How to Plan a Trip, Part 2: Research & Accommodations

Last week we talked about the first thing we do when planning a trip – finding our flight. Most people save that for the very last thing they do, but by putting it first, you open yourself up to some serious savings. Leaving your destination, when you travel, and the duration of your trip flexible will give you so many more options in the end. So let’s move on to the next step in how to plan a trip.

I told you last week we were going to talk about hotels, but not quite yet.

Research: Learn About Your Destinations

The next thing I do when planning a trip is to learn about the area we’re planning to go. Give it a good ole Google. What are the landscape and climate like? Are there historical and/or geological things we need to put on our to-do list? Where is the airport location, how far away are the train stations, and how do you get to them efficiently? Are there nearby car rental locations and how far are we going to have to lug our luggage? Honestly, this is the part that often takes me the longest. I spend days and sometimes weeks learning about a location before I ever get to the next step – picking places to stay.

Very rarely do we plan a trip with a particular accommodation in mind. In fact, the only time this is true is when we’re heading to a resort. In these cases we do some jiving back and forth between choosing a flight and a resort location, but that’s another story.

So, once you know a bit about where you’re going, and how to get there, choose your accommodation.

The Art of Booking Hotels

Typically, my first search is on Trip Advisor. When you type in your search location and dates, you’ll first see a list of results, but I like to use the map feature in the top left instead. Since I already know the lay of the land from my previous research, this feature is SUPER helpful for finding accommodations in proximity to major transportation hubs. As long as you know how to get around a place efficiently, you don’t have to stay in the most popular tourist locations, and that alone will save you a bundle.

Let’s take Paris, as they have a very good metro system. Staying within walking distance of a metro station (conveniently displayed on the map), you can typically get anywhere in the city quickly for a few euros. The alternative is to spend (lots) more each night to stay exactly where you want to spend your time sightseeing.

Example: I could stay in the 1^st, 7^th, 8^th, or 4^th Arrondissements, the most expensive and popular areas of Paris – home of the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, and Arc de Triomphe right along the Seine. Or, I could stay a bit farther out, right next to a metro station in a calmer part of town for half the price or less. The latter option means you’ll experience more of true Parisian culture, get more peaceful sleep, and have more money in your pocket for something else.

How You Book Your Hotel Matters

Now, while I love to use Trip Advisor to find hotels, I never book through them. Almost 90% of the time I go directly to the hotel and book within their system so we have direct contact with them. If you happen to find a lower price elsewhere (on hotels.com or booking.com, for example), call or e-mail the hotel; many times they will match the lower price because they won’t have to pay a 3^rd party to do their bookings for them.

The other 10% of the time, I book through one of our credit card booking portals because we’re paying with points. You lose direct contact with the hotel when booking this way, so it’s good to email or call to make sure they have your reservation before you arrive. Also, make sure you know your credit card’s policy just in case your reservation gets lost.

However, I do use Trip Advisor’s “Create a Trip” feature to keep track of any hotels I like before booking them and any activities we might do along the way. It’s an easy way to keep your ideas in one place and have a sort of itinerary to share with others. Click the little heart with “Trip” at the top of the screen, then “Create A Trip” in the empty box. A pop up will ask you to name your trip and fill in your dates. Then head back to your search. Each page you look at will have a small heart in the top right you can click to add the hotel/thing to do/tour/etc. to your trip itinerary.

If I don’t find anything I love on Trip Advisor (they have a LOT of options, but not ALL the options), I take a trip over to Instagram. Yes, Instagram. This is where all those hashtags come in handy. I do a search for “Hotels in Paris” (or wherever you’re headed) and you’ll be bombarded with gorgeous photos of choices. This takes a little more work since there’s no map function to see where they are and you have to search various profiles to find websites, but I have found some AMAZING hidden locations that were well worth the extra effort.

Sometimes you can also find some hidden gem locations by again, giving it a good ole Google and reading other travel blogs like ours. This is how I found a BnB winery that we’re planning to stay at this summer in France.

Hotels.com is another option similar to Trip Advisor. I love that you get a free night with them after booking 10 nights. However, I typically only book through them if we are staying somewhere in the USA with a chain hotel where we don’t have status and aren’t working on earning status. This is because, again, they are 3^rd party (Expedia) and you lose that direct contact with the hotel.

Air BnB and VRBO are other options for finding larger, more unique, longer-stay accommodations. We’ve had good luck with them in Europe, but have recently been told scammers are focusing on both websites right now, so be careful and do your homework before booking. Be sure if you book with them to keep all communication and payments within the app and read all reviews.

Once you have all your hotels found (but not booked yet), it’s time for the next step – figuring out transportation within your destination. This should be pretty easy by this point because you’ve done your destination research already, right?

We’ll talk about that next week!