Travel insights and tips on some of the top attractions and best cities in the world

Whether you’re a loyal iPhone user or you love your Android device, smartphone apps have changed the way we travel. You no longer need to carry around a map, guidebook, bus schedule, and directions to the restaurant you want to try for lunch. You can find all of that, and more, on your phone.

Where can you see the colors of spring all year long, or the flame-like blaze of an autumn maple leaf even in the dead of winter? At the Harvard Museum of Natural History, you can witness the forever-blooming botanicals that make up the famous Ware Collection of Blaschka Glass Models of Plants, aka The Glass Flowers.

Bill Speidel's Underground Tour
 of Seattle isn’t very long and it doesn’t take an inordinate amount of time — but it certainly is a departure from most city tours. Narrated like machine-gun fire, the tour guide works to cram as much information as he or she can muster into the 90-minute, three-block walk under Seattle’s historic Pioneer Square.

From horse-and-buggies to railroads, and from railroads to station wagons the way we travel has really changed. What we do on our vacations has changed as well, and more and more people are having a hard time leaving work at home when they go!

Queuing up outside the 9/11 Memorial in New York with other members of the press, I felt privileged to have the opportunity to preview the memorial hours before it opened to the public. The previous day, in a private gathering, the families of those lost on 9/11 were the first to experience the memorial, which took 10 years to discuss, plan, draw and build.

A trip to New York City isn't complete unless you take the time to visit the Empire State Building. Opened in 1931, the Empire State Building is the world's most famous office building, a historical landmark, and was named "America's Favorite Architecture" in a poll conducted by the American Institute of Architects. It's no surprise that visiting this amazing building is one of the top places to visit in New York.