Cheap saving: Germany!

Hallo! Next stop on our list is Deustchland! So just like my other post on Italy i'll go over another research and budget analysis on this trip. I'll be going over ways to travel within Germany while being monetary conscious. I try to use other resources and search for new websites to add to my list. Figured that not all sites are created equal some won't be consistent so to prevent that I again will post my findings. Let's begin!

The situation: 2 week vacation in Germany for the weeks of July. Dates: March 15th-29th, 2016

Let's book some flights!

Flights

I will test out my other websites I found and see if any prove to be consistent if not then i'll list them on here. 

The list are flights for a roundtrip per person.

1. Travelsupermarket.com

This site helps you generate cheap flights by directing you to other travel agency pages such as: 

Gotogate.com

USD= $722.09






Omegaflightstore.com

USD= $729.77







ebookers.com

USD= $738.84

Even though they are priced at euros the conversion turns out to be cheaper than other websites I've search in the past. Especially for a flight from San Francisco to Germany is incredibly cheap. I'm constantly finding ways to get the cheapest flights and budget as much as I can for the sole purpose of this blog. This was quite a find to get tickets below a grand. Lets see what their American counterpart can come up with. 

2. StudentUniverse.com

The mecca savings for students. From here you'll find flights from a great range from $899 to $970 with $10 increments in between. All other mainstream travel site are mostly priced at $994 which is damn near close to a grand. But for I want to dig deeper and spend alot more less than that.

3. Hipmunk.com









4. Kayak.com










5. Faredepot.com








Somehow Kayak.com was able to make it to the list even though I try to maneuver away from big name agencies but they finally caught my budget attraction. So far these websites were able to produce less than a grand flight tickets which is awesome and a money saver to explore Germany. Also added new sources to the list to expand more options on air tickets. Now that we have a quite selection pick out for Germany let's go find places to stay.

Hotels/Hostels

Okay from what I found hostels and hotels in Germany are pretty damn expensive. So flying into Frankfurt I found places ranging from $20/night to $70/night. So I'll just list the sites that I was able to seek for the cheapest yet a quality stay. I usually don't post pics of the hotel names and price reason that most people get pretty picky on what hotels or hostels they want to stay in. Therefore, I would gladly help provide the websites that bridge to the purpose of budgeting a cheap hotel. 

expedia.com
booking.com
agoda.com
ibis.com 
hotelclub.com

The last three websites I included are the new sources that hopefully can assist your plans for cheap stay. But for some reason expedia.com and booking.com were the cheapest one so far with prices of $20-$40 a night. But the last three range from $40-$80 a night. So depending how much you want to budget and quality but for me being a student I don't mind taking $20 a night since the purpose is to sleep and all the wonders are outside of the room. 

Transportation

Traveling within Germany I have came across few wonderful blogs explaining the best and cheap options of transportation. These prices are based on the total of the 2 week stay in Germany. The cheapest are the mini compact or smart cars which some are priced above and below $20 a day which is not too shabby. You could potentially spend at least $100- $150 a week.

Car rentals

1. Dollar.com

USD= $174.01

USD= $184.06

2. Travelsupermarket.com

USD= $193.04





3. autoeurope.com

4. travelocity.com

So if you do want to rent a car it's pretty damn cheap for a couple weeks vacation in Germany. Even better if you bring a friend along to cut the cost by half or more. Dollar.com reigns the top competitor in low cost rentals given that it has appeared in other travel agency sites on this list. I tried to look at German rental websites but only ended up finding prices up to $300 and above which is a big no no to budgeting. 

Trains

Trains in Germany are priced considerably high from going to big city to city which is why I was only able to find two really great websites for purchasing train tickets. I would say traveling through may not be the cheapest way since most tickets are somewhat costly depending on what day, time, and city you are heading too. Also searching for the cheapest ticket may not be the best plate for your traveling especially if you're going to be using train multiple times. And according to couple budget blogs, trains do charge reservation fees which adds up to the ticket price if you book in advance. 

1. loco2.com









2. reiseauskunft.bahn.de/

3. Raileurope.com

These are prices for 1 person, I couldn't quote the price for March since train agencies allow booking is too far into the future. There are rail passes that go from 150-300+ euros that can be bought for a group of 5 that may save alot of money traveling through a pack. 

Buses

Reading through budgettravel.org the bus system is the cheapest route to explore Deutschland. Traveling to city to city you get bus fares as low as 1 euro through bus companies like megabus, IDBUS, BerlinlinienBus, Mein Fernbus, and so much more. Check the website for all other city to city travel. 

For traveling within Germany I have came across gettingaroundgermany.info/  for guides into utilizing the buses, trams, and subways.  Fares are really cheap costing to 1-4 euros depending on how far your away from your destination and what zone you are entering in. 

Hitchhiking/ Cycling 

These are also options to roam the rural and vast areas of Germany. Hitchhiking is totally free but quite precarious not knowing who the person you're going in the car with. Good thing there are apps and websites that promote rideshare opportunities such as blablacar, iThumb app, and Rideshare4less. If that's out of your comfort zone then buying a bike for your exploration is definitely an eco-friendly and economical way to go. Germany has tons of bike routes for all traveler looking for a healthy alternative. 

Total traveling expenses

Let's total up our expenses and see where we can come up. BE IN MIND prices are subject to CHANGE.

3 nights in Frankfurt
Plane ticket roundtrip- $722.09
hostel- $91 (booking.com)
bus/trams- $13.41 (3 days)
train to Berlin!- $40.24

TOTAL= $866.74

4 nights in Berlin
Hostel- $58 (booking.com)
bus/trams- $13.20(4 days from berlin.de)
train to Munich!- $32.42

TOTAL= $103.62

4 nights in Munich
Hostel- $95
bus/trams- $20.90 (4 single day tickets from munich-touristinfo.de)
train back to Frankfurt!- $32.42

TOTAL= $148.32

2 nights in Stuttgart
Hostel- $72
bus/trams- $19.11 (2 day from vvs.de)
train to Frankfurt- $21.24

TOTAL= $112.35

Last night in Frankfurt
Hostel- $84 (hotel next to the airport)

TOTAL= $84

GRAND TOTAL OF TRAVELING EXPENSE= $1315.03

Say instead of using the buses and trains of transportation and rented a car from dollar.com
then we would be saving about $19! Total commute cost=$192.94 Total rent-a-car cost=$173.75 but then again that does not include gas! So be wary that 19 bucks towards gas for all your trip won't be enough. You can still decrease the commute cost and mix and match by taking long distance buses and bicycles throughout your journey. 

And again these were the prices I was able to find today so the whole purpose is to provide you the resources and selection to better you plan of budgeting. You have alotta room for other food and miscellaneous cost so it's always better to plan it out. Some tips that help me were to use key words such as "Super/mega cheap" but then again website are notorious for large bold "cheap" titles to grab your attention. Then you ended up looking at not so cheap options which everyone dislikes. So hopefully this budgeting info/guide may serve you an amazing vacation through Deutschland! Thank you guys for reading and i'll be getting you people ready for my next post!

Bis zum nächsten Mal!

Cheap saving: Italy!

Benvenuto! I'll be listing my future destinations and processing budget plans throughout my whole research. Setting up hypothetical dates and places plus I will post actual prices to show you tips and hacks to get the best possible deals within spending limit. So lets begin with booking flights, transportation and hotels!

Flights

The Situation: Booking a flight for 1 person departing June 10-30, 2016(summer vacation) from SFO to Rome...

The results of my research were pretty amazing. If you read my first blog post on Hawaii I mention about skiplagged.com and how it was able to produce one of the cheapest  prices for the flight but this time didn't serve me to well. But luckily using the same process as my last post I did my extensive research. 

So here are my findings... But keep in mind all prices are subjected to change. Also planning 8 months in advance may not be the optimal way of budgeting. Airlines tend to cut prices 2-3 months before you book your flight so try not to be too hasty prices will drop if you wait the perfect time. But that's a whole other topic to discuss. Now let's get back to cheap flights I have came across if I were to buy it now.

1. hipmunk.com

2. justfly.com

3. airfare.com

4. vayama.com

5. cheapoair.com

Sometimes the big popular websites may have a chance to offer better deals than other small travel agency websites. Even skiplagged.com didn't even make it on the list. Expected to be the first was now a slight disappointment but luckily I was able to find the cheapest one so far. This search took me about 30 min to find so it wasn't that hard to find the lowest prices. Now that I am able to share it to help fellow wanderlust travelers like myself serves me to help save a lil bit more money on the vacation. So the winner of this battle of cheap flights belongs to hipmunk.com adding more resources to the table. But REMEMBER timing is key! Don't wait too long nor too early just wait enough to see airlines begin to compete for lower prices then that's when you jump in the arena. Now that flights have been settled lets go to transportation and get out of the airport.

Transportation

So how do we venture without spending unnecessary amounts in Italy? Alright hypothetically we'll be arriving in Leonardo Da Vinci airport so most likely we would want to find our hotel/hostel or whatever once we land. So possible options of transportation I found is the use of the most economical way which is the bus transit and others include the train, shuttles and car. So lets dive into how to use the bus for money saving adventures.

Bus-  Definitely one of the biggest slice of savings is taking the bus around Italy. Specifically in Rome you can ride buses depending on which ticket you buy you can either get a 75min, 1 day, 3 day, 1 week or 1 month bus tickets. Relatively inexpensive, the cost ranges from 1euro to 30euros which can save a whole lot of money for lavish romantic dinners in Rome. So if I were explore Rome, possibly I would purchase the 3 day ticket and the duration may be long but it won't hurt sightseeing through the beautiful city. For more information go to slowtrav.com.

Trains- When it comes to city-to-city travel I stumbled on walksofitaly.com they have greatly written a detailed organize article on train traveling but the post is 4 years old so prices may look cheap on their website.But they have the step by step sequence on what to do in the train station. So I am going to update on prices and keep our wallets fat as a cat. So a brief summary and my research I have came across another site seat61.com which provided train sites to purchase your tickets. First lets set up the destination, going from Rome to Florence on Oct 1st(I tried finding June 17th but it was too early to book so for price comparison I choose this date).

loco2.com

italiarail.com

For italiarail.com you would want to scroll down to look for cheaper prices or just click the lowest price category and sometimes if you're lucky enough find these tickets. 

trenitalia.com

Definitely try considering these sites for traveling city to city in Italy. Most economical way to save money off of gas and time since from Rome to Florence by car will take longer than the train. Another excellent way to get around the country. Also you won't have to worry about popping out the GPS since trains literally take you from point A to point B.

Cars- I've read many websites that renting a car is a big no-no on a budget travel vacation. That's why I won't get to deep in this subject that face you'll be facing problems such as high gas prices, confusing violations, and long distance rides. Most likely I would steer away * pun intended from renting a car. Cars may induce high amounts of stress and anxiety on the street of Italia so to avoid paying over your budget do not get a car. It might seem a good idea if you are traveling on the countryside but for tourist it will obliterate your savings.

Hotels/ other living areas

Flying over to Europe U.S. dollars will be useless so now the current exchange rate is $1 USD is equal to .88 EURO which is pretty low to how much your getting every dollar. But lets see how we can budget this. 

Since this vacation is set for a 20day vacation I would definitely try to mix and match hotels and hostels since given a long period of time you would possibly make like a banana and split through various locations for about 4-5 days. So digging deeper I found hotels from booking.com costing from $200 bucks for 5 days which by dividing that by 2 people you would be paying at least a hundred bucks. 

There are many hotels/hostels that offer shared room or dorms which you can get about $20-25 bucks a night which is decently cheap. Great for travelers in groups, roaming with friends can significantly cut cost low for hostels. Depending how long you stay you can find really cheap places. From hostelbookers.com they can give you the best cheap rooms in the location you are looking for. Price comparison I found small discrepancies but this site won't have much variety but you'll still be able to get good deals. ALWAYS read the customer views sometimes the cheapest ones won't be as bad as if you would pay for a regular hotel. Some people have different views. If you find more positive reviews outweighing the negative then go right along and book it! But be warn you will get as much as you paid for so don't fuss and complain. Won't hurt to spend couple more euros for a comfier stay. 

HotelsCombined.com generates the cheapest options for you night in Rome. A little similar to booking.com but luckily scavenging through this website made searching a lot easier. The moment when this site post pictures of big name travel agency comparisons can really shed light for savings. Looking through this site greatly enhance what I was looking for. Easy to spot cheap hotels and places so conveniently almost puts me at a disbelief. It tells you the total of price as well as the amount of stay at the hotel. Making it easier when you travel with another party or group and just divide the amount with the number in your party. They literally spit out stupidly cheap hotels for your choosing I highly agree to check this website out and browse your selection.

Total traveling/living expenses

Alright so far we've searched a bunch of cheap websites for our plane, hotels, and transportation... let's tally up our cost and begin to estimate our budget. Using the resources above let's see what we can come up with. 

5 nights in Rome

Plane ticket roundtrip-$1264.40

Bus fare- 11 euros

Hotel- $167

Train to Florence- 14.30 euros

Total= $1459.7

Off to Firenze!

5 nights in Florence
3 day bus fare- 12 euros
Hotel Villa- $97
train to  Venice- 14.30 euros

Total= $126.32

Now let's sail to Venezia!

5 nights in Venice
2 day ferry ride- 28 euros
hotel- $66.80
train back to Rome- 21.90 euros

Total= $122.42

Last nights in Rome...

5 nights in Rome
3 day bus fare- 11euros
hotel- $93
train to the airport- 6 euros

Total= $111.95

So the grand total for all living/transportation expense= $1820.39

This doesn't include food and other items such as gifts, clothes, etc. so to be in the safe zone I would possibly bring at least $2500 to cover those expenses. Keep in mind that these prices are NOT set in stone and they will fluctuate. Also if you have more money left after you planned your whole trip try to increase one of the values of your hotel or adjust areas where you may want to spend more to get more of your vacation. It's always better to plan and predict how much you are going to spend so that you have a good idea of what you need to bring. Well I really hope this helps some of you guys... I'm just a person who loves to save and have fun so thank you for reading and I'll be back with more business and traveling posts! Stay tuned!

Any questions or comments please do so I would love to hear more tricks on money saving on trip and websites that you guys got for cheap!