Planning a trip for the
first time can be a bit overwhelming.
Where to go, how to plan
for visas, how much money to take, what’s the weather there like? These vital
questions can make you almost rush to travel agent so you can get a ready-made itinerary. But don’t do that - not only does it cost more, but once you find
your way around it you will learn that “planning” a vacation is almost as
exciting as going for one!
Here is a list of my five
favorite websites to make your life easier and prepping more fun :)
AirBnB
With
Airbnb you can rent out extra rooms in people's houses or even their entire
apartment or homes. Not only does it save TONS of money, especially when
travelling to Places like Europe, but also gives you an opportunity to interact
with locals there. Since the owners are generally nice enough, they help out
with the best places to see, how to get there and even give their
recommendations! It is also the 5th most popular online travel
booking site.
Booking.com
This
website is killing it. I am a sucker to this one and have made almost all of my
travel bookings so far through it. Booking.com has a huge selection of hotels,
apartments in nearly every city in the world and you can choose to look through
3, 4 or 5 star properties depending on your budget. Another positive is the
fact that you can book ahead and their easy cancellation policy makes sure you
never have to worry in case your visas don’t go through or travel plans/dates
change.
Trip Advisor
It’s
literally the world's largest travel site, offers advice from millions of
travelers and a wide variety of planning features. I’m a listed member and love
giving reviews of all the places I’ve been to so travel aficionados like me get
an opportunity to witness the best any destination has to offer. It’s also the
best place to narrow down your choices of hotels, tickets, food options and
itinerary.
Lonely Planet
Apparently
people say lonely planet has lost its charm and there are many “other” websites
you should move on to. Firstly, that’s not true. I always log on to this
website for all information regarding the unknowns. Let’s say you’re going to
Indonesia, for example, the weather, when to go, what to see, what festivals
are there year round, what currency to
etc. Glancing at these prevent me from going to separate links and
figure out the same details. Doing that makes my head go round and want to stop
the planning process! So stick to lonely planet.
Cobone and Groupon
Both of these daily deal sites offer travel discounts and I can
personally attest to the fact that they offer some great deals! I recommend reading all of the fine print before purchasing
any of the discounted travel deals, however, because sometimes there are
blackout dates or flight stipulations or any number of possible clauses that
could affect your vacation but overall these sites offer some fantastic
discounts.
Hope this helps!
The Sassy Explorer
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