Tag Archives: RCompass

Young Explorers

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Traveling is a fantastic opportunity to empower the next generation of explorers to work through some of the inevitable challenges that come with visiting new cities or countries. As a parent/guardian, use your best judgement on when to prep your child before or while in route to your destination. But also consider times when they can take the lead in finding the best route to an attraction, how to navigate local transit or things they should consider packing on single day excursions.

The younger the traveler the less likely they are to remember the trip. That still doesn’t mean that they won’t engage in the experience. Consider having them smell and taste new cuisine, or listen to local musicians or the sounds of the natural environment while in a park. For additional travel advice link to Rough Guides article, 20 Tips for Traveling with Children.

Passion + Action = Innovation

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Passion + Action = Innovation

In 2009, a resident of Hudson WI built a tribute to his mother-a former school teacher. Todd Bol created a miniature box filled with free books. His willingness to connect innovative ideas of others, create a shared space, and give back to his community became the cornerstone of the Little Free Library movement. In partnership with  Rick Brooks, they created an enterprise model that has supported the installation of over 40,000 registered libraries in all 50 states and 70 counties around the world.

What developed out of Bol’s interests created a revolutionary way to support literacy, bring together neighbors and connect visitors/tourists to a community.

How have you made a positive mark on your community, region, state or the world?

FLL Seberger Park

Traveling History

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Image by Nation  Geographic (February 2014)

Image by Nation Geographic (February 2014)

Classic, historical architecture has the ability to command attention. These buildings create the iconic skylines etched throughout our travels.

In honor of their creators, I would like to re-introduce a few of these historical resources in a mini series. The first stop is Brunelleschi’s Dome in Florence Italy. Learn more about innovation, rivalry and ultimately perseverance in NatGeo’s article,  Il Duomo (February 2014).

Travel & Reading

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Image by Arriba. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Commons' licensing.

Image by Arriba. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Commons’ licensing.

Think about the ways in which travel shapes our lives?

  • It is an escape.
  • It requires us to let go while others are at the helm.
  • It expands self concept.
  • It allows us to experience the exquisiteness and at times, the degradation of the world around us.

In a recent article in Book Riot, the author Jeremy Anderberg, binds these same contextual ideologies of travel with the literary world. Click here to read his full article, Reading as Travel (October 2013.)

 

Map Making Resources

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Image by Curran. Kelleher. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Commons' licensing.

Image by Curran. Kelleher. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Commons’ licensing.

I am not sure if it’s my passion for travel or the trained geographer in me, but, I am drawn to maps. The weathered, even torn, vintage variety seems to have the strongest allure for me.

A new take on an old classic are digital maps. So when I ran across a post by Open Education Database (OEDb), I knew I wanted to pass it on to my readers.  This summer, OEDb created a link for “Do-It-Youselfers” to 20 free open source tools and data resources to help non-GIS (Geographic Information Systems) users, create maps. Click here to begin!

Travel Season Tips

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Image by Matt Hutchinson. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Commons' licensing.

Image by Matt Hutchinson. Retrieved from Flickr. Used under Creative Commons’ licensing.

U.S. Travel Association estimated that U.S. residents took 1.6 billion person‑trips for leisure purposes last year. Respondents listed the number one reason for travel was to visit relatives (March 2013.) With the largest travel season approaching, I thought a friendly reminder of what to do (and not  to do) would be helpful.  RCompass points to an article by Amy Farley, written for Travel + Leisure.  Farley includes tips and tricks on how to cope with noisy hotel neighbors, wild taxi drivers, mission impossible plane changes, and more… To add some levity to your pending travel season; click on Farley’s full article , Travel Etiquette Dos and Don’ts (October 2013.)