Planning Activities on a Budget

Getting the most out of your trip for the least amount of money requires preparation. Here is a checklist to use when planning for activities on a budget trip.

After deciding where you want to go, comes the truly hard part: squeezing as much out of your vacation as possible for what you can afford to spend. So how do you make the process simpler, more effective and even fun? By following these steps, which have served me well through many a trip.

• Gather Your Tools. Since you're reading this, it's probably safe to say you have a computer with an internet connection. With this, you'll need a word processing program (even something as simple as Notepad) or even a real pen and paper - just something to take notes with.

• Put Together a Wishlist. What do you want to do on this trip? Do you want to see the beach or museums? Check out boutique shops or visit theme parks? Is there a specific place you want to see? List it all, then rank them in importance. This gives you an outline to work with.

• Fire Up Your Web Browser. Start at your favorite search engine, like Google, and do a search for the location's visitor bureau website. For example, “New York City visitor bureau” or “France visitor bureau” (minus the quotation marks). This should pull up the website for the location's official visitor/tourist website. These sites contain a wealth of information on the location, and many offer free guidebooks via mail.

• Bookmark Websites. In the initial planning stages, create a new folder in your browser's bookmarks toolbar and label it “trip activities” or something similar. Save any interesting activity webpages to this for further reference later.

• Pare it Down. Once you've saved all these bookmarks, go through them and add them to your wishlist in order of importance. Make brief notes of such details as costs, hours of operations and location. Why location? To group together activities in the same area for the same day so you don't waste time and money crossing back and forth across town for each activity. Also make note of any days the attraction is closed.

• Look for Discounts Online. Once you've decided where you want to go, visit the activity's website to see if they offer any discounts, either coupons or package deals. Use Google or another search engine to search for the terms "coupon" and "discount card" for the activity or location.

• Hit the Message Boards. Some of the best information you'll find on cheap and unusual activities in your destination will come from other travelers. Recommended message boards can be found at BootsnAll, Lonely Planet and your destination's daily or alternative weekly newspaper website (do a web search to find it).

• Put It All Together. Once you've made up your wishlist and whittled it down to the must-do's, print it out. Then go to the websites you bookmarked for your must-do's and print out any pertinent pages (main info page, directions, etc). Put all of these together in a binder or folder. Voila! You have your own mini-guidebook of activities tailored to your interests and budget.

• Keep a Portion of Your Time Open. When planning the final details, try to keep at least 1/3 off your schedule open. Flexibility is the key to not only enjoying your trip, but being open to last minute options that you might have missed otherwise.

These planning tips help you save money on your next trip. Do you have any tips not mentioned? Let us know on the discussion boards.

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