Vacation Planning
Posted by Gail | Filed under Smart Shopper
I will be on vacation next week. I’ll post Monday, but then y’all won’t hear from me again until the following Monday.
Remember that this week’s prize for sending in your “I Need Ideas” post is a Moonjar gift. It will be awarded by random draw from the entries received between Monday and Friday this week for the Success Posts, so you only have two days left to qualify.
There are two types of vacations that I love: the sit in the sun and do nothing vacation, and the hit a big city and do it all whirlwind. I think it takes about 10 days to do the first type of vacation right. For the second, five days are plenty.
My family’s travel bug is not as voracious as some others’ but we’ve done our fair share of gadding about. Alex and I have been talking about heading to Africa at some point, and she raised an interesting option the other day. She said, “Mom, how about we hook up with one of those organizations that builds schools or stuff and go with them.” Those trips are usually about a three-week commitment, but to do some good while seeing another part of the world just sounds perfect to me. Something to look forward to for when I get fired!
Whenever I go on a vacation I always start with a budget. How much in total am I prepared to lay out for this trip? Then I look for ways to save within various categories so I can have what I want for the amount I’m prepared to spend. Sometimes it means looking carefully at where we’ll stay. Sometimes it means thinking about how we’ll eat. Mostly it’s a way to stay conscious about the spending so it doesn’t run rampant while we’re away from home and less grounded.
As I spend on my trip, from booking the travel to allocating money for the odd shopping excursion, I keep a running total, comparing it to my spending plan. If those Broadway tickets end up costing more than I anticipated, I look for savings elsewhere to balance the costs. Maybe a late breakfast and early dinner means only two meals a day (with a fruit snack in the middle). Maybe we can get breakfast thrown in at the hotel. Maybe we can spend part of the vacation with friends and save on accommodations while we catch up on old times.
I don’t delude myself about what the trip will cost. People make this mistake and then end up surprised when they come home to an empty bank account or a racked-up credit card. Yes, I will have to pay out-of-country medical insurance. Yes, there will be the cost of cabs to the hotel. And along the way, the children will want to buy something. So I give them an amount they can spend and anything above that they have to pony up themselves.
I’ve found interesting ways to save money depending where I’m going on vacation, as I’m sure y’all have too. From having the right credit card so you don’t have to buy car rental insurance, to using points for flying and hotel stays, there are myriad ways to save. And I’ve used online resources to research accommodations and activities in the places to which we’re headed. The Internet is also home to all sorts of great deals and specials. You can comparison shop using online specials to decide when and where to travel and when it’s the right time to buy tickets. Sites like lastminute.com also offer great discounts. Booking accommodations and travel early can also give you access to special rates. If you end up finding a cheaper rate after you’ve booked, a lot of places will be more than happy to match the new price you found.
Remember, wherever you’re headed, your vacation is meant to be fun and relaxing. Put in a little time up front on planning and you’ll be able to go – and come home – stress free. Knowing what you want goes a long way to getting what you want!
July 30, 2009 at 8:24 am
When I went to England and Paris this spring (after working really hard to save) I decided to go cash. It was familiar to me as I had been using the jar system for a few months.
It worked very well. People kept telling me to just put the cash on my credit card and take my card, but the idea of using cash is to have a visual of when you are spending money.
I had a great time, bought some thoughtful souvenirs (not silly throw away t-shirts or caramel-filled London bus tins)
I didn’t skimp, but I didn’t toss my money around like I would have if I had been using my credit card.
I came home with enough money to pay for the one item I did put on my credit card (a lovely water color of an English cottage)!
It was a relief to not be worrying about the incoming cc. bill and I knew exactly how much I had to spend while away…no justifying purchases.
It may not be the ideal system for backpacking or when traveling in less safe countries, but it was effective on this itinerary.
Have a great holiday, Gail. I don’t know what I will do all week before the paper arrives….Free Cell, I guess.
July 30, 2009 at 8:34 am
Hope you have a terrific holiday, Gail! You definitely deserve it!
We are currently saving up for a trip to Disney World next year – either late April, or October 2010 – just not sure when yet. Our two girls are excited about it, and are saving their allowances up too – they have a special savings just for Disney. We want to do the trip right – so that when we go, we don’t have to say, “No, you can’t do that – we can’t afford it.” We have a special savings account for the trip (ING), and every payday we put in $50 to it, plus extra when we have some for it. We are really looking forward to the trip, and even though it would be great to drop everything right now and just go, the anticipation of the trip is exciting too. Besides, not having a big credit card bill to return to is worth the wait!!
July 30, 2009 at 9:12 am
Enjoy your holiday!!
July 30, 2009 at 9:26 am
My family is also planning for a trip to Disney, although in 2012 or 2013. Because we want to have our “dream” vacation, we have to plan so far in advance so that we can safely save the money to do it (and also be able to have enough in other savings to justify spending a large amount on 12 days). We’ve set up a Low, Medium, High budget, so that we have concrete amounts that we’ll need, and be able to see which standard of vacation we’ll want. It also allows us to plan, week by week, how much we’ll need to save in order to get our vacation. It’s so much easier to NOT spend money when we know that every dollar we spend over budget is two dollars away from Disney!
@Brenda: I highly suggest going in October. My husband and I had our honeymoon there, and the crowds were super low, the temperature was great, and we walked on most of the rides at Magic Kingdom
July 30, 2009 at 9:28 am
Have a great time!!!
My holidays consist of camping trips on the weekend :~)
July 30, 2009 at 10:44 am
Just wanted to give a tip regarding the extra cost of car insurance when renting. If you own a car you can have an endorsement added that allows you to save on having to pay the insurance when you rent. In Ontario it is called an OPCF 27 and is very inexpensive. Your policy document or getting a letter from your Insurance company and taking it to the rental place is all that is needed.
This is a huge savings.
One thing to remember…..If you go this route and get in an accident in the rental it will go on your insurance record.
Not sure what the rules are in other provinces but I am sure they have something similar.
July 30, 2009 at 10:46 am
To Gail……Enjoy your holiday.
July 30, 2009 at 10:52 am
Have a fantastic holiday, Gail. We’ll miss you.
July 30, 2009 at 10:58 am
For those looking to go to Walt Disney World check out http://www.mousesavers.com. And also look into using Airmiles for hotel, Marlin travel vouchers, passes to the parks, car rentals and such.
We go to WDW almost yearly and often have enough Airmiles for all the park passes and airfare. Often we only pay for the hotel and food.
July 30, 2009 at 11:07 am
One thing we do almost all the time on vacations, now that we are a family of 4, is stay at a place with a kitchen–sometimes hotel suites, sometimes private vacation rentals, like you find on vrbo.org. The accommodation costs are higher, but we more than make it up in what we save not eating out 2-3 meals / day. We usually eat out once per day–it is vacation after all–typically lunch (less expensive than dinner, and often just as filling). We started doing this more out of necessity, as with my younger son’s allergies eating out was very challenging (3 trips to the emergency room in his first 15 months!), and were pleasantly surprised to find we all liked having this ‘down time’ of meals at our home-away-from-home….and it saved us money to boot!
Have a wonderful holiday!
July 30, 2009 at 11:25 am
Hi Gail:
Hope you have a wonderful vacation.
I have used http://www.travelzoo.com over the past few years and have gotten some great deals on our hotel rooms in particular. You can register for a weekly top 20 update. Everything from car rentals, vacation packages, airline discounts, cruises and hotel rooms.
July 30, 2009 at 11:26 am
Have a great vacation Gail! We are heading out too. We have had some great vacations the last few years by staying in Ontario and bartering with family members. With 4 young kids the thought of sleeping all in one hotel room and eating out every meal does not appeal to me! Cottages and condos on the water with 2 bedrooms and full kitchens are much more my style.
Our best resource this summer hasn’t been the internet but the library. I picked up a couple of sightseeing/daytripping books for the area we are going to. Eventhough we have been there a few times before there are lots of things we have missed that I found in these books but not on the tourism site. Another great resource has been talking to people that live in different towns. Lots of municipalities seem to be marketing tourism to the locals. We just spent a whole day in another town with free museum tickets and a free beach.
We are also planning a trip to Disney but I find the prices a little hard to swallow. There is so much natural beauty right here in Ontario it bugs me to spend so much to see man made stuff. I know, I know… it is the “magic” of Disney the kids will love.
July 30, 2009 at 11:44 am
To our surprise a third addition will be added to our family in late December… hopefully a Christmas gift! As we had not planned on getting pregnant and we have been very agressive in paying off our consumer debt we have not saved up for a Husband and Wife weekend getaway.
I desperately want to goto Jasper for our anniversary in September, stay at a hotel, do some hiking trails, maybe a riverboat tour, and a spa treatment… with no kids. We have not been without our children since we became parents (5 yrs now) and I feel like it will be at least another two years or three before we feel we can leave all three and have a weekend away.
As we can drive to Jasper I figure the weekend would be about $1000.00. That is 1K of which we haven’t saved. We still owe 5K on consumer debt.
The good angel says “Christy stay on course.. your doing great you’ll have all your consumer debt paid off before baby comes; and won’t that be a relief! Maybe a few extra date nights with hubby will do the trick”
The bad angel says “Its will be another 2 or 3 years before you can feasibly have a chance to get away, you deserve a weekend with your wonderful husband, its only 1K and you know you’ll pay it off”
Good angel replies ” That kind of thinking is what got you into this consumer debt to begin with”
AHHHH… is what I say. Any ideas anyone? Please don’t say that I can have a weekend away before baby turns 2, I’ve ben a mom long enough to know that I personally would not feel comfortable leaving baby and I would just fret and worry the whole time I was gone. My youngest is almost three right now and I just now feel okay with the idea of leaving her for a couple of nights.
I would love to hear your ideas anyone?
July 30, 2009 at 11:50 am
@Cassandrasl: Thanks for the tip about October. That was our first plan – think we will stick with it!
July 30, 2009 at 12:01 pm
Gail, have a wonderful time whatever you do on your holiday!
I second Alex’s idea of going on a trip to Africa! I recommend Tanzania – the Serengeti, the Ngorogoro Crater, Mount Kilamanjaro and the country is peaceful due in large part, I believe, to Julius Nyerere the first President of Tanzania. However, I don’t know what kind of working holidays are offered in Tanzania.
Wanda
July 30, 2009 at 12:49 pm
I recently wrote an article about how to save on a family vacation. Check it out!
http://womeninthegreen.com/?p=129
I hope you have a great trip Gail and tell us all about it when you get back!
July 30, 2009 at 1:22 pm
Christy-
Congratulations!
It sounds like you really need this getaway, AND that you may somewhat resent your goals if you don’t get it. Remember that the all or nothing mentality of debt repayment can make us feel deprived and retaliate. My question would be, how much would this trip push your debt repayment goals? Do you need to buy anything new for this baby, or do you have everything you need already?
You still have a month or so. Is it feasible to tighten your budget to save even $200 before you go? What kind of interest rate will you be paying in order to make this getaway happen (assuming you’d be putting that 1k back onto a credit card) These are all questions I would look at carefully before making the decision. Will you be mad at yourself for going and pushing your debt-free life to January or Feb?
Also, is your income going to change drastically when you go on mat leave? It may be harder to get that debt paid off if your income is going to change significantly once baby comes.
Is there anywhere else you could go that wouldn’t be quite so extravagant? The weekend trip you described sounds magnificent, but what you kept getting back to is needing time with your hubby, and needing a break from being mom for a while. You could reasonably achieve this without going spending so much. Yes, a spa and riverboat tour would be wonderful, but it’s more about just getting that quality time in with your dh, isn’t it? Maybe start looking into some other options of getaways that would be a little less extravagant.
What does your husband think of the idea?
Good luck on your decision!
July 30, 2009 at 1:30 pm
We are each putting aside $100/pay for the next few months for our road trip/kayak trip across Canada (well, BC to Ottawa and back). Can’t wait!
July 30, 2009 at 1:33 pm
to christy..
I say go for it.. 3 under the age of 5 will be a handful-I have two and it’s a CHALLENGE to finish a conversation let alone get a whole weekend away so I can’t imagine with 3- and you are probably right about feeling guilty to leave the baby-don’t forget the added guilt from asking someone to watch 3 for a weekend vs 2..:)
that being said maybe you can reduce the cost of the trip –
1. Use airmiles to get gift cards that you can use for the trip- they have gift cards for restaurants , gas and spas as well..
2. If you or your hubby has benefits that allow massages you could get a massage at the spa to get your spa experience and then get your benefits to pay for it (as long as they are a registered massage therapist)
3. Could you consider this your christmas presents to each other as well (early but hey whatever works)- and then defer some money from your Christmas budget to pay for the trip?
4. Pack some food/snacks from home so that you could have breakfast/lunch in your room? Maybe the hotel offers a small fridge in the room..
and then make some extra money to cover the cost- any stuff you can take to the kids consignment store or sell on Kijiji? maybe offer some babysitting in the evenings/wekends for a few weeks..
I say go for it but I guess I mean go for it with a little creative juggling..:)
July 30, 2009 at 3:44 pm
Diana,
I’m with you all the way on cash. I have travelled solo all over the world (I sign up with small tour groups). I’ve invested in some clever money belts and holsters and I travel with cash and traveller’s cheques. It truly guarantees that I won’t spend more than I alotted for the trip and it’s wonderful to come home to an empty Visa bill.
July 30, 2009 at 4:54 pm
We are a huge Disney fan family. We go once in awhile, but only when the deals are good and the lines are short. We never stay in a higher end hotel on site, because you spend so much time in the parks and it’s just a place to lay your head. We also only go when you recieve the extra waterparks for free and the dining plan for free. That is usually in September (aka. hurricane season). With the dining plan you are able to book meals at the nice hotels. Since we have kids we pick the character breakfasts so that they get to meet/eat with them and not have to wait in line at the parks to snap pictures. My favorite is a princess diner at the Grand Floridian (only a favorite when it’s free with the dining plan:)
At first my husband was spectacle about the magic of Disney…but when you get there and realize that they everything at the parks is made to spark your imagination and is all very ornate.
And please…that the magic is there especially for the young…don’t wait till they can “remember” because by that time they will understand that everything is not real.
Another tip is to make a rule that you can’t ask for any souveniers all day but if the child remembers by the end of the trip we try really hard to head to Downtown Disney where they sell everything and find it.
…my husband jokes that we will end up retiring in Florida and I’ll end up working for Disney
July 30, 2009 at 5:31 pm
Christy~
CONGRATULATIONS!
Tough question though! I think I’m leaning more towards a ’staycation’ at home with hubby if either of your parents could look after your two children for a weekend so you can enjoy your Anniversary. Check out things around town that you could do together that would cost less. There are spas that have a ‘couples’ plan – I booked his and her pedicures for our Anniversary one year – included…they served snackies along with a flute of champagne. It was in a private room so hubby would not be embarrassed ;o) Then we went out for a nice dinner – right across the street. He commented that I certainly always have interesting ideas LOL.
I only suggest this because I know Gail has said that you should live on your hubby’s pay and bank yours till you go on mat. leave. The $1.000. and your accumulated pay may be a godsend down the road.
Only you and your hubby know best. Whatever you decide – be guilt free!
Have a fabulous vacation with Malcolm and Alex Gail! We’ll miss you here, but just think how much more out of debt we all will be by the time you get back! Be safe!
July 30, 2009 at 6:37 pm
What a timely post. Just last night I was search sunwing vacations for Feb 2010 because I want to be able to fly right from my city rather than toronto. Great prices even with taxes $1300 all inclusive 7 days with flight at a 4 star resort in Cuba. When travelling to foreign countries, besides money, people have to remember to check to see if you need visas, or exit money, like Cuba is 25 convertible cuban currency. Some countries are on the hot list for certain diseases. you might need a vaccination or medication in the case of malaria. Those things can cost money before departure. if travelling during winter weather, cancellation insurance can be handy. Out of country insurance is a must, we take our health care system for granted, it’s there, and there is no immediate out of pocket expense.
I should say this year when I got my tax refund, I opened a higher interest savings account and deposited that for my trip. I’m about 50% to my costs of my trip excluding extras.
July 30, 2009 at 9:29 pm
saving to get myself to Venice in 2 yrs.
in the meantime, i’m enjoying the sights and sounds of home.!
July 31, 2009 at 2:24 am
Have a wonderful vacay, Gail!
Wishing you and yours ONLY the best!!!!
July 31, 2009 at 12:11 pm
Christy:
How much can you save between now and then? $1000 is a lot for a weekend in Jasper. Try the B&Bs. Many are a lot cheaper than hotels. Decide which activities you really need to do. You could have a lot of fun with $500.
August 16, 2009 at 5:07 pm
When budgeting the costs of a trip remember to account for the expenses you will NOT have because you are away on vacation. Last summer our family of 4 spend a fabulous month in Europe (taking advantage of every deal, discount, freebee, and coupon I could locate – but that’s another whole story). I added up the cost of a month of groceries, summer camp, commuting costs, etc etc and determined that there was at least $3000 we would not spend because we were away. These reductions were applied to the cost of the trip. It was still an expensive trip, but making that mental adjustment certainly made the numbers a lot easier to swallow.
August 18, 2009 at 10:34 am
Christy
Is your heart set on Jasper for any particular reason? My husband and I just returned from a week long “cheap” vacation in B.C. and avoided Jasper and Banff. By staying in the smaller towns we saved quite a bit, we comparison shopped on-line before going.
We went on-line to Google Earth and planned a tentative route, then pulled up hotels/motels along the route and checked them out on line. Someone else mentioned Travelzoo, their top 20 list (emailed automatically every Wednesday) sometimes has great deals for Jasper or Banff.
I vote for taking the trip if at all possible (everybody needs some life balance) but trying to shave some money off of the bottom line. Take snacks, split meals in restaurants (servings are often huge), take advantage of every coupon you can. You can apply for a Travel Alberta card online (I think the website is literally travelalberta.ca) which will make you eligible for discounts like two for one admissions at some museums, etc. Also go to the travel information centres to pick up information on what is happening in the area – quite often there are coupons in the tourism books. Can you travel mid-week rather than the weekend? That in itself can make a huge difference.