Bear Hug Neck Cuddler (From Way 2 Go, $10 suggested retail)
Even the most energetic little travelers slow down for a nap now and then, or must sit still for long periods while getting where they’re going. Those moments are ones most happily shared with a cuddly road buddy, such as Bear Hug (pictured) or Puppy Luv. The plush, stuffed animals are actually neck rests, designed for children’s smaller proportions. You should be able to find Bear Hug and Puppy Luv at retailers such as Toys R Us and Babies R Us. (800-929-0323)
Travels with Santa (Rand McNally, $2.95)
This 16-page sticker book could keep the 3- to 7-year-old crowd busy just long enough to drive over the river and through the woods, etc., etc. Two pages are devoted to world geography as young readers are instructed to decide Santa’s route, continent by continent. At 3 3/4 by 5 1/2 inches — about the size of a postcard — it can stuff into a stocking.
GEAR
Briefpack (From Tumi, $275-$550)
Think of Briefpack as the suitcase that came to the office, dressed for casual Friday. It’s a piece of executive luggage that functions as both briefcase and backpack — an exquisitely tailored backpack. Briefpack comes in rugged, “Tru-Ballistic” nylon or full-grain Napa leather and is available in five styles. All styles come with sturdy, comfortable backpack straps and a padded, luggage-style handle. All have a large, zippered main compartment and another zippered compartment that opens to reveal an accordion file and pen holders. In four of the models, the large main compartment is fitted with a shock-absorbing suspension system called “Safeport,” which protects laptop computers from the vicissitudes of getting from here to there, with at least enough room left over for your swimsuit and a T-shirt. Some models have additional zippered side pouches. Marshall Field’s, Kaehler Luggage, Deutsch Luggage and Emporium all carry the Tumi brand.
The Strap (From Signature Plus, $12.95 each)
They say that accessories “make” the outfit. If that’s true, then here’s a travel fashion that has it made — or will as soon as you place your order. The strap is a luggage accessory — an elasticized belt 1 1/4 inches wide and an adjustable 66 inches long. Each belt fastens with what the Flushing, N.Y.-based company describes as a “double-twist action lock and a uniquely designed key.” Each piece is customized with your name woven in white against the strap’s blue background, and the whole piece is trimmed in red. (888-30-STRAP)
GIFT BOOKS
“New York City Traditions” (Watson-Guptill Publications, $24.95)
At the risk of confusing Bill Clinton, we’d like to say that New York City is not just what is, but it is also and at the same time what has been: that row of steel workers perched along an I-beam 70 stories up, feet dangling from the RCA building they were constructing in 1932; the perky-yet-romantic ball gown designed by Irene in 1948; Cotton Club playbills; Brooklyn Dodgers victory celebrations; Andy Warhol; food stalls strung with sausages; skinny-legged rock singers and vest-suited show-tune composers; oh-so-young Harlem Globetrotters; King Kong battling the biplanes; and an endless advance of Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade floats. It is everything that is there right this minute, plus everything we’ve ever remembered about it, even if we’ve never so much as changed planes at JFK. This hard-bound book, which fastens closed with a band of elastic, captures the New York of the psyche, and serves it whole upon 192 appropriately thick-skinned pages.
“Legends of the Plumed Serpent: Biography of a Mexican God” (Public Affairs, $35)
His rags-to-riches story is perhaps more along the lines of Evita Peron than Horatio Alger. Quetzalcoatl, the Plumed Serpent, began his career as a pre-Columbian agricultural deity. But he would rise in many forms to inspire generations of Toltecs, Aztecs, Olmecs and Maya. His image would dominate pyramids and altars, lapse into obscurity, and finally live again in the murals of Diego Rivera. His Mexico, the ancient and mystical one of Chichen Itza and Teotihuacan and Monte Alban, is the land many travelers are lured to visit. This 256-page, 8 1/4-by-10 1/4 hard-cover is a good place to begin the journey. Out in November.
VIDEOS
Touring Civil War Battlefields (Questar, $19.95)
Grassy meadows edged in forests. Split-rail fences zigzagging from here to there. Statues of heroes, and then, row upon row of their headstones. That’s about all that battlefields have to offer in the way of scenery. Americans don’t come for the view, though, but the history that played out on these now-silent fields. This video focuses on Manassas/Bull Run, Antietam, Fredericksburg, Gettysburg and Appomattox Courthouse — those Civil War sites that are an easy day trip from Washington, D.C. Much of the footage is taken up with battle scenarios demonstrated by troops of re-enactors, who bear the comfortable advantages of clean water, wholesome food and impotent weapons that their real-life forebears didn’t have. Those scenes set up ones that follow, effectively showing battlegrounds as they appear today. (800-544-8422)
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Toni Stroud’s e-mail address is tstroud@tribune.com.
