Budget Travel’s 10 Best Undiscovered Locations

by Neil Woodburn on

It’s that time of year again when Budget Travel reveals its Best Places You’ve never Heard Of.

Every year the editors of this fine magazine interview 10 travelers and ask them to “reveal the places they’ve recently discovered.” The underlying theme here is that these are very cool places which most people have never heard of before, but may some day become popular tourist destinations when word gets out.

True to form, nine of the 10 suggestions this year are places … I’ve never heard of! The lone exception is the city of Wroclaw, a rather nondescript Polish town I visited 12 years ago and found exceedingly boring. Things, however, have apparently changed — at least according to traveler Walter Lowry, who touts the city as having the “prettiest plaza in Poland and perhaps in all of central Europe.” He also applauds Wroclaw for its fine shopping.

As for the other nine cities, here they are. Click, discover, and enjoy!

• Castelmezzano, Italy
• Caraiva, Brazil
• Baranja Region, Croatia
• Estacada, United States
• Yirgalem, Ethiopia
• Puerto Angel, Mexico
• Jura Region, France
• Jomsom, Nepal
• Sangkhla Buri, Thailand

Gadling’s own Leif Pettersen is traveling through another not-so-well-known location: Ia??i, Romania.

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Indulging on a Cruise Ship — for $15 a Day

by Catherine Bodry on

It’s true. You can take a corporate luxury cruise for $15 a day. But, like any deal this sweet, there’s a catch. You either have to work for the company, or know someone who does (and who’s willing to take you with them and share a 10 by 10 cubby with you and maybe two other people). In Alaska most of the summer workers I know are affiliated with the cruise companies, which run lodges, and railroad and motor coach tours in addition to cruises.

I’ve been lucky enough to take two cruises, and on both I was an obvious outsider to the older, affluent crowd. My most recent cruise was with my best friend Jen and our significant others. Jen and I had just arrived in Europe after 7 months backpacking through Asia, and it showed. We looked worn in and dirty in a polished way, like a favorite pair of shoes. We had (re)packing down to a science, and were well-versed in disguising un-showered hair and un-laundered shirts.

While the other cruisers took air-conditioned buses to the port from Rome, we took the local train and walked through the port, straining to catch a glimpse of our company’s logo through all the industry. We knew we were heading in the right direction when the air-con buses farted by, leaving a trail of dust for us cough out.

We walked up to the boat with our packs slumping over our shoulders, and were approached by a security guard about 100 meters from the ship. We didn’t have actual tickets, and it took us a while to convince him we weren’t planning to stowaway to Santorini. Finally we got him to check the list of passengers and we boarded, the last passengers to do so.

After that, it was hot showers, clean towels, salad bars and fine wine. Jen and I could’ve been featured in a magazine article with a title like “Extreme Makeovers: Some Folks Really Do Clean up Nice.”

I felt like Jack Dawson in Titanic when he says (and I really wanted to say this to people on the boat), “I mean, I love waking up in the morning not knowing what’s gonna happen or, who I’m gonna meet, where I’m gonna wind up. Just the other night I was sleeping under a bridge and now here I am on the grandest ship in the world having champagne with you fine people.”

The irony of cruising wasn’t lost on us; most of the staff was from the developing countries we’d just left, and were probably sending everything they earned back home to their families. The volume of food was ridiculous, and I’m sure much of it was thrown out. I was embarrassed and apologetic at the abundance of service — someone actually picked my clothes up off the floor, and turned my sheets down at night. We visited World Heritage Sites for a single afternoon, which made it really difficult to say “I’ve been there” (kind of like counting a layover as a visit to a country).

But then again, $15 a day for fresh towels, chocolate mousse, and a tour of the Mediterranean is not such a bad way to spend a vacation from traveling. Especially when it’s actually cheaper than traveling.

Want more information on cruises?

Sleeping in Airports — “Beds” for Budget Travelers

by Catherine Bodry on

We’ve written about the expanding options for airport shut-eye, but I’d like to offer one more resource: the website Sleeping in Airports.This website has an entry for pretty much every airport in the world.

I once landed after midnight in Athens and had a 7 a.m. ferry to catch. A train to the port left at 6 a.m., so it didn’t make sense to pay for an airport hotel when I’d be there less than 5 hours. I checked out Sleeping in Airports, which advised me to stay on the baggage claim side of customs — the chairs past customs had armrests, which is only good for comfortable sleeping if you’re a yoga master who can fold yourself up like origami.

After claiming my backpack, I debated whether or not to trust the website. The baggage claim was bright and noisy, with a dinging announcement every time a new flight arrived. But if I passed customs, there was no turning back. I decided to trust the website, and stretched out under the fluorescent lighting of baggage claim. I barely woke up to catch my train, but I did groggily notice the arm-rested chairs after I passed through customs.

If you’ve got a long layover or a late landing time, check out their website to see if you should forgo the expensive nap. And when your trip is over, add your tips to the website. Travelers like me appreciate it.

Coming soon: Sleeping in Train Stations (definitely not as pleasant as airports).

More Tips for Cheap Airfares

by Jamie Rhein on

No matter how many articles about cheap airfare there are, there’s always room for another. Here’s one of the latest. In “8 tips to snag the lowest fare” Karen Aho gives some tips we’ve covered before, such as, check with sites like Travelocity and Expedia for the lowest prices, then go directly to the airline’s Web site. Karen mentions another advantage of doing this. In addition to a cheaper rate, by booking through the airline, you’ll get email messages from the airline.

When seeking out cheap flights, she suggests thinking about how a business traveler might think and do the opposite. Business travelers tend to travel at the beginning of the week and at the beginning of the day or the end of the day, therefore think middle of the week and middle of the day. As Karen points out, this doesn’t always work, but it’s a starting point.

What I found interesting is that you should look well in advance for cheap flights, as in several months if possible. The 21 day advance flights may not have the cheapest seats left. That’s certainly true with Skybus. And when booking, don’t hesitate since thousands of people are seeking out flights at the same time you are. I hesitated on booking Skybus and it cost us $100 per ticket. However, when we went to Florida last December, I assumed flights would be expensive since we didn’t start looking until the beginning of November. I was amazed to find flights for $160 round-trip from Columbus.

Checking alternative airports is also a great strategy. I’ve found this particularly true when traveling to New York City. Between Newark, La Guardia and JFK there seems to be a cheap flight somewhere. The downside is the cost and ease of getting in to and out of Manhattan, but even that is getting competitive.

To see if a fare is going up, Karen suggests checking with Farecast. This site tells what fares will go up or down over a 7-day period for specific airlines. The idea behind this is that you can decide to buy now or wait.

Another strategy that might work is being nice. For example, Karen switched seats twice on an airplane after being asked and was so nice about it that the flight attendant put her in first-class. This strategy also can work on merry-go-rounds. When I took my son to the Ohio State Fair, one woman asked if my son would switch horses so she could sit next to her son. When he switched, she gave me two ride tickets.

TVTRIP.com

by Erik Olsen on

Any first-time visit to a city brings a host of potential problems. Among them, especially for the more budget-oriented, is finding a decent hotel to stay in, one that promises a measure of comfort and convenience, as well as cleanliness. Face it, if you look around on the Web for hotels, many of them appear quite different online than they are in person. This has happened to me before, for sure. Online the place looks lovely and well-tended. But when you get there, cockroaches skitter into the shadows and those pearly-white walls you saw on the Web site are soiled with water stains.

Well, if you are heading to Europe any time soon, you might be able to avoid this problem. A new site called tvtrip.com offers video tours of European hotels. The site was created by managers of Expedia Europe, so you can be relatively sure the quality of the site is good. And it is. It is not only well organized, it is good-looking and easy to use.

I clicked through several of the tours and thought that if were were heading to, say, Paris, this could be a very useful research tool. In fact, I imagine that we’ll be seeing a lot more sites like this that allow you to check out tourist sights, restaurants and more. If a picture says a thousand words, a video says a million. Give it a look-see to see what I mean.