I Love to Travel

As a child, my parents took me on a fair number of trips. My father went to seminars in San Francisco, Chicago, New Orleans, Mexico City and New York and other locations that have faded over the years. Sometimes we flew, some times we drove. On the trip to San Francisco, my parents decided that we should take the train while there was still a passenger train to take...what an excellent decision. On the trip to New York, we drove in my father's brand new double cab pick-up...which was a source of embarrassment for me once we reached the Big Apple. On the trip to Mexico City, we drove in my father's brand new VW beetle...way too crowded for a party of four. For the December trip to Chicago, we flew on Southwest...about 6 stops between Texas and the coldest weather I'd ever experienced. All of these trips were done on a budget, which prepared me well for my future life as a business traveler.

In college, I went to Israel on a 6 week archaeological dig where I had afternoons and weekends to myself to explore a foreign country with a couple of my buddies from church. This also prepared me for my future life as a business traveler. There were no adults around to help me find my way into Tel Aviv or back again. There was no one there to keep me from getting conned or to get me out of trouble if I did something stupid. Just a group of three pretty good college boys figuring things out as we went along.

When I got married, my father sent my wife and me on a cruise of the Mediterranean. I discovered three things: traveling with my wife was a lot of fun, I would rather tour on my own than on a bus with a lot of tourist, striking out on my own (as my wife and I did once the tour reached Jerusalem) gives me a rush like nothing else. From that moment forward, she and I were hooked on travel. Not the safe "looking out the bus window" travel but the "getting lost down tiny winding streets where no one speaks English" kind of travel.

It was very fortunate that I discovered this early in life. When leaving a meeting with a Chinese Technical Park official with just enough time to make a meeting with a large PC maker on the other side of Shenzhen, I was in my element when the taxi driver could not speak English or read the English address of my next meeting. With my few words of Chinese, I was able to get the taxi driver to flag down a couple of college kids who interpreted for us and we were on our way.

What follows are some quick tips on surviving travel when you do not have the luxury of going first class. Keep in mind, you can see the same stuff on TV. Why travel 18 hours to get there if you are not going to get out and experience it? In many ways, traveling on the cheap is better. Embrace it.

James Snider is a global marketing professional with 15 years experience in the high tech industry. He is currently looking for his next great job. www.linkedin.com/in/jamessnider