When the 4th edition of The World’s Cheapest Destinations book came out in January, I posted some advance review comments from various other writers and bloggers. Now that a few months have gone by, here’s what people have said in the early reviews.

 

“Even as an experienced traveler, with some 60 countries under my belt (many of them cheapies), I still was able to find the book useful and interesting.

The World’s Cheapest Destinations will be helpful for travelers at different stages: newbies who would like to start traveling to other countries for the first time, individuals with some international travel experience who are looking to push their comfort zone a little bit, and folks just looking for a little more luxury without spending more money. This book tells you where and how to look.”

- Stephen Bugno of GoMad Nomad

“If you’re currently considering traveling to destinations where your ‘travel money is worth a fortune,’ I highly recommend you pick up the fourth edition of Tim Leffel’s well-researched, chock-full-of-details book The World’s Cheapest Destinations.”

- Kara Williams, The Vacation Gals

“If you’re up for a wry sense of humor and aren’t put off by the occasional unabashed assessment, The World’s Cheapest Destinations is not only an easy read and a money-saving Bible, but also a veteran traveler’s look at places that many travelers in the U.S. tend to leave off their dream lists.”

- Kristin Mock, freelance travel writer

“The 4th edition of Tim’s book has totally inspired us to travel even more by visiting cheaper places.”

- Ashley Steele, Wandering Educators

“Leffel wastes no time outlining some of the world’s cheapest destinations in a concise and honest fashion. Refreshingly pointed, this compact guide is an ideal handbook for those looking to stretch their money further.”

- Stuart McDonald, editor of Travelfish.org

“His advice ranges from the common sense (albeit often forgotten) to the wise been-there-done-that genre. The most intriguing reason to pick up this book is its nature to inure interest in destinations that may have been left by the wayside on your travel itinerary, but are an absolute must-see for any global traveler worth his weight in passport stamps.”

- Ramsey Qubein, Examiner.com

“With a little ingenuity, a bit of creativity and this book, you’ll be able to travel many places in the world you never thought possible. The World’s Cheapest Destinations is hands down the best guide to traveling the world on a budget.”

- Beth Whitman, editor of Wanderlust And Lipstick

“The very first step to saving money when on the road is to figure out where you can stretch your money the furthest. Due to the ebb and flow of international finance, wars, and natural disasters… the cheapest places are always changing. Tim offers a great way to hit this moving target.”

- Doug Lansky, author of more than 10 travel books including First Time Around the World

“Tim is correct: where you travel has more to do with saving money then how you travel. The cheapest hostel dorm bunk in Zurich will be more expensive than a large, quality hotel room in Bangkok. I’ve been to most of the countries outlined by Tim and can attest that they are great value destinations. This book is a must for affordable travel planning.”

- Gary Arndt, editor of Everything-Everywhere.com

 

Get Your Copy!

So where can you get this book? Pretty much everywhere online:

Direct from the publisher – paperback ($15,95 plus shipping) or PDF ($8.99, no shipping)

Kindle version from Amazon, Nook version from Barnes & Noble, Apple version from iBookstore – all around $8.99.

Paperback from Barnes & Noble, paperback from Amazon.

If you’re in Australia or New Zealand, you can order a copy from Fishpond.

I hate paying for parking anywhere and would hate to add up how much I’ve spent over the years leaving my car at airports. When you’re flying out for a week or two and it’s not convenient for someone to drop you off, you’ve either got to pay a taxi (if it’s from home) or to suck it up and pay to park. If you live far from the airport, or you’re in an area where it’s sometimes cheaper to go one city over, you’re really out of options.

Thankfully I don’t pay nearly as much as most other people do when this happens. Half or less most of the time.

See, I rarely park in the actual airport lot—even at economy one—because it’s usually dramatically less to leave my car in a private lot nearby. I’ve never paid more than $7.50 per day to park in Fort Lauderdale, for example, until recently when I had to park in the airport garage when running late for a flight. (Long story.) There it’s $15 per day. If you’re away for a week, that’s $105. In a major city, it can be even worse.

In Orlando a couple weeks ago, I paid $6 a night to leave my car in the lot of the Airport Marriott, where I caught an airport shuttle in a flash. That’s another advantage of these places: usually they have a more frequent shuttle schedule than the airport itself does. When I used to park off-site in Nashville (BNA), they would take you within 10 minutes even if nobody else needed a ride.

I usually use a site called Cheap Airport Parking because they’re on of my advertisers over at Perceptive Travel. Even if they weren’t they’re the second-largest consolidator of these off-site options, so it’s worth checking them out. Here are some sample rates available most days of the week.

MIA Embassy Suites – $5
LAX Premier Parking – $3.99
EWR (Newark) Premier Parking – $5.99
FLL (Ft. Lauderdale) Hilton – $6
TPA (Tampa) Memorial – $3.25
MCO (Orlando) – 3 parking lots are available under $3 per day.

They continuously ask customers to rate parking lots on 5 criteria: location, facility, wait times, shuttle experience and personnel attitude. Based on these ratings they calculate the overall quality score of a lot and sort parking lots based on this score to promote the best lots. Parking lots know about this algorithm and try to serve the customers better in order to be on top in the list and get more customers.

They don’t serve every market—nobody does—but you can usually Google “airport parking” or “off site parking” and the airport code/city to find the options if the market is not on the list of sites like this one. It doesn’t work everywhere, since some airports are too small or inconveniently placed, like the PIE one I have to use sometimes out of Clearwater/St. Pete, Florida.

Most of the small ones (not that one) have reasonably priced parking though. Where my father lives in Greenville/Spartanburg, South Carolina, the overnight charge is $4 and you can walk from the lot with your wheelie suitcase to the entrance.

Can you round up $68,500 in ready or borrowed cash? If so you can be the owner of a furnished beach house in Mexico and can cut your monthly living expenses in half. Or just have a cheap place to be a snowbird or go on vacation.

About a year and a half ago I announced on this blog that my Yucatan beach house in Mexico was for sale. Well, it still is.

We took it off the market a while during the rainy season and while it’s being rented a lot right now in high season, it’s still waiting for a buyer.

We own this place free and clear, so it’s not like there’s a mortgage gnawing at us, but we bought another house in Guanajuato, in the central highlands. We’re moving into that one come August for two years. We’d like to have the cash from house 1 to get debt free and flush so we’ve got plenty to put into beautifying house 2.

As you may have heard on the news, the housing market in the U.S. is in recovery mode now, to the point where there are bidding wars again in some cities because of a lack of inventory. While some savvy investors no doubt bought houses for $68,500 or even less the past few years because of bank foreclosures, they weren’t getting property one house back from a beach and those homes weren’t usually nice enough to be move-in ready. This one is both.

You can follow the link at the bottom for more details, but this is a well-maintained 2BR, 1 bath house with a nice covered outside terrace and plenty of room to build up or put in a pool. It’s a 30-second walk to the water and three blocks to the town square. There are already local caretakers in place we’ve worked with for years. It comes with beds that sleep four and all the other furniture there now, plus a fridge, dishes, and a bottle of 100% agave tequila we’ll supply upon closing.

This beach house is 40 minutes from the international airport in Merida, a city of a million, or less than four hours by rental car from Cancun.

If you’re wondering about home prices in Mexico in other non-tourist places, we paid a shade less than $90,000 for the Guanajuato house. It has four bedrooms, two baths, with a big sun room on the top floor that has terrific views. But right now it’s got a kitchen that we hate and no furniture…

So buy this bargain Yucatan beach house for $68,500 bringing just a toothbrush and a bathing suit. Then come stay with us later in the revamped city one. Full details here: cheap furnished Mexican beach house.

 

This week Google announced that on July 1 it is shutting down the most popular RSS stream blog reader in the world, Google Reader. A whole bunch of you probably get to this blog from there.

I’m sure most people who signed up for the service assumed it would be around as long as Google would, close to forever. But the company is chopping anything that’s not a profit center, so your calendar and Gmail could be next if you rely on them daily.

Which brings us to an important question: do you have a backup plan for products or services you use regularly when you travel?

* What’s your second way of getting cash if your debit card is lost, stolen, or eaten by a machine?

* What second or third credit card will you use when your first one is lost, stolen, downgraded (by credit limit) or copied by a cyber thief and disabled?

* How will you keep in touch with the important people in your life if you lose your phone?

* What will you do if Facebook shuts down or starts charging? If there’s a Twitter outage that lasts for days?

* What if Skype goes down or Google shuts down Google Voice?

* What’s your secondary e-mail address when the first one gets shut off or hacked? Do you trust Google enough to rely on gmail?

* Where are you storing all those photos you’re taking in case you lose the laptop, tablet, or phone where they’re stored?

I can’t say I’m 100% prepared for every scenario, especially considering I almost never buy travel insurance. And if Paypal goes under, I’m in big trouble since that’s how most advertisers pay me.

But if you spend 10 bucks on Nomadic Matt’s book you’ll get ideas on what to do on the money side (with specific recommendations).

As for me, stay tuned next week if you read this blog’s RSS stream somewhere because I’m dropping Google’s Feedburner like a hot potato this weekend. It’s been a long time since I trusted that company anyway and based on how they’re treating customers, I don’t have much faith that Feedburner is reliable for the long term.

If you’re visiting a big city on almost any continent and are looking to stretch your budget, try to time your travels so that you will have all of Sunday there.

Most long-term travelers figure this out eventually, but I was reminded of this strategy again when I was in Bogota, Colombia this past weekend. As I’ve talked about before in Quito and Mexico City, a main avenue running through the city is blocked off to traffic, opening it up for anyone wanting to ride a bike in safety.

That’s just the start though. In many cities this is the most likely time for free outdoor concerts and cultural events. After all, it’s when you’re going to have the best chance of getting a crowd. Since many weekend visit tourists are gone by the afternoon, you’ll be mingling with locals more than foreigners too, which is always interesting.

Free museum days can vary a lot and I know in popular cities like NYC or Paris they will usually be on a certain weekday each month to keep the numbers down, but for many other countries it’s politically favorable to make the free day whenever the most families can visit. So when I visited the Gold Museum in Bogota a few days ago, the normal 3,000 peso ($1.75—still a bargain) entrance fee was waived.

Guidebooks will usually tell you this info, but double-check it online to be sure. This is a case where the official city tourism site is usually your best bet as it’s kept up to date and will link directly to the museum/attraction.

The one downside of all this is you may find places more crowded than usual, so time it earlier or later than the masses to avoid a crush. The flip side of that is you’ll get a real taste of who lives in a place, which can be enlightening.

Have fun!