As I detailed last week, we took a trip to Grand Cayman in January. Over the course of a few posts (which I'll spread out a bit) I'm going to detail what we did, give some tips for making the best of a trip to the island, and throw in a few pictures for fun. I'll list the events by day and put in tips where they seem appropriate. How We Roll Before I get into specifics, … [Read more...]
Our Trip to Grand Cayman
After we canceled our cruise, we began looking for Caribbean islands to visit. I still hadn't given up my desire to go to the Caribbean in early 2018, though I was wondering what our options might be since we were starting to look in mid-October. I was thinking we might have slim pickings by scheduling at the "last minute". As I said in the initial post, we wanted to … [Read more...]
Save Money and Time by Packing Light
I have been doing a lot of traveling lately. We didn't travel much the first part of the year as people came to see us. But the second half seems like we've had one trip after another. Here's where I've been since June: Took my daughter on her senior trip to Seattle and Portland (June) Flew with my daughter across the country to college (CO to VA, August). We … [Read more...]
My Results with Travel Hacking
Last week I posted The Keys to Travel Hacking where I listed seven steps I consider to be the travel hacking process. Today I want to share my results and thoughts on travel hacking. Let's do this by first going through each of the seven steps outlined in the previous post. Step 1: Set a Goal I had the fairly vague goal of "save money when I travel." This hindered me … [Read more...]
The Keys to Travel Hacking
In August I asked whether or not travel hacking was worth the time and effort. I got responses on both sides but I'd say most were in the "yes" camp. Good thing since I had already started my travel hacking adventure. :) More on that next week when I'll share my results so far and what I think of travel hacking in general. Today I want to cover what I consider to be … [Read more...]
Costco Travel Saved Our $10k Vacation
This is going to be a long and winding story, but stick with me as it will be both personal (and hopefully fun) as well as finance related. I'll try to cut through the story by bolding some of the key money learnings, so those of you who just want the hardcore personal finance stuff can focus in on those. Bottom line: This post is about how Costco Travel 1) saved us from … [Read more...]
Help a Reader: Is Travel Hacking Worth It?
Here's an issue a reader needs help with. In this case, the "reader" is me. :) Now that we are close to 1) having both kids far away from where we live (we are in CO and will have one kid each in VA and LA) and 2) once we have no kids at home, we're going to travel a bit more, I've started to think about travel hacking. Between the four of us we'll be frequently jetting … [Read more...]
Visiting Seattle and Portland
One of the things I want to do in retirement is to travel a bit. I don't want to live out of a suitcase or to be gone for a couple months at a time (I like my routines at home too much for that) but there are some places I want to visit. As I do get out and see the world I'll be sharing my experiences with you -- what we did, how we liked it, the costs, tips, etc. We … [Read more...]
What Vacation Plans Do You Have for 2017?
What's the use of having lots of wealth unless you get to live it up a bit, right? Well, today's topic is going to focus on just that -- enjoying what we have earned, saved, and invested. In particular, how we all choose to spend some of it on vacations. I thought I'd post our plans for this year and you could do the same. Great way to spend a day, right? They say that … [Read more...]
