Know the Pet Policies

Airlines that allow their passengers to bring their pets along with them in the flight impose certain policies. That being said, you should familiarize yourself with the pet policies of your chosen airline to prevent stress to your pet and inconvenience on your part. Some airlines may allow taking small dogs and cats in the cabin, while others require pets to be placed below the cabin for the rest of the flight. Understand the restrictions of the airline regarding pets to avoid any hassle. Aside from these, you also have to be aware of the rules on pet carriers and any health and immunization requirements that are set by the airline.

Visit the Vet

Have your pet checked before your flight. Ask your vet if your pet is suitable for airline travel. Also, see to it that your pet has received all the needed vaccinations to comply with the rules on pet immunization of the airline. Ask the vet to give you a health certificate for your pet; you will need this piece of document at various points in your entire travel. Make sure that it is dated within at least 10 days of your departure.

Choose Your Flight Wisely

If possible, opt for direct flights because changing planes will cause stress to your pet. To reduce the stress your pet has to endure throughout your trip, you should try taking a non-peak flight where there are fewer passengers and more cabin room. Also, avoid busy travel period such as during summer and holidays, as more passengers mean more stress for your pet.

Invest in a Pet Carrier

It would be rather unwise to tug along your furry friend without a carrier to keep the pet secure. So if you don’t have one yet, buy a carrier that’s appropriate for the size of your pet. Make sure that it will be comfortable, too. It should allow let your canine or feline companion to stand up, sit, lie down, and move around comfortably. Allow your pet to get used to the travel carrier for at least four weeks before your flight. This will lessen the stress during your flight.

Avoid Feeding Your Pet Before Your Trip

Chances are, feeding your pet within four to six hours prior to your flight will cause undue discomfort and stress. But you can give small amounts of water before your flight.

Bring a Photo of Your Pet

Travel with pets can become a horrible experience when the pet gets separated from its owner. Your pet’s photo will come in handy in such cases. You will easily find your missing pet by showing the photo to the airline personnel.

Travel is all about packing light. It’s not a good idea to cram as much as you can carry on your backpack when you go off to new places. The first rule is always to pack just enough to last you a few days.

Unless you enjoy lugging around bags that weigh a ton, bringing along just a few choice articles of clothing is better.

You’re better off not packing three sneakers, your two boots or those many shirts.

If you’re worried about clothes, you can buy some of these when you get where you’re going. Remember that the longer you stay in one place, the less clothes, toiletries and other accessories you bring. Because when you get there, you can just shop around and look for a few shirts you can wear or stuff you can use while you continue on with the next leg of the trip.

Buying things over there is easier for you because you save up space in your bag and it makes it easier for you to carry your bags. Unless you have money to burn, you can’t afford to pay strangers to carry your bags for you. Once or twice, yes—if it’s particularly hot and you want to take it easy. But since it pays to be wise with your coin while on the road, just keep the money and spend it on things that’ll no doubt prove to be more fun.

If you bring along too many things, you’d either have to be prepared to pay for the extra charges when you have them shipped home or else, be forced to leave behind some of your old things. Or even worse, leave behind that extra-special lamp you’ve set your heart on or that sleek and adorable fur jacket meant for your three-year-old niece. Add to this how you were actually hoping on turning this into a shopping trip and you can be sure that, as things stand, having a lugging around a loaded luggage is definitely not a sterling idea.

Also, don’t forget to pack in your own water. If you plan on visiting all the tourist spots you could find in that area, be prepared for it. You’ll grow tired, perspire and eventually get thirsty. Not having your own bottle of water with you could cost you a few dollars higher than you normally pay for the stuff. It’s common knowledge that things are priced a bit higher around tourist spots than when you buy them at the grocery or supermarket. Not to mention that it’s safer to know where your drinking water comes from. It pays to be careful when you’re out there.

So if you don’t want anything to spoil your trip, just pack in the absolute essentials—this includes your drinking water—and nothing else. If you have your passport along with other important travel documents, clothes, your toiletries, first aid, extra shopping bags, gadgets like mobile phones (don’t forget the charger if you’re planning on staying for more than three days), then you’re all set. For camera enthusiasts, remember to bring an extra memory card. You don’t want to find yourself deleting pictures you would rather keep but can’t just because there’s not enough space.

What You Need to Know in Getting Travel Insurance

There is a variety of travel insurance that is available for you. Your personal insurance carrier, your credit card company, travel agents and specialists all offer different forms of travel insurance. Sometimes your auto or health insurance or your credits already cover travel insurance related to your vacation. Now, this poses question of when should you ensure and which should you choose.

There are three major types of travel insurance. The first type is the medical coverage. For medical insurance, make sure you check their rules and conditions for age limits. Some insurance policies charge higher for seniors. The medical coverage includes medical and dental expenses incurred because of injury or illness.

A medical evacuation, which covers your transportation to a hospital in case you are injured in a remote area and need a helicopter, is typically included your medical coverage. You may however choose to purchase on a stand-alone policy.

Meanwhile, an accidental death and dismemberment policy acts like any life insurance policy paying your beneficiary a certain amount in the event of death.

The second type of travel insurance is trip protection. It can be purchased for a single or annual multi-trip basis. This insurance has three main parts: cancellation coverage, delay coverage, and trip interruption protection.

The first one covers insurance—prepaid expenses will be reimbursed—in case you need to cancel your trip due to illness or if a family member is sick or dies. The second one deals with transportation delays. In the event that your flight is delayed due to snow, your prepaid hotel expenses are covered. The last type is used in the event that you get sick while away and you want an interruption policy.

The third type of insurance is the luggage or car rental protection. It covers your rental car in case of an accident and your baggage and personal items are lost, damaged, or stolen. Take note however that most policies of this type do not cover loss or damage in flight and too expensive items.

With this type of travel insurance, make sure you read the rules and conditions. Sometimes your personal auto insurance might cover such. Further, look for policies that offer not only monetary coverage but also travel assistance.

Once you know all the types of insurance offered and what you need, the next question is how to buy one that you can maximize the benefits.

The first thing you should do is determine all the rules and conditions that are covered in your current insurance policies and credit cards. Check strictly all your policies if they still cover foreign countries in the event that you are traveling abroad.

Make sure that your expenses are covered up front and you get reimbursed later. Be sure that you understand very well the deductible and coverage limits. In addition, beware of travel insurance bundled with your trip by a travel agent. Most of the time, these are more expensive.

More importantly, if plan to avail a travel insurance, you should shop around and check and compare prices and coverage.

Totally Random Travel Tips

Traveling — that simple act of going from one place (yours) to another (a nearby town or a famous tourist destination) — has now become one of the world’s biggest industries.

It has also developed into one of the more complicated modern activities starting from getting your tickets, preparations, packing, all the way to the airport and immigration and finally to your destination.

From experiences (good and bad) of the many travelers who had survived traveling, here is a list of tips arranged in no particular order. It is hoped they can help the first-time would-be travelers and to remind those who had traveled before.

Before the trip

Go to the Internet to know the basics about your destination – banks, money, personal and other insurance, health, vaccinations, language, important customs, weather conditions, their police system and the law.

There is no need to know everything, just the important basics. It pays to have an idea on most things around.

Get a new email address and mail to yourself all the copies of your important papers (passports and visas, travelers’ check numbers, insurance certificates, medical info, important phone numbers and addresses, etc.) for emergency access, if needed.

The trip

Before packing anything, first make a list on what to bring. From there, you would know what’s necessary and what’s not (right clothes), what’s important (only a jewel item or two and no flashy ones) and what’s redundant (big cities have batteries).

You would know you if you overdid things. You would also know which items to leave out. Keep this list to check on your belongings when you get back home.

Bring a small amount of US dollars (legally acceptable). Most places accept them, in case things go wrong with your cards or your other “cash”. Bring a small medicine bag as your cabinet with emergency medicines (aspirins, diarrhea tablets, water purifiers, etc.) and a first aid kit.

Bring only two or three pieces of travel-size personal items such as soaps, shampoos, deodorants, toothpaste tubes, lotions and perfumes — if your stay is short. If longer, bring some more. It’s more convenient to dispose of empty mini-wrappers and tubes than bringing back big jars home. 

If you are going on a nature trip or safari, arm yourself with the right medicine (malaria pills, insect repellents, etc.). A Swiss knife is very useful as is a small duct tape.

Destination

Line your backpack with chicken wire inside (deterrent for bag slashers). Buy a fake wallet and fill with fake (or expired) cards, etc for muggers. Hide your money somewhere safe with you.

Take taxis at night, even if it’s just a short trip.

If you are traveling alone, message boards in the internet list other travelers in your area. Traveler pubs and bars are the best places to meet them.

Be careful with the local food. Don’t gorge on them, no matter how delicious. Your stomach need to be used to it. Rotate eating foods you know with those of the local cuisine.

Last words

Not everything is bad in your tourist country. You traveled over there because you liked it and you want to enjoy it. This is the time to do it. This list is simply a reminder for you to be careful.

How to Pack Wisely: Tips for Frequent Travelers

Aside from booking airfare tickets, packing up is one of the most challenging tasks that savvy travelers have to endure. Well, this applies to almost everyone, except for those who squeeze a year’s worth of stuff in their bags for a weeklong holiday vacation. On the other hand, some travelers pack too lightly, so much so that they forget to bring the most essential things like medicines and even passport! Listed here are some suggestions on how to pack wisely.

• Pack only the clothes that you will really use. Stuffing all your wardrobe in your bag is never a wise way to pack even if you are traveling for more than a month. For longer travels, you can just bring just a reasonable number of items to wear and wash them right after using.

• Roll your clothes. Instead of folding your outfits individually, you can maximize the space of your travel bag by rolling them. This packing technique works best with skirts, pants, and shirts. Another recommended method is folding clothes together to prevent wrinkles or creases in the folds.

• Keep a digital copy of your important documents. Misfortunes such as lost passport and stolen credit cards can happen even to the most careful travelers. You will never know when they will strike, so it always pays to be prepared. Scan your passport, tickets, and other travel documents and send the digital copies to your email. You must also keep a copy of the emergency hotlines of your credit card or ATM card, which will come in handy in case it gets lost or stolen.

• If you’re using a backpack, put all the stuff you use most often on top. That way, you won’t have to rummage through all the contents of your bag just to get a single item. You can make your bag feel lighter by putting the heavier items on top and the lighter ones at the bottom, as this makes the pack rest on your lower back.

• Use airtight plastic bags. Doings so helps eliminate the mess that comes from the toiletries and dirty clothes. Plastic bags are handy because they can keep the contents of your bag organized and neat. Sort the items according to type (e.g. toiletries, underwear, shorts, etc.) and put them into different plastic bags. This makes accessing a particular item a lot easier.

• Put all your valuables in a carry-on bag. It helps to bring a bag that you can take with you all the time so that you can easily access important items like medicines, cash, and mobile phone. Your carry-on bag should be small enough to keep under the seat and large enough to accommodate larger items like laptop and gadgets.

• Bring only a few toiletries. Don’t stack up on toiletries in your baggage as if tomorrow’s the end of the world. Also, store items such as shampoo and toothpaste in small containers. You will be surprised at the amount of space you are going to save.

All these tips on how to pack wisely boil down to one important point: do not over pack your baggage for the sake your safety and convenience.

Essentials in Travel

Your passport is only one of the few essential things you must remember to bring along with you when you travel. Yes, there’s sunscreen, guidebooks, your camera, and mobile phone. Also there are other important travel documents that you must have handy if you plan on crossing several borders on your trip. You don’t want to be the only one of your friends to have to trudge back home from the airport, not having been admitted entry to another country because you were missing some identification.

There’s also the first aid. Fun’s no fun if you have the sniffles plaguing you all throughout. There’s nothing like a fever that’s coming down on you like a ton of bricks to take the cool factor off of the trip. It pays to be healthy when you’re tromping along the fields and gawking around the sights of another country.

But these are the basics. While we don’t forget our MP3s, our guidebooks, our extra shirts or lucky hat, we forget the most basic of all: respect.

Sometimes we judge without thinking, comparing things with how they are back home. They’re supposed to be different. Learn to deal with the difference. Respect it. Observe the locals’ traditions, their ways. Watch without passing judgment. Don’t blunder about, thinking what you do at home is acceptable. See if it is. If it’s not, adjust.

Also, don’t forget to bring along a sense of humor. There are plenty of surprises that chance could spring on you when you’re on the road. Having the wit to laugh off even the most awful slip-ups or mishaps could keep your trip from turning into a disastrous jaunt, keeping it on a fun and thrilling keel.

So you have respect. And humor. If it’s not too much of a stretch for you, you could also try for a little kindness.

Most of the tourist-friendly places in the world aren’t first-world countries. They’re mostly the poor nations, where good-paying jobs are hard to come by and the majority of people survive on their wit and skills rather than their wealth or trust funds. Residents of these countries often work in the tourism industry to earn a few extra bucks everyday to help out in their families. They offer to drive you around, serve as your guide, provide you with transportation and basically try to make your stay a lovely and pleasant one.

When it’s time to go, don’t stiff them. Don’t pay them through the nose. They’ve worked hard to earn a living. While not all guides are hard-working or likable or charming, there are really the remarkable ones, the ones who stand out, who were kind to you, who did try to make your stay as fun as possible. Hand over an extra dollar or two if you think their service has been worth it. So long as they’ve earned it.

We’re not saying give them money because they don’t have a lot of it. We’re saying learn to appreciate the efforts that other people have put into making your stay a great one, in whatever country you are. People who made you respect them with their hard work and kindness.

It’s important to pay them back in kind, in travel and life.

1. Choose someone you know very well.

Make sure that you are quite familiar with any quirk that your companion may have. Why? If you don’t, you might end up sharing the hotel room with someone whose neurotic behavior will drive you nuts. You don’t want to deal with someone who spends three hours just for bathing and grooming or someone who is too repacking his or her things. Most especially, you don’t want who would rather argue with you all day about everything than enjoy the attraction you’re visiting.

2. Choose a companion who shares your interests.

It would be very difficult to travel with a person whose interests greatly differ from yours. You would be better off traveling on your own if that is the case. How can you enjoy hopping from one bar to another when your travel buddy is more interested in attending theater performances or concerts? It doesn’t mean, though, that you should be together all day. But it would help a lot for both of you if you have several common interests. You can, for example go separate ways during daytime and then meet for some drinks in a bar at night.

3. Put your potential companion to a road test.

This tip may prove to be useful if you are on the lookout for a long-term travel buddy. You can invite a friend or colleague over your home to a dinner or plan a weekend picnic in a great place within your area. Observe how comfortable you are with each other, particularly when you share a room or even bed. Also, take note of any habits that you could tolerate. If you can live with your companion’s smoking habit, then that should not be a problem when you go on a holiday trip together.

Traveling with a companion is a very good idea, especially if you are the type who easily feels lonely being alone and having no one to talk to throughout your trip. Finding the best travel companion is not difficult at all since you can choose anyone from your relatives, friends, and colleagues. If you think no one fits your criteria, then traveling solo might be better for you.

Classifying an adventure travel however pose a little difficulty in defining what exactly it means. Adventure travel depends on the level of strenuousness of activities involved. Adventure may involve leisure biking and hiking for some travelers or it may entail base jumping into an underground cave in Mexico.

Nevertheless, a travel involves some fundamental aspects to be classified as adventure. Adventure travel typically includes going to far-flung areas, intermingling with various cultures, and doing a physical activity.

Two categories of adventure travel are hard and soft adventures. Hard adventures fall under extreme and mostly dangerous sporting activity. Examples of hard adventures are rock climbing, surfing, paragliding, and scuba diving in remote locations. Soft adventures, on the other hand, are leisure activities that are often educational. It does not involve strenuous activity unlike hard adventures. Bird watching, religious pilgrimages and architectural tours fall under soft adventures.

But you might wonder who usually embark on an adventure travel? Travel Industry Association of America’s (TIA) study indicated an estimated 20 percent of adult travelers are adventure tourists. It is also parallel to The Wall Street Journal reporting in 2003 that revenues from adventure tourism has skyrocketed topping the adventure market with $245 million dollars.

While many studies say college-educated males in their 20s typically embark on hard adventures, it is harder to categorize people who go for soft adventures. They say baby boomers and seniors significantly affect the rise of number of soft travelers. However, adventure-seeking women have also substantially caused the continuous growing of the industry. For example, divorcees ages 40 and 60 usually turn to adventure travel as a shift into new lives.

In addition, adventure travels are physically and psychologically beneficial both men and women. Physical challenges like mountain climbing require both physical fitness and focus. It develops muscles as well as serves as an excellent mental workout. Achieving difficult tasks also help build self-esteem especially for people in midlife crisis.

There are several options to what kind of adventure travel fits a specific type of person. But you should determine first how adventurous you would like to be. A travel agency may actually help steer you through the multitude choices that you will face.

Sports-themed vacations are well-liked for athletes. Examples of these are baseball fantasy camps and NASCAR driving schools. Safari is one example of soft adventures popular to many of varying ages. This may involve driving and walking through the African plains and come into close contact with lion, leopard, elephant, rhino and buffalo.

Longtime popular destinations are the Seven Wonders of World that include biking and hiking to these locales. Some of the world wonders include pyramids of Egypt, expedition to Antarctica, cultural tour in Japan and Ethiopia, the Great Wall of China, and Taj Mahal in India.

If you opt to have an adventure travel however, be sure to be safe as much as possible. Take note that adventure travel has inherent danger involved.