert with software developer GroupInfoWeb.com -- provides travelers with a simple tool to keep up an online journal to record all aspects of their trip and stay in touch with friends and family, all in an ad- free environment. It includes the usual text and photo uploads and messaging as well as full use of the patent pending IntelliMap system. Premium features include the ability to post unlimited personal videos, to store thousands of print-quality photos and to receive a full archive on CD or DVD. A free version is available at www.MyTripJournal.com. Standard websites are complimentary for professional travel writers by emailing dparlow@mytripjournal.com.