The Millennial's Guide to World Travel - How to Travel the Globe on a Young Professional's Salary Millennial Venture, 2014
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The Millennial’s
Guide to World Travel
How to Travel the Globe on a Young Professional’s Salary
Millennial Venture, 2014
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Table of Contents Travel for the Young Professional ................................................................................................................. 3 Who Am I?................................................................................................................................................. 3 Choosing Your Destination............................................................................................................................ 3 Setting Your Target ................................................................................................................................... 4 Destination Toolbox .................................................................................................................................. 5 Pay Yourself First – Savings Accounts ........................................................................................................... 6 From Zero to Auto-Pilot ............................................................................................................................ 6 Three Month Report Card ......................................................................................................................... 7 Savings Toolbox......................................................................................................................................... 8 Fast Tracking Your Trip – Credit Card Points................................................................................................. 9 Why Use Credit Card Points ...................................................................................................................... 9 Understanding Rewards Programs ......................................................................................................... 10 Creating a Points Machine ...................................................................................................................... 11 My Specific Cards .................................................................................................................................... 12 Credit Cards Toolbox ............................................................................................................................... 14 Plan Your Trip .............................................................................................................................................. 15 Booking Flights with Credit Cards ........................................................................................................... 15 Booking Accommodations ...................................................................................................................... 16 Other Considerations .............................................................................................................................. 16 Plan Your Trip Toolbox ............................................................................................................................ 17 Enjoy! .......................................................................................................................................................... 18 Other Resources.......................................................................................................................................... 18 www.millennialventure.com July 2014
Travel for the Young Professional
Our generation has a travel itch. According to the WYSE Travel Confederation, young travelers make up
20% of international tourism. Professional trade reports aside, I see it with myself and my friends. I hear
all the time that “I want to see the world while I’m young” or “I need to travel before I have a family.”
Most of all I hear “I wish I could travel more; everybody’s doing cooler things than me.”
The curated life on Facebook can make it seem like
everybody is experiencing more than you. These people
don't necessarily have more money than you, but they “Young travelers today
probably have the systems set up to make travel a priority.
want, more than ever, to
This guide is to help you act on your wanderlust and enrich themselves with
experience the world outside of where you grew up and
cultural experiences, to
went to school. Maybe you’re transitioning from school to
work or building your career one day at a time. There’s a lot meet local people and to
to see out there and there’s no time like the present to do it. improve their employability
Contrary to popular belief, you also don't need an amazing when they return home.”
salary or a trust fund to see the world.
Who Am I?
My name is Max, and I’m the writer of Millennial Venture. I graduated college in 2011 and since
graduation I have been able to visit Italy, Hawaii, Mexico, Japan, the Bahamas, California and New York
on an entry-level salary. In fact, I’m writing this guide from the Bahamas right now. I’ve learned from
firsthand experience how to plan for, save for and experience world travel on the salary of a young
professional. Now it’s your turn.
Choosing Your Destination
Imagine your dream vacation. Maybe it's climbing Mt Kilimanjaro, or seeing the cherry blossoms in
Kyoto. Maybe it's visiting your significant other across the country or laying out on a beach in Mexico. All
of those are possible with a bit of planning and saving. Let’s get started and first focus on identifying
your dream vacation.
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Some people might advocate choosing
your destination last in the process, but I
think it deserves to be first for one
important reason - motivation. Setting a
Motivation Action goal and being able to see yourself
chipping away at it is extremely important
in maintaining motivation. A body in
motion remains in motion, so use your
momentum. Sir Isaac Newton may not
have specifically meant that the
momentum of visible progress would
sustain motivation, but I'm going to say it
Progress applies here anyway.
To really extend that motivation, set up
ways to remind yourself often about your
goal. Set a picture of the specific beach you want to visit as your phone's wallpaper. Change your
passwords to words relevant to your destination. Hang a picture of it on your bathroom mirror. Remind
yourself frequently of your dream to keep making progress on it.
Setting Your Takeoff Target
It's a little early now to plan your exact itinerary, but now is the time to choose your destination idea
and amount of time you'd like to spend on your trip. Since its relatively inexpensive to go to Mexico but
it'll cost a lot to visit Australia (from the US) you want to have a destination in mind so you know what
general amount you’ll need to save.
Do a general search on Kayak using the flexible dates calendar view and see what a flight to your dream
vacation costs. Then do a quick search on AirBnb or Hostelworld to see what it might cost for you to stay
for the length of your trip. No exact numbers needed here, just ballpark some figures. Add those up and
you have your target.
Now, how to reach that target?
Side note: although it seems straightforward and defined, there are actually a lot of ways to spend
much less than you'd expect on these trips. From choosing specific flights to staying at a hostel
instead of a hotel, there are plenty of ways to travel on the cheap that might go against your basic
assumptions. When it comes time to book your trip, we’ll go over some of those methods.
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Destination Toolbox
Pick a destination or dream vacation that has an emotional drive for you
Set up motivator cues to remind you of your goal
Research potential transportation and lodging costs to get your savings target
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Pay Yourself First – Savings Accounts
We're going to start with some basic personal finance management so that we can save towards our
goal. How are we going to go about saving?
Almost everybody in finance will advocate creating a budget and "just stick to it" advice. It just isn’t
effective or realistic, for a few reasons. How many times have you tried to stick to a budget and failed?
Some people get creative with specific envelopes stocked with
cash for specific types of spending. Budgets work for some
Common savings sub-accounts:
people but we're not going to focus on that idea. Not us, for a
few reasons.
House Down Payment
1. Budgets rely on enormous self-discipline. The classic line
Travel
goes like this - don't think of a pink elephant. Wait.
What are you thinking of right now? I bet it's a pink Emergency Fund
elephant. We aren't wired to function well on restraint,
especially when we are in a less than ideal physical
state. Get hungry or tired and you're more likely to
spend and go over your designated budget.
2. Budgets rely on hoping that you'll have enough at the end. If you do well at saving and scrimping
this month, you might have enough left over to allocate toward your goal. Rinse, later, repeat.
This leaves our goal as an afterthought, rather than a priority.
Instead, we are going to rely on a system that doesn't depend on daily will power or vague hope.
We are going to pay ourselves first.
Instead of telling ourselves to save and looking back at the end of the month with no more than we
started with, we are going to automate our finances and let our system work without us. Not only will
this help decrease the decisions we have to make, but it will also guarantee that we can look back in six
months and see progress towards our goal. Let’s get started.
From Zero to Auto-Pilot
First we are going to set up a savings account that is kept separate from our checking account. This will
help us mentally understand how much we have to spend in our checking account and how much we
have saved toward our goals in our savings account. It also helps to view the savings balance as off-limits
for regular expenses. In case we do want to spring for something we can't afford, we have to consciously
decide to transfer money back in and wait the few days for it.
Set up a savings account
When you go to set up your savings account, you may even consider doing it at a bank that is not your
primary checking account bank. This way you earn more interest on your savings and impose a time
www.millennialventure.com July 2014restriction of a few days on how quickly you can move money around which discourages uses your
savings to pay for everyday expenses. Consider setting up an account with Capital One 360 or Ally bank,
as the online banks have a lot lower overhead costs and can afford to give you a better interest rate. I'd
also recommend setting up sub-accounts so that you can specify what exactly you're saving for. You may
have an emergency fund, a vacation account and a down payment account. This way you can measure
progress on multiple goals and, if you do run into an emergency and need to withdraw you can choose
exactly which goal should take the hit. For example, let’s say that you need to make repairs to your car.
You can look at the amounts in your travel account versus your house down payment account and
decide which one you’d like to withdraw from and delay.
Set up automatic transfers
Next, link your checking account and set up automatic transfers. If you're paid on the 1st and the 15th,
set up recurring transfers on the 2nd and the 16th from your checking to your savings. That way you
never see the money in your checking account for longer than a day or two. At first these transfers
might be small, and that's okay. Maybe all you can spare is $25 per paycheck, but you'll see that money
add up quickly and you won't miss it from your checking account. You’ll never miss the $25 and a couple
months later you can check your balance and be impressed at the saving you did without even trying. If
you recall our cycle, this is the Action part.
After you have transferred out everything that you
need to, what's left in your checking account is what
Ramit Sethi of IWillTeachYouToBeRich.com calls
Motivation Action "guilt-free spending." Instead of budgeting and
beating yourself up any time you buy anything, pay
your dream account first and then enjoy your
paycheck. This will help keep your sanity and your
dream alive.
Divide your travel goal by how much you’re saving
Progress each month and you will know how long it’ll take you
to save for that trip – that’s your timeline to takeoff. It
may seem daunting now, but getting started is the
most important part. We’ll discuss later how you can actually fast-track your trip with some extra
strategies.
Three Month Report Card
Just because you're out of college doesn't mean that you can't get a report card anymore. Check in on
the progress of your savings accounts every few months. Set a calendar reminder.
No seriously, go set a recurring email right now to remind you every three months. I use Google
Calendar and it texts me a half hour before any scheduled appointment.
www.millennialventure.com July 2014During your report card check ups, take a look at the
Emergency Fund progress you've made! All of a sudden those $25 transfers
have become $150 and you're making progress on your goal
Australia
instead of looking longingly at Facebook photos and wishing
Down Payment you had the money to travel. Remember our cycle of
Motivation, Action and Progress. These checkups let you
measure your progress and give you the motivation to keep going toward your goal!
It may be that you've gotten a raise or a bonus since you started saving. Instead of taking all of that
money and increasing your spending accordingly, try splitting it with your savings. If you have an extra
$100 per month, put $50 more into savings and spend the other $50 on yourself. Now you can
accelerate your timeline for your trip and get there even sooner!
Savings Toolbox
Set up a separate savings account. (Optional: set up sub-accounts for specific goals)
Pay Yourself First. Use automatic transfers to savings after you get paid
Set up reminders to do a three month report card. Measure your progress and make
any tweaks.
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Fast Tracking Your Trip – Credit Card
Points
Let me start with a disclaimer here: I don’t encourage any Rewards credit cards are,
irresponsible use of credit card spending. Some people hands down, the best way
swear by credit card churning, which is applying for cards
to afford travel as a young
solely for the signup bonus. My strategy focuses on earning
credit cards points by maximizing rewards in a variety of professional.
categories, not on signup bonuses.
Why Use Credit Card Points
Credit card points are an amazing way to get discounted flights. Put simply, if you can be rewarded for
the purchases you already make, you should be. Credit card companies skim a couple percentage points
off the top of every transaction in exchange for doing all of processing of that payment. Since their
services are so remarkably similar, credit card companies compete with benefits, annual percentage rate
(APR) or, our favorite, rewards. If you choose and use their card, they're happy to share some of that
profit with you. Unlike our parents and the "budget experts," our friendly credit cards actually reward us
for spending money.
Interesting story: A few years back, the US Mint was trying to get dollar coins used more heavily in
circulation. They had the option to order them online with free shipping. Some smart people (who
I'm very jealous of) started ordering cases of these coins on their rewards cards, depositing them
into their checking accounts and paying off their credit card bills with these coins. The result? Free
miles, and lots of them. You were only limited by how many coins you could wheelbarrow into your
bank and dump onto the counter. Some people earned hundreds of thousands of miles – to put
that into perspective, you can get a round-trip ticket to Europe for about 50,000 miles.
Now it's important to note that the rewards will never outpace the actual spending that you do. Getting
anywhere from 1 to 5 points for spending a dollar will never justify spending just for the sake of getting
rewards. Be aware of the effect that rewards credit cards have on you and don't let them sway how
much you actually spend. To put this into practice, I'd suggest setting up a service called Mint. It does a
great job of tracking your income and spending so that you can 1) compare your spending over time and
2) find out specifically which areas you might be overspending in.
Credit cards rewards are NOT for everybody. Having direct access to spend money that you might not
have can be a challenge for some people, and using rewards cards is not always in your best interest.
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Rewards Credit Cards Aren’t Ideal If: Rewards Credit Cards Are Great If:
You carry a balance on your credit card You get expenses reimbursed through work
You tend to overspend with credit cards You have a good cushion amount in your checking
You don’t have great credit history You have good credit history
You are living paycheck to paycheck You pay off your credit cards in full each month
If you’ve decided that credit card rewards are for you, let’s figure out how to get started.
Understanding Rewards Programs
All points are not created equal, so it's important to understand the different types of rewards programs
you can earn in. Most importantly, realize that a point can vary in value depending on how it is used.
Each of the programs earn points from what you spend on your credit card, but they differ in how you
redeem those points for travel.
Rewards Program Type Examples
Cash-Back Travel Capital One Venture Card
These programs let you book travel and then remove the charge from BarclayCard Arrival Plus
your statement using your points at 1 cent/point. A flight that you paid
$400 for would take 40,000 points to remove from your credit balance.
This is the same value as getting cash-back for your points and buying
the ticket with cash.
Program-Specific Travel United Explorer Card
These programs give you rewards in the form of miles or points directly Southwest Rapid Rewards
with the partner of your choice. For example, a round-trip domestic Visa
flight on Frontier would take 20,000 Frontier Miles, while a flight on
Southwest has variable point values.
Hybrid Travel Chase Ultimate Rewards
These programs give you rewards in the form of points that can be American Express
transferred to cash at 1 cent/point or transferred into miles or points
directly with your travel partner of choice. This is a hybrid between Cash-
Back and Program-Specific since you can use your points either way.
Here are some of the advantages of each program:
Cash-Back Travel usually earns more points per dollar on all purchases, can be spent on different
travel providers and allows you to redeem for all sorts of travel, not just the programs that your
credit card provider has partnered with. On the other hand, there aren’t usually bonus
categories and you’re limited to redeeming points for travel only.
www.millennialventure.com July 2014 Program-Specific Travel earns a lot of points per dollar spent with your specific travel partner
and often get you great benefits like priority boarding or free checked bags. Sadly, your
redemption is tied to one carrier, you only get bonuses when you spend with that carrier and
you can’t exchange cash for points.
Hybrid Travel cards may earn fewer points per dollar on general purchases but usually have
specific multiplier categories and the flexibility of being able to redeem for cash or miles and
shop around. Some drawbacks of these programs are that some specific carriers might not be
available and the earnings potential isn’t as consistent as cash-back travel cards.
I’d personally recommend a Hybrid Travel program since that lets you look around for the biggest
discounts and best prices using either cash back or miles. These cards have the best of both worlds in
that they let you find HUGE price differences between dollar value and points value options. I regularly
see flights that are $300 go for the points equivalent of $150 (15k points) and last year I booked a
$1,400 flight for the points equivalent of $750.
There are a few services out there that will analyze your spending and determine the best cards for you
in terms of bonus categories. They’re very good at the analysis and can find the cards that will earn you
the most points, but it’s important to note that they’ll recommend Cash-Back, Program-Specific and
Hybrid cards. They’re a great tool to get an idea initially of what cards to look at, but do some research
to make sure they’re what you want.
Creating a Points Machine
Applying for your Credit Cards
Now that you’ve decided which cards will work best for your situation, it’s time to apply. The online
application process is very straightforward for most cards, but there are a few things to know ahead of
time.
If the cards you’re signing up for have a signup bonus that requires a minimum spend, keep that
in mind when applying for multiple cards. If you sign up for two cards at the same time that will
require $3,000 spent in the first 3 months, make sure you have the income to support spending
$6,000 in 3 months.
If your online application isn’t immediately accepted, try calling the reconsideration line at the
bank. This phone number is specifically for people to explain their situation and why they
deserve to be considered for a credit card. The phone numbers are easily available via a quick
Google search – “name of credit card reconsideration line” should get you the number easily
enough. Million Mile Secrets has a great explanation of how to do these calls to get approved.
Racking Up the Points
There’s one very straightforward answer on how to maximize your credit card points. Are you ready for
it?
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Use your credit cards for everything. I mean everything. A pack of gum, gas, groceries, bar tabs, even your rent if you’re able to. If you have multiple cards with specific bonus categories, make sure you use the card that will get you the most points. You may want to take a Sharpie and write your bonus categories on your cards to help you remember. Set up your recurring payments to auto-pay with your credit cards. Utilities, cell phone, TV, internet, Netflix, Hulu, gym membership – anything you can. If you have an old credit card that you don’t use much anymore this can be a great way to keep an active credit history on it without having to carry it. You can also enroll in certain programs that increase your miles by a small amount. For example, United MileagePlus Dining lets you link your credit cards and gives you an extra few miles whenever you dine at one of their participating restaurants. My Specific Cards People have asked me a few times which credit cards I use, especially after they hear that I like to take one or two free international trips with credit cards each year. While a small part of that opportunity comes from traveling for client projects, most of the points are a result of using the right credit cards. Here are the specific cards I have used to travel the world on a young professional's salary. A key to this strategy: One thing to note with Chase is that points from a cash back card don't necessarily have to be used to get cash back. In fact, using a cash back card to earn points and using those points for travel is a great way to get a deal. Two of the cards I use are technically cash-back cards but the third allows me to use those points for flights instead of cash back. The every day cash-back, no fee card The Chase Freedom card is marketed as a cash-back card, but it fits into the travel program perfectly because of its rewards categories. The card has no annual fee, gets 1 point per dollar on all purchases and gets 4 extra points per dollar on purchases in rotating categories. These categories vary quarterly between restaurants, gas stations, movie theaters and Amazon. A final thing to know about the Freedom card - if you only have this card, you can only exchange points for cash back or spending in the Ultimate Rewards Mall. The specific use cash-back business card The Ink Cash card is a business card that earns points in a few different categories from the Freedom card. It has no annual fee, gets 1 point per dollar on all purchases and gets another 4 points at office supply stores, cell phones, landline, internet and cable services as well as 2x points at gas stations and restaurants. It was named the 2013 Best for Cash Back for Small Business by MONEY magazine. www.millennialventure.com July 2014
This card is great for cell phone, any office supplies and cable/internet. It’s easiest if you set utilities, cell
phone and cable/internet on auto-pay using this card so you can really set it and forget it. The points for
this card can also only be used for cash back or spending in the Ultimate Rewards Mall, which brings me
to...
The hybrid travel and dining card
The Chase Sapphire Preferred card is the best tool for booking travel with rewards points. It gets 1 point
per dollar on normal transactions and 2 points per dollar on travel and dining. Travel includes airfare,
hotels, gas, rental cars, taxis, parking, bus fares, subway, etc. and dining includes restaurants, fast food
and coffee shops.
The card has no foreign transaction fees, which is a huge benefit. It’s useful to have at least one card
that has no foreign transaction fees, because they are about 3% of every transaction and can add up
quickly when you’re abroad. Last year I visited Japan but was unable to use this card most places
because it didn’t have the chip and pin security system that most of the world uses. Since then Chase
has added a chip and pin to the card, which is great.
This card does have an annual fee of $95
which is waived the first year but the savings
Earn Points on
Different Cards you can get from this card far outweigh the
annual fee. By far the biggest benefit of this
Hybrid card is that you can transfer points
one for one from Chase to most travel
partners (airlines and hotels). This gives you
Combine into
the ability to shop airline tickets or hotel
Hybrid Points rooms by dollars or by points, whichever is
cheaper.
The second best benefit of the Sapphire
Redeem Redeem Preferred card is that you can transfer
for Cash for Miles Freedom/Ink Cash points into it and make
those points much more useful. So instead of
taking the points from the Freedom or Ink Cash as cash-back points and getting a check for 1 cent/point,
I can use them as Hybrid points and find some really valuable airfare savings.
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Credit Cards Toolbox
Decide if you’re in a good financial position to take advantage of credit cards rewards
Choose the right credit cards for your spending and apply for them
Set up recurring bills on auto-pay and use credit cards for almost all of your purchases
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Plan Your Trip
Congratulations! It's finally time to take that dream trip of yours. You've put in the work to plan and save
to get somewhere amazing, so make sure that you take the trip that you really want.
When it comes time to start planning your itinerary, you should keep in mind exactly what your goal is. If
your dream is to get pampered, stay in high-end hotels and plan to spend on great meals. If you want to
backpack and see four countries, focus on having enough money for trains and hostels. If you want to
get tickets to a music festival or a concert at your destination, rock on. If your goal is to get enough great
pictures for a year's worth of jealousy-inducing cover photos, get it done. Don't let somebody else tell
you how to take your trip, but instead focus on what you want to get out of it!
With that being said, here are a few ideas for how you can save a bit here and there to spend a bit more
on what matters to you.
Booking Flights with Credit Cards
Once you've built up your points balance and you need to scratch your travel itch, it's time to book some
flights. How you book your travel is going to depend on 1) which type of rewards program you're in and
2) what the best deal is currently.
With a cash-back travel card, you'll simply book the best or cheapest flight from a Kayak search or other
flight aggregator, along with any airlines that might not show up in that search. For example, Southwest
isn't included in a Kayak search. Then you just log into your credit card account and apply your points
toward paying for that flight. This is why these companies advertise no blackout dates, because you're
just booking the flight with cash and then refunding that amount to your credit card balance.
With a program-specific travel card, you log into your airline's site and search for your trip using award
travel, then book using points directly. Most airlines have standard redemption rates for certain flight
categories like 20,000 miles for a round trip domestic flight on Frontier. Some airlines have discounted
bookings for award travel; a Saver Award on United costs half as many points as a Standard Award, but
there are fewer Saver seats on each flight.
With a hybrid travel program, you do both searches based on dollar cost and on points cost and then
choose the best one. This lets you shop around for the best deal, whether it's paying for a flight with
your card and then taking cash back or whether it's transferring points into airline miles and booking a
cheap flight.
When comparing flights with hybrid points, it’s important to understand cash vs. point value. There are
two ways to consider it:
1. Divide the amount of points to book a flight by 100 to get the dollar value of those points. This is
helpful when comparing a points flight to a cash flight.
www.millennialventure.com July 20142. Divide the cash price of a flight by the number of points necessary to get the cents per point
value. This is helpful when comparing two different points flights.
For example, roundtrip flights from Denver to Los Angeles on Southwest are usually about $270 or
13,500 points. Since those 13,500 points could also be transferred into $135, that's a 50% savings. On
the other hand, if a flight is only $200 but would cost 30,000 points, you’re better off exchanging 20,000
in points and buying the flight with cash.
Booking Accommodations
Although hotels are the default lodging that we think of when traveling, there are plenty of great
options now for sleeping in a foreign country on a budget. The Sharing Economy has been good to us
and people are now perfectly happy to rent out an extra
bedroom or even invite strangers in for a stay on the couch.
I've never personally done Couchsurfing, but I've heard Take advantage of the
great reviews of people who not only got a free place to stay sharing economy for
but also a hot dinner and a friend to party with for the night.
lodging. AirBnb,
In my experience I've had nothing but good luck and great
experiences with AirBnb, and most of the hosts live nearby
Couchsurfing and
and are happy to be a guide or take people out in their hostels are all great
town. If you're going to be somewhere for more than a few options.
days, AirBnb can be really nice to feel like you have your
own place of refuge in a new city.
The other common lodging, especially in Europe, is a hostel.
Despite what you may have seen in horror movies in the US, hostels are an amazing experience and a
ton of fun for a good price. In Europe especially, hostels actually encourage a younger community by
enforcing an age limit on their guests. If you're interested, I'd recommend going through
Hostelworld.com as their reviews and descriptions are great and every hostel there has to compete for
amenities, price and atmosphere. You may share a communal bathroom, but you'll also share new
experiences and come away with some really amazing friends.
Other Considerations
Springing for the Upgrade: If you like to travel in style and luxury, consider using your points for seat
upgrades as those can be a great value for airline miles. The cents per points value is considerably higher
on upgrades, if that’s your style. I personally like to spend the least amount to get somewhere.
Repositioning Cruises: If a cruise is your idea of a great vacation, check out CruiseSheet.com. You may
even want to consider taking a one-one-way cruise either to or from your destination to really mix it up.
These are called repositioning cruises and they are when a cruise company is looking to move a ship
from one route to another, usually at the end of the season. These can be a great deal if you're okay
with fewer stops and spending more time on the boat. On a 14 day cruise between Florida and Spain
www.millennialventure.com July 2014you’ll spend 7 days on the open ocean and the other 7 will be visiting various ports near your starting or
ending port.
Open-Jaw Flights: It’s often useful to book multi-city tickets instead of a normal round-trip ticket. For
example, you may fly into Rome, take a train into Paris and fly from Paris back home. This is called an
open-jaw or multi-city ticket. An eBook called Life Nomadic is a great resource for information on saving
with complex routing scenarios.
Consider Rail Passes: If you have an extended trip and you'll be visiting multiple different cities, a rail
pass can be a great deal. However, a rail pass isn't always going to be cheaper so take a look at the
ballpark figures of what individual tickets would cost versus a pass.
For example, in Japan it was about $50 cheaper for us to buy a JR Pass for two weeks when looking at
our trips on the Shinkansen (bullet train) between Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto and back to Tokyo. Add in what
we saved on trains in the cities themselves and it made a lot of sense. However, I didn't do a Eurail Pass
when in Italy because it was much more expensive than the few local trips we were taking. You can run
the price on every single leg of your trip to compare to a pass, but it's a good idea to at least compare
options with ballpark prices.
Plan Your Trip Toolbox
Decide what the goal of your trip is: relaxation, sightseeing, meeting locals, etc.
Find the best flights for you and book them using your savings or your credit card
points
Locate a great place to stay for your dream vacation and book it
www.millennialventure.com July 2014Enjoy!
The last and most important step is this - enjoy your trip! Take some pictures to evoke Facebook envy,
since we all have it. Hell, tag me in them and let me know where you got to go!
Other Resources
Life Nomadic – a great eBook detailing the nomadic attitude of a world traveler, the best gear for
packing and living light and specific information on flight hacking for discounts.
The Points Guy – the ultimate resource for information on all things credit cards rewards, especially
credit cards churning. This guy knows his stuff inside and out.
Thanks for Reading
With questions about any of the content in this guide, email me directly at max@millennialventure.com.
Even if it’s a specific question about what you should do, I’d love to hear from you so don’t hesitate to
reach out!
Cover Photo Credit: Lajon Tanganco – My Travel Journal
https://www.flickr.com/photos/lajon/5879305105
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