Travel Tips

Costs - all prices in $US before tax

Hotels

Hotels cost $50-$120 per night for a private room with bed and bathroom, usually TV and coffee maker (not a kettle), and sometimes microwave oven and small fridge. Major cities are more expensive, especially downtown. It is sometimes cheaper to stay at the airport but usually not convinient.

Tax

States and cities set taxes between 0% and 15% on food, rooms, etc. Some cities have separate room tax. Price, except for package deals, is quoted before tax. Always check to see if price is before or after tax.

Hire Car

Known as Rental Cars in the USA. Standard car hired at airport costs between $20 and $30 a day. Automatic with aircon. Insurance is another $18-$25 a day - never included with price. See below on how to avoid buying overpriced insurance from Car Rental companies

Food

There is a show on one of the cable channels called $40 a day - eating well on $40 a day, when touring the USA. The host of the show eats great food for this. We'd easily eat for less than $40/day for the two of us - sometimes $20 covers all our food for the day. One of the best lunches in cities is a footlong Subway Sandwich (eg roll) which feeds both of us well - and its probably one of the healthiest take away foods. More tips are shown below.

How to get a good price on flights/hotels/car

General Tips

Flights

Cheap Times

Cheap at really inconvenient times ie 6am, 11pm departures. If you want a reasonable flight time you will need to pay a bit more. We fly out of LAX because it is more convenient. However we are told that other airports can be cheaper, and some friends fly out of Long Beach because of this.

Good Deals

Flights costs about the same on their parent sites eg American Airlines, as they do on travelocity or orbitz. Always check.

Cancellations - Flights

Unless you pay a fortune, airfairs are not cancellable, refundable or changeable

Flights - To/From Australia

Qantas, Air New Zealands, and United are the big three carriers. In order of service/quality, Qantas is best and United is worst. Air New Zealand only flys via New Zealand, which adds a break and extra time to the flight, however, it is often cheaper than Qantas. Our personal experience is only of Qantas, though many friends/family have flown Air New Zealand. Flights are generally cheaper mid-week. Flights can drop by many hundreds of dollars when the good deals are on. In 2004 it became cheap to fly from the USA to Australia in June-August - down to less than $US700 per person from LAX to Sydney. Flights from Australia to USA were lease expensive in Feb-April (excluding Easter - a big holiday in Australia, not a holiday in USA).
Whilst it may be cheaper to book each leg of your flight separately, using a discount airline within Australia/USA, booking all the way through from departure to destination saves the hassle that comes when flights are delayed/cancelled - the airline will get you to where it said it would. Otherwise it is wise to leave half a day between domestic/international flights to ensure delays don't cause you to miss your connection. For example, we flew Qantas from LAX to Sydeny and after all the delays the plane arrived over 5 hours late. Rob was booked all the way through to Hobart from LA and so whilst he didn't miss his connection he was covered if he did. All those who booked Virgin Blue (discount Australian airline) from Sydney and who missed their flight would have had to pay to get on a later flight. Travel insurance may assist in these situations.

Quarantine

Please check the Australian Quarantine Regulations becase the laws about what you can take into Australia are strict and may limit what you can buy/bring on your holiday. The quarantine laws are the same for everyone. No special treament for visitors or citizens. Quarantine regulations coming into the USA are not as stringent, but are worth checking.

Security Checks

With all the added security checks for visitors to the USA, ensure your passport is correct and up-to-date, and that you have a machine-readable passport. Make sure you have the address of where you are staying on your first night with you on the airplane - this information is required for completing the immigration forms before you receive your baggage.

Accomodation

Chain hotels

bestwestern.com qualityinn.com ramada.com Holiday-Inn.com Travelodge.com Motel6.com aka the cheapest motel in the USA. Super8.com

Appartments

When in NYC, we stayed in an appartment (ie someone's house) - fully furnished, etc. This was cheaper than a hotel, given we were there for 8 nights. Short term rentals are more common than we thought and there were heaps to choose from (and heaps of companies) in NYC. It is a bit more organising and possibly risky, but was very good.
According to Consumer Reports better deals can be obtained by phoning the hotel directly. We haven't tried this.

Where to stay

Using maps (online and paper), review sites (Trip Advisor we work out if a hotel is OK and in an OK location. Once we have rought flight times, a hotel (or selection of hotels) we'll try for the best deal on the sites that do combo deals - eg travelocity, orbitz, etc.

Cancellations

Note that some hotels will charge for cancellations. Others have really good cancellation policies. We have booked online and cancelled after finding a better deal elsewhere (or better hotel location) - just read the conditions before finalising the booking.

National Parks

Accomodation within National Parks is expensive, usually $100 for a basic room. Of course you are right there and may have an amazing view from your window, or snow outside. Accomodation outside the parks is usually less expensive, but may require driving some distance.

Food

Some hotels provide breakfast, and as a minimum you should be able to get your total daily sugar intake from this :-) We either buy cereal already packaged in a bowl from the supermarket, or take bowls and cereal or buy cereal when we get to our destination (depends on whether we are driving or flying). We use dried milk powder, or buy small milk cartons if there's a fridge. There are not always 24 hour or 7/11 shops near the hotel, but often there will be a Walgreens (or other small supermarket) around open at least during the day. There are a wide array of TV dinner or reheatable takeaway foods available in supermarkets and if the hotel has a microwave oven, you'll be fine. We have a small heating element which enables us to heat water for soup or two minute noodles (which take three minutes in the states) or other freeze dried foods (we buy some from outdoor shops like REI - they maybe designed for camping, but they're just as good in a hotel). Also, there is room in the coffee maker to place a sealed bag of food. We eat the "" brand, common to some supermarkets or Trader Joe's. One thing we haven't found in the USA is suprise peas/carrots/corn, so we got some from Australia - useful as a meal extender or to supplement the often meat only reheatable foods. Of course we enjoy going out to restaurants, but when holidaying for a week or two, it isn't good for the wallet or the belly.

Serving Size

We are not big eaters and so the serving sizes in most restaurants in the USA are far bigger than we can fit in, and so it it is appropriate we will share a plate.

Tipping

Tipping is expected anywhere there is table service. In California, basically double the tax, which will give you a rough idea - 15%-20% is usual (tax is 8.25%, hence doubling gives a rough ballpark figure). Either leave notes on the table, or give to waitress, or add to the credit card before signing.

Pricing

Pizza is a lot more expensive than in Australia. However, good pizza eg Chicago deep dish, or New York Pizza is well worth trying. You can also get "Pizza by the Slice". This is usually cheese or pepperoni, but are quite large pieces.

Salmon is common in the USA and can be considerably cheaper too.

Transportation

Hire Car

Standard car hired at airport costs between $20 and $30 a day. Automatic with aircon. Insurance is another $18-$25 a day - never included with price. Many travel insurers provide equivalent insurance at a much lower price than the rental car company. Check if your credit card or own insurance will cover a hire car. Note: in California (maybe all USA), the car comes with zero insurance - ie you will be responsible for all costs incurred in repair/replacement including loss of income of hire car company.

• some companies charge extra (or don't allow) the car to be driven out of state, or into certain states.
• Cars cannot (in nearly all cases, including actual 4WD/SUVs) be driven off road
• Get an 'unlimited miles' car - given all companies have a similar absolute base rate it is worth hiring a car with unlimited miles and no limitations on which states you can travel in
• Car hire companies do not allow the car to be driven into Mexico. Many will allow the car to be driven into Canada.

Public Transport

Most big cities have public transport. We have found it excellent in San Francisco, New York, Washington DC, Chicago. In all those places we have caught trains from the airport to near where we were staying, and used it to get around the city. All have had info on their web sites (Google to find site) which enabled us to know how close the station was to the hotel, costs, which attractions we could use it to see.

Public Transport - Los Angeles

Los Angeles does have public transport, but given its size it is not always convenient. Rob and Hai-Tan use different bus lines to commute to work. Visitors have used the trains to get around, but sadly a car (and lots of time and patience) is usually required.

Attractions

National Parks

Most National Parks charge an entry fee per car (or per person if on foot, e.g. San Francisco Naval Museum). For the Grand Canyon, it is $20/car and so if visiting more than one, it may be cost effective to purchase a National Parks Pass for $50 which provides you with unlimited access to parks for one year.

Discounts

Nearly all attractions provide discount entry of some description:

• coupons in travel booklets
• discounts for AAA members
• discounts if pre-purchased
• discount if Rob buys through work (most have no restrictions on who can use them)
• discount or free days in Museums (usually a weekday)

Note - many attractions will have lines of people waiting to purchase tickets and so this should be considered when deciding when to arrive, or whether to prepurchase tickets.

Travel Insurance

If we're spending a lot of flights and hotels we get travel insurance. We find travel guard to be OK. Don't rely on them sending the baggage tags etc out in time, however. We have made claims and used their "concierge" service - they found a camera repair shop in Manhattan when the camera broke at the World Trade Center site. Recently we have used InsureMyTrip.com, and selected an insurer from them, but have not had to make a claim (as always the real test of a good insurer).

Credit Cards

Great for use online, just make sure you check your bill and try to have a spare in case you have to cancel one mid trip

How do we work out what's worth seeing?

Books

We prefer to use Lonely Planet guides. Recently we have used Fodors Guides for individual cities because the local library has the latest editions - they are a it more opinionated than Lonely Planet but have good accomodation information and public transportation information. Fodor's publish National Parks of the West, which we find very useful.

Internet

search google
National Parks Site - excellent information on each park or monument, and maps (, however the National Parks web site is excellent - click through to the "Plan Your Visit" section), guides, weather, advice, etc

Friends

:-)

Maps

AAA has brilliant maps of the roads - not great for street level in cities, but on the open road they are great. In the Canyons, their Indian Nations map is the best. Often the other side of the map will be covered in places of interest, etc.