Holiday companies have created a package holiday generation offering customers holidays which include, flights, accommodation and more often than not, food and drink. These types of holidays are good for people who wish to get away quickly without the hassle of organising or worrying about where to go or stay.
Me and my family have always gone on different types of holidays; we have road tripped around America, stayed in numerous private villas and combined snow skiing with a beach vacation.
I’m going to explain how easy it is to book an adventurous holiday which will change the way you travel forever.
Holidays are a good way of seeing new places whilst giving you the freedom to do the things you want to and allowing you to immerse yourself in the country’s culture. People are sometimes scared of booking everything themselves due to the fear that something could go wrong and although things can go wrong, if you book everything properly you minimise the risk.
- Country – First of all I would start by deciding where you would like to go on holiday maybe Europe, America, Australia- the world is your oyster.
- Flights – Search online for flights to your given destination. Skyscanner and Expedia are good places to start, they are comparison websites which will let you see which companies fly to your destination and which company is the cheapest. Once you have found the company which is the cheapest, go on the airline’s website and sign up to their mileage programme- it’s totally free and easy to do. Mileage programmes allow you to collect ‘miles’ for every flight you take and you can use your miles to purchase discounted future flights and upgrades. They usually offer rewards such as a free extra bag, club lounges and meals. Now it’s time to book your flights- flights leaving on a Tuesday or Wednesday are usually cheaper than flights at the weekend. You should also aim to book your flights on a Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday as prices can sometimes change when the companies think more people are looking at them. You should also clear your cookies as companies use these to change prices of flights you have looked at on a number of occasions.
- Aim – Decide what you want to do on your holiday; what’s the aim of your trip? Do you want to have a beach holiday, sunbathe, go snow skiing, go travelling, just relax, take a culture driven trip, go sightseeing, go on tours or go to theme parks (or combine some or all of them)?
- Accommodation – Take some time to research the accommodation available in your chosen destination. Some good websites to start your search with are hotels.com, Airbnb and hostel world. Hostels and Airbnbs can be significantly cheaper than hotels and provide more of a cultural experience.
- Research – Now you have booked everything and sorted out flights and accommodation, it’s time to start the fun part of deciding what to do when you get there. There are many different websites which provide guides to countries and you can find by a quick google search of ‘things to do in…… (your holiday location)’ to give you more detailed examples. I also recommend researching what locals do or where they eat. You could also google ‘blog posts about….. (your holiday destination)’ as blog posts will give you honest reviews from people who have actually been there.
- Check and Confirm – The last thing you should do before leaving for your holiday is double check everything especially dates and times. Where possible you should select to pay when you arrive or leave accommodation and you need to decide whether you need a hire car or not. You then need to print out all your information so you have a copy of it with you whilst travelling.
- Go on holiday!
As you can see there is nothing challenging, time consuming or difficult about booking your own holiday- if you take all the necessary steps, there’s nothing risky about it either.
I hope this inspires you to look differently at booking your next holiday.
