USA Travel Information and Travel Guide

USA

Our Top Picks For USA

1 Black Hills

Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse, bison, Deadwood: the Wild West lives!
2 New York City

The USA’s must-see metropolis: 8 million people can’t be wrong
3 New Orleans

Cajun and creole cookin’, beguiling bawdy culture, jazz and ahh - Mardi Gras
4 Yellowstone National Park

Geysers, grizzlies, boiling mudpots, bison, wolves and wilderness
5 Big Sur

Slow down for sunsets, crumbling cliffs, creaking redwoods and curvaceous Hwy 1

6 Silverton

Sssshh - this unpaved historic mining town is Colorado's best-kept secret
7 Grand Canyon

Heard of it? Still here, still freakin’ big
8 White Mountains

Hiking, skiing, kayaking, swimming holes and that famous New England fall
9 Baltimore

Gimlet-eyed grit, raucous spirit, working-class pubs. Don’t be shy, hon.
10 Chesapeake Bay

Tooth-achingly quaint small towns, holiday beaches and seafood
11 Key West

Getting drunk, key lime pie, pirates, literary legends and, uh, getting more drunk
12 Olympic National Park

Pristine wilderness, roadless rain forest, untamed adventure
13 Portland

Microbrew-quaffing, latte-sipping, outdoor-loving, Prius-driving, politically progressive fun
14 Texas Hill Country

BBQ, boot-scootin’, dude ranches and river floats
15 Anchorage

Big-city eats and drinks with Alaskan wilderness beckoning on all sides

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Fast Facts about USA

Number of passengers in the air over the USA on average? 62,000
Unemployment 9.5%
Average number of TV channels in a US home
104
Gross Domestic Product (GDP)
$11.9 trillion
Military defense budget in 2006
$441.9 billion
Inflation
2.6%
Population
302 million
Percentage of citizens who have passports
about 30%

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California Off the Beaten Path

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Our favourite USA Blogs (beta)

People On Line At Box Office!!!

Blog: VEGAS HAPPENS HERE - 25 July 2009

Erich and I told one another yesterday not to over-expect on the first day of ticket sales for "Las Vegas Celebrates The Music of Michael Jackson." All week, we kept telling ourselves we needed to make it to Saturday and we'd be on our way, onto the next phase of this crazy project that's only about three weeks old.

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This week's LVW Col: Vegas Movie Mistakes!

Blog: VEGAS HAPPENS HERE - 23 July 2009

I've been saving up this one for a while. Finally, it's ripe. Hooray! Here goes! In fact, here's a shot from "Fools Rush In" that I didn't even get to mention in the piece. Where's this exit? Not near the Mirage, that's for sure. Enjoy! -sf

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The Show is UP: Charo!

Blog: VEGAS HAPPENS HERE - 23 July 2009

Don't prejudge this lady. Yes, she's got the maracas, but beneath them is a serious musician and a veteran performer who has earned a place in Vegas performing lore. Also, she's delightful to chat with and tells great stories. Plus, it's worth it to tune in just to hear how I was nearly mistaken for a predator. Eek! You know the drill: click on the date below to listen or right-click and save to your computer.

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Introducing USA

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Paul Simon had such yearning in his voice when he sang, ‘I’ve gone to look for America,’ and anyone even vaguely familiar with this nostalgia-loving, future-obsessed, multiple-personality patchwork of a country can understand why.

If you’re looking for America, you might want to start somewhere in the middle – in the heartland’s undulating fields of grain, among the soaring Rocky Mountains or under the endless sky of the Southwest desert, its vast expanse changing color with each subtle shift of the sun. Or you could go south, into the velvet heat of the Carolinas or Mississippi, toward the wondrous wetlands of the Florida Everglades or the dusty dream-catcher towns of New Mexico. Then there are the salty coasts. New Jersey, Maine or Oregon – lands of lighthouses and dune grass. And don’t forget the cities. Brash New York, surreal Las Vegas, earthy San Francisco, indie-rock Austin, strong-willed New Orleans – each like a microcountry of its own. ***As of June 1, passport requirements for US & Canadian citizens have changed; see the Customs & Border Protection website for details***.

This land is hard to pin down. Filled with so many different worlds and subcultures and belief systems, it’s no wonder so many Americans experience an identity crisis at some point in their lives. Heading off into the sunset to drive these open roads, diving headlong into a thrumming big city or hiking into the gorgeous countryside for weeks at a time are the classic ways of figuring out what this American life is all about. That searching is an old, romantic notion, chronicled on the page by writers from Mark Twain to Jack Kerouac, and lived out, daily, among locals and visitors alike.

And this is certainly a wonderful place for a journey.

But what might you find there, beyond the pulsing nightlife and awesome landscapes? That is a whole other story indeed – one with chapters on race, religion, class, sexuality and, of course, politics. It is the story of the USA experience, and it’s never simple.

The United States of America is essentially a series of miraculous dichotomies, each helping its seeming opposite to thrive. It’s a place where people embrace the technology of heart transplants with the same enthusiasm as yoga, a land where the nation’s richest folks live among some of the poorest. Many Americans are diehard traditionalists – flocking to old-fashioned state fairs and barbecues and cotillions, and feeling in love with all forms of nostalgia – and yet they always keep an eye on the future and the cutting edge.

It is also a country founded on the concept of immigration – of foreigners, with differences, coming together and living as a single nation. And despite all the bickering and hypocrisy and complex human emotions that drive both the good and the bad here, this is still a place that is incredibly diverse and desirable and passionate and gorgeous and, in endless cases, welcoming, in spite of itself. It’s part of the great yin-yang that is the US of A. Come in, explore, see all sides for yourself. When it comes to presenting new perspectives, this country will not disappoint.

Travel Alert: Restrictions on airline carry-on baggage are in place throughout the US. For details check the Transport Security Administration website.

Last updated: Jul 13, 2009

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More about USA

Tips & articles

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Latest headlines for USA

From BBC News

Octuplets' mum signs rich TV deal

26 July 2009 4:45AM

The Californian mother of octuplets agrees a $250,000 (£152,000) deal for her infant children to star in a reality TV show.

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Brazil and Paraguay in power deal

25 July 2009 9:45PM

Brazil will triple payments to Paraguay for energy from a border hydro-electric dam, ending a long-running dispute.

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Two toddlers shoot siblings in US

25 July 2009 9:52AM

Two young children have been shot by their toddler siblings in the space of 24 hours in the United States, police say.

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