My Favorite Travel Resources

Looking to get booking? Here are my favorite travel resources for researching and booking cruises, hotels, tours, as well as getting cash back and extra air miles along the way.

Cruises & Hotel Stays

Expedia – Always excellent Expedia! Expedia feels like one of the original travel search engines and I’ve been using it for years (more than I really want to say!) Expedia is a great cruise search engine, offers great pricing and works with Rakuten for cash back.

Booking.com – This site, while most known for the “stay” portion of a trip has now branched out to include cruises, flights, car rentals, and attractions.

For their stays they offer pretty much every version you could imagine – from traditional hotels, bed and breakfasts, to apartments and guest houses. They offer great rates for your stays, have a rewards program called “Genius” that gives you a percent back pretty early in booking.

Booking.com also works in conjunction with Rakuten, a browser extension offering cash back. This can really add up depending on how much you spend and is a nice bonus. I’ve used Booking.com for quite a few stays on several continents and always had great luck and enjoy doubling up by rewards through their program, Rakuten cash back, and using a rewards credit card.

Tours

Viator – The ultimate in booking day trips, overnight excursions, bus rides and non-cruise line shore excursions for your trip. Viator offers trips all around the world and they do the vetting of the tour companies so you don’t have to.

Browser Extensions

Browser extensions are a great way to get a bit of money back on your travel purchases or get extra miles towards your airline miles accounts. Either way if you’re shopping online it is a great way to maximize your dollars.

Rakuten – This might not directly be a travel resource, but while booking different travel it can really add up. Rakuten is a browser extension that you use on devices like your laptop. When you visit different websites, if they offer cash back with it a small pop-up window will show up. After you sign up for it, you click on it, and then you get cash back.

Airline Browser Shopping Extensions – The big US airlines – American Airlines, Delta, and United Airlines have browser extensions for their shopping links. You install the extensions and then when you visit a website that has an agreement with the airline shopping program a small pop-up will come up and you can get an additional miles per dollar spent. Usually one mile per dollar spent but often times more.

Bonus to get extra miles – sign up for their dining programs to link with your credit cards. You can get extra bonus miles for eating at the restaurants you would go to anyways.

Cell Phone Plan

Google Fi International Cell Phone Plan –
Having a cell phone plan that works internationally has been a huge game changer for my international travel. While there are some different plans available, I personally use Google Fi. I signed up for it a few years ago and really haven’t looked back. Their plans start at $20 a month and go up to $70 a month for unlimited data. If you plan to travel internationally long term I recommend getting your phone switched to something that you can rely on will not cost you hundreds of dollars a month for service.

Referral Link for $20 off your first bill: https://g.co/fi/r/N49FFD

Credit Card – No International Fees!

Chase Sapphire Preferred Travel Credit Card – Just like having a cell phone plan that you know will work abroad is important, so is having a credit card that will. This credit card gives you bonuses for travel and restaurant purchases as well as a huge sign on bonus. Among the biggest bonuses to this card for me is that you can redeem it for cash back or you can move them to travel partners such as United. The points can also be combined with other Chase Cards such as the Chase Freedom.