gtrekker

The BBC Profiles provide an economic, historical, and political overview, with a section on current leaders. The Profiles also list the media outlets, which include television and radio stations and the press.

National Geographic's People and Places feature provides a short overview of the destination and include a Features section with related articles, photos, and videos, depending on the destination.

Travel + Leisure Magazine's guide to the greatest hotels worldwide as selected by its team of reporters and editors.

Weatherbase provides historical weather information such as "average number of day above 90," "average number of days with thunderstorms," and other similar types of data.

From website: With an area of 83.858 sq km Austria consists of 9 independent federal states (Burgenland, Carinthia, Lower Austria, Upper Austria, Salzburg, Styria, Tyrol, Vorarlberg and Vienna) with their own provincial governments. The federal legislation is exercised by the national council (Nationalrat) together with the Upper House of Parliament (Bundesrat) the two chambers of Parliament.

Austria is a member of the European Union, the United Nations as well as most UN organizations.....click for website

Frommer's Forums are divided into countries, and all the messages relating to a country are presented in a list that makes it easy to browse through the topics.

Review site with hotel reviews and candid photos posted by users.

Concierge.com destinations guides include information on getting there, getting around, lodging, places to eat, see and do, ... etc. Although Concierge.com may not have as many hotel recommendations as some guide books, they provide hotel photos along with the recommendations. The destinations guides also have links to articles about the destination published by Concierge.com or Conde Nast Traveler.

Frommer's has put a substantial amount of content online, making Frommers.com a good resource for travel planning. The site is easy to navigate since all the destinations are organized by similar topics such as "Getting There," "Restaurants," and "Suggested Itineraries."

USA Today's Country Guides have information on topics such as Money, Health, Accommodations, Entertainment, Top Things To Do and See, Getting There, Getting Around, Climate, and Map. You can also select the topics you are interested in and create a mini guide that puts all the information on one page for easy reading.

From Conde Nast Traveler
Published December 2005
A mystery to many but a friend to all, the hotel concierge is a traveler's most overlooked ally. Christian L. Wright reports on these ultimate insiders and how to put them to work for you ... click for full article

From Conde Nast Traveler
Published March 2006
Sprinkled throughout Europe are fairy-tale hamlets that offer a taste of the Continent as it used to be-places where simple pleasures and centuries-old rhythms seem to slow the world's very rotation, and where even the stillness speaks volumes. "Guidebooks privilege cities and sites, but the history-not to mention the romance-is often far more potent in villages," writes Cristina Nehring, who took her thesis on the road last summer to three countries: France, Greece, and Italy. There, she discovered entire cultures writ small-in the scent of lavender, a taste of black truffle, and the Hellenic art of doing absolutely nothing ... click for full article

From Conde Nast Traveler
Published November 2005
Hitting the slopes in the Alps can cost less than a ski vacation in the Rockies. Follow these guidelines for surprising values on schussing across Europe ... click for full article

From Conde Nast Traveler
Published October 2003
Stephan Wilkinson takes an up-tempo tour of operatic proportions at the wheel of an Audi A4 Cabriolet ... click for full article

Virtual Tourist has user reviews on topics such as Hotels, Things To Do, Restaurants, Local Customs, Nightlife, Off the Beaten Path, Tourist Traps, Transportation, ... etc.

Podcasts of Traveler Magazine's selection of the world's greatest walking tours. The podcasts last about 20-30 minutes.

From Conde Nast Traveler
April 2007
St Stephen's cathedral is just a stone's throw from your floor-to-ceiling windows, and yet nearly nine centuries separate it from the newborn DO & CO Hotel. ... click for full article

From Conde Nast Traveler
Published October 2003

Shopping & Service
1. Tip wisely. Americans are famously generous, but in Europe a ten percent tip is perfectly acceptable for waiters. If a service charge is included (check your bill carefully), don't leave anything more.

2. Shop tax-free. Some stores participate in a program called Global Refund. It's a better value on more expensive purchases: Spend $161 in the United Kingdom, for example, and get $13 back; spend $1,612 and get $208 back. See www.globalrefund.com for details ... click for full article

From Conde Nast Traveler
Published January 2005
Where you eat is often as much a part of the pleasure of dining as what you eat. The four Gold List hotel restaurants we tested from among those applauded by readers were all exceptional environments for exceptional meals (for hotel reviews, see the Gold List). ... click for full article

From Conde Nast Traveler
November 2005
"The streets of Vienna," wrote the Austrian satirist Karl Kraus, "are paved with culture." ... click for full article

From Conde Nast Traveler
Published March 2006
His music added to her glory. Now, 250 years after Mozart's birth, Vienna emerges with a fresh, multicultural vigor to honor its adopted son with an unprecedented array of concerts. Manuela Hoelterhoff leads a tour that seamlessly fuses an imperial past and a dynamic present ... click for full article