BEST/WORST traveling Sites

When booking your future trips, the amount of sites of Internet offering deals and promotions can be overwhelming. Here is a list of the top 5 sites i believe is very helpful and also, affordable for the traveling students


1. Cheaptickets.com

There are an array of websites that offer deals and promotions. I find cheap tickets the easiest way to book trips for an affordable price and it is also the fastest. Unlike other sites that you have to spend hours negotiating, cheap tickets prices are the cheapest i found without the hassling of negotiations for airfare and hotels.



2.TripAdvisor.com

This website is the easiest websites to view the hotels prices and pictures on their website to make a decision on whether to book with those hotels. Also, there are a lot of helpful reviews from both travelers and professionals


3. LateRooms.com

For all us last minute travelers, this website offers great bargains for anywhere around the world for hotels. I recommend calling the place of choice, which the website offers the phone numbers of the selected hotels, and booking your last minute bargains. This website will offer the rates of the currency of the location you will be traveling at. According to Kiplinger.com, there tip is as follow about this website in regards to rates:


When you pay your hotel room bill on checkout, beware if the clerk offers to convert your bill into U.S. dollars. Decline this offer because hotels usually charge higher exchange rates than banks charge through ATMs or credit cards.

4. Lastminute.com


Again for all us last minute travelers, this website offers airfare, hotels, and car rentals up to 3 hours before departure.

5. XE.com


This website is useful when traveling oversees. This websites offer conversion calculators and rates to exchange dollars to the currency of the country you will be traveling to.



When checking out the good in traveling, one must also check out the bad. Here are 3 websites I believe isn't as useful when booking your trips.



1. Priceline.com


My beef with priceline.com is that when I was trying to negotiate a recent trip I took, the discount was practically invisible. The rates weren't as different as the original price and I found on a similar site, and the negotiation took too much time for my taste.



2. Hotels.com


For traveling on a budget, I suggest for travelers to go on this website as their last resorts. There is no bargaining, no discounts, and no negotiation.



3. Travelnow.com

This website offers little help in a travelers vision of booking their trips. Very few photos are displayed when booking your hotels, so if your like me, I would stay away from this site because I would like an image of the location I am staying at. Also, it is hard to find a flight that is non-stop.

Swine Flu and Mexico

The recent scare of the swine flu in Mexico has dropped tourism dramatically, whether it is by sea or land. Recently, the Royal Carribean Cruise line states that its earnings dropped 22% per share because of the outbreak. The cruise line is a Miami based company and the chief executive Richard Fain states that the cruise line is staying away from ports in Mexico. Its celebrity based cruise line has not been affected by the flu. Also, many companies are now giving discount rates and air credits to travelers wanting to go to Mexico since the tourism has dropped. For example, the resorts in the Riviera Nayarit are offering to cut expenses up to 50% for travelers. Tour operators like Apple Vacations are offering free hotel nights and reduced airfares. As these deals are offered to the public, travelers should still be aware of the severity of the flu and to still travel with caution.

Personal Thoughts/San Francisco trip

Traveling these days is harder than it seem, but it doesn't have to be impossible. Recently on a trip to San Francisco for spring break, my fiancee and I were able to enjoy the beautiful city with just a few dollars in tow. We started out our trip going to San Jose and went to visit the Winchester Mystery House first since it was on the way. Stories have it that the house is haunted by the spirits of the people that have died from the Winchester rifles, making Mrs. Winchester hire a psychic for advice and the psychic advised her to continue building up the rooms in her home to keep the spirits confused. Basic mansion tours start at $23.00 dollars per person. After the tour, we headed to San Francisco to our hotel called Hotel Kabuki located in Japantown. We booked our rooms at cheaptickets.com where they were offering a great deal for 4 nights stay. *hint, when staying at this hotel, do not bother with their amenities like water and food, they have a Japanese mall right outside the hotel that sells food and water for half their price* This hotel usually goes for around $150-200 a night but we got our room for $80 a night! Also, when booking our trip, the site gave us a $50 dollar coupon from restaurant.com to enjoy in San Francisco. A couple of places comes to mind when remembering this trip. We enjoyed a night out to a local diner called Grubstake. Cheap and great good. When this place been featured in Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, you know you have to try it out! Mel's-Drive in is also a classic joint in San Francisco that one must try out too. What's great about it is that they are both open until about 2-4am. We visited a few interesting sights as well. Haight and Ashbury street is a fun place to walk around to see all the smoke shops, records stores, and vintage clothing stores in the heart of what i like to call hippie town. We spent the whole afternoon lost in this block, hitting up the different stores, and not spending a dime. Another place we have visited is Presidio National Park, a military outpost. Again, we just walked around took in the historical view and was able to enjoy the nature around us free of cost. We then headed to Golden Gate Bridge and enjoyed the view of all of San Francisco from there. Only have to pay $5 dollars to head back to the city from the bridge. One last thing i would suggest to check out in San Francisco and that is 6Th street and Howard. There is a building that has many weird quirks to it like furniture hanging out from the building. A sign of protest a few decades ago.

SoilNGreen

Vacations

I believe that is important for us to find time to travel when given a chance. While money is tight these days, traveling could be quite cheap when done right. I encourage travelers to go outside the spots that are high in tourist attractions, and to take a look at the local beauty of a spot. These blogs will provide a look at different spots to visit as far as dining, shopping, and other fun and often missed attraction in and around your destination.