At the beginning of the week I shared some web stats and plans for a Million Reader Giveaway.
I only wish I had realized the traffic milestones earlier for this blog, I could have reached out to my favorite travel providers and asked them to help me celebrate… with promises of riches beyond readers’ wildest dreams elite status and points.
Instead, I’ve had to get creative with the sorts of things I’m able to offer on my own.
So here’s part one of the Million Reader Giveaway!
Prizes will include:
- (5) Milepoint premium packages (1000 United miles, Hilton Gold status, National Car Rental Executive status, and more)
- $200 Gift Cards
- Amazon Gift Cards
- Miles in your choice of several programs
- Amazon Gift Cards
I might even throw in elite status and a club membership with an airline. There will be at least 15 prizes in this round, and probably more in round 2!
It’s a bit of a grab back of most high value prizes, half of which will be given away randomly and half will be give away based on quality or usefulness of entry.
Here’s all you need to do:
- leave a comment in this thread sharing either your best travel-related tip or advice, or the most useful thing you’ve learned from this blog.
- Since quality is key (as half the prizes will be given out based on quality), you may enter as many times as you like.
- All entries for this round must be submitted as a comment to this post by Sunday 5pm Eastern.
Thank you very much — in advance for your tips and for reading and sharing along with me, all these years!
Now enter away…!
Best,
Gary
- You can join the 30,000+ people who see these deals and analysis every day — sign up to receive posts by email (just one e-mail per day) or subscribe to the RSS feed. It’s free. You can also follow me on Twitter for the latest deals. Don’t miss out!
My best advice as of this minute? When you fly out & leavie your car in airport parking, make sure you have your key with you when you return!!!!!! Sigh. Take it from me…..
– Lonely & stranded at a parking lot at TPA, waiting for the locksmith
Don’t forget to plan your credit card applications, and always leave a little wiggle room in case a great offer comes along. I always space out applications between my wife and I so that one of us could quickly apply for a limited time offer comes along (like 75,000 membership rewards for Amex Business Gold one-day offers).
The best advice I got from this blog was to not just sign up for the right credit cards, but use the cards in the right places at the right times. To help me organize this I have printed out small stickers on each card to remind me which one is x5 gas, x2 restaurant, x5 office supply. With so many cards I often mix them up and this helps keep me straight.
When traveling with children it is always a good idea to play up the adventure of the current trip. Not only will your child be more engaged with what is going on, but you will find that it helps you to stay in the moment as well.
It is so easy to take travel for granted or not fully appreciate what you are seeing in that actual moment. Children are always living in the moment, so by engaging them in a way that is meaningful and fun, you are able to share memories in a unique and wonderful way.
If your stuck in your hotel on business, go out and get a decent meal, don’t just veg out and order room service, you deserve to get out and enjoy some good local food.
Check your hotel’s gym for bottled water (or a water cooler). It beats paying the overpriced bottles in your room/in the pantry, and beats having to run somewhere. Sheraton is great about having them in the gym.
Internationally, use a Charles Schwab debit card to withdraw cash from ATMs, an American Express platinum card for large purchases due to their great fx conversion rates, and the Sapphire Preferred with EMV chip for everything else to eliminate bank conversion fees and earn maximum miles!
Do not always limit your flights searches to origin-destination. Know which routes and which hubs have more competition and therefor lower fares. It is often cheaper to route directly from a different airport and make your own way to that airport. It is also sometimes cheaper to add additional legs to itinerary that you have no intention of utilizing.
Write your contact information on a sheet of paper and put it inside your suitcase on top of all of your clothes so it’s the first thing someone sees when they open your luggage. That way, if your luggage tags get ripped off or lost, an airline employee will still be able to contact you and get you your luggage.
Concur. I often find prices of hotel rooms and cars go down!
Along with regular clothing, I take throw away clothes on vacation. Whenever underwear is losing its elasticity, socks are getting stretched out, a shirt is a little frayed, etc., I put it aside to take on vacation. You can wear it once and throw it away. Your luggage gets lighter and you have room to bring back anything you may buy as souvenirs.
Always have a backup battery for your phone. From keeping you entertained on the flight, to handling emergencies, you can’t do it on your phone without power.
For international traveling ALWAYS find out how far and how much a cab should cost to get to your hotel. Don’t get taken advantage of by shady cabbies like happened to me once. Plan ahead!
Have fun traveling and try something out of your comfort zone!!
The best thing I’ve learned here is that the best/cheapest way to book award flights on a given carrier isn’t necessarily using that same carrier’s miles!
One very important thing I have learned from following Gary’s blog, is to never give up and never accept the first volley of “Nos” when seeking award seats!
Thanks for letting me know I can fly up front instead of being relegated to coach!
Always make sure to have some extra clothes in your carry-on bags since you never know whether or not your checked bags will make it to your final destination.
Lay out the clothes you think you’ll need on the trip and cut it in half. For my wife and daughter, the never heeded advice is to cut it in half again.
Same for the shoes.
SkyPesos and BA Avios are not worthless! Your greatest tip was to use those miles to fly partner airlines instead of Delta or BA Metal. I live in Los Angeles so business class to Australia on Virgin is a great deal with SkyPesos. And business class to Hawaii using Avios is only 50,000 miles. That’s just 1 credit card sign up bonus!
If you need to charge your phone and don’t have an outlet near, plug the USB into your laptop in an emergency. I was in a cab from the airport – opened my laptop, fired up a picture slideshow to prevent the computer going in “sleep mode”, and let it charge.
Best tip for me was way back in May.
Let go of name brands. Certainly Fox, Payless, and others will often have lower rates than Avis and Hertz. The question is whether the lower rate is worth the extra hassle. The lesser known brands may be off-airport in several cities, so more of a hassle to get to the car. And they don’t all have the streamlined checkout and checkin processes that you can at least sign up for with Hertz, Avis, Thrifty, and National — I don’t ever want to stand in line at a rental counter if I can avoid it. Do take the advice though of checking out Sixt which is just getting going in the U.S. but is a common brand in Europe, and offers some high end vehicles at a lower price due to less consumer knowledge of their brand.
The elevator trick. I’m not sure if it actually works, but it worked every time I tried in Vegas at NYNY and I was on a high floor. Hold close door button, press your floor and don’t let go
Always ask rental car company for a car with bluetooth. Not only will this improve your safety, navigation, and music listening experience – it often lands a newer car as well.
Use your smartphone to take pictures of all your passport & travel documents and save these on a cloud based email (hotmail, yahoomail or gmail) so that you can retrieve these in case of loss or theft.
Signing up for credit cards not only allow you travel anywhere for free but in the long-term will increase your credit score as well =) win-win
I’ve found out that if you’re dressed nice and act nice at the airport , you can be bumped up to business class on your flight. That happened to me flying from LA to Sydney. That really did help!!
Check kayak.com against the hotel brands website for best rate guarantees
Upon arrival — one of you go get the rental car — one of you go get the checked baggage — the rental car person picks up the checked baggage person, and there’s no need to deal with dragging bags from here to there!
I honestly didn’t know about double dipping with points/miles until I read your blog!
My best tip would be to always pack at least a day of essentials in your carry on if you plan on checking your bag in. If your luggage gets lost, you’ll at least be able to change clothes once.
The best thing about this blog is the updates when credit card bonuses are raised. Nothing like a new credit card!
I also learned that sometimes it’s cheaper to book two separate one-way tickets on different airlines than it is to book roundtrip on one airline.
Always travel overseas with a credit card that does not charge foreign exchange fees.
Have the chase credit card trifecta: sapphire, ink, freedom to maximize ultimate reward points
Travel tip:
Put a couple plastic supermarket bags in your
carry-on. Some locales ban them, so it’s
good to bring your own; but they are
also useful for ‘containing’ any messy/wet
items.
Tge best travel idea is to read view of the wing
The post that stood out to me most so far is the one about calling the airlines to book awards miles. If you don’t get the answer you want, try again (but praise the agent for trying). Often times the agent will “magically” find the route and fare you are looking for.
The IHG cash and points trick has saved me $100’s when staying at HIEs!
Tk status match, and Chase S Preferred. Thanks!
I’ve found that going away on long trips, it’s sometimes hard to imagine what clothes, shoes and accessories to bring. So a few nights before, I pick out everything I would like to bring and put together outfits,( while interchanging clothes with other outfits). I then take pictures of them, so I’m not wasting my time while on the trip, trying to figure out what to wear.
Simple rules to prevent travel weight gain: a) Focus on proteins to fill up faster – avoid sweets. b) Eat only one full meal if you go “all out”. c) If you eat more, exercise, even if it’s walking around the city.
To prevent liquid spillage, remove the cap, put some plastic wrap over the bottle opening and put the cap back on. Then place the liquid containers in a zip lock bag. Helps keep the rest of the items in your bag dry – unless there’s a downpour.
CSP, Ink and freedom cards for the bonuses that transfer to United!
I learned the ins and outs of Bluebird thanks to you. 🙂
When traveling abroad,OR domestically, take a wad of $2.00 bills. They are generous tips for good service, whether for housekeeping, or any other of the polite and gracious acts folks provide. They are appreciated and the relatively novel nature of them often evoke interesting response.
When you manage credit and card applications for multiple people (like a spouse or significant other), stagger your applications for identical products year-to-year so that you effectively have a longer no annual fee period (assuming the first year has a waived fee). My wife and I do this with the Amex SPG cards. Since there are personal and business versions, we’re able to always have one account open. Since Starpoints are my favorite points/miles currency, it’s helpful to always have one for non-bonused spend or recurring expenses (bills and monthly charity donations).
Download an Offline Reader app for your smart phone – it’s an easy way to save webpages such as Wikitravel. This is especially useful if you are in another country with limited phone/wifi access.
Take 20 mins to search viewfromthewing for deals, tips, tricks before making ANY travel plans!
Two pieces of your advice for novices–get the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card and “hang up, call back”–allowed my wife and I to turn a last-minute work trip into am extraordinary anniversary vacation to Hawaii, complete with business-class tickets. Keep up the great work, Gary.
Download an offline YouTube app for your smart phone or tablet. This is a great way to queue and cache hours of free entertainment for your flight.
Use tools like google my maps to organize your must-visit places ahead of time. Combine with a smartphone with an international data plan to help you easily navigate on arrival.
I used to be a serious coffee drinker and could never find a decent nor cheap cup of coffee overseas. While in NZ, I found that they didn’t know what half & half was. I was going crazy! Lol. Always bring powdered creamer and instant coffee packets with you, so you’re not cranky on your trip!