Chasing the Fionist Dream

As you probably know by now, we live for travel. We love exploring, experiencing new things and learning about new places. We are always reminiscing about past vacations and busy planning and looking forward to our next one. Aside from 2020, we have made sure to have a family vacation each year, not including periodic visits to family in the US. And since 2019 (Eilat), 2021 (Emek Hama’ayanot) and 2022 (Bat Yam) were all in Israel (and fabulous), we’re itching to get back to Europe, which we haven’t visited as a family since 2018 (Budapest) – and we were one less person then. We’re planning on making another European getaway happen this fall – for under 8,000 shekels. We can’t wait to tell you all about it when we get back!

For the Americans reading this – Israeli credit cards don’t work in quite the same way yours do, so travel hacking is much less of a thing here. If you have access to that type of opportunity, by all means – go for it! 🙂 If like us, you don’t have American credit cards, or even if you do, keep reading. We’ve got a lot of good stuff here.

So how do we build memorable family vacations while cutting costs and still having a great time?

1. Be flexible on your location. At this stage in the parenting game our kids don’t care where we go. They just want to have fun and spend time with us. Instead of focusing on countries or cities you’re interested in, think about what activities you’d like to do (beach? skiing? ancient ruins? countryside? a city adventure?) and look for places with inexpensive flights, accommodations and cost of living that can offer you what you’re looking for. Think skiing in Bulgaria instead of Switzerland, beaches in Greece or Cyprus (or here in Israel) instead of the Maldives, or a city adventure in Budapest instead of Amsterdam. When pricing out a trip, remember to look at costs on the ground as well as flights. We originally found Malta and Vienna attractive because of the cheap flights from Israel, but changed our minds when we saw how much accommodations and activities cost. To get ideas of prices, we use Skyscanner for flights and Booking and Airbnb for accommodations.
   
   
2. Choose an apartment instead of a hotel. We are looking to stay in a two-bedroom apartment with a kitchen and washer & dryer. Not only is this setup cheaper than many hotels, it will give us our space and enable us to be awake with the lights on after our kids are in bed. A kitchen will make it possible for us to prepare (most of) our own meals and thanks to the washer & dryer, we plan to avoid checking any suitcases, which on some airlines has become more expensive than the ticket itself.
   
   
3. Travel off-season if you can. By avoiding summer (especially August) and the chagim, you will find much cheaper flights, cheaper accommodations and your destination will be less packed, leaving you more time and space to enjoy yourself. If you must travel during peak season, book your tickets as early as possible, ideally 10-12 months in advance, as prices will only go up. When flying off-season, the opposite logic can be true (but not always). Closer to the date, airlines may lower prices in order to fill up the flight.
   
   
4. Seek out free and inexpensive activities. We love “free” walking tours and have done them in three different continents, including here in Israel. It’s a great way to get your bearings in a new city. You can also download an audio tour and do your own self guided tours instead of paying to join a group. A simple Google search should be able to help you find plenty more free or cheap activities at your destination.
   
   
5. Find out what the locals do for fun. Or normal things for them that might be fun for you. As we all know, anything targeting tourists costs more, so think like a local. What parks, gardens or beaches do they like to visit? Will there be any festivals or free concerts or events while you’re there? Make sure to learn all about public transportation in the city you’re visiting. Depending on the layout of the city, they may have ferries, double decker buses or even cable cars as part of their network, which will cost you no more than a ride on the bus or metro. Many cities have hop-on-hop-off buses for tourists, which we have tried and don’t like, both because of the steep prices and because they often come less often and the routes are more roundabout than the local public transportation options.
   
   
6. Price out the trip in advance. We use this spreadsheet to plan our trips. We open a new tab for each destination we’re considering and fill in the blanks for each category based on prices we see online. For things that have a range, such as flights, accommodations, or eating out, we input the higher end of the range. We also add 500-1,000 shekels in the miscellaneous category, since you never know when surprises might pop up. By rounding up and leaving lots of wiggle room, you can be less strict with yourself on your vacation and it becomes much easier to stay within your projected budget. Not only, will it make it less likely for you to go overbudget, you may even find that your vacation costs you less than you projected. In 2018, we budgeted 6,000 shekels for a 5 day trip to Budapest with a toddler. In the end, we only spent a total of 4,000 shekels including everything.
   
   
7. Decide what you are willing to compromise on. Let’s say you do want to travel to an expensive destination, do an expensive activity, or travel at peak times. Great! Go for it, but consider which aspects you are willing to compromise on to bring costs down. Despite preferring to fly direct, we added a short layover in Europe on our way back from Pesach in the US this year in order to save nearly a thousand dollars on flights during peak season. And whenever we eventually make it to London, (our daughter has been obsessed with London and the UK as whole ever since she watched way too much British TV during the lockdowns) we will likely compromise on lodging and squeeze into a one-bedroom since accommodations there are just so pricey. We’ll also probably eat out less and prepare more of our own food. Good thing London has so many wonderful free museums. 🙂

While travel definitely is a luxury, it doesn’t have to be out of your budget if it is important to you. Make yourself a vacation slush fund and make it happen. You got this!

Did you like this post? Find it useful? If so, great! We’re planning more posts like this one, which we will share in the months leading up to our next family vacation. ✈️

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