Top travel Web sites

I like researching a trip almost as much as I do traveling.

It's hard to stop myself from going out and buying a guidebook the minute I start thinking about a new destination. I use them to get an overall sense of a place and sketch out a broad itinerary.

But when it comes to the nitty-gritty of finding a hotel or homestay, searching for a cooking class or just gauging the opinions of real travelers with no vested interest in selling books, I turn to the Web.

With a cup of tea and a few hours to spare, I sit at the computer and follow one link to another, unearthing nuggets from blogs, chat boards and forums.

After buying tickets to Madrid and Marrakech for a fall trip, I turned to the Web to find a Moroccan ecotourism group that arranges country walks and visits to Berber family homes.

Guidebook listings initially led me to a family-owned riad, a traditional Moroccan house, in Marrakech, and a B&B near Madrid's Plaza Mayor. I booked both directly on their Web sites, but not until I read the reviews posted on TripAdvisor.com.

Useful Web sites come and go, but here are a few that make it to the top of my list.

TripAdvisor (www.tripadvisor.com). This site contains millions of reviews written by travelers about hotels and other types of accommodations in 190 countries.

It's a good place to cross-check guidebook recommendations. It's also helpful for finding small inns or B&Bs not listed in guidebooks.

I also like the links to articles about various destinations and the traveler advice forums.

Some say it's easy for a hotel to inject favorable comments or a competitor to write a negative review, but I don't see this happening to a degree that outweighs the many reviews and photos posted by actual travelers.

A few tips:

• TripAdvisor, owned by Bellevue-based Expedia, posts traveler reviews that go back several years. Overall ratings may be partly based on outdated information. Base your judgment on the most recent reviews.

• The site lists a year-round average price for each hotel, but the actual price is often different. Example: TripAdvisor lists the year-round average price of the Westin Bear Mountain resort in Victoria B.C. as $202, but a check on the hotel's Web site showed a rate of $185 for August weekends and $100 for weekends in mid-October.

Northwest Cheapsleeps (www.nwcheapsleeps.org). I get dozens of e-mails on lodging deals, but they're often for hotels that have gone from over-the-top expensive to just plain expensive. Northwest Cheapsleeps is the real deal.

Lauren Braden is communications director at the Washington Trails Association and a young mother on the lookout for affordable ways for her family to explore the Northwest. The result: Cheapsleeps, a side project where she posts info on places in Oregon, Washington and British Columbia that are friendly, clean, cozy and under $100 a night.

I liked her June post leading budget travelers to the 72nd Avenue Studios in Portland's Roseway neighborhood, where she found studios with kitchens for $70-$75 a night.

BootsnAll Travel (www.bootsnall.com) Another homegrown site. Unlike Northwest Cheapsleeps, its backyard stretches from Africa to Antarctica.

Started by road-tripping buddies Sean Keener and Chris Heidrich in Eugene, Ore., Bootsnall is based in Portland.

With its stories and blogs written by travelers, destination guides and bargain-hotel recommendations, it stays true to its purpose of encouraging independent travelers to "have fun, be open-minded, and have a thirst for adventure with a willingness to share."

Check out its latest summer travel tips for Europe including sections on what to wear to stay and look cool.

In Your Pocket (www.inyourpocket.com). Skip this one if you've never heard of Plodiv, Novi Sad or Tirana. If these and other Central and Eastern European cities are on your list, you know how fast things are changing. The guidebooks just can't keep up.

Use this site to find out where to get a cold beer in Odessa or where to buy a copper coffee set in Sarajevo. In Your Pocket sells printed guides, but its comprehensive online versions are available free in PDF form.

Transitions Abroad (www.transitionsabroad.com). This publication went out of print a while back. It continues online with dozens of articles about working and volunteering abroad and tips for tapping into the local culture. Stories focus on low-cost independent, responsible and family travel.

Airline search sites: Three worth a bookmark:

• Yapta (www.yapta.com) for its system of tracking airfares and e-mailing alerts when prices drop. If you've already bought a ticket, Yapta will let you know if you're eligible for a credit from the airline.

• Microsoft's Bing (www.bing.com) for its price-predictor feature supplied by Farecast, a Seattle company that Microsoft now owns. Plug in your dates and destination and Bing (like Kayak.com) brings up the lowest fares with links to airline and online booking sites along with a prediction on whether the price is likely to rise or fall in the next seven days.

One quibble: The price-prediction feature works only on selected routes.

• WhichBudget (www.whichbudget.com) for how to get between foreign cities on low-cost airlines. Select the country you want to fly to or from — Spain, for instance. Then select the city — Madrid — and up comes a list of destinations and links to the discount airlines that serve them.

Carol Pucci's Travel Wise column runs monthly online and in print. Contact her at cpucci@seattletimes.com. Twitter updates at www.twitter.com/carolpucci