How To Have A 5 Star Holiday On A 2 Star Budget

by: Tukshad Engineer

Travel, Holiday & Flight Discounts - Getting The Best Travel Deals Online

Love to travel? The international traveller has never had it so good in terms of being able to afford to see the world at discounted prices. Sometimes there is a huge over-supply in holidays and this leads to a slash in holiday prices. Below you’re going to learn just how to spot cheap holidays as well as the best places to find them, particularly if youre based in the UK.

Companies That Offer Regular Travel Bargains

Let’s start off with some online companies that have been known to offer good travel discounts. It’s best to keep checking these sites regularly as good offers will get snapped up almost immediately.

http://www.travel-travel.co.uk/latedl.htm - If you can travel within 30 days it’s possible to find some incredibly cheap last minute fares including flights and accommodation. I’ve seen 7 nights including flights and hotel to Ibiza at prices of just 99. Of course Ibiza is not everyones cup of tea - which is why you’ll find equally good deals to Edinburgh, Alicante, Palma, Faro and several other desirable locations. I have also seen 7 nights at a 4 star hotel including flights to Majorca and the Belearics at just 130.

http://www.bargainholidays.com - Very similar to Travel Travel but also includes a host of cheap city breaks.

http://www.holiday-net.com - Again, several travel deals. Also includes properties for sale from abroad.

http://www.airparade.co.uk - Just discounted airfares and holidays to several locations.

http://www.teletextholidays.co.uk/Homepage/Home.aspx - Look around for some excellent last minute offers from hundreds of holiday providers. Some real gems available.

http://www.lastminute.com - One of the more well known online providers but these guys really do provide some very good last minute deals.

http://www.france.cottages.co.uk - Good French packages including cottages and ferry crossing at discounts.

http://www.ferry.co.uk &

http://www.seafrance.com- Good for inexpensive channel crossing deals.

Worldwide - For great deals on world wide flights only offers try these:

http://www.instantflights.com

European

http://www.cheapestflights.co.uk

http://www.just-flights.co.uk

Discount Hotels

It’s possible to pickup some good discounts on hotels all over the world. Try the following places for European stays in particular:

http://www.ibishotel.com/ibis/index.html

http://www.hotels-europe.com/france/reims/clarine-form.htm (European Hotels)

Also checkout the Formule 1 series for cheap stays in France.

Saving Money On Travel Insurance

In the UK, you can save money on travel insurance simply by picking up discounted travel insurance from the Post Office.

Some Travel Secrets To Get You The Best Prices

Like most things, there are many tricks available to secure the lowest possible fares for flights, hotel and all forms of world travel. Every year there is a huge surplus in flights and holidays. Holiday companies have to estimate how many holidays will be demanded for any particular location and time - they never get it just right. Every year there is a surplus on certain holidays and flights, and if all places haven’t been filled by the final few days, you can pick up some really dramatic discounts.

Flights and accommodation are priced according to supply and demand - and this supply and demand follows a certain pattern. Once you know the situations where supply exceeds demand, and you know the right time to buy, you can save big time. A good example of this are fly by drives to the States - typically mid-November is when the cheapest fly drives are available and you can pick up deals for under 150 for 14 days (I’ve seen them as low as 99). Keep an eye on teletext holidays if you’re interested in this type of deal. If you do not mind coming back on Christmas day you can also find some stunning deals available. This may not be ideal for family trips but certainly for the lone traveller it’s a worthwhile option to check out.

How to spot cheap deals - With a little know how you can really figure out which flights and holidays are likely to be put on special offer as late deals. It all boils down to supply and demand - A good example of this is the late availability deals on teletext. 7 Nights in Lisbon, flights and self catered all included for 79 IF you waited a few days before departure. This was initially offered at 149 a month or so before. But how is it possible to know that the price would come crashing down to just 79? The secret is to contact the company offering the deal and ask them how many seats are left. In the Lisbon case there were just 14 seats booked 5 days prior to departure - there was no chance of this holiday being booked by departure date and the result? A massive discount offered to those who booked at the last minute. This is how the holiday business works and now that you know this you can make incredible savings just by making a few calls on holidays you’re interested in.

Car Hire & Day Trips should always be booked outside your holiday booking company otherwise you’ll almost certainly pay a premium. Usually there are specialist shops in most town centres that have been setup to provide car hire/day trips and you can save quite a lot of money using them.

London Airport Parking - Parking in London & other UK locations can get very expensive. Try London Airport Parking and Airport Parking UK for inexpensive parking options.

I really hope this helps all of you track down some incredible bargains.

Happy Travelling

Tukshad

There are two ways to save money traveling. The first way is to get the best deals on the specific things you want. There is a limitation to this type of approach though. If , for example, you find the lowest price on the best hotel in Honolulu at the height of the season, you will save money, but still have a very expensive vacation. Trying to get exactly what you want, or what you think you want, will generally be an expensive proposition, in travel and in life.

There are two ways to save money traveling. The first way is to get the best deals on the specific things you want. There is a limitation to this type of approach though. If , for example, you find the lowest price on the best hotel in Honolulu at the height of the season, you will save money, but still have a very expensive vacation. Trying to get exactly what you want, or what you think you want, will generally be an expensive proposition, in travel and in life.

Be A Travel Opportunist

The other approach is to be a true opportunist. This will be difficult for some of you, and entirely unacceptable to others. Nonetheless, the travelers who get to travel the most, go to the widest variety of places, learn the most and do the most, are the opportunists. This will be true until you are so wealthy that you have no monetary limits.

The first time I went to Ecuador, I went there because it was cheap. If it wasn’t, I would have had a great time - somewhere else. The trip lasted a month, and cost $1045, which included airfare and even the $130 fee for a guide to take me to the top of glacier-covered Mount Chimborazo.

I cut the cost by taking a bus from my home in Michigan to Miami, and back again when I returned from Ecuador. The round-trip ticket cost $158. The round-trip flight to Quito from Miami was only $256, because it was a courier flight, which meant I signed for some luggage (car parts), and could only take carry-on luggage.

Never did I feel deprived, or bored. I had a great time, eating wherever it was cheap and clean, doing all sorts of inexpensive, but interesting things, and traveling across the country to climb Chimborazo. I also met and fell in love with my wife Ana.

How To Become An Opportunist Traveler

Can you drink rum at a dollar per bottle, instead of your favorite beer? Can you eat chicken instead of steak? How about visiting the free sights first, and dancing in the street festival instead of the disco?

Being an opportunist means you’ll have just as much variety, and probably almost everything you want - eventually. You just have to stop trying to get exactly what you want exactly when you want it. If the guide that took me up Chimborazo hadn’t dropped his price from $200 to $130, I would have spent $2 for a bus and gone hiking on El Altar, another great Andean mountain. That would have left me with enough money for several other minor adventures.

More Secrets Of Cheap Travel

Plane Tickets: My wife and I were planning a trip to visit family in Ecuador. The cheapest airfare from Traverse City, Michigan to Quito, was $1720. Out of curiosity, I checked Miami to Quito, and it was only $404. Airfare from Traverse City to Miami was $300. Book two separate flights and save more than $2000! The discount sites aren’t set up to search in this way (yet), so you have to do this on your own. By the way, the whole six-week trip, which we took in 2004, cost $2400, including losing $100, and being robbed of $174.

Food: Whether traveling here or in other countries, it is usually cheaper to buy some healthy snacks in a grocery store, rather than eat every meal in a restaurant. When you do eat in restaurants, it can be cheaper to to order individual items on the menu from the list of appetizers or side dishes. You also may get more variety in that way.

Accomodations: For a long trip, you may want to rent an apartment in an interesting city. We did this for two months in Tucson, for about $600 less per month, compared to even the cheaper motels. Watch for hotel coupon-books in gas stations. The coupons will often save you $10 on a room you would have stayed in anyhow. If you have a conversion van or RV, you can camp a couple nights a week, like we do, to save on motels. We love the hotsprings we’ve stayed at, for a $3 fee to the BLM, instead of $40 for the cheapest motel in the area.

Travel Expenses: Do more and travel less. It is often the traveling part that costs the most, due to the cost of gas, convenient fast food, and expensive hotels you are forced to pay for when you just can’t drive any further. So if you find a place with a reasonable motel, and a lot to do in the area - stay for a while!

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