Good afternoon, Janice, and a hearty welcome to Tripatini! It's so great to have you with us -- and we think you'll find our site productive as well as interesting and enjoyable.

To get the most out of us, you may want to take a few minutes to join several of our many groups which you might find of particular interest, such as Media Only, California, Wine Tourism, Eating/Drinking the World, The Caribbean, our Spanish and Japanese language/culture clubs, and plenty of others covering many topics and most destinations throughout the world.

FYI, on your profile you'll see a green bar marked "Text Box," which you can turn into a box containing not just text but also photos and even videos about yourself, your interests, and your writing/outlets.

Finally, if you would, please be so kind as to spread the word among your travel-interested friends, family, associates, and readers. It's fast and easy to use our "INVITE" function above left on the navigation bar to enter e-mails (even your whole list at once!). If you're able to cover us in any of your outlets, that would of course be greatly appreciated, and we also invite you to consider also occasionally blogging for us (guidelines/rates available upon request).

Many thanks for joining us, Janice; we wish you an outstanding rest of 2009 and look forward to hearing more from you...!