by Brook Wilkinson

It's gratifying to see how much attention Conde Nast Traveler's 20th anniversary issue has been getting after all the thought, effort, and late nights we poured into it. It's a weighty issue (literally, at 400 pages) that we started planning even before the September '06 issue hit the newsstands. Way back then, I heard my colleagues whispering around the office about our top secret cover subject, code named "World Citizen." I eventually figured out that they were talking about Bill Clinton (whom Wonkette claims would make a better first lady than Judi Giuliani). In our interview Clinton says, "I believe that those of us who have had the benefit of lots of foreign travel have an obligation to share what we think we know with our fellow citizens." This pretty much sums up what we're trying to do here at The Perrin Post.

It was nice to see World Hum, one of the best travel blogs out there, give us props not just for the Clinton interview, but also for Pico Iyer's memoir of his early days as a Let's Go writer, Wendy's round-up of her 30 favorite travel secrets, and Mark Schatzker's trip around the world in 80 days going no faster than 100 mph (an article eagerly awaited by those of us who followed his journey online).

Gadling, another of my daily reads, praised the announcement of our partnership with the Five & Alive Fund, which improves the health of children aged five and under around the globe. Conde Nast Traveler has pledged $20,000 to the fund and will donate $5 from every new subscription as well. It's all part of our effort to give back to the planet that we've spent 20 years exploring.

My personal contribution to the September issue?  The World Savers Awards, our annual compendium of travel companies that are helping preserve the environments and communities around them. I've helped direct this project (previously called the Green List) for the last few years, and I'm heartened each time to see the good works being carried out around the industry.

There's a bunch in the issue that's not online, such as the Wommies, "8 trends, concepts, and innovations of the past two decades that have changed the way we travel," and a four-page map of Mark's trip, broken down into segments that you or I could do ourselves. So grab a copy off the newsstand (if you can lift it) before it disappears in a week or so.