Everyone wants a vacation but cost is undoubtedly the biggest hindrance. People daydream of stumbling on a fortune and traveling the world, staying at luxurious hotels, and going on adventures. Even people with a decent and steady income struggle to save and go on vacation perhaps managing one vacation a year. And even this is managed only by a privileged few. It is not all doom and gloom, though. There are a few things one can do to bring down the cost of a vacation.
Plan Early
Planning one’s vacation months in advance is prudent for so many reasons. On saving money, early planning allows one to secure affordable airfares, for example. Secondly, one is able to book affordable entry-level rooms which sell out fast, especially at popular hotels. One can also take advantage of early-bird offers that usually discounted rates to encourage early booking mostly for the Festive Season. The examples go on and on making a case for why planning one’s vacation early can be a good way to save money on one’s vacation.
Travel During the Low Seasons
Vacationing during the off-peak season is a no-brainer for anyone shopping for affordable vacation packages. In Kenya, a rule of thumb for the aforementioned purpose is to avoid the Festive Season and school holidays, especially for beach vacations. For safari destinations, more so Masai Mara, avoiding the Great Wildebeest Migration months (July to October) is advisable to avoid the peak season. Generally, April, after Easter, to mid-July marks the low season in Kenya.
Use Shared Transfers/Transport
Transport is typically quite expensive. However, shared transport significantly brings down the cost per individual. For example, instead of using a private taxi from, say, the SGR station in Miritini to one’s hotel, one can book a shared transfer service where the cost of the taxi is split between the passengers. Travel agents are usually best to secure such a service. The vehicles do not overload ensuring comfort and one is only grouped with other travelers going in a similar direction making the service logistically efficient.
A similar service is also offered for safaris. The cost of hiring a safari minivan or Land Cruiser is split between the passengers.
Go For Affordable Meal Plans
The Bed & Breakfast and Half Board meal plans can be utilized to cut on costs. On the other end, an All-inclusive or Full Board meal plan is typically expensive and to some, unnecessary. If one is okay with skipping a meal here and there or stepping out of the hotel for an affordable meal then the “lean” meal plans can be a good way to save money. Kindly see our article here that delves into the differences among varying meal plans offered by hotels.
Stay in the Entry-level Room Categories
Hotels have different room categories whose prices go up with the size of the room, amenities in the room, and location of the room. Typically, more spacious rooms will fetch higher prices than less spacious ones. Rooms with more amenities are priced higher. Finally, rooms with a sea view or ones closest to the ocean are more costly than rooms with, say, a garden view or a pool view.
If the differentiating factors above are not of too much interest, one can go for a standard garden view room, for example, to save on cost. This is highly subjective but some people are not too bothered by the room they stay in seeing that they’ll probably spend very little time in it anyways. However, this is different for different people.
