Travel Tools

Lots of resources exist to help you out when planning a trip abroad. Here are some of the resources I’ve used during my travels along with others I’ve heard of friends using to help sort out all types of travel arrangements.

This is an evolving list, so as I use or hear of other helpful sites I’ll be sure to add them here.

Flights

Hotwire – Find cheap and discount travel deals. They offer flights, hotels and rental cars that meet your budget.

Orbitz – Book cheap airline tickets, hotel reservations, car rentals and vacations.

Air Treks – Experts in Around the world (RTW) airfare planning and Multi Destination Flights.

Airfare Watchdog – Airfare deals, cheap flights, & money-saving tips from their airfare experts. Track airfare prices with fare watcher alerts for different cities.

Booking Buddy – Compare flights & hotel rates to make sure you get the best deals….plus no booking fees!

Flight Fox – A team of experts, hired for a fee, that will build your trip, alleviate your stress and get you great savings.

Hipmunk – Find cheap flights and deals on hotels. They search hundreds of travel sites to find the best prices and take the agony out of travel planning.

Kayak – Search hundreds of travel sites at once to find and book cheap flights, hotels, vacations and rental cars.

Last Minute Travel – For the procrastinator who wants to find the best hotel discounts, airfare deals and discount vacation packages.

Sky Scanner – So you don’t have to, they’ll compare cheap flights, hotels & rental cars of more providers than anyone else.

Vayama – Specialists in locating cheap international flights so you get the best international flight deals available.

Yapta – Tracks flight prices before and after you buy your tickets. If the price goes down, Yapta helps you get a refund for the difference.

Accommodations

Agoda – Search listing hundreds of thousands of hotels to find the most competitive price.

AirBnB – A community marketplace for people to list, discover, and book unique accommodations in more than 33,000 cities and 192 countries around the world.

Booking.com – Browse hotel reviews and find the guaranteed best price on hotels for all budgets.

Couchsurfing – The world’s largest free travel community. You can travel the world and explore new cities while staying with verified hosts.

Eurocheapo – Find the best cheap hotels in Europe.

Hospitality Club – The world’s largest hospitality exchange bringing people together – hosts and guests, travelers and locals- offering free accommodations while traveling.

HostelBookers – Find hostels all over the world at a cheap rate with no booking fee.

HostelWorld – Find hostels for all budgets all over the world.

Travel Health Insurance

Insure My Trip – Find and compare travel insurance plans.

SquareMouth – Helps travelers easily and instantly compare travel insurance products from every major U.S. travel insurance provider.

World Nomads – Simple & flexible Travel Insurance helping you stay safe & informed.

Budgeting

Budget Your Trip – Helps plan and track your travel budget. Their travel budget calculator lets you search cities and countries around the world and then offers an estimated travel costs based on your budget.

Travel Funding

Fund My Travel – Fund your meaningful travel experiences. Create a campaign and begin raising money for your cause.

FundRazr – An easy and effective crowdfunding platform. Tell your story in words, pictures and videos and start raising money in minutes. Check out their travel section.

Go Fund Me – The #1 do-it-yourself fundraising website to raise money online. Check out their travel and volunteer sections.

Go Get Funding – a crowdfunding website that lets you raise money for anything that matters to you. You can raise money for anything!

Project Travel – Online fundraising and crowdsourced funding for making educational travel a possiblity.

Volunteer Forever – Committed to helping travelers overcome the financial obstacles to volunteering overseas. Use crowdsourcing to raise funds to volunteer abroad.