On the Fly

There is a new show on TLC called On the Fly and it gives viewers a behind the scenes look of what Southwest Airlines personnel day to day work is like. Personally, I like the show because I like yelling at the dumb dumbs on the TV. The things people complain about truly amaze me; especially when they are expecting to get somewhere.

One thing that people never seem to understand is a "maintenance delay". On almost every episode there is someone complaining that they missed their connecting flight because their last flight had a maintenance delay… Well, wouldn’t you rather them fix the problem and you be late then have the possibility that you could be dead because something on the plane failed??!?! Come on people! They are looking out for your safety! On the last show a guy was delayed 6 hours and he was given a $50 voucher for food at the airport. I think that’s pretty good, at least he got something. But he just kept complaining about how that wasn’t sufficient enough and he couldn’t believe he had to wait 6 hours! If you are running that late check another airline and see if they can get you there sooner.

If you can't reach your destination on time because of a flight delay with the airline you bought the original ticket from, that airline it is obligated to put you on a competitors' flight if that flight will get you there sooner than the original airline's next scheduled flight.

Another one that my husband and I seem to disagree on is when passengers are wearing something that is offensive (usually cuss words or profanity). Now, I'm not going to get offended if someone is wearing something like that but I can see where people with children would find it offensive. Also, typically when someone finds that sort of stuff inappropriate they choose not have it in or around their life but then all of a sudden they are being forced to be on a plane with someone who is wearing their "life choices" literally on their sleeve. And the people that make a fuss about taking it off… are you really going to let a little thing like that be the reason you don’t get to your final destination on time? If so, you are dumb!

There is also weather delays; snow, lightning, heavy winds, all things that can keep you from your final destination. If you are traveling to an expensive vacation and you didn’t get travel insurance that’s your problem. Travel insurance is one of the best things you can get and something I will always get when we travel for a vacation; you're protecting your investment. Your travel insurance will cover missed connecting flights and weather delays and will compensate you if you need to stay overnight and can't get to your luggage. We typically pay about $100 per person per trip for our insurance. One couple on the show was flying to Florida in the morning to catch their cruise that was leaving at 5:30pm… (WOW, don’t you think you're cutting it close?!?!?). Their flight to Florida was delayed a few hours and they were in jeopardy of missing their cruise. If you're traveling for an event or are catching a cruise/tour I would advise always traveling the day before to be on the safe side.

Now here is a frustrating one that I actually would complain about if it happened to me; the airline overbooking your flight. I understand from a business stand point why they do it but it is very frustrating to the customers. They will overbook a flight in an attempt to cut losses/make profits from passengers that don’t show up. It's something that they do and all I can say is check in on time and get their early to make sure you have a seat and they can see when you checked in.

Tune into TLC's On the Fly Thursday nights at 9/8C

Happy Travels!

How to Plan a Vacation: Part 2

Click here to read How to Plan a Vacation: Part 1

After I have figured out all that we want to do and see I start to research places to eat!

Step 3: I really use tripadvisor.com to help me out here. People post pictures of their food so I am able to see portion size and presentation. It also helps me find the local restaurants and diners; we like to stay away from the hotel's money pits and restaurants are one of them! While planning our last trip I ran across this awesome café called Hawaiian Style Café and it was so good and inexpensive we went back twice! Those are the places I love and it gets us away from the tourist traps (even though all the locals look at us a roll their eyes…they totally know we're tourist). I am really hoping we can find a few places like Hawaiian Style Café on this next trip.

I make a list of the restaurants we want to go to and some that look interesting as backups and other options. I write down their addresses and phone numbers so I have them with me and I'm not searching on the phone last minute for an address or number. I also do this for other things such as farmers markets and art galleries. 

When I plan vacations I plan WAY in advance, like 8-6 months in advance (sometimes as far out as the airlines will let me!). So step 4 doesn’t really come until about 3 months before departure.

Step 4: Time to commit and pay! When the 3 month mark comes around is when I usually start to make down payments on all the activities we'll be doing and getting them all officially scheduled. Three months is far enough out that things shouldn’t be booked up yet and it's still close enough for them to actually accept your reservation. I secretly want to book everything right way and get it all paid for but I wait. Another reason why it's good to wait on this is because you may end up having to cancel (I hope not but you never know) and you'll either A) have to call all those place to get a refund or B) you don’t get your money back at all (boo!).

And don’t forget to make reservations for the nicer restaurants you plan on going to. You want to make sure you get a spot to watch the sunset and the stars!

When it's all said and done it looks something like this!

Happy Travels! 

How to Plan a Vacation: Part 1

So I have been rattling my brain for the past few weeks wondering what to talk about on the blog. I haven’t seen any good articles I am just dying to talk about so I figured I would fill you in on how I plan a vacation from start to finish.

WARNING: You might think it’s a little on the extreme side :P

Step 1: I start by making an excel spreadsheet with how many days we'll be on vacation and insert the times from 6AM to 9PM.

Once this is done I simply start Google-ing the activities we want to do while we're on vacation. I'll look up things such as, "snorkeling in Kauai", "kayaking in Kauai" and a slew of companies come up. I write them all down and start pulling up their websites and pricing them. Then I start to research what others have to say about the company; I use both tripadvisor.com and yelp.com to see what people are saying. When reading these reviews I take a lot into consideration, first, how often does this person review? If they have only made a few reviews and they are all negative then they are most likely complainers and are only giving out bad reviews (you can look at their other reviews to see their reviewing patterns). Second, are they complaining about the weather? Surprisingly a lot of people complain about the weather. Hello! People cannot control the weather! One review I read about a boat ride to the Napali coast in Kauai said that it was the worst ride of their life and the water was so rough and they got sea sick and blah, blah, blah. It really sounds like a you problem and not the company's problem. The company clearly states on their website that the waters are rough and if you get sea sick that’s not really their problem is it?!

Step 2: Once I have all the companies I am going to be booking with I start to map it out on the schedule to see where things can go based on schedule restrictions by us or the tours. As you can see below I have a color coding system I use as well. Tours at are 100% a must (green) vs. tours that we are thinking about (red) vs. free activities (blue), when we're traveling (orange) and what restaurants we're interested in (purple). And the red text indicates the location on the island.

Visit the blog next week to see step 3 and 4 and how I pick what restaurants to go to!

Read Part 2 here!

Happy Travels!

Traveling on a Budget: Pt 2

So I know I have talked about this before but I'm going to talk about it again. How to save while on vacation!

Check out this post on finding things to do for free and packing your own food: Traveling on a Budget

And then look at this one on how get airfare and lodging for next to nothing: How to have an Inexpensive Vacation

They both have some really good ideas that I hope you'll check out!

If you have a travel tip of your own, head on over to Budgets Are Sexy to enter his $1,000 giveaway, in partnership with HotelClub

Happy Travels

Trip Advisors Top 25 Destinations in the World

Trip advisor has once again compiled their Travelers' Choice 2012 list of the top 25 destinations in the world. Some are classic favorites and some may get you researching new places to go (like I did!). Click on the links below to read more about my trips to these locations! If I didn't comment on it it's because the location is not really on my bucket list…but if someone gave me a free trip I wouldn't turn it down!

1. London, United Kingdom - 2012 is definitely the year to go to London…with the Olympics happening and all. London is a great town and I believe can be seen in a weekend; although, I do think to really immerse yourself in the history you need more time. I went to London over a weekend when I was studying abroad. We went to Museum of Modern Art, Buckingham Palace, the Tower of London, rode the London Eye (at dusk, very pretty) and saw a play! And we did all this by walking and taking the tubes. We visited some cool and different neighborhoods including Notting Hill, my favorite movie!

2. New York City, New York - I have been here once as a child where we saw the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island and then once as an adult where we went out on the town and saw things like 30 Rock and Time Square. I still want to go back because there are two things I want to see/do there: 1) have ice cream at the original Serendipity 3 and 2) see the Russian teardrop 9/11 memorial (which is technically in New Jersey and I think it's something to be seen by boat).

3. Rome, Italy - I went to Italy for Christmas in 2008. My friend and I took a Trafalgar tour through the entire country. We saw everything you need to see in Italy in 11 days! I like Trafalgar because they take you to what you want/need to see while still giving you plenty of free time and since they pre-book tours of museums and such you don’t have to wait in line (which comes in handy at the Vatican, Colosseum and Sistine Chapel).

4. Paris, France - Ah, Paris! What travel doesn’t have this on their list! I am hoping to get over there soon! Maybe in the next few years, fingers crossed.

5. San Francisco, California - I went to San Fran when I was young and we saw all the sights including the Golden Gate Bridge and Pier 39. On this trip we also went to the Red Wood forest which was amazingly beautiful!

6. Marrakech, Morocco

7. Istanbul, Turkey - I am hoping to visit Turkey on a cruise of some sort, maybe Greece and Turkey. I hear it's beautiful!

8. Barcelona, Spain

9. Siem Reap, Cambodia - This is somewhat of a new addition to my bucket list. I am so into how beautiful the ancient buildings and temples are! I really hope I can convince my husband to go!

10. Berlin, Germany

11. Chicago, Illinois - Chi Town! A place I really want to go to! I don’t know why I want to go there but once we see more distant lands we'll spend a long weekend in Chicago and enjoy all the sights and deep dish pizza they have to offer!

12. Florence, Italy - One of the cities we visited on our trip threw Italy and where we had the best pizza and saw the most beautiful masterpiece in the world, Michelangelo's Statue of David. I'm not a huge fan of art, especially old art but I have to say it's one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. I literally sat and stared at him for 2 hours.

13. Buenos Aries, Argentina

14. Sydney, Australia - Yep, the down under is on the bucket list too!

15. Beijing, China

16. Prague, Czech Republic - I visited Prague in 2010 and it was a fun trip. I went on the Trafalgar tour, Imperial Europe and Prague was the 2^nd city we visited. I would say, traditionally, you might want to stay in one place longer but that’s the thing I like about Trafalgar is that you can see SO much in just a few days. So if you don’t mind living out of your suitcase for your vacation these tours are right for you!

17. Las Vegas, Nevada - I have been twice and that is enough! I went once when some friends were visiting from Europe and then again for my brother's 21^st birthday. I don’t plan on every going back. Some people LOVE Vegas and make a point to at least once a year, but I really don’t see the point. For 2 trips to Vegas I can go to Hawaii!!! To each his own I suppose, I'll take the Aloha Spirit over the desert any day.

18.  Bora Bora, French Polynesia - I think when people picture paradise this is the place they think up in their minds, whether they realize it or not. It is most definitely on my bucket list!

19.  Shanghai, China

20.  Honolulu, Hawaii - All the Hawaiian Islands are on our list of places to go but we are probably saving the capital for last. It's such a big city and that makes it easy to sink into the touristy stuff (which we don’t want to do). Plus, they have a Disney Resort on the island so we might just save Oahu for a family trip in the far and distant future.

21.  Los Angeles, California - LA's tourism draw is obviously Hollywood and really nothing else. I went there when I was about 15 for a wedding and we did all the sightseeing things like the Walk of Fame, the Hollywood sign, Grauman's Chinese Theater and Rodeo Drive…and that was it.

22.  New Orleans, Louisiana - Even though I live "right next door" in Houston, TX I have never been to New Orleans. It was always some place I wanted to see until the hurricanes destroyed it. I have heard that it is just not the same. Maybe we'll go one weekend when all the other place on this list have been visited. 

23.  Cape Town Central, South Africa - Also another place that is on the bucket list!

24.  Chiang Mai, Thailand - Chiang Mai is in Northern Thailand and I really want to go to Southern Thailand, particularly the island of Ko Samui. I stumbled upon this island by chance when I was looking at a Groupon getaway.

25.  Dublin, Ireland - Both my husband and I have a wee bit of Irish in us so it would be fun to go; partake in the drinking and seeing those emerald hills.

When Browsing Turns to Buying

In my last post I mentioned that I like to price and plan future vacations that are happening WAY in the future. We'll a few weekends ago I was doing just that! I was checking out an email I got from AAA that said "Hawaii was on SALE!" so I started clicking away to see how much it would cost IF we went. First I looked at Maui and it would cost about $4,000 for a 10 night stay at a hotel, flight and car for two people. This wasn’t a bad deal and we were really considering it. Then I looked into Kauai and saw that we could get the same deal for only $3,200!!! WHAT?!?!? REALLY?!?!? So called the travel agent, told her I would be in her office that afternoon and by 5pm our trip was booked! We couldn’t believe the deal we stumbled upon!

photo from napaliriders

So this is where my crazy love for travel and planning comes in handy! Booking unexpected great travel deals! So now I am in full on planning mode on the activities and fun things we'll do on the island. Kauai is where many movies and TV shows have been filmed so we plan on watching all of them before we go! Can't wait to get back into the Aloha Spirit!

Read about our last trip to Hawaii's Big Island.

Aloha!

How to Have an Inexpensive Vacation

So I am always planning trips and seeing how much it would cost to go to places that I want to visit. While I plan vacations that aren’t happening anytime soon I often wonder two things 1) what is the best way to get free or nearly free flights (because I read about people doing it all the time) and 2) how can we stay in a nice place for not a lot of money. I find this is a topic that is discussed in MANY blogs out there (some even wanting to charge you to let you in on their secrets) but I think I have found some realistic ways to travel cheap.

Airlines

The first way to get some SUPER cheap flights would be to work for an airline. I was reading the finance blog budgetsaresexy.com and learned that the blogger use to work for Continental Airlines. In his post he talks about how employees can get round trip flights in the US for $10-$30 and international flights were about $50-$100. I can't imagine getting a flight that cheap! He did say working for them had some drawbacks; you need to be awesome in customer service (which I am not) and you better have a sofa to crash on in your final destination because they don’t  paid well.

Another way to get discounted or free flights would be to use an airline credit card to earn your points. United Airlines boast on how you can earn 40,000 points in the 1^st year (which I believe is enough for a domestic round trip flight). You also get the perks of priority boarding and two tickets a year to a United Club of your choice (kind of worth having the card just for priority boarding). It took me a long time to convince my husband that this was something we needed to do. It was a hard fight (because we don’t live in debt; therefore using a credit card is the devil). But after taking his first big vacation (to Hawaii) and his first long flight he realized I might be right. We got our card shortly after that and have been using it on EVERYTHING ever since! I mean everything just to get those points, hoping that the year and half of spending will help us get a free flight. And we just pay it off at the end of each month so we don’t carry a balance J

Lodging

After taking our trip to Hawaii we decided that we would rent a house the next time we go anywhere for a long period of time. That way we could save some money by cooking for ourselves and not pay resort or parking fees. With this on our minds we found HomeAway.com. You can get really good deals from people renting out their vacation homes and condos (some for less than $50 a night). Then a few days ago I stumbled upon this article about these retires that were doing home swaping as a way to save money and get to travel at the same time!

This US couple owned their own vacation home in San Diego, California and had never traveled outside the US until they were 60. They started taking short, one week trips to Europe and caught the travel bug! Then they found homeexchange.com and homelink.org. Now what they do is they house swap for a few months at a time with other people around the world. They have been able to live, breath, and take in so many cultures by doing this…can you tell I am SO jealous! After reading this story we decided that this was something we were going to do too when we can purchase a vacation home (I don’t think any ones wants to visit Houston, TX). Check out their whole story here.