Navigating along the Great River Road

A paper map used to be the way travelers found their way on road trips, and we have a whole stack of AAA maps in our car to help us make our way down the Mississippi River. But we also have a AAA Magellan RoadMate 1440 GPS and while I have always been a paper kind of gal, I'm definitely warming up to the more high-tech system. It especially comes in handy when I think we should turn right and my husband thinks we should turn left.

The first time we turned it on, my kids were quite impressed. "It talks Mommy!"

The kids decided to name it "Cutie," which might seem odd but you have to understand that these days my kids name everything from caterpillars to stuffed animals Cutie.

While there's not actually much that's cute about the Magellan unit, there's certainly a lot that's helpful. Since the Magellan talks, telling you when to exit and make a turn, you can keep your eyes on the road. Plus, it's stocked with information from AAA's TourBook, including diamond-rated restaurants, hotels, and roadside assistance for AAA members that shows your current location. Nearly all in-car GPS units come with a large database of "points of interest" but these rarely include more than an address and phone number. Magellan's AAA TourBook takes points of interest to the next level: Restaurant listings include a one-paragraph restaurant review, hours, meal price range, parking, and more.

To make our device even handier, we downloaded (it's free and works on most GPS units including Garmin and Tom Tom) the locations for every Best Western hotel in North America. Now the crown logo shows up everywhere a Best Western is located—and we can easily find where we're going to bed down each night.

Price: The listed price for the Magellan GPS is $199 and AAA members get 15 percent off. Amazon also sells the unit and sometimes at an even lower price.