Want to know how to get the best bang from your travel dollar? Want to know how to travel cheap in this day and time? You’ll be happy to know that budget travel deals are still easy to find if you know where to look!
For example, let’s talk about air travel. It used to be that companies would fly their employees all over the place and never have a second thought. They’d even fly first class most of the time! I have a friend whose company flew her to Germany 3 or 4 times a year, first class all the way. No budget needed. Now, they do video and phone conferencing and no more flights, budget or not. The sad thing is, her company could have continued sending the employees abroad if they had done just a little research and figured out how to get their costs down.
Luckily, for the everyday traveler, there are lots of ways to travel cheap. Years ago you needed to buy a round-trip airplane ticket if you were planning to fly. No one at all ever bought one-way tickets unless they didn’t plan to return and were truly going one-way only. Now you can save a lot of money by searching different airline companies for one-way fares. For example, you might fly to your destination via AirTran and then return by way of Jet Blue.
So what’s the catch, right? I mean, why were round-trip fares cheaper years ago but not anymore? Well, the airlines know that people are very budget conscious these days. There will probably be a tradeoff in that you might have to have a layover and not fly nonstop, but it’s worth it, right? I’d certainly rather save money on a flight that had a short layover than pay a huge amount more for a nonstop flight.
Okay so let’s say you don’t plan to fly but you still want to take a budget vacation. No problem! Trains are an awesome way to travel, and you can also still take your own car and not break the bank. Pick a spot that isn’t too far away and go in the off season if possible.
You might also consider renting a house or condo instead of staying in a hotel. My cousin recently came for a visit for a little over a week, and her family rented a house near Disney World. I have to admit I love staying in hotels myself, but it was a great idea for her family. They got to eat breakfast and one other meal in the house (much cheaper) and then they ate out one meal per day. This made it very easy for them to take a budget travel vacation, go to the theme parks, and still save a lot of money even with a family of four.
Source by Zak McAvey
