The future of online travel booking?

There's a 95 percent chance Senior Editor Christine Sarkis is thinking about travel right now. Follow her on Instagram @postcartography and Twitter @ChristineSarkis.

Christine Sarkis is an SATW-award-winning journalist and executive editor at SmarterTravel. Her stories have also appeared on USA Today, Conde Nast Traveler, Huffington Post, and Business Insider. Her advice has been featured in dozens of print and online publications including The New York Times, Conde Nast Traveler, and People magazine. She has also shared travel tips on television and radio shows including Good Morning America, Marketplace, and Here & Now. Her work has been published in the anthologies Spain from a Backpack and The Best Women's Travel Writing 2008. She is currently working on a travel memoir.

The Handy Item I Always Pack: The Trtl Pillow. It's easy to pack and comfortable, and makes it so I can actually sleep on flights.

Ultimate Bucket List Experience: Seeing the Aurora Borealis from the comfort of somewhere warm, like a glass igloo or hot spring.

Travel Motto: Curiosity is an amazing compass.

Aisle, Window, or Middle Seat: Aisle all the way.

Email Christine Sarkis at editor@smartertravel.com.

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USA Today just published an overview of some young travel planning and booking sites that have really come into their own this year. It’s a great reference if you’re among the travelers who tend to plan and book online but don’t have time to keep up on the good, the bad, and the ugly of new travel sites.

On the list, you’ll find a number of sites which deliver a combination of traveler reviews and booking options (Boo, VibeAgent), as well as sites that help you organize all the bits and pieces of your trip into a single, easy-to-reference document (Yapta, TripIt).

During 2007, SmarterTravel.com editors reviewed many of the sites on the list, but the USA Today article is handy as a simplified version of the information in one place.

If you do want more than a sentence or two about each website, though, check our reviews of a number of the sites included in USA Today’s list, plus others.

Plus,

Ed Perkins on cFares and Vayama
Ed Perkins on Farecast

(Editor’s Note: SmarterTravel.com is published by Smarter Travel Media LLC, a member of the TripAdvisor Media Network.)

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