Travel While You're Young

I cannot count how many times I have heard the following phrase: "I wish I had the money (and/or time) to travel." This is so self defeating that it hurts me deep down every time I hear it. Stop wishing and start trying, it is incredibly feasible to do this when you are in your 20's and if you don't do it now, then when will you do it? People always ask me how I do it, and honestly, there are a few easy rules to follow but first, a bit of my background as this is the first post...

I am a 27 year old male working full time in advertising in NYC. Rent is not cheap, nor is the cost of living, and the thought of saving a lot doesn't really come easy to me. But like many people before me, I realized I like to travel more than anything because of the new people, places, and experiences.

Because plenty of people have asked me how I do it and even asked me to plan vacations for them, I decided the best way to divulge this information would be to anyone and everyone who wants it. The more, the merrier, right? Throughout the life of this blog I will post flight deals, sample itineraries for cool places, and ultimately strategies to travel on a budget while still holding a full time job. Never hesitate to reach out directly with questions about your own itineraries or travel questions and I will do my best to help out assuming I don't get inundated by requests.

The main ways I go about traveling on a budget are fairly simple when used together but many do not take the time to learn how to do it (it's not difficult, I swear). Below are some methods that help me travel regularly each year which I will elaborate on each day with different posts on different subjects but for now, a brief overview of each.


1. Learn to Save Money, Even at Home

"But I thought you just said you don't save money?" You're right, have you seen my (non-existent) savings account? But what I really mean by this is to budget out your home expenses so you know you'll have enough left over for a mini vacation of sorts. Being able to save $500 - $1,000 could easily mean a 4 - 10 day vacation in South America, Central America, or even Europe when the other rules are followed. Maybe skip the bar one night a weekend, that's at least $20 a night, $80 saved a month. And that's at minimum, you don't want to see my bar tabs some nights.

2. Use Credit Card Points and Know Your Benefits

This is a bit tougher to sum up here because there are tons of CC's (Credit Cards) out there with a million different benefits. Ultimately though, many people don't even know that redeeming 1 point per 1 cent (10,000 points = $100 in travel) means the CC company has won. You can redeem for minimum 1.25 cents per point via Chase Ultimate Rewards (Chase Sapphire anyone?) but one of the best ways is to transfer to partner airlines. There will be a lot of talk about this in coming posts but I will try to simplify it rather than you having to learn a whole different language. Oh, and if you make 1 point per 1 dollar spent, please cancel that card immediately and do 2 seconds of research now.

3. Don't Panic and Know How the Airlines Work

Use Skyscanner, Google Flights, ITA Matrix and airline websites directly to research different routes (Kayak/Expedia/Priceline also work to an extent but I prefer the 3 aggregators mentioned). Flexibility and patience are key in planning a vacation because the airlines love nothing more than people that travel only in the summer and only on holidays because their rates are always hiked at these times (except in special cases). This will be covered at length in coming posts so I won't dwell on it here. The Flight Deal is great if you can be flexible, I will filter through that and repost as many valuable posts as I can but feel free to check yourself.

4. Know Your Discount Airliners

Sure, you know about RyanAir but do you know EasyJet, Norwegian, Air Asia or Wizz Air? If you want luxury, well then maybe this advice isn't quite for you but if you want to go to different cities and for cheap, this is the go to move (trains and buses are also possible but we'll get into that later). This is what makes Skyscanner so valuable to me, it finds many more discount airliners than most aggregators and why would you want to pay $300 for a flight that could cost $50?

5. Make a Route That Makes Sense

No brainer, right? Wrong, so many people do this poorly. Pick locations in close proximity if you're on a short timeline, make it circular or even look into making it an open jaw plan (arrive and depart in the foreign continent/country from different cities/airports on the same or different airlines). This does not mean you have to plan every aspect of the trip before going either, just choose your next step wisely or even stay in one place and experience it to the fullest!

6. Know the Currency

This is a huge one for the budget traveler that many don't think about until they arrive at their destination. Did you know the Euro is almost 1:1 with the Dollar? It was 1.4:1 last year at this time, you should probably capitalize on this. Or maybe just go to Hungary (Forints) or Colombia (Pesos) where beers at bars can easily be less than $1. This also translates to hotel and hostel prices there so just think about that for a second.

7. Shop Around for Places to Stay

This is kind of a no brainer also but ultimately just want to point out that there is way more than just hotels out there. Some know about hostels and consider them too dingy but you'd be surprised how many might even have private rooms for you. If you're a solo traveler, hostels are the way to go for the community. Let's not also forget about AirBnB and CouchSurfing as well. Did I mention knowing your currency? Yea, you can live in a palace on AirBnB in some cases for way cheap.

8. Meet People and Have Fun

Most important point for last but meeting people will always lead you to the less touristy things to do which often leads to more local prices (this means it's cheaper). This doesn't even mean just meeting "locals" but many people are way more traveled than you or I and have very valuable information to share. No matter how much research you do, you will almost always find the coolest things from locals or other travelers. Who knows, in talking to them you may even make some new friends or a new travel buddy. Just let loose and have fun, you're traveling so be yourself and do what you want.