Darren Rowse, Digital Photography School, shares his tips for improving your travel photographs and his description of tour photo stops exactly matched my experience. My guiding principle:Take as many photos as possible at each location using various techniques and settings.
In China I used more Kodachrome a day than most of my tour companions used the whole trip but I have one great photo of every place we visited. With digital there is no excuse to not take those extra frames, just remember to put the camera away and experience the place as well.