My Travel Optimizer

This is a quote from Sarah Palin; “I’m not one of those who maybe came from a background of, you know, kids who perhaps graduate college and their parents give them a passport and give them a backpack and say go off and travel the world.”

You don’t need well-off parents to travel and see the world.  Travel is not the exclusive domain of the rich.  I’ve know plenty of people who have either worked to get their travel money or put the plane tickets on a credit card(or both).  A lot of people would say to never do the latter but I believe you should take your chance while you have them.  Its very easy to put things off for a time when things are “right.” The problem is that the “right” time may never come along.

I’m not waiting till retirement to do the things I want to do and go the places I want to go.  My wife and I were in Europe in last summer and we had a blast because we are in our thirties and in good health.  Its not that older people don’t enjoy their travels but they have to deal with their health issues and the simple fact that they are old.  My wife and I saw a lot of incredible landscapes and ancient ruins but we also saw Frenchy electronic duo Justice at a concert in Arras, France and we went clubbing in Munich.  We saw Guns and Roses at Rock in Rio Portugal in Lisbon.

I say travel while you are young. The older you get the more comforts you will need(making travel more expensive), the less you’ll be able to do and the more you will be disconnected from the nightlife.  There is certainly more to life than bars and clubs but its nice to be able dance to some Fedde Le Grand after checking out a 13th century castle.

My wife and I travel with money we’ve saved and we’ve put some expenses on the plastic.  That’s fine by us.  We are traveling while we are young and we are accumulating memories and experiences that no one can take away. Of course, we have also learned to travel as cheaply as possible and to get the most return for our travel dollar. Its been well worth it.

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Tags: travel

There are some things you should do before you leave to assure the best travel experience possible. I’m going to list them in a numbered format and then I will expand on each below the list.

1. Set up web mail account for trip
2. Email yourself important phone numbers, directions, contacts.
3. Reconfirm all reservations one week before leaving.
4. Make photocopies of your passport
5. Inform your bank and credit/debit card companies of your travel dates and itinerary.
6. Automate bill payments if possible
7. Secure your home
8. Stop mail and newspaper
9. Give travel information to family or close friends

1. Set up a free web mail account like gmail, yahoo mail or hotmail. I would avoid using any of your regular email accounts. Use the new account that you create exclusively for your trip and avoid transmitting any sensitive data (financial information, passwords, etc). You never know what kind of security, or lack thereof, there is an internet cafe or hotel computer. There are many programs that can be installed on a computer to hijack information. I would always treat any public computer as unsecure. If you create a webmail account specifically for your trip and avoid transmitting any sensitive data then you will have a safe means of communication to your home country.

2. Once you have this trip email account ready then go ahead and email yourself helpful information like the phone numbers and web sites for the airline, car rental company, hotels, tour guides, etc.  This is good information to have accessible online in case you should lose some paper documents.  I wouldn’t worry about security as far as this kind of info goes. You won’t be in trouble because you have the Avis international phone number in an email.

3.  Call your hotels, tour groups, car rental agency, etc one week before leaving. Make sure everything is in good order and that they are expecting you.  Be very careful about switching up dates on your reservations.  For whatever reasons, mistakes are commonly made. If you have to change a date, call a couple of times to make sure that they are expecting you on the correct date. Profit from my experiences, please.

4. Make photocopies of your passport.  Keep the real passport in your hotel room safe or other secure hiding place. Carry the photocopy around with you when you are on a day excursion.  Having a photocopy will also make it easier to get a duplicate from the American Embassy if you are unfortunate enough to lose your passport.  I’ll be making a post on securing your passport and other valuables later.  If you have a scanner I would upload a copy of your passport to your travel email account.

5.  Call your bank and credit card companies and tell them when you will be traveling and where and on what dates. You don’t have to give them specific locations; the country you are in will suffice.  It is important to do this so that any purchases or cash withdrawals will not be flagged as suspicious and then blocked.

6.  Make sure all your bills are paid that become due during the time you are gone.  Ify ou are going to be gone for more than a month try to automate your bill payments if that option is provided.

7.  Make sure that your home is secured.  If you have sliding glass doors I recommend you place a wood board at the base so that the door cannot be slid open. Do the same with windows.  IP cameras are now affordable and this is a great way to secure your home. You can view the interior of your home from most any computer in the world. These cameras also have motion detectors and they will automatically take a picture (even in low light conditions) and email you an alert when they detect motion in your home. How’s that for peace of mind. You can also purchase a timer to turn lights on and off. If you have neighbors you can trust, ask them to keep an eye on your place.

8.  You can go online and ask the post office to hold your mail while you are gone. You can ask them to deliver when you get home or you can pick it up at the post office. Don’t forget to suspend your newspaper subscription since accumulated papers on a lawn are a sure sign the owner is not home.

9. Let your friends and/or family know where you will be and when. Give them some numbers they can contact you with or at least the address of your travel email. Its important that someone know when you will be gone and, more importantly, when you will be back.

If this seems like a lot of hassle, its really not. Anytime you step out of your regular routine you are going to have to do some extra work. It will be worth it. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

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Tags: before you leave, security, travel tips

I’ve been recommended to use Kayak by more than one site. I didn’t find them to be that much better than Orbitz or Travelocity. I would still use them to look for cheap tickets. The more places you look the better odds you have of finding a good deal. I am planning a trip to Costa Rica in December. The Kayak price for tickets was not as good as the one offered by purchasing tickets directly from the Spirit Air web site. I wrote about this in one of my other posts.

I did find some good info on cheap plane tickets here. I agree with the writer about using secondary airports. This is how local carriers on Europe keep their prices down.

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Tags: cheap airfare, Kayak

I’d like to point out I don’t work for Spirit Air or have any sweet deals with them. I’m only trying to find the cheapest airfare possible. It is a short flight to Costa Rica from the Southern United States so I’m not worried about luxury or uber-friendly service.

I’ve flown on Spirit to Costa Rica on many different airlines. Since settling down in Florida I have used Spirit and Martin Air. The latter no longer flies to Costa Rica from Orlando so that leaves Spirit. I’ve heard some horror stories online about them but I’ve had good experiences.  I don’t feel I was treated any worse than any other airlines I’ve flown.  I could write a novel about the deteriorating quality of service in the airline industry but why bother?  I just suck it up since there aren’t really any alternatives.

What matters to me is that I arrive safely, on time and with my luggage. I’m not going to die because the person at the check in counter was a bit short with me.  I must re-iterate that I have not had a bad experience with them.  You also have to realize that sometimes when you travel you just get screwed no matter who you are flying with. Sometimes weather will shut down an airport or a flight will be cancelled. You just have to accept it as part of the traveling experience and move on.  These sorts of experiences are rare and its been many years since I had a flight cancelled on me.

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Tags: cheap airfare, Costa Rica, Spirit Air

I was looking at prices on the Delta web site. The cheapest flight from Atlanta to San Jose, Costa Rica was $938. To fly from Tampa was well over a $1000. In addition to that we would have had to fly north to Atlanta. The same is true for Delta flights flying from Miami. The cheapest option is definitely flying Spirit Air out of Tampa or Orlando ($593).

I also looked at flights from New York to San Jose. The Delta Price for the dates we selected was $1,188.80 The Spirit Air price from New York to San Jose for those dates is $773.02. Again, Spirit has the better price.

I looked on google for lowest air fares to Costa Rica. The top site was costaricaairfare.com  Their search result was a Spirit flight on my chosen dates for $50 dollars more than the cost of booking it yourself form the Spirit web site. I would like to remind you that in some cases the travel web sites have given me better prices than the home sites of the Airlines. Please check both for the best deal.

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Tags: cheap airfare, Costa Rica, Delta