Our 10 best travel tips

1. Travel insurance

   This is obviously the first thing to check before making your reservations and I have dedicated a complete article to this subject which you can consult here.

   2. Plane reservation

   Booking a flight can be an adventure in itself and you have to know how to do it to avoid the pitfalls of airline algorithms, because they only want you to pay as much as possible for your flight and fly from point A to point B with as few empty seats as possible. There are a few strategies to try to get around these pitfalls: First, the more often you return to an airline’s site to check the price of a flight, the more they will notice interest in it and start quickly to increase the price. You can start your search on third-party sites like Google Flights to give you an idea of flight times, connections and prices to your destination. Once you have made your choice, I recommend that you open a private browsing window which will be free of cookies and will allow you to carry out your final search without traces of your previous searches and therefore to have access to the best possible price.

   Booking a midweek flight is also more economical than weekend flights and they are also less crowded and less likely to be overbooked. Obviously, if possible, avoid very busy periods such as end-of-year celebrations or school holidays. Your experience in flight and at your destination will be even better.

   Remember to check the time allocated for connections and prefer a little more time than not enough. For our part, we often look for stopovers of around twelve hours during the day in a city that we do not know or where we would like to return to go for a walk and makes you explore more places. We made a stopover in Vancouver on our way to Hawaii, in Beijing on our way back from Australia and in Zurich on our way to Bangkok.

   Speaking of connections, it is sometimes less economical, but safer, to book all segments of your flight with the same carrier to avoid having to buy a new ticket in the event of a delay on your first segment. We experienced this in Hawaii where our flight was cancelled from one island to another on a small local airline because of a particularly violent storm and we had to find accommodation for 2 additional nights and buy 2 new tickets for go home. It was a mistake that cost us much more than the savings we initially thought we would make.

   3- Flight delayed, canceled or denied boarding

   If your flight on an airline flying from the EU or Turkey is canceled or delayed by more than 3 hours, if you missed a connection due to a delay of less than 3 hours or if you are refused entry boarding due to overbooking, the airline is required by law to compensate you if the delay is attributable to them, or if they could have avoided it. Compensair offers you a compensation calculator and can even take care of making the claim for you.

   For Canada, although the law was strengthened to better protect consumers from airline abuse in 2019 (Canadian Transportation Agency [CTA] Air Passenger Protection Regulations) it is still difficult to have the  compensation require by the law. At Air Canada, the battle now involves AI for the first stage of the process where you will be offered less than what the law requires so that your file is resolved more quickly…

   In the United States, you are entitled to compensation after 1 hour of delay attributed to the airline (for overbooking for example) you can find information on the legislation here: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/ title-14/chapter-II/subchapter-A/part-250?toc=1

   My advice: No matter who you are flying with, document the sequence of events accurately. Everything within the airline’s control (mechanical breakdown, crew, etc.) could be subject to compensation, but they often hide behind the weather, when this is not always the real reason for the delays…

   4. Telephony while traveling

   With the advent of electronic Sim cards, you are no longer at the mercy of your cellular service provider and their high roaming charges and there is no longer even a need to wait until you arrive at your destination and look for a cell phone provider to purchase a physical card and get cell coverage. With Airalo, you can buy an eSim for more than 200 countries and regions before your departure. Some destinations even offer multiple provider options or multiple package types depending on your needs. With a recent iPhone, you can have two working Sim cards

   With a recent iPhone, you can have two Sim cards working at the same time so you never miss a call!

   5. Hotel reservations

   Carrying out research to find the ideal accommodation can be time-consuming and tedious. There are a lot of parameters to take into account: location, cost, services offered, nearby transportation and attractions and obviously traveler reviews. In addition, you can make your reservation on the hotel’s website or via a reservation platform which buys blocks of rooms and resells them and whose prices can vary enormously. Trivago offers you the possibility to carry out the research for you with a platform which allows you to choose the parameters important to you and which compares all the booking sites to suggest the one which is the most advantageous for your travel dates. This is a very effective shortcut, but I would still urge you to read the fine print and cancellation policies, as sometimes the cheapest rooms must be paid in full upfront and cancellations are sometimes impossible.

   6. Reservation of residences

   When your housing needs require a residence instead of a hotel, VRBO is the platform to use to ensure verified, quality accommodation, faithful to the photos on the site and to give you peace of mind. We prefer it to other platforms that offer less security. In all cases, we recommend that you do business with a landlord who has many reviews and is well rated in order to avoid unpleasant surprises once there. Also make sure you get a quick means of communication with the landlord so you can contact them quickly if your itinerary changes or if something doesn’t work when you arrive.

7. Planning your route

Although it is essential to do your research on the chosen destination to have an idea of the must-sees and things to do once there, having an overloaded itinerary can become cumbersome and make the trip less pleasant. Nothing worse than discovering a pretty public square lined with pretty terraces, but not being able to linger there for a coffee or a drink because we still have 3 attractions to see that day or discovering a market that you would like to explore in more depth, but all your days are dedicated to a particular activity. Conversely, not planning anything will undoubtedly make you miss the very essence of your destination. I would recommend making a list of activities, sites, restaurants you would like to see in order of preference and only booking activities that may not be available on site. We had not booked the excursion to Alcatraz in San Francisco for example and we were disappointed not to be able to go.

Setting aside free time to wander when you’re more tired can make the trip more enjoyable for everyone. Leaving room for the unexpected and recommendations from locals can greatly improve your experience, as they will be able to take you off the beaten track and discover little gems that may not be mentioned in travel guides.

8. Activity reservations

When you search for activities through search sites like Tripadvisor, Viator (which is owned by Tripadvisor) or Get your Guide, these sites are paid by the tour operator to promote their products. Making your reservations through these platforms generally doesn’t cost you anything extra and if it doesn’t, it’s probably because it’s a slightly different package and probably exclusive to the platform used. In any case, you are a winner, because you have the assurance of booking an activity validated by thousands of people.

For our part, if we recommend a program to you, it is because we have tried it and were satisfied. Over the course of our many trips, we have sometimes been fooled, booking with a platform with non-existent customer service, on a website that does not provide the service sold or whose use is complex (we Of course, on vacation you don’t want to worry!), which is why we only recommend what has worked well for us.

9. Visit a city

The best way to get your bearings in a new city, in our opinion, is to take a one or two day pass with the Big Bus Tours, these big red double-decker buses that crisscross the city and allow you to hop on and get off at any stops along their route. These are built around the city’s main attractions and often a portion of the slightly longer journeys will take you a little outside the centers to explore a park, a beach or an interesting neighborhood. Don’t hesitate to take these routes which have great surprises in store for you! In all cases, check with your driver the timetable and the stop for the return. It’s true that it sounds like a tourist… and then? There’s nothing wrong with that, you are an explorer who seeks to make your investment (your trip) profitable by looking for adventures that will please you and that is completely legitimate. Often, the pass offers you discounts on entry to the different sites along its route, why not take advantage of it and use the savings to buy something unusual, a good restaurant or a souvenir that you will cherish a long time?

10. Get your bearings

Often when visiting a new city (region), it is difficult to find landmarks to orient yourself easily. Over the years, we have discovered several applications, but our favorite is undoubtedly MAPS.ME which allows you to download the map of a specific region and have access to it offline. You can also perform searches to find a restaurant, WiFi, a hotel or even save a point on the map and personalize it to remember a specific location. We mainly use it to save dive sites or places we would like to return to, but which are not always on the usual maps. The possibilities are limitless.

You must always remember that planning the trip is an integral part of it and allows you to transport yourself to the destination of your dreams virtually during this stage. Dedicating time to it is a guarantee of a good time once there.