Barb19

I am particularly interested in France and Italy. Are there any sites that review hotels and restaurants as well as describe sights? I have used chowhound.com, egullet and tripadvisor.com. Viamichelin is helpful as well. I guess Fodors is my favorite. Are there any other forums like this one? What are your favorite travel websites?

Underhill

I started out on the bonjourparis.com web site, and it's still my favorite for anything on France. The BP Forums have many different topics, with threads within the topics, making it easy to track information. The site is especially useful for French culture questions and for in-depth restaurant and hotel reports. There is also has a newsletter with articles on France.

Another good general site is tripadvisor.com, which has reader reports on hotels all over the world, with average ratings for them. It's an excellent spot for researching places to stay and to get information on sightseeing.

mclaurie

I have found initaly.com a great source of information, particularly if you really learn to navigate the website. She (the woman who runs it) does a monthly article which is usually interesting about a new place or a special exhibit. She also has a list of all outdoor food & antique markets. You can pick an area & read about it & see photos. I understand the prices for hotels & home/apt rentals through the site are more expensive than other sites though.

Venere.com is a good website for "shopping" hotels (you can check availability etc.) but people here will often contact the hotel directly to book & ask for the rate they saw on venere. It's best for Italy I think but also includes France.

For France, provencebeyond.com is a good place for general info on the south of France. Pagesjaunes.com is really fun. You can put any address in & actually see the outside of the building & then "walk" up & down the block to see what it's like. I've only tried it for Paris but I think it works for most/all of France.

There is an old thread here that lists tons of websites (much more than you're looking for) that might be fun for you to read. The title is something like "Lost my favorite websites.."

BarbBC3

Hi Barb,
Another site with an active forum is virtualtourist.com. There are a lot of international people on that site, so you can usually get advice from locals.
Barb

francophile03

Has anyone ever heard of www.bootsnall.com? They have a forum too. It says there's membership; I didn't get a chance to read if you pay or not. But it appears to offer low airfares and I'm not sure if there is a catch.

rex

You have more than you can wade through already - - but sometimes there is some good info on epinions.com

Best wishes,

Rex

SalB

A few favorites:

http://www.france.com/
http://www.franceguide.com/
http://www.francetourism.com/
http://www.logis-de-france.fr/uk/
http://www.meteo.fr (weather)

Have fun!

hanl

www.cityvox.com - reviews of masses of restaurants, monuments, hotels etc. in Europe (esp. France), by city.

For the French cities, it helps if you can understand French - most of the site is in English but some reviews are in French. You can still see photos of places, check maps and opening times and see what "star" rating people have given them though.

jody

This is a pretty good one for Italy

http://www.dolcevita.com/

JBX

Following thread is an older one, however many of the URL's provides are still valid websites.

>Lost my favorite URLs<
http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34391846

JBX

Here's a link purportedly listing,
World Hottest 100 Travel Web Sites ---
http://www.worldhot.com/lifestyles/travel/