Travel Tips

Financial Literacy Month #5

As we get closer to Spring, are you ready to explore the outdoors? April 19 is one of the days that you can go to a National Park for free. Other days this year are June 19, August 4, September 27 and November 11. We have seen a few but have more to see. Last year we went to Mount Rushmore and Badlands. #JillRussoFoster #FinancialLiteracyMonth

Going On The Road

Do you have a summer road trip planned? Maybe you are taking the kids back to school. Either of these situations or jsut in general, here are some tips to keep you and your car comfortable in these dog days of summer.

Read 11 Cool Tips for Comfortable Summer Drive

You might learn something you never knew 0 I did.

Packing Light

We don’t want to pay the checked baggage fee with the airlines, so we try to pack in a carry on.

If I can do it, you can to. Here are some tips on how we pack light:

Pick a color theme – I pick three colors (two neutrals and a color) so that I can mix and match outfits.
Make items do double duty – a pair of sandals can go to the pool and dinner.
Wear you bulkiest clothing – think sweater / coat / sweatshirt vs. packing it.
Consider packing less clothes and doing laundry mid way through the vacation.
Think multiple use items – your phone or tablet can be your camera, e-reader and still be able to check your email vs. all single use items / electronics.

So I wear my sneakers and sweatshirt. We bring a pack a clothesline, clothes pins and laundry detergent to do laundry. My tablet eliminates my need for a camera, book / magazines. I wear my sandals to the pool and then use them in the evening for dinner )shoes take up a lot of room in the suitcase). My pool / beach cover up can be used a as sundresses for dinner. It takes a little organization, but works for me.

Every little thing you can eliminate from your luggage will lessen what you hvae to take and in turn you will have less luggage and avoid luggage fees. One carry on can easily do a week of vacation for me.

We’re Back From Our Anniversary Trip

This year we celebrated our anniversary with a Pacific Northwest cruise.

Back in the early summer, I wrote two newsletters about planning our fall vacation. We are back and wanted to share the trip with you. Here’s the link to the two earlier newsletters – first and second issues to remind you of the details.

We took a Pacific Northwest cruise out of Seattle with stops at Astoria, Oregon, San Francisco, California and Victoria, BC and few days in Seattle too.

With all this planning and paying ahead, we spent very little on the actual vacation. Mostly everything was paid (or paid with points / miles) in the months before as our budget permitted – hotel, cruise, airfare, attractions and some meals were included. We selected hotels with breakfast included, bought City Pass’ (discount admission to attractions) and walked and/or public transportation. Lots of steps – over 21,000 in San Francisco in one day!

Yes, there was a lot of research and planning, but this step saved us money and we have fun – lots of money!

Here we are at the Space Needle. To view more photos, visit our Pinterest page.

Planning Our Fall Vacation

What to do in each port? That’s a difficult question. So much to do and so little time.

If it’s a new place, sometimes we just want to take a tour to get an overview. That’s the case for the first and last stop of this cruise. We are taking a cruise line shore excursion to see the coast and in another city we are doing a whale watch.

Yet another city, San Francisco with a two day stop (we have been there before), what to do? Our original thought was to go to Yosemite for the day. We even worked out the details to make it work for us. But now the wildfires may derail this plan.

For us, the research is critical to saving money. First, what do we want to do? To start, we look at the cruise line shore excursions for ideas. If we find something that appeals to us – great! Then the research begins. What other companies offer this excursion? The research piece begins with for these other companies:

Is there a cruise guarantee? Do you get your money back if the cruise line doesn’t come into port?
Will they guarantee you will make it back tot he ship in time?
Will they pick up and drop off at the pier or very close by?
What are the companies reviews like (both on the website and with outside companies)?
What is the cost and what does it include?
Are there discounts?

These are important questions that we need the answers to.

Some of my favorite websites are Trip Advisor, Viator, Cruise Critic and more. I should tell you that Cruise Critic is the best. You join the chat room for your specific cruise and this puts you in touch with others sailing with you. This is a great resource, as we have shared private tours many time by joining others (and sometimes we have booked the tour and are looking for others to share with us).

All these are factors in determining what to do in port.

Planning Our Fall Vacation

Those of you that are regular readers, we have an upcoming vacation for the fall. I am going to take you through the planning this week, to see how we save money.

Our airfare, hotels and cruise are booked and paid (a while back). We always fly in a day or more before a cruise (never want to miss the ship). Since we are arriving late the night before, we are staying close to the airport.

Getting to the the ship in the morning, we have several options:

Back to the airport and take the cruise transfer
Make our way on our own
Alternate transfer

Our choices was the alternated transfer. This was our thought process, we have never been to this city and wanted to see some of it. We didn’t want to get to the ship too early and wait there to board. We found a cruise transfer tour company that will pick us up at the hotel and give us a 3 hour tour of the city and drop us off at the pier.

The savings for us:

No rental car needed
Tour company will take luggage on tour
Hotel pick up with pier drop off

Yes, this is more than the transfer alone, but we have never been to the city (I don’t count changing planes here years ago a visit). This way we will be familiar with the city before we spend the weekend after the cruise.

Travel Made Easier

You know we love to travel. Personally, the $85 I spent to get TSA Precheck was well worth it. It is so much easier to not have to take out your toiletries, electronics and/or take your shoes off. Note, that not all international airports recognize this status. Although, recently in London’s Heathrow airport and they did stamp my boarding pass on connecting flights and I was pleasantly surprised.

We actually had to wait weeks to get an appointment with the local (30 minutes away) office of IdentoGo. Then you wait more time to get your TSA Precheck number. Yes, it’s well worth it to not have to take off your shoes.

But by later this year, it will be easier. IDEMIA, the company will be offering the interview process through select Staples locations to start – 50 locations to start. How convenient will that be? When my renewal is due, this should be so easy.

Vacation Planning – Don’t Forget!

As you know, we love to travel. For this month, my posts are going to be about how we plan the day to day details of our upcoming cruise.

These are some great tips from Samantha Brown to do before you leave for that great vacation. This way you will come back to a relaxed home (and maybe have a few more hours of vacation) before you jump back into your life.

Vacation Planning – Before You Leave

As you know, we love to travel. For this month, my posts are going to be about how we plan the day to day details of our upcoming cruise.

There is so much to do in the days before you leave on vacation. Here is a check list of what has to be done before we leave:

Place a mail hold with the Post Office – we stop it one day before we leave just to make sure it’s done correctly. This typically can be done up to 30 days in advance.
Stop the newspaper while you are away – we can automate a vacation stop with one call.
Notify your neighbors and police – one quick call to each, so that your home can be watched. Our local police department will take your information and keep an eye out.
Pay your bills ahead or schedule them to be paid from your account while you are traveling. You don’t want a missed payment or worse a late fee. Start the month before and make a note of the due date of each bill, keep a list so that a bill doesn’t get forgotten.
Contact your debit and credit card companies and notify them that you are traveling to …. and on what dates. They will approve your charges especially if you are traveling internationally. Note this is not a prefect process. Have a back up plan just in case.
For international travel, make sure to have some foreign currency with you ahead of time. We will have three separate currencies to deal with, so we typically get some of each before we leave. Make sure to get some small bills and coins as you will need these.
For international travel, you can notify the State Department’s STEP program (Smart Traveler Enrollment Program). This service for US Citizens notifies the nearest embassies of your travel plans and contact information. They will contact you if necessary about events you need to know about.

Happy Travels!

Vacation Planning – Travel Insurance

As you know, we love to travel. For this month, my posts are going to be about how we plan the day to day details of our upcoming cruise.

Should you buy travel insurance for your upcoming trip? That’s not an easy question to answer, there are many questions to answer so that you can decide for yourself.

According to Wallet Hub, 1 in 6 Americans have an illness or natural disaster happen to them. Are you covered so that you don’t lose you hard earned money? Of these 1 in 6, only 22% have insurance to cover their travel costs and expenses.

Some credit cards offer you coverage for lost or delayed luggage, missed connections, trip cancellations and even death sometimes. All credit cards are different and you need to check your individual card for what your offers you. If you are covered, they offer you reimbursements. That means that you pay upfront. Do you have that money? And they come with restrictions. Remember my Microsoft Surface Pro experience from last fall?

We have one credit card that we always use to rent a car. It gives us coverage so that we can decline the optional rental car company insurances and feel comfortable. We have another credit card that gives us the travel protection of lost or delayed luggage, missed connections, etc. We have done the research for us and you should too.

You should think about what you may need and find out if you are covered with the credit card you already have. Typically, if you don’t charge the trip to that specific credit card, you don’t have the coverage. Then check with your personal insurance, such as auto insurance for rental car coverage, home owners / renter’s for loss of property, etc. Then look into travel insurance, if you need or want more or additional coverage.

You should do this process for your health insurance as well. Most insurance policies don’t cover you when you travel outside the US. All of this pre-planning could offer you the needed assistance in your time of need. So do your research and make the choices that are right for you.