With the dawn of 2014 comes a whole host of new travel challenges for the coming year. Some will be easy to overcome with a little ingenuity and extra digging. Other challenges aren’t really challenges at all – they’re simply a new reality that travelers will have to grapple with heading forward; causing them to look to other areas of their vacation planning budget to scale back and save money. This week, we take a look at some of those realities and help you navigate those waters in a way that can help you travel affordably and enjoyably.
Let’s jump right in!
Higher airfare is just going to be a thing.
Unfortunately the days of big corporate consolidation in the airline industry has been a long time coming and with that continued consolidation will come less competition. When there’s less competition, prices are bound to go up.
To make trips more reasonable, people are going to have to shift their thinking and seek savings in other areas of their vacation planning. That means entertaining the idea of less expensive hotels, sight seeing venues and yes – saving on rental cars.
For longer trips, forget hotels.
Websites like airbnb have listings to hundreds of rental rooms in countries all over the world. By subletting rooms and apartments, you can pay pennies on the dollar compared to what you pay for hotels. If you’re open to a little more work, you can save a substantial chunk of money to offset other, more expensive areas of your budget.
Keep up on currencies.
Especially when it comes to international travel, be sure to try to keep up on exchange rates. If you’re looking to travel to an exotic country, choose those where currencies have taken hits like Japan and/or Bali. In those places, your dollar will go a long way compared to other, less exchange-rate friendly countries. In the United States, you’re simply going to have to get more creative with your budget.
