Saving Money While Traveling Mindfully
Recently, we were asked by a magazine to submit some travel money-saving trips. We don’t know if any of our tips made it into the publication but we thought we’d also share them with you. These are in addition to the typical ones we always talk about - local food, eco-friendly tours (this means no helicopter tours, ATV rides, etc.), local lodging (this may or may not be less expensive), and other items we’ve mentioned before. Now, we’re past our halcyon, couch-surfing days of youth so none of our tips are going to tell you to hitchhike or stay in cheap hostels. And none of these tips are exclusively for eco-travel but they do follow eco-travel guidelines overall.
- Bring your own sunscreen and pain relievers from home. In tourist-heavy areas, stores charge an arm and a leg for those items.
- Most of us don’t normally eat a big breakfast – like the ones you’d get at a sit-down breakfast joint on vacation. Skip paying for breakfast and bring with you a box of granola bars – eat one each day with a cup of coffee. Instead of spending $10 per day on breakfast, you’ll pay $3 for the whole week. This will also help you avoid the dreaded “vacation five pounds!”
- Make sure to read up on the tipping culture of your travel destination. If it’s not expected and maybe even viewed negatively, why tip 20% at a restaurant or for a cab ride? Of course, if it is the norm, don’t be stingy and give the rest of us a bad name.
- If you’re walking around sightseeing, hiking in the wilderness, or just lounging on the beach, you need to hydrate. Instead of buying bottled water every day, invest in a water filtration bottle that you can fill with tap water. You’ll save money in the long run and you won’t be contributing to landfills with all those plastic bottles.
- Find out from a trusted source what the average cab ride fare should be for where you want to go. Then tell the cabbie you need to get to “such and such place” and will pay that amount. That way, there will be no surprises or cabbies who try to charge you an exhorbitant fee.
What are your tips to save money while vacationing?
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Gloria CasinadiRosa, Borgo di Vagli . Borgo di Vagli said: RT @casinadirosa: Saving Money While Traveling Mindfully http://ow.ly/1Z2SX [...]
Hi,
This is an interesting list. But instead of bringing pre-packaged granola bars along with you for breakfast, why not seek out the local market (the large produce markets, not supermarkets!) where you can almost always buy some very affordable sort of baked good and local coffee? It will cost about the same as the granola bars, be free of plastic packaging, you won’t have to carry it around with you. As an added bonus, you’ll be getting out and interacting with the locals and putting you $$ into the local economy. It’s a great cultural experience as well - taking breakfast with the locals.
Erik - thanks for your comment - great ideas!