Travel Tips @us | Transfercar Blog

The world’s most luxurious supervans!

You don’t like being on the water, but you want to live that superyacht lifestyle? Get a luxurious supervan!

Our favourite supervan has to be the amazing eleMMent Palazzo mobile home. This visual feast of extravaganza and luxury is actually of German craftsmanship, so made to last! The Palazzo features two floors of entertainment with a giant master suite, multiple bars and a liftable “flybridge” lounge up top. You can even extend a slide-out, increasing interior space by 80% when not on the road. The new eleMMent series 2015 is coming out soon, and we wonder what improvements will be provided to what is already an amazing motorhome, by all accounts.

Another supervan that would be nice to try is the Futuria Sports and Spa Motorhome. Another German invention! This mansion on wheels contains everything for luxury travelling: bathroom, bedroom, roof terrace with Jacuzzi and even sports car garage (equipped with the custom Toronto garage doors).

Guess where the third best supervan comes from? Germany as well!!! The Volkner Mobil Performance Bus comes equipped with a large fridge-freezer, dishwasher, microwave, Bose-Dolby-home Entertainment Surround System and a widescreen TV which can be concealed in the cabinet when not in use. Pretty cool, uh?

Think this is out of reach for you? Maybe… but do you know that you can find some supervans on Transfercar? Especially in the USA where you can drive brand new RVs for next to nothing. .. Check it out.

Reference: Hunretsville NC Garage Doors.

Road Trippin’ Route 66

Route 66 has long been deemed the ultimate all American road trip. The 2400-mile ‘Glory Road’ spans America from Los Angeles to Chicago and has inspired many authors, songwriters and directors, capturing the imagination of many. Though officially decommissioned in 1984, due to new and faster routes, it has been forever ingrained in history as one of the greatest routes of all time. Its rich history and breathtaking country vistas make this route ever popular with nostalgic travellers. If you’re looking for an all-American experience, look no further and “get your kicks on Route 66”.

The attractions on Route 66 are endless and all preserve a special time in America’s past. From the Dixie Trucker stop to The Blue Swallow Hotel, each site has a special charm that keeps driving travellers to their doorstep. Here is a rundown of some must-see stops of Historic Route 66, so that you don’t miss a thing while you’re riding, hood-down and hands up.

You can follow in Elvis’s footsteps and take a hike around the Meteor Crater in Arizona. The meteor crashed there around 50,000 years ago leaving an out-of-this-world crater nearly a mile wide (half the size of a football field).

At the El Morro National Monument in New Mexico you can bear witness to the travellers from over seven centuries before you. The huge, 200-foot tall sandstone Questa are covered in the names of those who passed before you and hold carvings of Native American petroglyphs.

The Blue Swallow Motel in Tucumcari, New Mexico provides the perfect spot to take an overnight rest. Listen to the buzz of their famed neon sign and talk to fellow travellers in their cosy courtyard. Just over the road is the Odeon Theatre. Open since 1936, it’s famed for its authentic date-night appeal.

The Blue Whale pond in Catoosa provides the perfect spot to cool down in landlocked Oklahoma. You can fling yourself off the large whale’s tail into the cool swimming pond and peek through his blowholes at people enjoying the Route 66 icon.

If love to revel in a rebel’s story, visit the Meramec Caverns in Stanton, Missouri. The cave system provided refuge for legendary outlaw Jesse James but apart from it’s sordid past, the 6000 caves that dot the Missouri limestone bedrock are a spectacular natural attraction that have lured travellers since 1935.

By the time you get to Illinois your stomach will be grumbling and your eyes beginning to droop along with your petrol gauge; stopping in to The Dixie will solve all your problems. The Dixie is the oldest truckers stop on Route 66 and in the 70 years its been operating it has been closed only one day. The old Dixie will provide weary travellers with food, fuel and things to reminisce over in the museum full of Route 66 memorabilia.

It is widely recommended to hit this Route up in a hired soft-top or American classic to maximise all that the ‘Mother Road’ has to offer.

At the time of writing we have plenty of RVs that you can take along this historical route, so click here to make your booking and get ready to get your kicks!

How to Save Money on the Road

Yes! You can save money while travelling! Just look at how much money you’ve saved with your free Transfercar rental. And then follow these rules and you’ll save even more money…

Food Rules

Most travellers spend way too much money on drive-thru food. Not only is it expensive, but it’s going to make you feel tired and sluggish, two things you don’t want to feel while driving a Transfercar! Bring a cooler with you so that you can make grocery runs along your trip. Bring the necessary cutlery and treat yourself to nice cheeses, salamis and breads while you’re on the road, instead of spending your money on average food from diners on route. If you’re absolutely desperate for a cooked meal, veer off the main road and into small towns for cheaper, and often better, meals.

Snack Attack!

Snacks are an absolute killer on road trips, especially when you’re stopping for gas. Before you leave town, pack your car with snacks from the grocery store. You can easily make your own treats and store them in your cooler. Fruit stands on the side of the road are always great in summer, too.

Mean Gasoline

Following a few simple gas-saving tips can help you save a lot of road trip money:
Turn off the AC: just open the window!
Ease off the pedal well before a stop sign and coast to a stop; take off in a mellow manner. Burning rubber burns gas needlessly.
Inflate tires to close to max — carry a teeny tire gauge and read the tire’s side.
Avoid cruise control.
Don’t speed. Wastes gas and one ticket can destroy a summer road trip budget.

Sneaky Tips

A prepaid credit card can help to keep you within your budge. Just make sure it doesn’t have excessive fees associated with it.
To avoid going into debt, save money with a detailed budget for what you’ll spend on lodging, meals, activities and gas.
Carry some cash with you in case you need it.
Limit your time away to less than 10 days.
Pack the right necessities.
Book accommodation in advance.
Book a free Transfercar rental car.

We don’t want to toot our own horns, but travelling with a free rental car is obviously going to save you more money that paying for one. Also, if you’re looking for an even cheaper trip, why not rent an RV or campervan, thus eliminating the need to pay for exorbitant hotel rooms especially if you’re travelling as a family?! Some of our deals even come with ferries and a free tank of fuel, which means you save even more money! I know it sounds too good to be true, but thousands of travellers all over the world have cracked onto our services, saving money as they ride with us, and making their trips last longer. If you haven’t registered, you’re not saving money. So get amongst it. And let’s hit the road.

Hostels: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Fun Fact: Good hostels can be hard to come by. Places can be very hit or miss and often the reason a hostel is great has more to do with the location more so than anything else. When trying to pick a good hostel there are a few things to consider

Price

Budget travellers have a natural preference to go for the cheapest accommodation but that can sometimes bite back. Many cheap hostels are unclean, the showers are filthy and the pressure is terrible, and the place could be rife with bed bugs! The lower the price usually means the lower the cleanliness.

Check Out Time

The best hostels have 11 A.M. check out times and the excellent ones let you checkout at noon. Sleep is priceless on the road because you’ll rarely get enough of it, if you’re travelling correctly!

Safety

A good hostel comes with good lockers. Lockers in rooms are an absolute must and a safe at reception is a major draw-card. Building security has got to be taken seriously, so make sure you check out the level of security before you book.

Common Area

If your hostel doesn’t have a bar, leave. Kidding. But it should have a big common area. The best hostels have a place where travellers can hang out and socialize with each other. Common areas facilitate interaction and help solo-travellers have an easier time meeting people. They’re almost as important as…

..Staff

Oh man, is there anything worse than bad service at a hostel? The staff at a great hostel must be friendly, helpful and welcoming as well as knowledgeable about the city and its surroundings. The best hostels have natural people pleasers as staff, often fellow travellers themselves, or at least former ones, who can give good advice.

Fun Times

Even if the hostel you choose is clean and safe, you’re going to leave unsatisfied if it doesn’t provide a range of activities for guests. Tours and trips around the city, and special events at the hostel are great activities for fostering relationships between travellers. A recent Blackout Bingo review says that parties and barbecues are an even better way for travellers to meet and greet each other, swapping stories of brews and burgers. Many good hostels have a games room for rainy days, ranging from board games to pool tables.

If you’re pressed for time and can’t bother going through the multitude of hostel websites out there to check out individual facilities, you can just hop online at TripAdvisor where heaps of travellers leave honest, sometimes too honest, reviews of hostels from around the world. If you’re travelling in your free Transfercar rental, you might want to check if the hostel has secure parking. If you’re looking for a way to save money, check out our deals on free RVs and campervans, where the room is clean and comfortable! Just check out our routes and with a few simple clicks you’ve got yourself accommodation on wheels for free! You can’t beat that!

Editor’s Pick for Best Travel Blogs

Ok. There are literally tens of thousands, no, possibly millions of travel blogs out there in the World Wide Web that cater to every, and any, traveler’s tastes. Over the year we’re going to publish our picks of the most popular travel blogs and the ones we believe are the most inspiring, too. If you come across some that you think we should have a look at then get in touch as we’d love to see them!

Young Adventuress is a darling blog geared toward adventure and slow travel. Liz Carlson began travelling at the age of 16 and 40 countries later she’s not showing any signs of slowing down! She starts her blog while trekking through the Andes before moving to Spain for two years, where she was teaching English and living the expat life before kinda getting sent packing by the government for over-staying on her visa! Yikes! She’s so hard-core! With over 25 countries under her belt, Liz is living in New Zealand and you can follow her (mis)adventures as she wanders, eats, and photographs her way around the North and South Islands. Her posts on how to talk the talk with kiwi slang are well, sweet as, bro.

Bridges and Balloons Victoria and Steve, a writer and filmmaker from London packed up their home in 2012 and took their careers on the road for as long as they can. They were recently in South America, but right now they could be just about anywhere! They happen to be serious vegetarians and their posts do a great job highlighting how to continue that lifestyle choice while travelling the globe. Their blog is composed of travel stories, photos, personal tales, interviews, curated content, and practical guides that are written in a way to inspire you to explore, dream, discover.

The Polar Route is a travel photography blog geared towards anyone with a hunger for seeing this incredible world through pictures. The best thing about this site is the daily photo which could be taken from anywhere in the world. No country seems too far for Ed Graham who has travelled almost everywhere and manages to produce professional style travel photography. This site is a great inspiration if you’re looking to travel but you’re not quite sure where you want to go yet.

Four Jandals: Cole and Adela, an adventurous traveling couple from New Zealand, started this blog when they began travelling together in 2009. They have great posts on how to travel as a couple and not break-up! Ha! Trust me, it happens! Their posts have an interesting take on locations, pushing you to experience all that there is available in certain locations. The idea for their blog began during an 18,000km road trip across Canada. Man, I bet if Transfercar had been there they would have saved some sweeeeet cash! Clearly they managed because the adventure continues! FYI: “Jandals” is kiwi slang for flip-flops or sandals.

Anywhere But Home is the creation of Naomi, a 20-something wanderer pursuing her travel dreams on a backpacker’s budget. In 2010, she left home in search of unique experiences and hasn’t looked back since, which is I guess why her blog is so aptly titled. She gets up to all kinds of no-good: she’s been shot at with live fireworks in Taiwan, tracked wild orangutans and pygmy elephants in Borneo, worked with mummies in Peru and dropped plans to impulsively move to Georgia, the country. Her posts on Australia will have you packing faster than you can say “koala” so maybe book your Transfercar now for that epic Aussie road trip?!

Emma’s Travel Tales is a blog aimed at the under-30 traveler, but not necessarily a backpacker. Emma is a 22-year-old Scottish lass who has already been on over 10 cruises. Girl likes boats! Her quest is to see the world and to work wherever she can to satiate her wanderlust! She’s an inspiration for travelers who want to keep going and who work travel into their life plans.

Our Tasty Travels Brett Domue, a lifelong gypsy who has been traveling the world since 2004 created this blog to inspire everyone to quit their jobs and work overseas! He started in the Netherlands and Taiwan and then paired up with the lovely Erin De Santiago, an avid foodie and wine-lover, and together they search the world for tasty dishes. Yum! Erin just happens to be “Best of” Food and Drinks writer for CBS Sacramento and she regularly contributes to Examiner: Belize Travel Examiner, Luxury Hotels Examiner, International Travel Examiner, Culinary Travel Examiner, Islands Travel Examiner, and Worldwide Disney Theme Parks Examiner. She was previously the Topic Editor of Asian Cuisine and Old World Wine for Suite 101. I think she knows her food inside and out! Consider yourself warned: do not look at this blog while hungry. You will eat your computer.

Flora the Explorer is one cool chick who is out in the world looking for the wonderful weird and wacky! Over the years, adventurous Flora has studied Italian in Florence, literature in San Francisco, volunteered with villagers in Kenya and orphans in Lithuania, and worked with musicians in Iceland and celebrities in India. There is no stopping her! She’s eaten crickets in Thailand, slept in the deserts of Jordan, read nursery rhymes to numerous classes of Nepali children and navigated her way around America’s East Coast via the notorious Chinatown bus system. Oopf! If you’re looking to do the same, maybe grab a free rental car from us first?!

And there you have it, some of the finest blogs on the Web to date. Dirty secret: I wanted to put the Transfercar blog on there too, because we have posts on everything from budget travel tips to how to party in some of the great places in America, Australia and New Zealand. If you’re looking to explore any of those three countries sometime soon, have a look at our free rental car system. And then book!

Travel Apps: Making Travel Easy-Peasy

With Smart Phones and iPhones basically running the world, they make everything seem easier, even the complications of planning and booking a trip. While travel agents and DIY travel sites are still excellent and aren’t going anywhere anytime soon, we think it’s time to turn to our phones to check out what travel apps can do for you and your holiday. Have a look at some of the trending travel apps available. You just might find one that catches your eye. And if we’ve missed any get in touch and let us know which ones you prefer to use and we’ll add them to our next list. Promise!

FlightTrack
This sneaky app helps you check out the paths of heaps of international flights with detailed info on departure gates, delays and even pesky cancellations. If you’re looking forward to someone’s impending arrival, and you want to be there on time, this is the app for you.

WeatherPro
You know how weathermen always get it wrong? Well, with this intuitive app offering weather reports for over two million geographical locations, you’ll never be underprepared again! This app is so accurate that it can basically tell the future of weather. Get it and get it now.

JetLag Genie
How many remedies do you have up your sleeve for jetlag? Well guess what, smarty-pants? They don’t work! What does work is gradually altering your sleeping habits before your trip and this app will help you do that. Simply input your destination, dates and sleep schedule and it will create personalized alarm clocks to set your internal clock straight.

XE Currency
It’s all about the bling bling. This free app is the user friendly and it uses live currency rates making it super accurate. FYI: it’s been downloaded over 5 MILLION TIMES, so everyone you know already has it! Get it together!

Packing Pro
Yes, some people need packing help to this extent and yes there is an app for to help them. Just tell the app where you’re going and for how long and who with and it tells you what you need to bring in list form that you can tick off as you pack. Amazing.

Onavo
Ugh. Data roaming charges can be a kill buzz for any trip, and I know this first hand. With Onavo the amount of data required to perform everyday tasks is drastically decreased, so it won’t cost you an arm or a leg retrieving emails and posting selfies to Facebook. Can I tell you how it does this? No, no I can’t, but does it matter when it’s saving you money and doesn’t cost anything?!

Perfect World Clock
In a perfect world this clock would run it, but because the world is flawed, we turn to this app to access the time in hundreds of different cities the world over. Is it revolutionary? Not really, but you won’t be calling your mom and dad at 3am anymore so there’s that. Keep time zones at the touch of a screen by adding several clocks as home-screen savers.

TravelSafe Pro
This app is basically your lifesaver. A database of emergency service numbers for every country you’d want to visit, and a few you wouldn’t! And if you’re prone to losing stuff, and your mind in the process, there are embassy details if you “misplace” your passport.

WorldMate
If you have a personal assistant, then I hate you, I mean, fire them this instant because all you need is this app, and this app is all you need. Just forward your various confirmation emails for flights/hotels/hire cars/restaurant bookings etc. to [email protected] and the app generates an itemized itinerary. And it’s free. FREE.

Waze
This is where GPS navigation meets social networking. Just tap in your destination, or use the nifty speech recognition option if you’ve got busy hands, and other users submit traffic reports ensuring you the quickest route!

HopStop
This free app gives you the public transport information of over 68 of the world’s biggest, busiest metropolitan centers. So if you’re looking for the best Metro routes in Paris or you’re just looking to catch a bus in downtown Montreal, this app will give you a stop-by-stop itinerary making it less likely to get lost.

Pin Drop
There are two kinds of travelers: the psycho over-planners who devour all the guidebooks and those who just off and enjoy the spontaneity of travel on the fly. If you subscribe to the latter, this app is for you. It allows you to drop GPS pins onto a map when you come across something interesting, or browse user-made lists recommending the best places for shopping, dining and sleeping in town.

Foodspotting
Foodies rejoice! This app responds to your every gastronomic whim by giving you user-generated recommendations for the local area you’re travelling in. So if you’re in downtown Kiev looking for the best pierogies, have a scroll through Foodspotting and you’ll be on your way to cheesey-potatoey heaven in no time. And it’s free!

Better Translator Pro
Say hello to the highest rated translation app on Android. This app has more than 50 languages in text-to-text mode, and an impressive 11 that operate with the voice recognition feature. Who needs phrasebooks with apps like this?! Don’t expect immediate fluency, and learning a language while travelling is always a better choice, but this app is at least a start in finding your feet in countries where English isn’t center stage.

I could go on and on as there are so many great travel apps out there these days, but you’ve got work to do exploring the list we have here. When you’re travelling in the States, Australia or New Zealand with your free Transfercar rental, these apps can give you a head-start on the trip of your dreams. With most of the best ones available for nothing, it just goes to show that the best things in life truly are free. Register with us today.

Photo copyright Anne Worner: https://www.flickr.com/photos/wefi_official/14610977120/