How do I open my email from another computer while I'm on vacation

The easiest and probably safest way is to access your account via webmail.  Go to the website for your mail provider and there should be links there.  If its someone's computer that you trust, then you can set up your account as on your machine, but go to Tools | Accounts | Mail | Properties | Advanced BEFORE checking the mail and check the box to leave a copy of the messages on the server, so that when you get home, you will get the same messages.  Otherwise they get deleted.  If you are on a public computer, then its not likely to be secure and your safest access would be via webmail.

steve

While away from home, how can email be checked from a different computer?

Generally yes.There are three possibilities:

1. If you take a laptop with you, you can install e-mail software on it and set it to your e-mail account. You can then check it whenever you find an internet connection--usually wireless. That's what I do  whenever I travel, and is almost the only reason I own a laptop.
2. If you use a public computer (for example in an internet cafe) you can use whatever e-mail software may be installed on it and similarly set that to your account. However this is not a great thing to do, since it may compomise the security of your e-mail password (even if you delete everything you do after you've done it, there could be a keylogger on the machine that captures your password).
3. If your e-mail provider (usually your ISP) has a webmail feature, you can use that on a public computer.

As I said I normally take a laptop with me, but if I don't, I do number 3.  Doing e-mail on a web site is very slow and clumsy compared to doing it with an e-mail program, but sometimes it's the only choice I have. And bear in mind that although it's generally safer than number 2, it is *not* completely safe.

If you travel a lot and can afford it, I recommend number 1. You can get a small netbook (which is fine if almost all you do on it is e-mail) very inexpensively.