road trip
7 tips to save on transportation during your trip.
Transport
Savings
Saving on transportation during your trip is always fun and certainly possible. We often find that people pay some people unnecessarily for transportation. We ourselves sometimes make that mistake, which is why we made these tips. Not only to help you but also so we can take them all in again ourselves. Here are our tips for saving on transportation during your trip. but feel free to add to it in the comments.
1 Looking up
Before you leave, it’s best to look up a few things. Especially if you are going to a country with a foreign currency. For example, in Mexico we actually paid 30 euros too much for our first cab. Simply because we were not prepared and did not know the right price yet. So be sure to look up what a cab, bus or train costs in advance. And also look up what is the cheapest. After all, a bus or train is not always the cheapest mode of transportation in many countries. Another thing you can look up is whether there are certain turn cards or discounts. Because sometimes you are cheaper off with a weekly pass even if you only need the bus for 3 days.
2 Uber
Our second tip for saving on transportation during your trip is actually one that we ourselves have a double feeling about. Uber often causes cab companies to go out of business. And you’re not really helping the locals with it. If this is not a problem for you, you can of course just use Uber but for us this is a stumbling block. The Uber app is actually an application where ordinary, non-commercial, people offer to take you from point A to point B with their car. And want to earn a pocket money on the side in this way. This is often at bargain prices and can therefore let you save a lot of money on (other) transportation.
3 Share a Taxi
A very good tip that we often use is to share a cab. Suppose you come out of an airport and there are people nearby who also need to get to the center of town. Then it would be very stupid to both pay a cab, because often you pay one fare per trip (and not per person). Dare to approach people to possibly share a cab. Not only can you share the bill, but that way you get to meet new people, which is always nice too.
Hitch-hiking by car
A very familiar and old trick for saving money on transportation is, of course, hitchhiking. This is easy and usually free. Of course, you have to be daring and often have some luck with it. Because sometimes it can take a long time to find the right car to the right destination. Also, don’t just get into the first car you see, always follow your gut! Today, there are already apps like Lyft that do make hitchhiking easier. But that doesn’t make it any safer.
5 Bicycles
If you are a bit more sporty, you can of course always rent a bike (or often this is free at the hotel). We often do this when the distances at an outing are no more than 5 km. This not only saves you on transportation but is often an easy way to see much of a city. Of course, you do look for the distances beforehand. For example, once in Menorca we got it wrong and it was not 5 but 15 km from the hotel. And in that heat, this was pretty tough.
6 Travel Like the Locals
Often the locals know what the cheapest and best is. So travel like them too, this will often save you a lot of money. For example, in Mexico we used public transportation like the locals and it cost us barely 40 cents for a 30-minute ride. While we would have done this same route with the tourist transport, this would have cost us almost a 1 euro more. And yes a euro is not much either. But if you have to take the bus 4 to 5 times a day this does add up.
7 Rent a car
Renting a car is often a very cheap way of transportation in a country where you can see a lot. If you plan to not go out much and stay mostly in the city where you are staying, this is not such a good tip. But if like us you plan to see a lot of a country and travel around from city to city, this is usually the cheapest and easiest way. For example, for our trip soon to the USA, we have calculated all possible ways to move from city to city. And renting a car came out best here in many places. But it is always best to calculate this at home first. Definitely keep fuel in mind.
You any tips on saving transportation while traveling?
Do you have any tips for saving on transportation during your trip? They are more than welcome in our comments or on our Facebook page.
Another appointment next Tuesday with more tips. Can’t wait until then? Then be sure to take a look at our other travel tips or our travel blog.