We know it’s only February, but it’s never too early to plan summer travels! This year is expected to be a pretty crazy season for summer travel, even with high inflation and interest rates, so it’s better to get started now. Check out this episode to get our 10 tips to help you have fun, smooth, and affordable summer adventures.
Listen and Subscribe on: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts
Resources
- Finding Cheap Flights: Going (or this blog post)
- 100 Tips for Traveling with Kids
- Life Saving Travel Tips
- Mobile Passport vs. Global Entry
Transcript
Jess: Welcome to the Jetsetting Family Travel Podcast. I’m Jess. And I’m Rod. And today we are coming to you with summer travel tips.
Rod: Okay. I know, I know. It’s just what, February almost March. And there’s still plenty of like blizzards and winter weather advisories, but. As you’re going to find out from our tips, the time to start booking is now.
Jess: Yes. And maybe because we’re in Florida and it feels like summer, it was 88 degrees this week. That we have Summer on our mind, but the summer season will be here. Before you know it, I know spring breaks coming up and April and May are going to fly by and you want to make sure you have a fun summer planned.
So let’s get. First start early, A.K.A. now. Summertime, things book up really quickly. If you wanna have options of a lot of different places or more flexibility on flight fares, I really suggest booking now. I know we’ve talked about it a ton throughout our blog, our Instagram, our podcast. Use Google flights to search flights now. You can put in the dates you want and leave the destination empty and kind of see what your options are at an affordable rate during those June, July and August months. And also know that for summer, it seems like, from what I’ve noticed in our summer planning that we just finished up. That the beginning of summer, so those, if you are in a state that gets out, say in late May, those first two weeks are sometimes cheaper because the northern states aren’t on spring break yet. The same for the northern states that have a late summer start, but they go well into August. Those last few weeks of your summer vacation may be cheaper because the whole country isn’t off at the same time.
So kind of look for those beginning, like those book end dates of your summer travel to see what rates are.
Rod: Yeah, it’s been a really interesting year so far. You know, with the recession, and inflation, interest rates and all that stuff that’s happening. Despite that, from what we’ve read and seen, people are still booking travel and vacations and airlines now, they have less flights available.
Their routes have been cut down, so there’s going to be more competition or crowding or price increases for air travel. So that’s definitely something to consider if you’re thinking that No, I still got some weeks or months or so to start planning my summer. Granted, yes, you can plan it the closer that you get, but also be aware that you’re not going to get either the best prices or the best availability if you choose to delay.
Jess: So the only way you’ll get a good price if you delay, is a few things like cruise lines to offer those last minute pricing. And those sometimes are incredible deals. I won’t lie. It’ll be like if you leave on the cruise in five days, you get a huge discounted price. But a lot of times those are due to last minute cancellations.
A lot of these cruises are going to be sold out this summer. So if you really wanna guarantee you’re going on a trip. I don’t know if that’s the route you wanna go, yeah.
Rod: But in terms of planning now our next tip is really how to find the best discounts. And one of the particular ways is if you’re going into, say, an Airbnb, Jess, tell us about how you can get some Airbnb discounts.
Because she really is a pro at this.
Jess: I love a good Airbnb discount, even as an Airbnb host. I encourage you guys to try to get these discounts if you are going somewhere for say six days. Put your dates on Airbnb at seven days, or if you’re going 12 days, put it at 14 days. You wanna hit those milestone marks of one week, two weeks, or one month.
Because a lot of times you get a huge discount for having those longer stays. So if you stay a week, you might end up getting 10 to 15% off. If you stay a month, sometimes it’s upward of 50% off, and you can actually stay a whole month at the same rate as you could for two weeks.
In hot zones during summer they might not offer that as much, but you never know. Also look for new Airbnbs. When you’re looking at Airbnb, it’ll say new listing. But sometimes it’ll say new listing and Super Host. That means that host has other properties already on Airbnb with great reviews. So even though this is a new property, they’re experienced hosts and you’re probably going to have a great stay.
And a lot of times on a new listing, they’re going to offer a discounted price for the first three guests that book in order just to start getting reviews coming in. I know we did that with Airbnbs as well. And so getting one of those new listings doesn’t have to be extremely risky if that host does have prior reviews, and it’s a great way to get a good discount.
Rod: Yeah, and in terms of other discounts, so for example, hotels. Search a lot of different places, so look through Expedia and see what kind of deals are being offered there. You could also look directly with the hotel. Sometimes you might get the same price as you’re getting in Expedia, but they might bundle in some additional amenities.
Also look into, if you’re doing the credit card thing, look into your points provider. Sometimes you get additional points or either discounted stays just because of the affiliation with Chase or American Express and all that. So in terms of hotels, look into that. Rental cars, similar thing.
If you have loyalty status for a certain one, then book directly through that or look through your points provider to see if you can get a better deal there.
Jess: Our next tip is get creative. I feel like so many people miss out on this part when they travel because I think maybe if you don’t travel often, you don’t know to do this, but.
A lot of times when you’re looking at Google flights per se, or whatever search engine you’re using, and say you want to get to, I’m trying to think, Munich, Germany, you’re going to be searching Orlando to Munich. Well, it might be very expensive because sometimes those search engines don’t look at local carriers.
So you actually might be able to get to Munich, Germany quicker by actually flying straight to Berlin on say, Delta. And then buying a separate local carrier flight from Germany or from Berlin to Munich, or even a train or a bus, which, especially if you’re going to Europe, their train system is incredible.
So a lot of times it’s best to try to get to an actual region. That hub, like search for a flight to that one region, that one hub, and then see price out trains or other local carriers to get to the smaller city you’re going to. And sometimes you can save $400 a person, which if you’re like us, you’re a family of four.
It’s a lot of money. It adds up quickly. So always when you’re doing flight searches, get creative, look up different alternative routes. I usually put it in an Excel spreadsheet and I have it direct one way with a local flight and then one way with a train added on and I kind of price it out and.
We have to, you know, decide what’s the cost benefit of time versus money savings. But you can definitely find some incredible deals by doing like that, especially if we use a site called Going that sends us travel deals. You can look down in the show notes, we’ll put a link there. And they have sometimes crazy discounts.
We just booked a flight for Rod and I’s Trip. It’s actually in the fall, but, it. It’s Jacksonville to Switzerland and it was like $550, which is normally a thousand. But that flight deal came in. And so look for on those sites for just cheap ways to get to Europe or South America and then look for a local way to get to where your final destination is.
Rod: Yeah. And that’s another reason to book early, I think. One of the, the funny things about our trip to Switzerland that we’re planning is last week when we booked it and the price was at about $550, we looked again this week and it’s already gone up. And that’s going to happen in like September October timeframe.
So this is past summer. Travel prices are already going up even for that. So definitely consider, you know, continuing to book early and, really, If you have fall plans already that you’re trying to do, then book them now. That way you don’t have to worry about any price increases or availability and all that stuff later on.
Another thing about being creative is if you don’t have an actual destination in mind, think about not having to fly there or making the journey itself as like the focus of it. So I’m talking road trips where say you want to get to eventually one place and you have flexibility in time, then maybe just think about driving there.
Or you can do something cool like booking an overnight or like a week long train ride that’s going to eventually get you there. But it also stops in different places. That’s something that we’re doing this summer. We’re doing a road trip up the East coast and we have a couple of destinations of places where we want to be, but we don’t necessarily have a specific time or date for when we want to get there.
So right now we’re, we’ve got most of it planned out, but there’s still some days where we’re flexible in terms of if we wanna stay at one given city or location a day or two extra, then we have that built in. It’s going to be fun. I think there’s a different kind of adventure we’re used to just like doing as much as we can to get there in the shortest amount of time possible.
But maybe this time we’re going to embrace the journey a little bit more with this road trip kind of thing.
Jess: The next tip we have is location and timing, guys. So, for us, it’s summer, but that is not the case all around the world. If you head further south, if you are an adventurous person who wants to do a longer trip, you can head south of the equator where they are in winter.
There are some cons of traveling to some places during winter, because depending on where you go, especially if you’re going remote, like we did Patagonia in fall going into winter. Mm-hmm. Places start to shut down. So that’s something you need to keep in mind. But if you’re in a bigger city in winter, you can actually get some really good discounts by visiting some places in their winter, which is our summer.
So that’s something to consider. Maybe head down to Buenos Aires, Argentina. You can head down to Santiago, Chile. There’s a lot of different cities that actually might not be as high priced during that time.
Rod: Go to Australia. Yeah. South Africa.
Jess: Yeah. So we’ve done that in the past. We visited Patagonia, probably not at the most optimal time, but it was still amazing and worth it to us.
Another area you might wanna look at to get better rates are ski areas. Yes, ski areas can be more exciting in the winter, but they still offer a lot of fun in the summer. Sometimes they have mountain luging. You can usually swim. You might be able to go to a lake, so sometimes ski areas aren’t as badly priced in the summer as they are in winter.
So it’s a great time to kind of check out those locations as well and get some fun hikes in.
Rod: Yeah, there’s places that turn like. When they have the big ski jump area that they use for the Olympics, they turn that into this massive pool where you slide down the big ramp and you’ve like fall into this pool.
Water parks I think are starting to come up around different areas that usually have wintertime kind of activity. So definitely look that up. Could be a nice, unique destination for a summer trip somewhere else. In terms of the next tip is look into kids camps and other activities in the locations that you’re going to.
So if you’re planning on spending more than a week or a couple of weeks, if you have a remote job and have kind of flexible arrangements, but your kids are outta school and you still need to find time to work, then. Look into kids camps at the destinations that you’re going to. A lot of different areas have things for STEM, things for the arts.
They have physical activities. You have pools that are open and beach clubs and things like that that you’ll be able to take advantage of while you’re there.
Jess: Yeah, we’ve definitely taken advantage of that and it honestly is great because it gave Rod a night time to ourselves as well. We put Santi in a Surf Camp in Costa Rica and by doing a little extra research, what I loved something to consider is I found him a local surf camp where he was actually with all the local kids.
One I saved, I think like 70% off by doing it that way. Two, it had him with Spanish speakers, and I got to meet some local families as opposed to like the touristy camps, were a lot more expensive. And he didn’t really get that immersion. So try to find like a local camp if you’re traveling. It gives your kids a fun activity, a way to meet friends and you some time alone.
Rod: And similarly to that, the next tip is if you are going to be spending weeks away, look into either house care or pet care options. So if you have a pet instead, or if you don’t have a family member that can watch your pet and you’re paying money to send them to a kennel, one of the things you can look into is something like trusted house sitters.
That’s a service online where you can find somebody to come and stay at your house and take care of your plants, take care of your pets while you’re out, and it won’t cost you any money out of pocket. I think there’s a small fee to use the service itself, but to have somebody instead of paying money to a kennel or, or something like that, then you can just have somebody come over.
That person can enjoy their trip. Or even if you are flexible enough and you want to go house sit for others or pet sit for them. Look into being a host on that service. So that you can essentially have free accommodations at places if you’re willing to be flexible with the location or if you want to you know, not have to pay as much.
Granted, you will have to take care of the house and the animals where you’re at, but from what we’ve heard, it’s a very worthwhile thing. And that’s something that we’re looking into doing while we’re out this summer as well.
Jess: Yeah, our house will be listed on there. Going to look for a good sitter because we plan to be gone for six weeks and that saves us a lot of money not having to board our puppy Simba.
Mm-hmm. Wasn’t very smart of us to get a dog as a travel family, but we love him. And I think he enjoys being home more so. Yep. The next thing is holidays. So there are holidays, especially if you’re listening from the US during summer, 4th of July being the first one, I think of.
Rod: Memorial Day. Labor Day.
Really like the book ends of summer with the 4th of July in the middle. Yeah.
Jess: So when traveling in the summer, you’re going to find cheaper rates if you either, one: straight up avoid the holiday week in general. Especially if you’re heading to places with large celebrations. It’s going to be way more expensive to be there on these large holidays.
Or the other option is, if you don’t mind missing out on the festivities, is to travel on the actual day. So sometimes if you actually travel, like on 4th of July itself. A lot of people want to be hunkered down to celebrate that day. So you can actually get a pretty good discount, depending. It’s the same for Christmas time.
Rod: Yeah, Christmas time, Memorial Day itself, labor Day itself, or even as Jess mentioned, the week after Labor Day or the week before Memorial Day, when people aren’t necessarily planning on taking a trip yet. Those are times where you might be getting better rates or availability at the places that you’re looking into going to.
The next tip, and it’s something that Jess kind of hit on already, but that’s looking into alternative airports. And say, if you live like us, we live in Jacksonville. The Jacksonville airport has a limited amount of places that they fly to compared to other airports in our area like Orlando. Or even Miami if we’re looking to go international somewhere.
So one of the places or things that we do is we look into what the price difference would be if we were to fly somewhere from Jacksonville versus from Orlando. Or like Jess mentioned, instead of, say you’re planning to go to New York City, flying into an airport that is an hour, maybe hour and a half, two hours, away from it, you might get a better rate for actually flying there.
Or you might have a better seat selection, it might be actually better timing for you to get there. So if you’re willing to be flexible, look into those alternative flight options. I think that’s a setting you can also put into Google flights, where you can just look at the price differences between one airport to another or just have two different tabs open so that you can check that out.
But ultimately, yeah, if you have that flexibility and you want to save a couple of bucks or you want to get there in a better way, then look into these alternative airports.
Jess: Yeah. And I, for one, don’t like layovers as much as possible, just because I feel like layovers leave you at, I don’t know, in airlines, what would you say, mercy. Whether you’re going to make your flight, if it’s going to be delayed or canceled. So something to consider as well. It’s not really a flight cost saving measure, but maybe a time saving measure is if we can get a direct flight from Orlando that’s two hours away versus having to stop from Jacksonville.
We sometimes choose that, even if it’s the same price, just because having a nonstop takes out a lot of possible complications that might delay your ability to get somewhere.
Rod: Yeah, lowers your risk for sure. And I think that’s a good lead in to our next tip, which is all about ways to stay healthy while traveling.
I think it’s really interesting now that. It seems like we’re post pandemic and not a lot of Covid requirements and testing rules that we have to worry about this year. But with that, there might also be opportunities for people to, to get sick. So when, whenever you’re going out and about, one of the things we recommend always take Emergen-C with you.
That’s like the little powder that you put into your drinks so that whenever you’re on a flight, your vitamin C is boosted and your immune system is operating as kind of peak performance so that you don’t mess up your travel plans because one of you in your family got sick. Or as soon as you get there, you get sick because you got it from the flight.
Another thing is still, one thing we’ve seen is during Covid and the pandemic, the airlines would hand you a thing of like sanitizing wipes. I don’t think that’s happening as much anymore. So if you wanna make sure that you’re still staying clean and sanitized, either take some sanitizer or take some sanitizing wipes with you.
Super easy to carry. Now they have the little travel versions that you can use. And make sure that you’re keeping your immune system boosted and ready for your vacation.
Jess: And this one, if you’re a parent, just to keep in mind when you’re traveling, is always pack snacks. We are the worst. Our kids have a habit.
It’s like their airline day treat is that they get to go and raid the little markets at the airport. If you’re trying to save money. I do not think that is the best strategy to go for because they’re going to price gouge you once you get to the airport. So maybe instead, we should try this summer babe, to hit up our local Publix with the kids and let them pick a few snacks to put in their backpacks or hit a Costco run if you’re going on a road trip.
And have those snacks handy, because flights nowadays don’t love to give out things, although we do love that. Is it Delta that gives off the Biscoff cookies?
Rod: Oh, yeah. I don’t know which airline it is. I think it’s multiple of them at this point.
Jess: Oh, it’s so good. Yeah. But a lot of airlines aren’t giving snacks anymore, and it’s going to be way more expensive to buy it on the flight or at the airport.
So pack those snacks so that your kids aren’t complaining that they’re hungry.
Rod: Yeah. And something that we’re also terrible at is we usually buy a water bottle at the airport, since we can’t bring it in. Bring an empty water bottle with you, one of those, reusable ones. We, we have a drawer full of them, and I don’t know why, we just don’t think of taking it with us, and that’s something that we’re going to do next time.
Jess: And the final tip of the day is take advantage, if you have credit cards, of the perks. A lot of credit cards nowadays will reimburse you. Maybe it’s the Wi-Fi fee. If the airline doesn’t have free Wi-Fi, some of them will reimburse you for your luggage fees. Some of them offer free, access to clubs at the airports, but sometimes you have to actually sign up for that.
It’s not like, not all of them, it’s just your credit card gives you access. So before the summer season starts, I would definitely look at the credit cards you have and make a list of what potential perks you might be missing out on, so that you can save money and leverage those perks. I know for us, we love American Express and Chase Sapphire as like our two big travel cards.
We might start open a new one this year, if there’s a good bonus entry point. Yep. Yep. But sometimes even the ones, if you’re military, a lot of times they waive the fee. So military members, thank you for your service. Check that out. If not, sometimes the fee’s worth it. I know for us, we love getting into some of the clubs at the airports. If we have long layovers.
Rod: Yeah. When you really add it up, I think some of these cards, like the Amex Platinum, it’s like $500 a year. Right? But what you get with that, you get $200 reimbursed of airline fees. So if you designate one, airline, say Delta or Southwest, then anything that’s associated with that airline up to $200, whether that’s baggage, I don’t know if the ticket itself, I don’t think the ticket itself counts.
It’s like amenities for it. But that will get reimbursed. You also get other reimbursements. You get sometimes like free Uber Eats or free Instacart subscriptions. You might get upgraded loyalty status for a Marriott or for a rental car, so you get the perks there. What we’ve seen is if you take advantage of those and you get like the 3X points on certain types of purchases that you make.
So if you’re diligent about paying off your credit card so you’re not paying the ridiculous interest rates on those cards. And, you want to be pretty responsible. You’re getting the, the points and the perks that will very easily, outweigh that annual fee.
Jess: Yeah, so those credit cards definitely look it up before you go because you can have huge savings there on your trips, especially if you’re flying.
Rod: Yeah. Yeah. Ultimately, regardless of whether you booked early or late, last thoughts are to manage those expectations. It’s from what we hear going to be another busy travel season in the summer. So when you go to the airport, arrive extra early. If you don’t have TSA pre-check, look into getting it.
That can save you some time in the lines. If you can pack lighter and maybe take carry-ons only, which I know as a family it’s like very hard or almost impossible to do if you’re going on a long-term trip, but ways that you can lighten your load so you’re not paying as many baggage fees. Or you’re skipping the counter altogether.
If you’ve got your tickets on, you know, your mobile phone, then think of things like that. Have some flexibility built in so that if there’s any delays or there’s unexpected changes to your itinerary, then you can have the patience and the energy to get through it.
Jess: Yeah. So we hope that these tips help you have an epic summer of travel, and hopefully find some good deals so that your epic travels aren’t a huge hit to your bank account.
And we’re excited. We hope that you guys can send us some messages and tell us what your summer travel plans are, because we always love finding ways to connect with all of you. You can reach out to us at [email protected]. You can find us on Instagram @thejetsettingfamily, and you can also find us at our blog, www.thejetsettingfamily.com.
Every time I say that, so much . It’s a lot.
Rod: It’s a lot. Or, if you really enjoyed this episode, then you can always subscribe to the podcast on whichever platform you’re at, whether that’s Spotify or Apple Podcast and all that stuff.
Jess: Be sure to read our show notes because this week we’re going try to link some of the blog posts we have on how to maybe book cheaper flights.
We have a blog post on that and a link to going the one that we use sometimes to find good flight deals. So, we’ll try to put some of those resources there in case you want to go back and reference them as well.
Rod: Yeah, for sure. So once again, thank you for listening to this episode. Always reach out if you need anything from us, but until next time, Happy Jetsetting!
