What makes a successful trip? For me, it’s when things go smoothly, and you’ve done enough preparation to ensure that even when things come up you can easily handle them and go back to enjoying your holiday.
If you’ve traveled before, you probably did some things you ended up regretting and noticed that other things didn’t exactly go to plan. Maybe you chose the wrong airline and had a terrible flight or cheaping out on your hotel room meant you listened to people give their drive-through orders all night.
Here are my best travel tips to make sure you have a successful trip:
Travel Light
If you want to make your trip nice and easy, traveling carry-on is the way to go. If you’re traveling anywhere from a few days up to a week (or longer if you’re a packing professional, you can easily only take a carry-on sized suitcase and skip the time spent waiting for your luggage at the baggage carousel and make it easier to check in and out of hotels.
If you’d like to freshen up your clothes mid-trip, take a small pack (even a zip-lock bag will work) or clothes detergent with you and a travel washing line or some thin rope so you can wash your clothes in the bathroom and hang them up to dry.
Take Travel Insurance
The sad fact of travel is that sometimes we get sick or hurt overseas, we miss a flight, lose our bags or get mugged walking back to our hotel. The simple answer is to purchase travel insurance so you have the peace of mind that if anything happens you’ll be covered and won’t be out thousands of dollars in medical costs.
Focus on your health
The weeks leading up to your trip can be stressful and you may find yourself low on sleep as you try to get ahead in work and organize last minute details. But it’s important that you focus on staying healthy, take your vitamins, exercise, eat well and get as much sleep as possible so that you’re feeling well when it’s time to go away.
When you’re traveling it can be easy to get sick, since time zone changes, jetlag, pollution, and unfiltered water can all do a number on your health. Take some cold and flu medication with you and ensure that you’re only eating and drinking from places that seem clean and have a lot of people working there.
Book in Advance
We’re spoiled for choice these days when it comes to booking in our holidays, and companies like Monster.Travel offer discount holidays to many different destinations throughout the year. Once you know when you can get time off work and get away from it all, spending some time online and signing up to deal sites and being ready to book quickly if you spot a great deal can give you more cash to use while you’re actually overseas.