Reviews

If you are heading to California any time soon, be sure to check out the California Winehiker’s Blog – It’s a Wine Blog. Here you are going to find a blog that blends both the love for outdoors and the love for wine culture in one handy spot. The goal at Winehikers is to provide their guests, who they esteem as treasured, with wine country experiences resulting in sensory satisfaction, rekindled vigor, and indelible memories. This is a blog about wine and hiking, the winehiking blog. The blog isn’t about just that however, you will find a wealth of information on tours, California wine country, and information on the Top 20 Wines. Take a sip of any of their recent bloggeries to get the true taste of the blog: Saturday Sippin’, For all you Vayniacs who don’t stay up late, Freewheelin Friday Links, Cabernet in July, Thirsty Thursday Links, Opening new doors in Winemaking, Gary Vaynerchuk Going Big-Time Tomorrow Night, Cougar, and Just one Week Left to Win that Bottle of Dominus.

The navigation system on this blog is very easy. Posts are left marginalized with black text on white background, and there is a very appealing ‘vineyard feel’ green border around the blog with an attractive vineyard header. There is a right sided navigation bar that contains Winehiking information; a Case of Wine Contest; Subscription information; Testimonials for the site; Upcoming Tours information; Archives menu; as well as other food, wine, and hiking blogs. You will also find here the Categories menu that contains categories incuding Grape squeezins, Tasting notes, Tasting venues, Technical Stuff, Wine Reviews, and Winehikers trails. If you are a wine lover, or just a hiking lover, there is a wealth of information for you right on this site. And if nothing else, the active readership alone makes this blog a very credible read for its niche.

This blog gets a 3.4/5 from me. I would like to see a few things added. I think relevant pictures would give this blog a little more punch, and a recent posts menu would also add ease of navigation to the blog’s organization. I find there is a little too much ‘blogvertising’ in each post. Each post contains appeals for emailing, digging, commenting, voting for, subscribe to, all for this particular blog. I see the point and hope this method is working for the blogger, but as a reader I find this content in every single post extremely distracting and it takes away from the blog content. I find the content itself to be excellently written and with the personal voice that readers of blogs tend to enjoy. These suggestions are offered simply to improve what is already a very good blog. Overall I think the uniqueness of the blog, and its daily content are going to serve the ultimate purpose for the blog which is a strong following and inevitable success.

-Chrissie

Have you ever been to Italy? Or are you one of those that has always wanted to but never really got the opportunity? If you take a minute to visit Italian Insight. You will come as close as you can to catching a fresh breath of Italian air without actually being there. David is your blogger and tour guide to all that is Italian on this website. He has recently moved back to the United States after having spent 20 years in Italy. He has worked and lived extensively all over Italy and his blog is designed to help you get the most out of any Italian experience you may have. This includes various aspects of vacationing and living in Italy from how to not be seen as a typical tourist to how to deal with security personnel. You can discover from David’s experiences all that Italy has to offer from food, wine, fashion, hotels, art, culture, and what he describes as the greatest people in the world. Have a look at some of his most recent bloggeries to see what I am talking about: Travel Tips – Medical Care while on Vacation in Italy, The Nights of San Lorenzo – Wine, Food, and Fireworks in the Squares of Italy, Barolo Ravera 2003 DOCG Elvio Cogno, Armani Prive – Women’s Fashion Fall Winter 2007 2008, Risotto with the flavor of Springtime – Risotto Primavera, Italian Garden Gnome Goes Missing – Save the Gnomes, and Fantini Club – Spa and Vacation Destinations to the Adriatic Riviera.

Navigation on this site is very straightforward and easily laid out. The posts are centralized with black posts on white background and there are both left and right navigation bars. In the left navigation bar you can find an archive pull-down menu where posts are sorted monthly, advertising, an Expats Italy Menu, and the Categories Menu. In the Categories Menu you will see how easily Italian information is sorted by Shopping, Fashion, Restaurants, Hotels, Recipes, Wine, and so much more. The right navigation system will give you the About Me page; advertising; Italian destinations, restaurants, cheese, and wine links; Blog Friends, book recommendations, and photo blog recommendations. Each posts is accompanied by relevant pictures that give a true feel for the Italian experience, and the blog is very appealing to read and look through.

This blog will get a 4.9/5 from me. I have no suggestions for this blogger, he seems to be doing an excellent job. The advertising is incorporated beautifully without being distracting. He also offers daily content that is excellently written and flows perfectly with his very easy navigation system. The blog is unique and appealing to the eye with all that it has to offer. I think this blog has excellent merits for both quality and quantity of his bloggeries, and would guess this blog will have continued success. If you are thinking about visiting Italy, or just want to know more about it, this blog comes highly recommended and is definitely one you want to bookmark.
-Chrissie

If you are the type that likes a spooky story or wants your hair to stand on end, you may want to have a look at World Horror Stories. The author here asks when you log in if you are ready for the scariest stories, photos, and videos ever, and if you want to continue through the blog, prepare yourself. This blog is a collection of ghost stories, and gruesome things happening in the world, and is definitely not for the young OR the faint of heart. If you want to see what I am talking about, check out some of the most recent Bloggeries: Mermaid II, Flying Creature, Karaoke Room, Unknown Figure Behind a Girl, White Ghost Figure in the House, Parking Lot, Tour Turns to Horror, Beach, and Audition. Each Bloggerie is a recollection of a story or an event that will make your hair stand on end. Each post is accompanied by either a relevant picture or a video, and while I was in the middle of a review, one of the spooky ghost videos actually shut my computer down. So, I don’t know if someone was mad at me, or if my machine is just cranky today, however….

Navigation on this site is a little busy, but if you enjoy the content you will barely notice the navigation. Posts are centralized with both a left and right navigation system. The posts are centered on a burgundy background with yellow text and the navigation bars are in spooky black. The left navigation bar contains a PayPal button, ads, a ghostly poll, and results from recent blog polls. Each post contains relevant pictures and videos as well as a dig bookmark along with a reader voting system for each post. I like how this is done as it really shows the readers and the author as well, who is liking what. In the right navigation bar you can submit your own ghost story, read any of the Most Popular Posts, or visit any of the Categories. Categories include Announcements, Asian, Type of Spirit, Unexplained, and Western. You will also find a slew of blog links and widgets for the blog.

I am giving this one a 3/5 for a few reasons. The blog scores well on content and uniqueness, but lacks some things in other categories. The appearance mark would be improved if some AdSense was removed or at least tamed. The blog is very busy with advertising and it really distracts from the content. I liked how the AdSense was formatted to blend with the blog, but there is just too much advertising. For navigation, if some advertising was removed there would be room for an archive menu as well as a recent posts menu, both of which are lacking from the blog and really help readers with navigation. Activity score was also a little bit low, with posts coming in about once a week. Again, this blog is a very unique concept and it would do well with some appearance changes and more frequent bloggeries. The blog also clearly has a good following, which again could be even better with some of these changes. I enjoyed reading this topic and viewing the videos, and could definitely be persuaded to return with just a few tweaks here and there. I think like-minded others who enjoy a good ghost story would agree.
-Chrissie