Thrifty Fares: How to fly on a budget 6-9

 

6. Utilize price drop protection on sites like Orbitz or FlightNetwork.

7. Be flexible.  

Flexibility on dates and airports within your destination city will result in cheaper fares.  We were able to do this more before working full time.  Especially when my first job had zero (gasp) vacation days for the first full year.  Now, since we try to maximize our time away while saving vacation days, we end up paying more in order to fly at specific times.  On weekends, for instance, we pay more for a flight that leaves after work hours on a Friday and gets in late Sunday night.  If we had all the flexibility in the world, we would leave on a Tuesday or Wednesday (leaving in the middle of the week tends to be cheaper).  If you are willing to wake up at the “butt crack of dawn” for the earliest flight, that will save you some mulah sometimes as well.

Flexibility can also include volunteering to take a later flight in order to receive a voucher for a future flight.  Most of the time in my experience this involves staying another night before that next available flight so this is not always an easy decision but it can work!

The season you choose to visit will also determine pricing.  Who wants to spend thousands of dollars to visit Hawaii when it is rainy and blow-your-house-down windy? Catching flights to your destination right at the beginning or end of the low season can be cheaper not only for your flight but for hotels and other expenses along the way.

i.e. Fares to Europe usually go down between August-December.  Australia/NZ and South America are less popular during the summer months because it is their Winter.  NYC is most popular around Christmas Time.  You get it.

*Try Priceline’s “Name your price”

8. Look at the price on two one way tickets before purchasing a roundtrip ticket!

9. If you’re going a long distance that usually requires a stop, look for 2 separate flights.

i.e. For an Orlando to LA trip, see if two flights (maybe Orlando to Houston and Houston to LA) are cheaper than the one Orlando to LA flight with a stop.

Thrifty Fares: How to fly on a budget 1-5

Unfortunately, I do not have a single secret website or trick to instantly find cheap flights.  Flight prices fluctuate randomly and often and I cannot figure out any sort of pattern.  My dad has more miles than I can count and even agrees that there is no way of knowing for certain if that flight you’re interested in today will get more or less expensive by tomorrow.  However, I can share the tools we use to save as much as possible.

1. Use miles!

 Pick your favorite airline (or just the one with the best rewards) and start traveling with them consistently.  Make sure that each trip you take you add those miles to your account.  Some airlines make this easier than others.

Another way to accumulate miles is by getting a credit card with miles as rewards instead of points or $.  We much prefer this option because you can get a ton of miles just from signing up and then additional miles from setting someone as an authorized user and then even more for spending a certain amount within different time frames.  Then, of course, you earn miles as you spend.  We were shocked by how quickly our miles racked up.  American Express and Chase (United Explorer) both have pretty great programs.

Our last trip to Europe cost a grand total or $255 total for both of us (this just included the airport taxes because both our flights were FREE).  We already have 3 domestic flights or 1.5 international flights saved up for future use 🙂

2. Consider purchasing a vacation package.  

Flights are much cheaper when you purchase a package with _______ (could be hotel; could be car rental; could be a combo with tours).  Honestly, some of the absolute best deals I’ve seen are on Groupon through these great discount travel services.

3. Set up flight alerts.  

Nerd alert; I get SO MANY travel related emails daily.  I love it.  When I’m waiting at the Dr’s office or going through and checking my social media alerts, I take a quick glance at travel sites.  I probably spend a good 15 minutes a day checking out the deals sent to my email.  This is critical for knowing if you’re getting a great deal – you have to know what the average price is to compare.

You can go to tripadvisor or other websites with airfare deals and set up alerts to be sent to your inbox whenever flights to your top destinations go under your preferred amount.  That’s the beauty of technology, folks.  You can let these sites do most of the work for you; you just need to check your email and compare every once in a awhile.

I will do another post soon with all the travel sites I receive emails from so that you can sign up too!

When you get an alert at the price range you’re looking for, I say book it!  I’ve found that the times I keep waiting for a price to go lower I end up kicking myself for waiting too long and then the prices are sky high again.

*I also keep travel folders in my email account and move good promotional emails to those folders for future reference/comparison’s sake.*

4. Pack light!  Save on luggage fees!

5. Don’t pick your destination – pick the deal.  

If this is possible for you, it will save you a ton of money!  Brandon and I are open to going almost anywhere.  However, we do have our “top spots” we’d like to get to first.  Right now I am keeping my eyes open for an incredible deal – even if it isn’t number 1 on our list.  I happen to be pretty flexible about this because I will go anywhere at least once BUT if you are at least able to pick a continent or a region rather than a specific country or city, you can find a much better deal than if you had a narrow itinerary.  For example, instead of looking for flights from Orlando to Bangkok incessantly, search for affordable Asia trips and you can likely find a great package that includes airfare to Bangkok (or once you see other cheaper deals to another country you may decide to go with a new plan).

*Keep in mind that most packages are based on double occupancy*

*Make sure not to fall into the package TRAP*
What I mean by this is… make sure you cross-check this seemingly amazing deal by searching the hotels ratings and price on another website (I cross check everything on Trip Advisor).  For example, if you can’t find a flight to Dubai for under $1000 but you find a package to Dubai including hotel for 3 nights and you’re thinking “this is too good to be true” – make sure it’s not by looking up the hotel’s reviews.  It could be a crapshoot and therefore not worth the flight savings.

If you go with the whole “don’t pick your destination, pick the best deal” concept, here are some of the absolute cheapest international trips to take right now from Orlando according to my “research” from cheapest to still cheap:
Ireland (holy cow there are always good deals to Ireland), London/Paris tour, China (Shanghai, Beijing, Xian multi city tour), Mediterranean cruise out of Rome or Barcelona, Caribbean cruise

Here are the cheapest domestic flights I’ve found consistently from Orlando: DC, San Juan, NYC, Allegiant Air through Sanford, and Ft Lauderdale or Miami of course

Where to eat in Munchen

WHERE TO EAT IN MUNCHEN

Munich is a dream for a culture-leech like me.  There is every type of food you can imagine.  Walking down the street perpendicular to our hotel, there are Turkish, Vietnamese, Italian, Japanese, Indian, AND Bavarian restaurants all within a few hundred feet of each other.  It seems like a food festival all year long.

Bakerei Ziegler

I had a yuuuummy poppyseed pastry and Brandon had a chocolate croissant for breakfast for less than 3 euros.  Nice quick stop.  You can ask for them to be heated up (this is not as common as it is in the states).  Pastries in Germany are between 1-2 euros.  A croissant is abut 1,20 euro.

Paulener

This is a local brewery and they have many restaurant locations serving their affordable beer along with their not-so-affordable food.  Their stinking water is 5euros which is more than their beer.  They don’t serve tap water.  Don’t you hate when they don’t serve tap water?  I’m not sure if this is across all of Germany but at least in this restaurant there is a price per stinking breze (pretzel), not just for the basket of them.  What I mean by this is that, much like Italy, they stick a plate of carbs in front of you and automatically charge you a “bread fee,” if you will.  In both Italy and Germany you can deny the bread in the first place and avoid the charge but often times people/tourists so not know this when they first get gipped.  I assumed there would be a fee knowing this from reading Rick Steve’s tours and such; but, I was surprised when the waiter handed us a check and then went back and brought us a new check when he noticed we had grabbed another pretzel from the basket.  What’s so funny about this is that no matter how many WE eat, they’ve already wasted them.  So why not have a flat fee?  Oh well.  We enjoyed splitting the pretzels and a beer.  The beer was amazing; we had the Paulener “domestic” dark beer.  One of the best I’ve ever tried.  Good atmosphere; okay service; crowded outdoor seating area so we stayed instead; clean restrooms; soccer on TV 🙂

Coffee Fellows

Seems to be the Starbucks of Munich – although there are plenty of Starbucks locations too.  Good espresso, whatever service, size small is rather small (almost a short in Starbucks terms).

Burger House

This is one of the best restaurants in Europe.  It is rated highly on Trip Advisor for a very good reason.  I can’t believe more people don’t come here.  I expected it to be a tourist trap due to the high rating but it is actually a local place; I only heard German around the restaurant and it is a TINY joint.  Only about 30 people could squeeze in there at full capacity including the bar.  I think there are only 6 tables plus bar seats.  One of the servers was Scottish so thankfully she spoke English – she was the sweetest.  All of the staff was very kind and accommodating.  One of the servers gave me sparkling water and charged me even though I asked specifically for tap water but it was my own fault for not continuing to clarify since she did not know English all that well.  I should have asked in German since I was the visitor.

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Sidenote: Always clarify that you want still/tap water so that you don’t get sparkling!  No matter how casual the restaurant.

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We asked about the makeup of their customers; they said that tourists did definitely eat there sometimes but that it is mainly locals, especially for lunch.  Brandon says this is the BEST BURGER HE HAS EVER EATEN.  I really enjoyed my veggie burger but I couldn’t go that far.

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He had the Vato Laco burger which had guacamole, jalapeños, lettuce, tomato, a high quality fresh patty, their special sauce, and bacon.  The sautéed veggies, if you have those on the burger you order, and the bread is just smothered and/or toasted in butter.  The sauce is surely not made with good health in mind either.  The veggie burger was a flavorful falafel with cooked onions and mushrooms, lettuce, tomato, and their basili rum sauce.  That was the only vegetarian option but there were a handful of unique burger options, onion rings, chili cheese fries, and hearty side salads to choose from if you want too.  They have Nutella cheesecake and two other desserts.  We just got the burgers and tried a local beer, Tegernseer Dunkel Export, which was also very good.  23 euros total.  Great meal, excellent service, and decent price for Munich.  The location was great, too, because it happened to be a 5 minute walk from the hotel; I didn’t even realize when I put it on our “must do” restaurant list before getting there.

Augustiner

Several locals recommended that we make our way to Augustiner – they said it is the best brewery in Munich.  This was another one of our favorite meals out of the entire trip.  I had the potato leek soup and the mushroom risotto.  The risotto was fantastic and it was very unique – we are used to having risotto in little rice-like pieces but this was rolled up in a big ball covered in sauce.  The sauce tasted like an out-of-this-world cream of mushroom soup.

This place is so unique because it is the biggest restaurant I’ve ever seen.  It seriously goes on as far as the eye can see – and all outdoors.  There is a huge dining hall indoors but they do not utilize this during the summer months unless it rains all day.  I can’t imagine what this place is like during Oktoberfest.  It was covered in people.  And yet we still ate in a normal amount of time and our food was spectacular and hot.

It was pricey but they give large portions so it’s perfect if you are able to take home leftovers for the next day.  Hotels there don’t generally have refrigerators but if you are staying in an apartment (which I always recommend) this may be an option.

Train Station Food!

I had smoothies at the juice stand a few times at the main station.  They were $6 or so but very fresh and it was the healthiest option around.

I also had pastries from a variety of vendors throughout the station and they were all about the same.  I prefer to have any kind of pastry heated up but none of them had this option.

I had a pumpkin seed vegetarian sandwich at the first vendor on the right when you walk in.  It was incredible and so cheap.

Surprisingly, prices at the station were not much different than other local eateries.  Usually we notice a big change at airports and stations.  The water was actually cheaper at the station’s version of a convenience store (immediately on your right when you walk in) than on the streets.  We are always looking for cheap/free purified water in Europe – hot commodity in some places.

*Tip: Hop around to a few different vendors first before buying – the exact same treat can be a much different price even just 30 feet away.  They can’t trick me 😉

Brats! This was Brandon’s go-to all throughout our time in Germany.  It was definitely the cheapest option for lunch.

Dallmayr

Dallmayr is like the tiny Harrod’s of Munich.  Same feel with tons of pastries and other goodies; pleasing to the eye; however, it is cramped and overpriced.  Enjoyable to get a quick view.  If you’re not claustrophobic that is.

Frankfurt Airport Bakery

I loved the industrial vintage theme and absolutely everything looked delicious.  I had a tomato mozzarella sandwich toasted and a latte.  Yum yum yum.  Okay service.