Keep on Truckin'

For those of you unfamiliar with this great American, Phil is the rodent responsible for our weather. He creeps out of his home on "Ground Hog Day," either seeing or not seeing his shadow, which results in either more winter or an early spring.

I forget which it is - whether seeing his shadow causes spring or not seeing it causes more winter. But, whenever I really want to know, I can cruise on over to http://www.state.pa.us and relive last "Ground Hog Day." In addition to the latest rodent report, I can also gather a lot of information on the Gettysburg Address once I get to Pennsylvania's web page.

If you check it out, you'll enter Pennsylvania's travel and tourism site through the state's home page. A link to http://www.experiencepa.com will direct you to attraction information. The state chooses to link you to Travelocity for lodging, restaurant, and getting-there goodies. Overall, the site navigation and information scatter is sufficient to discourage me from using the web page for any serious trip planning.

A quick hop to the coast gives us virtual access to the one hundred miles of beaches available in the Ocean State. Http://www.visitrhodeisland.com convinced me that the smallest of the contiguous 48 has a lot to offer.

First, I must admit I am partial to periwinkle and chartreuse as a color combination. The web page opens with a lovely shade of periwinkle accented in bright chartreuse. If that isn't a big turn-on for you, perhaps you'll appreciate some of the other site features. After mentioning the beaches, the nice folks at the Rhode Island web page provide a link to winter activities in their state. While I didn't find anything so earth-shattering that I'd hop in the car and drive a day to get to Rhode Island, there is certainly enough substance to encourage close neighbors to drop in on the fun.

The web page invites you to call an 800 number or e-mail them for additional information. The web page also flashes interesting facts at you as you virtually pass through. For example, Rhode Island hosted the first circus in the USA, in Newport in 1774, and is the home of the oldest synagogue still in use in the USA.

Also an A plus goes to the lodging search engine - you can locate accommodations by a range of preferences including the type of beach you prefer, smoking or non-smoking, whether there is wheelchair accessibility and whether your doggie is allowed to vacation with you.

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