Gift Guide

Podcast #197 — Renting a Tesla; 2023 Traveler Gift Guide

It’s the sustainability episode of the TravelCommons podcast, talking about my experience renting a Tesla from Hertz and my road-tested list of Christmas gift suggestions for the frequent traveler(s) in your life. I also talk about some new TSA biometrics equipment I faced (literally) in Nashville and yet another update on the EU’s ETIAS system…

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Podcast #181 — Travel Potpourri; 2021 Traveler’s Gift Guide

No travel since the last episode, so just talking through a random potpourri of travel stuff. There’s more travel planning; this time for a couple of weeks split between London and Wales which means sorting through a new set of COVID travel requirements. We look at some stats — Uber’s latest financials and how deeply…

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10 Best Travel Gift Ideas To Survive Post-Pandemic Travel

If last year’s gift guide was all about helping folks travel while dodging last-minute lockdowns, this year’s guide is stacked with the best travel gift ideas to help the frequent traveler in your life cope with all the major airline meltdowns. Or, if you are the frequent traveler, here’s a list of hints you could…

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Podcast #177 — B-Sides and Rarities… Interview Outtakes

After a 2-week, 2,500-mile and $120 in tolls driving expedition through the Northeast, I didn’t have much time left to write a new episode. So, I mined the audio files of recent TravelCommons interviews for some good stories that got left on the cutting room floor. We also talk about planning for a bike trip…

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Podcast #169 — Pandemic Holiday Gift Guide; Year-End Status Offers

No travel since the last episode, so I had some time to think back through my post-lockdown travel and come up with my top 10 gift ideas for your pandemic travelers. We look at the start of the year-end efforts by airlines, hotels, and credit card companies to keep their grounded travelers, unpack the work-from-hotel…

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10 Best Travel Gift Ideas for These Unprecedented Times

With public health officials saying things like “it will be easily by the end of 2021 and perhaps into the next year before we start having some semblance of normality,” I figured this year’s travel gift guide would need to be a bit different. Here are my top shopping ideas for your pandemic traveler. Comfortable…

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Podcast #158 — Travel Potpourri for $400, Alex

Good End to 2019 Skipping the Chicago winter with trips to Phoenix and Sedona, Arizona, and a Christmas morning flight to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Talk about those trips, my good and bad Hertz experiences, and then gather up odds-‘n’-ends from my travel notebooks to see off 2019 in this New Year’s Eve episode. All…

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10 Best Gift Ideas for a New Traveler

Coming into the heart of the Christmas shopping season, when people are getting desperate for gift ideas, I thought I’d offer up 10 suggestions for gifts that a new frequent traveler will actually use. While many gift lists are pushing Away luggage, Huzi infinity pillows, and Aesop travel kits (these companies must’ve splashed a lot…

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