The key word you want know regarding accommodations is “guesthouse.” These places have private rooms and typically a common area where guests can congregate. They start at $5 I am told, but I figure most Americans will want the $12 room, and for maybe twice that you can get a beach room that would set you back hundreds in the Caribbean.

Thai food is easy to like. I’m especially fond of the coffee, a multi-layered concoction with lots of cream. You can eat most cheaply on the street, from a vendor, but the restaurants are maybe a fourth what you would pay in the US. The food is safe and tasty, but don’t drink the water. Buy bottled water. Unless, of course, you want to catch Montezuma’s revenge. The bathrooms are nice, but you don’t want to spend all your time there.

Some of the more exotic victuals

I mentioned a few posts back that natural wonders tend to be less expensive than museums and amusement parks. Here’s a natural place to see. It’s on the route of an eco-tour.

Unfortunately, the best deals are for Aussies. They’re closer. But once you get there, Asia seems to have the most bang for your buck, and you can get some unbelievable deals even for luxury accommodations in some areas.

A word of warning: The communist countries are superficially friendly, but their universal philosophy is “soak the Rich American Tourist.” You have been warned.

Our general rule that the farther from the Big City, the lower the prices, but even the famous tourist spots are usually pretty reasonable. Just be aware that you’re doing tourist locations, not the real, authentic native culture. Of course, if you’re spending the bucks to fly clear to Indonesia or Thailand, you probably can feel justified to stick with the safe, public, touristy areas. They’ll be plenty exotic even if they are “tuned” for the tourist trade.

Here’s what I mean by luxury bargain: A top-of-the-line hotel in Bankok can be under $200 a night. This is for the kind of room (and hotel accouterments) that would cost you several times as much in, say Europe. Go to the bookstore and page through a fancy travel magazine for pictures of these places. By the way, I found a place in Thailand that charges $5000 per night, so you can definitely go expensive if you want. (It was for groups—3 fancy rooms, 6 less fancy rooms, and breakfast)

Get out of town, though, and visit the villages. You can find a clean room to rent for ten bucks.

These folks will even let you help feed the pigs if you want

Another tip: You’ll find lots of folks with some English, but it’s a good idea to bring a phrasebook.

Speaking of feeding livestock, one of our hens hatched out seven chicks last Sunday. You can stop by and feed them if you like. Visit my personal blog, Mushrooms to Motorcycles, for a picture and the story.

More on Asia next time.

This one’s a tip:

Consider renting out your house while you are gone. To someone in, say, Sweden, a visit to the town that hosts the Kalmar Nykel (sailing ship that brought Swedish immigrants to Delaware, where this blog originates) and is so close to DC and NYC might make a pretty attractive vacation. Subtract the rent from the cost of your vacation.

The Kalmar Nykel in Wilmington. Click to enlarge.

Organizations are out there that broker house exchanges. Or just plain rent it short-term to a doctoral student and family for the spring term. Figure out your own creative solution. (And share your idea in the comments.)

Principle six: Natural wonders tend to be less expensive than man-made attractions. For example, there’s a fee to go see the Mt. Rushmore sculptures, but you can drive through the badlands all day for the price of a tank of gas, which you’d have to spend anyway to get to Rushmore.Let’s don’t even mention theme parks.

Everybody sees Mt. Rushmore from the front; here's a profile view. Don't forget to buy a made-in-China souvenir at the sucker gift shop.

Free, and you can go exploring

Okay, maybe I come across a bit cynical here, but the principle remains. Anything made with tourists in mind is expensive, anything that’s already there is cheap.

By the way—I forgot to mention last time that you don’t have to volunteer, you can go somewhere for education, a seminar, or maybe secure a temporary transfer or go to a convention for work. Add a day or two on your own and you have a discounted vacation.

This principle isn’t exactly a “how to spend less” rule, but it makes a good rule of thumb:

The less you spend, the more you will interact with the locals. Tourist attractions tend to be set up to isolate tourists from “furriners” and make it easy for the “guests” to spend money. Take a bus tour. You’re with the other tourists. When they stop, where do they do it? At places to buy stuff, where the locals are people whose livelihood is selling to tourists. Those beautiful luxury resorts, to be truly luxurious, are isolated from the (often poor) people of the country. People spending money on themselves don’t want to be bothered by beggars.

Exotic Zanzibar. Tourists are on the beautiful beaches, not here

Of course, this locale would disturb anyone’s vacation (but see the next principle). But if you get out into the countryside, away from the slums, in a lot of countries the people are making a living and getting by. They’re a pretty interesting place to visit, and you’re more likely to pay the local rates. Yes, you won’t have a liveried waiter at your every beck and call, but you’ll have real life experiences that you’ll never forget. All this suggests the next principle.

Principle 4: What if you volunteer instead of vacation? I never heard of a missionary of any flavor who wouldn’t love to have some folks come and help out. What skills do you have? Someone in an exotic locale can use them. There are lots of quasi- and non-governmental organizations out there, too, if something like that is more your style. Here’s another view of Zanzibar:

This guy is helping out in a school

Seriously—consider doing some good instead of just spending money on yourself.

More next time. What ideas do you have to share?

So I’m sitting here in the exotic 896 Diner just south of faraway Newark, Delaware, enjoying a huge meat-lover’s omelet made from three of my own hens’ eggs, and I realized I had left my notes at home. My notes for this post. It was to be the beginning of a series on general principles for traveling cheaply before I got into the places to go to travel cheaply.

Well, I like to travel cheaply, so I remember some principles without needing my notes. I’m not going to tell you to sleep next to your motorcycle, though I have done that. Part of the adventure, dontcha know.

Principle 1: Get out of town. Especially the town containing the airport you flew in on. These urban centers get a lot of tourists, and the folks there tend to capitalize on the tendency of tourists to spend money. The farther off the beaten track you get, the more you will be offered prices that the locals pay.

A corollary of this is: Stay away from things aimed at tourists—shopping areas, tours, chains, and other tourists. For example, suppose you’re taking a simple trip down the interstate. You can pull off at a truck stop near the highway and get a decent meal (it’s a good idea to pick the place with the most tractor-trailers in the lot), but if you go a couple miles into the local farm community, you can eat at Kitty’s Koffie Kup, that has absolutely no atmosphere, but it’s where all the locals eat, you get a really good meal, and pick up some local color to boot.In fact, you might find out about something nearby that’s worth checking out. The county park, town museum, a nice antique store, some local geological feature.

This isn't the Koffie Kup, but you get the idea

And that leads to

Principle 2: The slower you travel , the cheaper the trip. Most of the best foreign really good deals will be noticed and experienced by the backpackers—people who pack lightly enough that they can carry everything with them. They get off the big commercial tour bus and rent a bike so they can explore the countryside. We’ll cover this in more detail later. The idea is like that visit to the farm community. Sure, you’re not making highway speed, but the trip itself is better. And the local sights are generally free.

Next time: a few more principles for cheap travel.