A friend pointed me in the direction of an interesting new site social recommendations travel site – Rolling Globe. It’s an interesting site, Trav Buddy, but with more of a focus on reviews and recommendations and less on social networking for globetrotters. If you need a little incentive to check it out, then it’s worth knowing that they are running a contest for a free trip to Munich for Oktoberfest if you sign up right now.

What I found most interesting about the site was the introduction post, essentially introducing the site as a place to recount the places you went as an American student studying abroad:

Sure, we opened a book or two (don’t get us wrong, we’re all for education), but what we really studied was the pulse and culture of the city in which we lived. We are firm believers that every city has the potential to be the best in the world. What determines that for each of us are the experiences and people we come across during the time we spend there.

So that’s where you come in. We’ve taken it upon ourselves to compile an insider’s guide to the world’s top destinations. Now we’ve got a good start, but we can’t do it alone… We need your advice, your memories, your good times and your bad… and a couple of uploaded photos wouldn’t hurt either… so that we really can create the ultimate travel guide from the world’s most reliable source: fellow travelers.

Other than the objection that a study abroad student’s view is hardly “insider”, I wish I could take more issue with this introduction. But the fact of the matter is that study abroad was the best travelling I’ve done in my life. If I have any advice to give on travel, the bulk of it certainly comes from the time while I was studying abroad. So I suppose I’ll take a look at what other people longing to re-live their story abroad glory have to say about places, and follow their advice as to what I should be doing. I hope they find mine useful as well.

TravBuddy is a fantastic social networking site that I am fairly embarrassed that I didn’t join until just this week. Generally I’m hesitant to jump into a new social network as I still have MySpace, Friendster, Orkut, Bebo, etc etc profiles that I never log into. However, after a little poking around it was clear that TravBuddy offers a number of services you just don’t find elsewhere.

Here’s the rundown on highlights I’ve encountered so far:

Pairing with other travelers. After my cheap ski trip to France this winter, I think I’m going to swing north and check out Switzerland for a week or so. I plugged that in as my travel plans and suddenly I have a link to other folks that are looking to go there at the same time. Couldn’t be easier.

Great use of Google Maps. I can’t deny that I love Google Maps, and TravBuddy puts them to better use than I can. When you create a profile, you also create a map of where you’ve been and where you want to go. Their interface for browsing destinations is essentially a large Google Map with markers of blog posts and pictures that users have submitted. This could keep me browsing for hours.

Energetic community. As soon as I joined, a slew of people started commenting on my profile welcoming me to the network. Before I had a single friend (er, wait, I still don’t have any), I had 8 comments welcoming me and 10 people had “smiled” at me. That warm welcome has made me that much more interested in the site, and trying to meet up with some of these folks for travels.

Other than the lack of privacy, I’m not sure I’ve found a low point that really bugs me. It’s a good site, and I’ll let you know how things go with finding a buddy for travelling in Switzerland using the site.

If you’re not a member yet, join on up. And if you are a member, go ahead and ad me as a friend.