Florida's Best Islands

originally appeared on OutsideOnline.com:

Q: What Are the Best Undiscovered Island Escapes in Florida?

I’ve been to Key West and it’s great, but I’m looking for an undiscovered island alternative in Florida. What are my options?

A: Florida's Best Islands: Anna Maria Island

Anna Maria Island
Even though Anna Maria Island sits less than an hour south of Tampa Bay, this accessible, family-friendly sand patch feels completely removed from the urban bustle. There’s no McDonald’s on the seven-mile-long island due to strict zoning laws, local ordinances limit building heights to no more than three stories, and free trolleys run up and down its length on Gulf Drive so you can hop a ride instead of driving your car. The result is a pretension-free hideout that’s surprisingly young and vibrant for a Florida coastal island.

MUST: Take the three-hour Dolphin and Manatee Tour led by Adventure Kayak Tours through mangrove tunnels and protected waterways around the island ($55 per person).

Cedar Key
If you want to know what Key West must have been like back in the Hemingway days, come to secluded Cedar Key, which sits off the Florida coast below the panhandle. This quiet town of less than 1,000 people sits on Way Key, buffered from the mainland by a necklace of marshy, protected islands. The cedar trees in these parts were once used to make pencils, and John Muir spent time here in 1867 while recovering from malaria. Today, though, the locals make their living off a booming clamming industry the smattering of tourists who come to cast a line from the fishing pier or toast the sunset at a watering hole like the Big Deck Raw Bar.

MUST: Paddle along shores of Cedar Key and explore the surrounding islands with Kayak Cedar Keys.

Siesta Key
You’ll never confuse eight-mile-long Siesta Key, floating off the Gulf Coast below Sarasota and above Fort Myers, with the famed keys south of Miami—and that’s a good thing. This barrier island has long, wide confectionary white sand beaches, the likes of which folks in Key West will only see in their dreams. Though Siesta Key has a definite resort feel, it’s not expensive or overdeveloped, and it's relatively untouched by the Sunshine State's signature blight: millionaire mansions, high-end hotels, and high-rise condos. The best beaches and places to shop and eat are found near the island’s northern tip, in small but bustling Siesta Village. Entertain yourself by fishing, paddleboarding, or kayaking (you can rent equipment from Siesta Sports Rentals).

MUST: The outdoor drum circle that performs on Sunday nights in Siesta Village.

How to save on family holiday travel

originally appeared in USA Today:

During the holidays, family travel usually involves visiting friends and relatives or that much-anticipated vacation destination. But the holidays are also high season. That means top hotel rates, restaurants serving expensive meals, and stages hosting sparkling ballets, plays and rock concerts at premium prices. Here are some tips on how to stretch your holiday budget by saving money on food, lodging and fees.

Cheap eats on the go

Eat the street food. Take advantage of the food truck revolution to cut your lunch costs. In Boston, New York, Washington, D.C, Minneapolis, Chicago, Austin and other urban locales, skilled cooks serve up imaginative fare from their mobile kitchens. The vendors tend to specialize in one main dish, tweaking the ingredients. Empanadas can be beef with potato or Jambalaya style with shrimp, sausage and rice. Tacos come filled with chicken, beef or even lobster. And for dessert, look for trucks selling waffles, cupcakes or custom-made ice cream sandwiches. These mobile meals-on-wheels rove the downtown districts, parking for awhile and then moving on. To track the trucks, check the destination's official visitor website for links and for apps.

Browse the green markets. Indoor farmers' markets bloom in major cities from Toronto to Los Angeles. Although winter might mean fewer home-grown vegetables, the markets lure neighbors and visitors by selling aromatic breads, fresh-baked pastries, crisp apples and other seasonal fruit as well as organic salads and deli meats. Dine in at the markets' inexpensive cafés or bring some goodies back to your hotel room or to your relatives' house.

Rooms with meals

Pick a property that includes breakfast. When rates include complimentary breakfast, whether it's a cooked-to-order meal or a Continental spread, you start your day saving money.

Make sure your room has a refrigerator. Stock your fridge with milk, juice and bottled water purchased at a nearby store, thus saving money on costly honor bar items. When traveling with little ones, buy plastic bowls and spoons as well as cold cereal and baby food. Tots can then eat breakfast when hungry, even if it's before the hotel restaurant opens. If refrigerators aren't standard features, hotels may supply them for a fee. Like all extras, availability is limited, so request a fridge when you make your room reservation.

Book a condo. Not only do these lodgings offer more space for the money than hotel rooms, but they also come with kitchens. That makes it easy to cook breakfasts and dinners, thus saving on restaurant bills.

Cook for the relatives. Instead of taking Aunt Sally, Uncle Bill and their families out to a restaurant to thank them for their hospitality, cook dinner for them. This is less costly and often less hectic than requiring youngsters to sit through a multi-course meal at a restaurant.

The destination

Consider a home exchange. By swapping your vacant place for someone else's, you can enjoy a getaway in Europe, the Caribbean or anywhere else you can find a family to live in your home while you live in theirs, all for much less money than renting a hotel or villa. Depending on what you want, trading places can get you multiple bedrooms and bathrooms, maybe a backyard and possibly extras like a car. Home exchange companies typically charge a membership fee and/or a monthly listing fee. If you've always wanted to treat your mom and dad to Christmas in Rome, then swapping homes can make this dream trip an affordable holiday gift.

Try an all-inclusive resort. The upfront cost covers all meals, activities and often children's programs. Especially with always hungry and active tweens and teens, all-inclusives can save you money.

Share a condo or villa with another family. Sharing a three-bedroom condo or villa with another family costs less than booking a two-bedroom unit yourself. But beware: nothing tests buddies like living with someone. The key to a successful trip that maintains the friendship is honest talk ahead of time. Discuss who will cook and clean; which couple gets to bunk in the master bedroom with the private bath; and what house rules will govern the kids' television viewing and bedtimes.

Money matters

Price various travel options. Compare the cost of driving, versus flying or boarding the bus, especially on the East Coast where discount bus services sell promotional seats sometimes for as little as $1.

Consider travel insurance. For that guided safari in Kenya, Caribbean family cruise, or other prepaid, big-ticket item, if your 8-year-old pops out with measles the day before you leave, you won't get your money back unless you're covered by the appropriate travel insurance. As always, read the fine print.

Use the right credit card. Don't add to the amount you owe by putting meals, lodging and other purchases in a foreign locale on a credit card that charges for converting non-U.S. currencies into dollars. Pick a credit card that foregoes these fees.

Look for package deals and passes. During the holidays, hotels bundle admission to special attractions into their packages and big cities offer combination passes that discount admission to several attractions for one fee. The caveat: This is only a deal if you expect to visit most of the museums and places featured within the allotted time frame.

Play with coupons. Check out social media for slashed prices. LivingSocial.com, Groupon.com and other digital discount sites may have just the money-saver you need to make that water skiing excursion or dining at a fine restaurant affordable.

With winter on its way, it's time to start planning a sunny getaway

originally appeared in USA Today:

With winter on its way, it's time to start planning a sunny family getaway. But don't limit your escape to a familiar resort or theme park, says one of the founders of TheVacationGals.com blog. She suggests the surprise of a new place on vacation is something that's so wonderful.

Palm Springs, Calif.

This desert getaway appeals to all ages, Williams says. For adults, there are spas, golf, shopping and restaurants, while kids will love the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway, the hands-on Children's Discovery Museum of the Desert, or a family hike to 49 Palms Oasis at nearby Joshua Tree National Park.

Puerto Rico

You may not need a passport, but this Caribbean island offers an exotic international getaway close to home for families, couples or singles. There's plenty of natural appeal from kayaking in a bioluminescent bay where microscopic algae glow in the dark, to jungle hiking in El Yunque National Forest, Williams says. Or soak in history wandering the cobblestone streets of Old San Juan. Visit on a Sunday and watch kite fliers at Fort San Felipe del Morro, a stone citadel.

Lake Charles, La.

Celebrate Mardi Gras family-style at this southwestern Louisiana city, where the parades and festivities play up tradition more than titillation. There's also opportunity for beaches, biking, and exploring marshland along the 180-mile Creole Nature Trail All-American Road. The food is so good, and the scenery is just pretty with Spanish moss and big oak trees and swamp land.

Island of Hawaii

It's volcanoes that draw Miner to the Big Island of Hawaii. You can go and see the lava flowing into the ocean and the island getting bigger. One of her favorite excursions is hiking through Thurston Lava Tube at Volcanoes National Park. For kids who have a little bit of Indiana Jones in them, it's an incredible place. And for beaches, the island's Kohala coast can't be beat.

Carlsbad, Calif.

This northern San Diego County town attracts families to its Legoland theme park, but for Miner the appeal goes further. This is a beachy community, it has a nice small-town feel. You can watch surfers tackle the waves, and even sign up for surfing school to try it yourself.

Atlanta

Lots of folks switch planes in Atlanta, but it's also a great place to spend some time. Family favorites include the massive Georgia Aquarium and the World of Coca Cola Museum, which has a giant tasting room where visitors can try scores of the company's beverages sold around the world. Tip: Watch out for Beverly, the bitter Italian soda that's so bad, it's good. For an active outing, Stone Mountain offers hikes, a tram ride and even a ropes course. Although the city occasionally gets snow, it quickly disappears.

Turks and Caicos

This Caribbean nation with powder-white sand keeps sun lovers happy, but there's also enough variety to break up beach days. Activities include a conch farm a former cotton plantation and humpback whale watching. But the common denominator is a laid-back pace. You go with the flow and relax.

Sanibel Island, Fla.

You'll get a beach vacation, but so much more at this Gulf Coast Island near Fort Myers. The island's location makes it one of the best places to find seashells in the country. Who wouldn't love shelling on the beach and wading in the mellow, mellow waters?  Biking's easy on the flat island, and so is kayaking at J.N. Ding Darling National Wildlife Refuge.

Tucson

You get a feel for Mexico and the Wild West in this laid-back Arizona city. One suggestion is to start with a visit to Old Tucson Studios, which celebrates the movies filmed here with sets, cowboy gunfights and stunt shows. Another day, visit the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, a combination zoo, natural history museum and botanical garden. It's an environment that's so unique and so different.

Los Angeles

The West Coast megalopolis is already on many vacation lists, but one of the city's residents says LA is more than Hollywood and beaches. One of her favorite stops: La Brea Tar Pits, where saber-tooth cats and mammoths emerge from archaeological digs while city traffic zooms by. It brings home the fact that our time is just on a dot on the planet, she says. Other favorites: Universal Studios theme park and sprawling Griffith Park.

To Track Traveling Teens, Just Follow the Money

Associated Press

You could wait a long time for a teenager who's traveling to call home or even text. But there's another way to see what your kid is up to: Follow the money.

Before sending teens off on a trip, make sure you have online access to any bank and credit card accounts they'll be using. You'll want to monitor their transactions anyway, to see that they're staying on budget, and to make sure their accounts haven't been hijacked by thieves. But there's another reason to monitor how the kids are spending their money: It will give you some clues as to their whereabouts and activities.

Last summer, I sent my 16-year-old son and two other teenagers - without an adult - to six countries in Europe. They stayed in hostels, traveled by train, and none of them had cell phones. But by monitoring their ATM and credit card activity online, I could get a sense of their whereabouts.

Did they make the overnight train from Barcelona to Paris? A record of a cash withdrawal from the Banque Nationale de Paris at a branch near the Eiffel Tower told me everything I needed to know.

When their itinerary called for them to be in Germany, I saw a withdrawal from a Deutsche Bank ATM near the Berlin Zoo. On the day they were to travel by ferry to Denmark, there was a credit card charge in kroner.

If I had to do it again, I would make sure, when sending a teenager abroad, that he or she did have a phone. But following the money gave me some peace of mind. Here are some other tips and advice for parents sending kids overseas, both from my own experience and from some experts.

MONEY: Book and prepay lodging, trains and planes in advance to cut down on the need for cash and credit.

But kids will need some local currency in their pockets when they arrive, as well as a way to get more cash and charge expenses later on.

Shop around for the best deals on foreign currency at home. My local savings bank offered the best conversion rate and no fee on the transaction. I sent each teen with cash to cover food and local transportation for three days. After that, they used ATM cards to get local currency wherever they were. Withdrawals should be made every few days instead of daily to cut down on transaction fees.

Many parents buy prepaid, preloaded cards from credit card companies and other outlets that limit how much money teens have access to at any one time. Parents can reload the cards electronically from home.

That way, teens "only have the money they need for the next day or two at most," said Mike Bowers, senior director of health and safety for People to People Ambassador youth programs and a member of the Student Youth & Travel Association (SYTA). "And I have the added comfort of knowing where they're spending it, because I can see online where the expenditures are being made."

Another option: You can get a credit card on your account, with your teen's name on it. Just remember, you are responsible for all charges. Can you trust your teenager to refrain from a shopping spree?

Remember to advise banks and credit card companies well in advance about cards that will be used overseas. If cards are not authorized for use in a given country at a given time, transactions may be blocked. Some countries now require PIN numbers with credit card transactions, and it can take a few weeks for credit card companies to process those PIN requests.

COMMUNICATION: Your domestic cell phone carrier may offer a good short-term international plan or an international SIM card for your phone.

Another option is to buy a cheap international phone. STA Travel sells international phones for $39, with $20 worth of call time.

But these days, "most kids don't actually talk on their phones," observed Patrick Connor, a vice president of SYTA and president of Director's Choice Tour & Travel, which coordinates performance tours for student musical groups. Instead, many teens prefer to text and post updates on Facebook, Foursquare or Twitter.

That's a great way for parents to see what they're up to - as long as you don't mind not hearing their voices. Just make sure you inquire about international data rates for cell phones to cover texting and Internet service overseas.

"If someone doesn't get an international data or texting plan, they can end up with a multi-hundred dollar bill," Connor said.

PERSONAL SAFETY: Bowers tells students on People to People tours to "dress down and blend in. Leave your bling at home."

Connor tells his travelers to "make sure your purse and backpack are zipped; don't keep things in your back pocket or an open pocket."

DOCUMENTS: Make copies of passports, credit cards and the like so that if they are lost or stolen, account and serial numbers can easily be located and the loss can be reported.

Make a master list of itineraries, including flights, trains and lodging, for both parents and travelers. Specify the names of train stations and airports, since some cities have more than one.

STA Travel sells an International Student ID card for $22 that not only offers discounts to 40,000 museums, stores and other sites around the world, but also provides access to a password-protected website where you can upload copies of important travel documents in case you need to refer to them during your trip.

INSURANCE: Mandatory summer school, sports injuries, family emergencies - there are so many things that can disrupt a teenager's life. For $130 a person, I bought cancel-for-any-reason trip insurance from TravelGuard and kept my sanity. James Bell, commercial vice president for STA Travel, says STA sells insurance that covers everything from medical expenses to a lost iPod. Insurance rates start as low as $6 a day.

LODGING: Tour groups will arrange for lodging, but for students traveling on their own, hostels are a good option in many countries.

Yet booking a hostel online, site unseen, can be confusing, even when using sites with customer reviews. For example, I wanted my son and his friends to stay in hostels that were not only safe and clean, but that were also centrally located. And in some cities, I wanted to make sure they were located away from red-light districts.

In this case, a travel agent's advice was invaluable. STA Travel has contracts with hostels around the world that it inspects a half-dozen times a year, and the STA agent I used was knowledgeable enough to book hostels that were fun for young travelers, while offering environments that met mom's standards.

Shipboard Dance Class Keeps Cruisers in Step

Miami Herald

Whirling, I was actually whirling across the dance floor in a Spanish bolero, with handsome Arturo Garcia Melo from Mexico.

I imagined myself on Dancing with the Stars. Bruno (Tonioli) would be excited. Len (Goodman) would say we ``sizzle.'' Carrie Ann (Inaba) would call me graceful. We would get respectable scores on the judge's paddles, and the audience voting at home would love us.

Back to reality: This was not competitive dancing. Melo was among instructors teaching passengers to dance on the 2,550-passenger MSC Poesia, on a Latin dance-theme cruise departing from Fort Lauderdale to the Eastern Caribbean. He had just picked me, a true novice, to help demonstrate a move.

But I was very much part of a craze hitting the high seas, the opportunity to learn to dance on a cruise ship.

A ship is a nice, non-judgmental place for such experimentation. For one, the other passengers are strangers, so no worries about embarrassing yourself. Plus, shipboard classes are suitable for everyone from beginners to those who know the steps. You are not expected to be a pro.

Italian line MSC Cruises is among several lines -- Crystal Cruises, Cunard and Holland America Line are others --jumping on the dance bandwagon, offering dance classes as part of their activities rosters at a time when TV shows like Dancing with the Stars have made knowing at least a few ballroom steps a very in thing.

The lines also offer occasional dance-themed sailings with additional tutorage, like the cruise I was on. Tour operators specializing in dance (including salsa and tango) book space on ships as well, bringing instructors onboard for those who cruise as part of their groups.

Nino Torre, a hustle and salsa dance pro and DJ from Richmond, Virginia, for instance, helps organize an annual Hustle & Salsa Dance Cruise. Now in its 11th year, the group attracts about 275 participants per cruise, most from the East Coast, a third from Florida.

Instructors are dance champions, most still competing, who do workshops in both hustle and salsa as well as in tango and cha cha and other steps, Torre said. ``We survey guests before the cruise and offer classes in what they request,'' he added. Participants range in age from their late 20s to early 60s with a desire to learn a few steps and show them off on the ship's dance floor.

On the Poesia cruise, our special instructors were a competitive ballroom pair, from Cleveland, Ohio, onboard to teach several classes specifically in Latin dances. Instruction included a half-hour class after dinner each evening so those who wanted could stay on the dance floor afterward.

Melo, a former pro dancer in Mexico, and other members of the entertainment team also offered instruction once or twice a day, as they do on every cruise.

At the pool, there were casual classes in dances like bachata (a four-step dance with origins in the Dominican Republic), come-in-your-bikini affairs that attracted a decent crowd.

But the ``serious'' learning on Poesia took place indoors on the dance floor of the Zebra Lounge, all done up in black and white stripes and a sexy space to learn dances like rumba and salsa and tango. Classes here attracted about 60 regulars, which meant a crowded dance floor, sometimes dancers spilling onto the carpet. There were couples and single women and occasionally a lone man too, the group varying in age from 30s on up.

 No need to sign up in advance. If you wanted to dance, you just showed up.

In one class, ballroom pro Minas Katsantouris demonstrated a sexy salsa move, the kind that's supposed to show meaning in every wiggle -- and in his tight jeans and a fitted black T-shirt, his wiggles did just that.

``The dance floor is our place, where guys can feel strong,'' Minas proclaimed, as the men in the lounge practiced their steps on one side of the dance floor, women on the other.

I did my best with a butt-out, wiggle-down with your hips move, with Minas instructing us women to ``Make the guy go, `Oh my god, that's exciting, what's happening.' '' Except my partner was my reluctant 78-year-old mom.

With regulars in the classes it was easy to make friends. In my case, they included Canadians Carol and Owen Rhodenizer, both age 69, and dance enthusiasts, who have done 39 cruises and take lessons at home several times a week.

During a salsa class taught by Katsantouris' professional partner, Rachel Neilson, Carol was such a pal she lent me Owen.

We were doing great for a few dances, Owen a strong leader. But when Neilson showed us a move involving the woman stretching her leg under and through the man's spread legs, I decided it was time to give Carol her husband back.

Katsantouris and Neilson admitted in an interview that they were teaching us steps on our weeklong cruise in a different way than they would on land. ``I am trying to give a basic foundation. It's more quickly than we'd do in regular circumstances, but these are steps that really do exist,'' Neilson said.

And we did learn. Of the steps I picked up, my favorite was the cha cha, which I practiced with mom and other female partners and did eventually get to try with a male passenger as well. I got to the point where I was really feeling the beat, as the instructor suggested, and my feet were actually responding.

I know there was no judge's panel, or viewers watching me at home. But I still think I made it to the next round.

Barenaked Ladies to Host Another Norwegian Cruise Line Voyage

USA Today

It's official: Barenaked Ladies will be back on the high seas in 2011 hosting a music-themed voyage on Norwegian Cruise Line.

Themed-cruise organizer Sixthman says the Canadian alternative rock band will headline a new "Ships and Dip" cruise scheduled for Feb. 6-11, 2011 in the Western Caribbean.

The five-night voyage on the Norwegian Dawn will kick off in Miami and include stops in Costa Maya, Mexico and Belize City, Belize. It goes on sale to the public on June 30, with rates starting at $799 per person, based on double occupancy.

This is the fourth time Barenaked Ladies has hosted a Sixthman music cruise. As in the past, the Norwegian Cruise Lines voyage will include a headline concert by the band as well as performances by a number of other groups that will be announced in the coming months.

Competition Heats up for Port

Florida Today

Carnival Cruise Lines' plan to homeport its 2,056-passenger Fantasy at Port Charleston in South Carolina starting this year is causing a few ripples of concern 400 miles to the south in Port Canaveral.

The move is another indication that Port Canaveral, considered the world's second-busiest cruise port, must be prepared for growing pockets of competition in areas where it has traditionally drawn passengers.

Port Charleston, for example, is a six-hour drive from Port Canaveral and there's the distinct possibility that its Carnival service could siphon passengers who might otherwise come here. The Fantasy is expected to attract passengers from the Atlanta area, both Carolinas, Tennessee -- and possibly even North Florida.

"Unfortunately, that's some of our prime markets," said J. Stanley Payne, chief executive officer of Port Canaveral.

And Payne said the competition could grow as more ships are deployed along the East Coast. "I don't think it's going to stop at Charleston."

Fantasy's presence in South Carolina likely will lead to Port Canaveral beefing up its outreach and marketing efforts there touting its cruise offerings, which include seven-day and three- to four-day Eastern and Western Caribbean cruises offered by Carnival, Disney Cruise Line, Royal Caribbean International and Norwegian Cruise Lines.

Carnival, Disney and Royal Caribbean have invested millions of dollars at Port Canaveral.

Payne didn't specify what additional efforts might be used to market cruises departing from Port Canaveral, saying only that "we're going to get a little more aggressive about the advantages of this port."

Port Canaveral's Central Florida location allows it to attract customers who live within a day's drive of the Space Coast -- more than 30 million people live within an 8-hour drive -- or fly into Orlando International Airport, the 11th largest airport in the United States. According the latest figures, Port Canaveral attracts about 2 million cruise passengers annually.

Even with expected price increases this year, cruises continue to be considered vacation bargains, and that popularity has the attention of many communities eager to sign deals with one of the major players.

Officials in Savannah, Ga., have commissioned a study about the possibility of offering cruises. The Jacksonville Port Authority is considering a new cruise terminal to get more business. Carnival's Fascination sails for five-day cruises out of the Jacksonville port, called Jaxport, but because of the port's design it's difficult now for larger cruise ships to negotiate its waters.

"Definitely home-port cruising is a hot industry trend again," said Carolyn Spencer Brown, editor in chief of the website CruiseCritic.com. "What's happening is that smaller markets are getting very aggressive about competing with the big guys, meaning Miami, Fort Lauderdale cruises and Port Canaveral. Charleston is just the newest entrant on the scene and Carnival is just seeing if it's going to work."

One way to tell if a market is good is if the cruise company sends in a bigger ship with more amenities, Brown said. That has happened several times with cruise lines serving Port Canaveral.

Robert Giangrisostomi, the Canaveral Port Authority's deputy executive director/business development, said the port continues to work with travel agents to promote Port Canaveral and its cruise offerings. Cruise ships are running 112 percent to 115 percent passenger capacity, Giangrisostomi said, and the port has to continue to ensure future numbers remain that healthy

The port also is lobbying the cruise lines to offer excursions to Bermuda and San Juan, Puerto Rico.

"The key is to keep these (current) cruise ships filled," Giangrisostomi said. "Everybody needs to sell Port Canaveral."