With body scanners certain to become standard security fare in airports following last week’s failed bomb plot, the controversy over their use is heating up, again: are they a necessary step to protect passengers or an intrusive tool stripping passengers’ privacy?

Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport, one of the places where the most recent terror suspect cleared security, will have scanners in place in about three weeks, and I, for one, think it’s a good plan. Scanners certainly seem less intrusive than body searches—which is what Amsterdam passengers who skip the scanner will endure—and only scans that are flagged by a computer will advance to human eyes.

I don't play chess. You could call me uncultured, but I probably wouldn't hear you. I'd be too busy stabbing at a flashing, beeping, handheld touch-screen trying to save the president from exploding skeletons. And let's be honest--most of your fellow airline passengers will be doing the same this season.

But what if you don't have the latest Megafastatron3000 gaming system in hand when you step into the airport? Are you doomed to manipulate magnetic rooks across a tiny chess board? Are you stuck shoving backgammon stones down endless rows of triangles? Nope! Because I'm about to lay down the travel game suggestions, 2009-style.

This weekend, along with a sizable portion of the rest of the country, I saw the movie Avatar. Through my 3-D glasses, I entered into the bioluminescent forestlands of a fictional distant moon named Pandora, where flowers bloomed rampantly, trees stretched into the skies, and rivers glowed. Although the plot was a little trite and silly, the Pandora landscape was a true escape. Much like an avatar, while my body sat in a darkened theater surrounded by hundreds of others in our dorky glasses, the rest of me entered into this forest world for 2 ½ hours. On a year when I’d opted not to travel for the holidays, this movie was my ticket to a realm beyond San Francisco, somewhere exotic and indelible—and not once did I have to step on a plane.

If you read this blog, you're probably a lot like us, constantly planning your next trip, collecting passport stamps like medals of honor, and always looking for that next peak to climb. The older I get the more keenly I feel that if I love travel this much, I also have a responsibility to preserve beloved destinations for my children and my children's children.

Responsible or green travel is at heart a conservation movement, a desire to keep pristine places around the world as they are--or even restore them to how they were. Here are 10 green travel resolutions you can make for Mother Earth. I've listed them from simplest to most ambitious so you can choose where you'd like to start. If we all make a pact to do just one of these resolutions, I think you'd be surprised at the huge impact it would have over time.

I find choosing a destination for a ski trip daunting, so I can only imagine how big a decision it must be for someone who can actually ski—wherever I end up, I spend a disturbing amount of time sprawled in the snow anyway. (Destination requirement #1: soft powder.) But with a friend living in Park City, Utah, this year, my destination was sealed—and what a magical one it is.

The town touts itself as the country's most convenient ski base, boasting three ski resorts within 35 minutes of Salt Lake City International Airport. And it’s true: not only is it easy to fly in and ski the same day—for free!—but there are frequent free buses running between resorts, and there’s even a lift going directly from Main St. up the slopes of Park City Mountain Resort.

Recently, I watched an episode of MTV’s Jersey Shore. Have you seen it? In the show, a group of housemates spent their days drinking, clubbing, partying, arguing, hooking up, and then getting up the next morning to do it all over again. Permanent residents of the region say that the show is giving them a bad name, that there’s much more to the Jersey Shore than what you see in a snippet of summer when the town’s population practically quadruples.

I’ve never been to the Jersey Shore, but I grew up each summer going to the Delaware shore, which isn’t all that far away. The beach I went to was one of those seasonal towns where summer swelled the local population to unprecedented numbers. And I could see how permanent residents might resent that. Suddenly, their highways were crowded, their stores and restaurants jam packed, and their beaches wall to wall with colorful umbrellas and towels, boom-boxes and beer bottles.

Flying for the holidays? History shows us that the combination of winter weather and holiday crowds can result in delays at the nation's airports. A look at Flight Explorer and Sabre Airport Data Intelligence indicates an increased likelihood of delays on peak travel days at airports with the most passengers departing. Throw a wintery storm into the mix, as The Weather Channel predicts this week, and delays could domino throughout the country. My advice? Have a heart-to-heart with Mother Nature, and ask her to hold-off on the snow dump. If that doesn't work, check your flight status, pack your patience (and a good book) and research things to do at your airport. The chart below illustrates traffic volumes and delays at some of the country's busiest airports.

Trains are iconic. They punctuate our history and our pulp novels, and our films are rife with them--from The Great Train Robbery's gold-bearing locomotive to the now-infamous Hogwarts Express train of Harry Potter fame. Ah, but don’t start mourning the lost days of train travel just yet! While you may have trouble finding platform 9 ¾, there are plenty of trains still churning through America's vast and gorgeous countryside, just waiting for a rider.

Perhaps the most famous of U.S. sightseeing train routes is the one taken by the Grand Canyon Railroad. Chugging recycled vegetable oil instead of coal (how green!), this rail-riding beast makes regular trips from Williams, AZ to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon National Park.

Ten years ago at this time we were worried about Y2K, listening to Christina Aguilera singing “Genie in a Bottle” on our disc-mans, and strolling through airport security with our shoes on and liquids in tow. Much has changed in the past decade, and, as we approach 2010, we face an entirely different travel landscape than we could have imagined at the tail end of 1999.

It never would have occurred to me, for example, that one day, airlines would stop serving peanuts, let alone meals. Peanuts and flights went hand in hand like putting your seat upright and buckling your seatbelt before the plane took off. And airline meals were standard on long flights—and often so bad they became the butt of many jokes. Looking forward to just how bad it would be was part of the fun of the flight experience.

Hands up if you're going to be spending a lot on time on planes--or in airports--over the next month or so. Hmm, not just me then? That's a relief. The great news is Virgin America has partnered with Google to offer free in-flight wifi on all planes through January 15, 2010. Why is this a deal? Well, hooking up to its GoGo Inflight internet system will usually cost you $12.95 for flights of over three hours, $9.95 for flights between 90 minutes and three hours, and $5.95 for flights of less than 90 minutes.

If you're not flying Virgin America, though, fear not: you can still plug in for free at more than 50 airports---thanks again to the generosity of Google. You'll find a full list of participating airports right here: they run the gamut from heavy lifters like Washington Dulles (IAD) and Miami (MIA) to smaller stops like Asheville (AVL) and Kalamazoo (AZO).

Being the planner that I am, my Christmas travels were booked months ago, but it's no surprise that procrastinators are still perusing online sites waiting for a better deal to pop up. Don't hold your breath, people. It's not going to happen.

Over the past few months, the last minute travel landscape has changed from a procrastinator's paradise to their very worst nightmare. (Well, at least a very unpleasant dream!) We see prices increasing as we get closer to the Christmas and New Year's holidays, making it harder for travelers to find a last minute deal.

I think it’s safe to say that the holiday season is here. Mall perfume counters are battling with the crisp scent of pine trimmings, and hundreds of homes showcase tinsel-trimmed trees. But the real heavyweights--the luchadores of winter decoration--are the hotels.

And around the holidays, they do decoration in a massive way.

Take the Westin St. Francis, for instance. The second you walk in, you're faced with an unbelievably tall confectionary castle--purportedly one of the largest in the country--built specifically for the holiday season. Another San Francisco giant, The Fairmont, boasts a similar baked behemoth--a two-story gingerbread house whose icing alone weighs 550 pounds. That makes even fruitcake sound light.

Even if budgets are a little snug this year, travel hopes remain high. Here's a list of affordable travel gifts for the globetrotter on your list. The best part? All of the items are $60 or less (and in many cases, much, much less). Happy holiday shopping!

For the Green Globetrotter

VeloPouch $45

(Source)

Ah, December. The holidays are upon us, and there’s a cheer in the air as we all prepare for some time off with family and friends. For British Airways crew members, though, it won’t be vacation days they’re taking: it will be a Merry Strike-mas, travelers!

British Airways cabin crews voted to strike from December 22 to January 2, introducing the possibility that one million passengers will be gifted canceled flights by New Year’s.

If you're staying stateside, you may want to skip going home for the holidays and opt for a hotel instead. A funny thing is happening in the hotel industry -- rates are falling fast, despite the fact that the week between Christmas and New Year's is typically one of the year's busiest.

With travelers clinging tightly to their wallets, you can bet more people are choosing to bunk with friends and family this December. For those willing to dish out the dollars, hotel rates have fallen from an average $180 per night to $130 per night. Even if you do head to grandma's house for Christmas goose, do yourself (and your family) a favor and stay in a nearby hotel.  You know what they say about fish and houseguests, right? Three days, max.

There's nothing quite like taking a few months to wander around Europe "finding" yourself---why, it's practically a rite of passage for college kids. So maybe that's why A&O Hostels---a chain of youth hostels with locations in Berlin, Prague, and other top European destinations---is offering free stays to anyone whose parents gave them one of the top baby names of 1989.

Oh yes, it's true. A&0 has chosen eight of the most popular names from 1989---four for boys, four for girls---and is offering free stays to kids with those names during January 2010. Sure, Leipzig in the winter certainly isn't Paris in the springtime, but when you're 21 and backpacking around Europe on pennies a day, free is a pretty good price for a night's accommodation.

What are some of the most expensive flight itineraries out there right now on planet Earth? As an experiment, I plugged in San Francisco as my departure city and Dubai as my destination (I picked Dubai at random), and did a search for first-class flight tickets over the Christmas holiday. Most flights I pulled up were in the $6,000 range, although one flight actually went for a whopping $19,517! At least it was direct!

Richard Branson is betting you’d pay $200,000 for a direct trip to outer space (which is quite a stretch from Dubai), and so far, he’s found 300 takers, even though the flights won’t even begin until 2011 at the very earliest, will only last for 2 ½ hours each (with less than five minutes of zero gravity), and will require a few days of training beforehand.

If chunky ZAGAT guides, pithy gourmet columns, and online restaurant reviews aren't satisfying your cravings, you might want to follow blogger Layne Mosler's example. She conducts her culinary pilgrimages by cab.

Sure, a lot of us have hailed a ride to our favorite restaurant, but Mosler actually takes her cues from the cabbies themselves. Every week, she gets into a random taxi and asks the driver to take her to his or her favorite eatery--and every week, she ends up somewhere unexpected (and often unexpectedly delicious). You can follow her adventures on her blog, the Taxi Gourmet, where she writes about experiences in Buenos Aires and New York.

From the First Lady recycling old tree ornaments to handmade presents, many people are trying to celebrate the holidays in a more eco-friendly way this year. And if you're anything like me, your holiday plans probably involve traveling over the river and through the woods to Grandmother's house. How can you green your holiday travel?

Why not let Travelocity's Roaming Gnome help? As a gift to new Facebook Fans, Travelocity is helping offset the carbon emissions holiday trips for free. Green travelers even get an animated video for their Facebook walls, showing the Roaming Gnome in a growing forest. To offset your trip for free, just visit the new Green Travel tab on Travelocity’s Facebook page.

Turkey is pretty much a given for Thanksgiving and Christmas is usually a ham, but have you ever wondered what they eat in the rest of the world during this time of the year? Come, take a trip with us. And don't forget to pack your eatin' pants.

Pity poor Pittsburgh: I mocked the city right here on this blog in 2007; we called it a “destination you never wanted to visit” in 2008. Well, I just returned from a stay in Steeler Country, and I’m eating my words along with my Primanti Brothers sandwich. My new line? Pittsburgh is indeed a town worthy of a weekend getaway.

This Thanksgiving, after two full days of tweeting from the Denver airport, I went to visit my family in Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C. It’s an area filled with tourist attractions, from the many esteemed Smithsonian museums and national memorials to the performing arts at the Kennedy Center and live music in clubs all over the city. But despite all this, the thing I almost always do when I’m there is go to the decidedly unflashy C&O Canal towpath and take a walk, no matter what the season.