Six Tips For Planning Your Perfect Holiday

Holidays are awesome, right?

Whether you're looking for an opportunity to experience new cultures, taste fantastic new flavours, marvel at the wonder of the planet, or to simply chill out, there’s nothing like a getaway to recharge your batteries and give you a fresh perspective on life.

I like to start my holidays with my best foot forward, so here are my travel tips for planning the perfect holiday.

1. When To Travel

Rain can put a real dampener on a holiday and while you cannot plan for every eventuality you can at least check average weather information. Travel resources such as Lonely Planet have information on the best times to travel under their Essential Information section for every country.

Remember (!) some countries (our own included) have microclimates and the north and the south, the east and the west can all be different. If travelling through a country you may need to plan for multiple climates.

2. Get The Lay Of The Land

Knowing a bit about the place you’re going can help in finding the right place for you to stay. Everyone is different, and whether you’re interested in sights, the beach, shopping, nightlife or sports can all influence the best spot for you. In planning, I always Google image search for tourist maps of my destination to get a feel for what there is to do and how the city is laid out.

It’s also worth checking if there are any bad spots or no-go areas. Every city has some less favourable areas and knowing in advance means you can plan around them and make sure you’re either prepared or can avoid them as necessary.

3. Do You Need A Travel Visa?

If the country you are travelling to requires a travel visa this can sometimes require you to send your passport to their embassy in advance which can take weeks. Nothing would be worse than missing your holiday because your passport is not back in time. Check the DFAT’s information on visas for Australians travelling overseas as a starting point.

4. Health & Wellbeing

Some necessary vaccinations have to be administered weeks or even months in advance to be effective. Check whether you need vaccinations (in some countries, they are mandatory) and check how long in advance you need to get your shots. More information can be found on smartraveller.gov.au. Talk to a travel vaccination specialist – they should be able to answer general questions over the phone.

Your biggest expense if things go wrong overseas is likely to be medical costs. Travel insurance is important to protect you should the worst happen. Some credit cards have travel insurance as a complimentary benefit – there are different “activation” methods if you do use this sort of cover and it’s important to check who is covered and the levels of cover that apply. For some this will be adequate, for others there will be the need for separate cover. For more information check smartraveller.gov.au/insurance

5. Booking Flights

Booking in an incognito/private window can save you money. As you search around the internet, websites drop little cookies on your machine so they can retarget you with messaging. As you demonstrate an interest in particular destinations or flights some companies will start changing the price to try and motivate you to book (think “the price is going up, quick book before it goes any higher!”). This could work for or against you, but if the price starts going up open up an incognito/private window in your browser and check to see if you are getting the best price. (Not sure what I mean by an 'incognito' window? This'll help guide you.)

Return flights can sometimes be cheaper. This may sound absurd, but in some countries a round-trip can cost as much as half as a one way trip. If you only need to travel in one direction, it might be worth checking if a return trip would be cheaper. Just don’t use the return ticket!

Also worth noting that cheap flights aren’t always cheaper. Beware all the extras that need to be added on such as baggage, meals, entertainment, et cetera. What looks like a great rate can soon be comparable with a “full-service” flight. Just make sure you do your homework and compare them apples for apples.

6. Booking Hotels

Same as for flights, booking in an incognito/private window can save you moolah. When you’re ready to book make sure you check the costs in an incognito/private window to make sure you’re getting the best rate.

Consider going hotel direct to book. There are lots of booking sites out there and they claim to be able to get you 50 to 70 per cent off, but many hotels also promise to give best rates direct. It’ll only take a few moments to hop on to their website and check the best rate. Booking direct also means more money goes into the hotel pocket and I have on occasion received perks from the hotel as thanks for booking direct.

By all means, check out the reviews on Trip Advisor, but don't obsess about them either. Remember that every traveller is different and one bad experience by one traveller doesn’t mean that a place will be terrible. Try and read reviews objectively and consider your needs; seek reviews from travellers more like you. Trip Advisor provides filters to help this. Maybe just avoid this place.