Holiday Travel Made Easy

Be it for Christmas, Thanksgiving, the Fourth of July, or even President’s Day, many Americans spend the holidays away from home. Holiday travel can be a well-deserved break or an additional stress. Here are some suggestions to help make your holiday travels as stress-free as possible.

Make realistic travel plans
First of all, make some realistic assessments of the constraints upon your travel. You might not make it to see all your relatives for the Thanksgiving or Christmas holidays, or have the time or budget to see everything you want to see on your vacation. If you can, take the ideal amount of time you’d like to spend away and add one day to either end, so you don’t feel so cheated if you get delayed traveling.

Afraid you’ll have nothing to do that extra day? Call or visit the Web site of your destination’s chamber of commerce — they frequently carry coupons for local public attractions.

Travel insurance
Think about your destination as well: your risks of being delayed are higher heading to the snowy Northeast in the winter, or to the Gulf Coast during hurricane season. Trip insurance normally doesn’t make sense for a weekend getaway, but if you’re taking a major trip with a budget to match, it might be worth considering.

Plan ahead
The earlier you can start planning, the better. If you’ll be taking a car trip, consider making plans to have any necessary maintenance for your car, such as an oil change or a new set of tires, completed two weeks in advance.

Planning might also help you score cheap plane tickets. Farecast is a service that predicts when airfares for a particular trip may rise or fall, while sites such as Orbitz and Kayak can search for cheap flights, hotels, and rental cars.

Pack light
Pack as light as you can, especially if you’re flying. It will mean fewer checked baggage fees, fewer chances to lose your bags, and less strain on your back.

If you are traveling for a gift-giving holiday, consider shipping presents to your destination. As the Transport Security Administration may choose to unwrap presents in baggage for security screening, pack gifts unwrapped and wrap them when you arrive, if you cannot ship the items.

Be prepared
Be prepared for something to go wrong. If you have time beforehand, run through some of the worst-case scenarios — you miss your flight, you lose your identification while on vacation, your car breaks down far from home — and see if you can work out backup plans. If you know what to do when bad luck hits, you should feel less stress.

AirSafe.com has a detailed explanation of your rights when your flight gets delayed or bumped. Check out their list and you may feel more prepared for potential flight trouble.

Learn from the past
Finally, learn from past mistakes. If you stressed yourself visiting relatives last year, see if they’ll come to you instead, or ask to visit during a quieter travel period. If you know a three-day weekend isn’t enough time to relax, take some time off at either end and turn it into a proper vacation — instead of an exhausting whirlwind trip.

Some years you may need a holiday from holiday travel. Take only those trips that are going to be rewarding for you.