I’m so behind on posts – I haven’t even finished telling you about my exciting adventures in Las Vegas – but I wanted to quickly share a tip for finding places to hit while traveling. Of course there are review sites like Yelp, plenty of periodicals, and even just a virtual walk down the street with Google Maps’ street view. But sometimes I want more personal advice.

I follow a lot of blogs on Google Reader and have many well-traveled friends who post photos on Flickr. When I’m getting ready to travel, I like to  search those two sites to see whether my friends (real or virtual) have visited my destination. Here’s how I do it:

Flickr:
If you don’t use Flickr, you can simply head over to flickr.com and search for your destination (maybe add a keyword – like ‘food’ or ‘park’). But if you do use Flickr, and want to search your contacts’ photos, click ‘More Search Types’ after you type into the search box on the top right and choose ‘Your Contact’s Photos.’

Google Reader:
If you’re not familiar with Google Reader, it’s a RSS reader – a tool that allows you to follow blogs (the benefit: no need to visit each blog to look for updates). Simply search at the top and your  results will show you whether that search term was used in any of the blogs you follow. Sometimes, it’ll be a surprise to see which of your friends have visited your destination.

What about you?
How do you research the places you’re going to visit?

Last weekend we attended the “Taste of Germany” food tasting / art show at the German American Cultural Society of Rhode Island.  The GACS, which is in a residential neighborhood in Pawtucket, has a picturesque mirrored ballroom perfect for special events.  (I’ll let you in on a secret – their cozy basement bar, the Ratskeller, is open on Friday nights from 7pm and is a great place for shockingly affordable German food and draft beers. The selection varies, but some of the beers I’ve had on draft include Kulmbacher Pils, Franziskaner Hefe-weisse, Spaten Lager, Aventinus Dunkel, to name a few.)

This was the first time they’ve held a tasting, and it was a huge hit, so hopefully it’ll happen again next year. I really appreciated the choice of uncommon and interesting foods.  The dishes represented 16 different regions of Germany.

I brought my camera and snapped photos of my favorites:

Eier in grüne soße (eggs in green sauce) from Hesse. The green sauce is bursting with fresh herbs.

Harzer Kase mit Musik – this marinated cheese is an acquired taste (one that I’ve acquired and my husband hasn’t). It’s really strong and pungent. Some people say the “music” that accompany the cheese comes a bit later, if you know what I mean (I hope you didn’t think my blog was too classy for fart jokes!)

Bread soup – doesn’t sound like anything special, but it was absolutely delicious!

Some of the other dishes included three other soups (potato/shrimp, white bean, green bean), potato salad, pretzels with obatzda (a cheese spread- also a favorite of mine), Spreewald style sweet pickles, herring dip, quark spread with pumpernickel, plum cake (my contribution), and stollen.  A large beer and wine selection accompanied all of this food – we had a couple of German beers on draft and toasted with a glass of Heinz Eifel Eiswein.

You can view the rest of my photos from the tasting on Flickr.

When we were in Tucson I dragged (I am not exaggerating) my husband and parents to Kon Tiki, an untouched 1963 tiki bar. We weren’t even in the mood for a drink, and man were those drinks strong! But I wanted to bask in the Polynesian surroundings and leave with a tiki mug. This one was especially cute.

Photo by Jeremy May

Its current content, also a perfect Arizona souvenir, is equally likely to put some hair – ahem, spines – on your chest.