Tapley's Travel Tips

Traveling is one of my great passions in life.  I do it as often as I can, and I post about it a lot on Facebook whenever I am on the road.  (I would love to blog on the road, but until I have a laptop, or at least a netbook, that ain't happening.)  Anyway, when I post about my travels on Facebook, I frequently get comments from people indicating that they wished they could do the same thing, but for whatever reason feel like they can't.

Now, I'm not here to tell you how to prioritize your time, energy, or finances, but I can give you some tips on how you can fit travel into your life while still holding down a job and paying a mortgage.

TIP #1
Get a credit card that gives you frequent flyer miles or hotel points.  Of course, the usual rules about credit cards apply - meaning pay it off every month!  Think about getting a frequent flyer mile for every dollar you spend on major purchases, or on gas, or groceries - or everything.  These can add up fast, and before you know it you are flying free every few years without spending any money you weren't going to spend anyway.  If the money you need for a purchase is sitting in your bank account, instead of using your debit card, why not put it on the miles card and then make an immediate online payment from your bank to the credit card?  You don't pay any interest, you only spend money you actually have, and you get the miles!

TIP #2
Set up a special savings account for travel and set up an automatic deposit for it.  If you have direct deposit for your paycheck, you could send a portion of that money into your travel account.  You could also set up a regular weekly or monthly transfer from another bank account.  If you are anything like me, make this an account that you can't access too easily to prevent you from dipping in whenever you are craving sushi or cute shoes.  If you are saving some amount of money, even a small one, on a regular basis, and you aren't touching your balance, before you know it you will have enough money for an adventure of some kind - even if it is just a weekend away.

TIP #3
Do your research and make use of travel guides, especially guides like Pauline Frommer's Spend Less, See More series and Frommer's Free & Dirt Cheap series.  These books are written with an eye towards getting you the best experience for your money, and have all sorts of tips and tricks to help you find affordable lodging, food, and entertainment on your travels.

Those are just a few of my favorite tips.  When Josh and I went to Europe for two weeks last year we got our tickets to London using frequent flyer miles from a credit card, we got very affordable lodging in London and Paris thanks to Pauline Frommer's guides on those cities, and we paid for the trip mostly by having money automatically saved out of every paycheck the whole time we were planning the trip.

I'll post more tips as the spirit moves me, so keep an eye out, and happy travels!