Trip Inspiration
- Pinterest: I am sure most of you reading this are familiar with Pinterest. I love following others with wanderlust like me to explore new places without having to leave my computer. If you don't know who to follow, Pinterest makes it easy to go see pins based on category, so click on Travel and do some exploring! It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words, so each pinned picture opens up a new world of possibilities. Don't believe me? Check out my pin boards and see if you don't catch my wanderlust!
- Fodor's Travel Today's Departure: If you are not a subscriber, I highly recommend this daily email from Fodor's Travel. I look forward to this email every day, as Fodor's always manages to showcase a new destination or somewhere I've been in a new way. Check out today's departure:
Trip to Porto, anyone?
- Other Travel Bloggers: Another great way for travel inspiration is to find some travel bloggers to follow. I use all different social media (twitter, instagram, etc) to follow some of my favorite travel bloggers on their own adventures. Oftentimes, they are people like me, and I trust them for guidance and honest opinions.The Blonde Abroad was the first blogger I started following because of her awesome guides to Greece and other destinations around the world, and my most recent follow was to A Lady in London who has all kinds of great posts for those wanting to explore London and the surrounding areas.
Booking a Flight
- Google Flights: Google is amazing. Just saying. I am not surprised that they managed to create my very favorite search engine for flights. Unlike other search engines, they give you the best flights (shortest flight time, cheapest prices) based on prices posted directly from the airlines. Other search engines might show cheaper prices, but they are including third party dealers who aren't always trustworthy to keep your flight and ticket prices. I much prefer purchasing my flights directly from the airlines. Google flights allows me to search the best prices available using a calendar tool, then links me to the airline where I am able to purchase a ticket at that price. It also has some cool tools like "Explore Map" which allows you to see flight prices from your destination to other places around the world at a certain date using a map. It also allows you to save certain flights, then watch how the prices change over time. Google FTW!
- Hopper: This incredible app has found me some pretty awesome flight deals in the past. If you know the destination and dates you are interested in, you tell the app to watch the prices, and it'll send you a push notification when there is a really awesome deal available. Hopper will give suggestions based on past data on when to book, and let you know if you should wait for a better deal or book now. When planning a trip, I get super excited when hopper sends me a notification on a new travel deal!
- Airfarewatchdog: Hopper is great when you know what specific dates you want to travel, but Airfarewatchdog is the best at finding deals in general. I have a whole list of places I want to go, but of course with a limited paycheck and vacation days, I can only go on so many vacations a year. I put alerts on all the places I am interested in going, and Airfarewatchdog will email me when there is a great flight deal to any of those destinations. They are especially great at last minute deals, but will also email when an airline has a deal coming up for travel during a certain season to your specified destinations. Just note that a lot of the time you have to act fast to get a certain deal, before the airline takes it away again!
Booking a Hotel
- Tripadvisor: This website is my top pick for two reasons: one, it is one of the largest review sites out there; and two, it aggregates prices from many different booking sources. Unlike other websites which just show their own prices on hotels, Tripadvisor will give you the price for booking with them, directly with the hotel, and at dozens of other deal websites like hotels.com, booking.com, and Priceline. How great is that?! I also love using TripAdvisor to discover activities and restaurants in the area I am traveling, because of its huge collection of reviews.
- Guide books: In the day and age of the Internet, I still find guidebooks to be a great resource. Extensive research has been done, so I have come to trust the hotels recommended in these books. Also, guidebooks are great in international destinations where I do not use my cell phone, so I am not so disconnected from the outside world. Guide books come in all different styles and sizes. I suggest going to your local bookstore and do some browsing to see which might fit what you need. Be sure to check the date published to make sure you are getting the most up to date information possible!
- Airbnb, Vrbo, Homeaway: Sometimes, a hotel is not the right option. In expensive cities and places I am planning to stay a while, I will often choose to rent an apartment instead. These websites are great resources when planning a trip. I suggest sticking to options with multiple reviews to make sure you are getting what you see. Another fun feature of renting someone's place is that the host will often give suggestions from the perspective of a local. I have used all three of these websites with great success, and definitely suggest trying it out in lieu of a hotel at least once!
These are just some of my favorite tools to use when planning a trip. What are some of the tools you like to use?
