New Yahoo Travel Feeds Summer Travel Fever
There’s nothing like a bright sunny Monday in May to get cubicle jockeys dreaming of a summer vacation. Yahoo has has channeled that impetus to redesign its Yahoo Travel portal adding some nice new features of those looking to plan a getaway.
The new Yahoo Travel combines Yahoo FareChase, a low-priced air fares search, with Yahoo Trip Planner, a social network for travelers which helps plan trips and create maps as well as offering options for online journals and photos.
Most of the new features revolve around user input, such as the new personalized recommendations which are drawn from search history and browsing activity.
Yahoo has also added Yahoo Maps integration which features even more recommendations based on both professional and user reviews of local sights, dining and more.
The most immediately obvious new features is a “Top Picks” selection in the middle of the homepage which highlights popular destinations in your area. Each of the the suggested destinations gets an enticing photo and moving your cursor over the photo will reveal tabs that offer quick links to deals, tips, travel guides and current weather information all without leaving the page you’re on.
Other nice Yahoo service integration for the travel portal include images from Flickr and Q & A data from Yahoo Answers which pulls in common questions related to the destination you’re exploring.
I’ll confess I never used the old version of Yahoo travel, so I’m not really in a position to compare the two, but the new Yahoo Travel is a fantastic resource for anyone looking for a one-stop-shop travel information site.
My only criticism would be that there’s so much information at your fingertips that it can be a little bit overwhelming. Fortunately, because the site tracks your browsing history, it’s pretty easy to get lost in a destination and still be able to pull back and start over without fear of losing the information you’ve found useful.
The new Yahoo Travel homepage
Yahoo Travel destination guide
A Slideshow of Flickr photos (from a link on the destination guide)
