- Check your passport expiration, a lot of countries want your passport to be valid six months after your travel is complete.
- Foreign currency, use your ATM card at your destination to get local currency, the ATM/Bank fees add up to less than what you would pay in currency exchange fees or purchasing traveler’s checks.
- Traveling with a child? Rent an apartment instead of staying at a hotel, it’s usually cheaper and you have the ability to wash clothes and make your own meals, saving money. The only downside, nobody cleans up your room while you’re out exploring.
- Use your air miles to purchase air fare, if you are not sure what your credit cards do for you, find out. Look for credit cards that give you lots of points.
- When picking seats online for a flight for multiple people in your family, don’t automatically put the whole family together, my strategy has been for the three of us if the seats available are four in a row like this OOOO, I don’t pick three in a row for the three of us, I pick this way XOXX, leaving an empty seat in the middle. The next person making a booking and selecting seats online will see a middle seat between other people and he/she will tend to move on further back on the plane than to select that seat. It will be one of the last seats picked by other buyers. IF someone DOES pick it, at flight time, just offer to let them have the aisle so your family can all sit together and they will be happy to do it, it may also force the person to go find an empty seat somewhere else.
- Keep deodorant and a toothbrush/toothpaste in your carry on for long flights.
- Keep gum to chew for little kids during take off/landing to help their ears pop.
- Take a stroller for a kid even if you think your kid is too old for a stroller, in most countries, they have a special line for people with strollers at airports, museums, whatever. Pro tip: If you don’t have a kid and you’re kameena enough, put your husband in a wheel chair and tell him to act sick.
- For any European travel, read Rick Steves’ book on your destination, his tips are AWESOME!
- At your destination, go to the grocery store and buy snacks and drinks instead of eating at restaurants every day, saves a lot of money and time.
- In most European cities, when at a restaurant and they ask you what you want to drink, when you say water, they will bring you very expensive bottled water, make sure to ask for TAP water. Most cities have delicious, clean, potable water in Europe.
- If you’re going abroad, try to look for direct flights even if the origin airport is not immediately near you, if you have to drive a few hours to a different airport but have a direct flight, opt for that. The more legs of travel you have, the more the moving pieces, and the more chances of things going wrong. With a direct flight, not much chance for lost luggage or missing connections.
- When you get to your destination, don’t be lame and try new things, specially the food, don’t be a fob. Follow the cultural rules of your destination, nobody likes an a$$hole.
I have MANY, MANY more, will write them down later. Now go out and TRAVEL!