On occasions, my husband takes overnight business trips. To prevent loneliness, he often invites me to go along with him. Whenever I discover what city we will be visiting, I immediately start researching it. For instance, I map out landmarks we’ve never seen, restaurants with good reviews, entertainment options, and hotels that look appealing. By the time we get in the car, board the plane, or get on the train, every minute of our trip is already planned out. If your spouse travels frequently for work, consider mixing business with pleasure from time to time. On this blog, you will discover how to make the most of an upcoming business trip.
Business and Pleasure
Skipping The Hotel Extras To Retain Your Cheap Hotel Rates
Delores Tucker
If you are planning a family vacation this year, then you probably want to save as much money as possible on airfare and hotel costs. You can easily find cheap hotel rates online by comparing prices in advance. Unfortunately, some cheaper hotels will charge you for any extras that you use when you are staying in the hotel. These can raise the cheap hotel rates to ones that you would see at a five star hotel. Hotels will sometimes not tell you about these extra costs up front. This does not mean that the hotel is a bad value, it just means that you need to be careful about your choices during your stay. The information below can help you with this.
Skip the Hotel Coffee
If you are used to staying in hotels, then you are probably used to drinking coffee out of the small coffee pot that is supplied to you. These coffee pots used to be amenities that were left for your convenience so you did not have to leave your room to get your caffeine fix. Unfortunately, more and more hotels actually charge for the coffee bags that are conveniently arranged next to your hotel coffee pot. In some instances, the small bags that make four or five cups of coffee can cost you three or four dollars. You can generally purchase a whole pound of coffee for around 10 dollars, and you can make about 32 cups of coffee with it.
You may think that the convenience of drinking coffee in your room is worth the three or four dollars a day, but some hotels actually charge you for using the coffee machine itself. This means that a small charge may turn into a much larger one.
Find Local Coffee Shops
You can save yourself a great deal of extra charges by locating a coffee shop near your hotel. You can simply ask the clerk at the front desk of your hotel for directions to a nearby restaurant or coffee place. You can also seek out this information on a map before you start your vacation. If you want to enjoy your coffee in your hotel room, then think about bringing a disposal cardboard coffee box with you to your hotel. You can buy these boxes at restaurant or office supply stores or you can refill a box that you purchase at a coffee shop near your house.
Ask the local coffee shop to fill up your cardboard container partially or fully and ask for a cup as well. Your hotel may charge for cups too, so make sure that you can provide your own.
Stay Away From the Gym
Many hotels advertise their gyms, fitness equipment, and aerobics classes to bring customers into their establishments. These gyms used to be amenities that were supplied to you as long as your paid the daily resort fees. Resort fees are now charged when you use ironing boards, safes, Internet services, and bag handling services.
Gyms are often not included with the resort fees, and this means that you are charged another extra fee if you use the hotel gym. Many hotels ask you to sign in at the gym or they make you use your key card to get into the facility. You can easily be tracked when you do this and you might be charged for a full day of gym access, even if you use the facility for only a few minutes.
Go For an Outdoor Run
You can easily avoid extra fees by skipping the gym and going for a run outside instead. Running is often considered one of the best forms of exercise, because it works almost all the muscles in your body. The workout is intensive as well, and this means that you can greatly increase the health of your heart and cardiovascular system when you run. You can also run anywhere, and this means that you will be very likely to find a location just outside your hotel where you can jog.
If you are going on vacation in an area that you are not familiar with, make sure to use the GPS feature on your phone or mobile device to help you find your way to and from the hotel. Also, you can ask the clerk at the front desk about nearby parks or sidewalk lined areas where you can run safely without having to jog on the road.
Family vacations are a lot of fun, but they can be expensive. You can read more and forgo the expense by booking hotel reservations and flights after scouring the Internet for the best prices. You want your hotel rates to remain cheap though, and this means keeping all extra charges to a minimum.
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