On most airlines, you can now check your meal, WiFi & entertainment options before departure. We like this option as a way to look forward to long flights. It could just be there are some movies you are excited to watch (often very current/just out of theaters).
Here are some of the airlines’ inflight entertainment pages:
Electronic boarding pass or paper? We often prefer an electronic or mobile when not checking a bag which helps you skip the airline counter all together. The main tip we have is to take a screen shot or save it to your phone before you head to security so you do not run into issues where there is a pour internet signal once you get in to the security area. Trust us on this one.
Also, most machines read the boarding pass best when the screen is fully lit so you may need to adjust your phone settings.
Did you know you can give a rental car company your airline frequent flier number to earn extra points? The same works for hotels! It’s called “double dipping” or “crossover rewards”. Next time you travel, ask if there is a benefit to giving the hotel, airline, or rental car company an additional rewards number to record in their system. Chances are you can earn more points!
Here’s some more info on the current programs that allow you to “double dip”: https://thepointsguy.com/2016/05/maximizing-crossover-rewards/
When you are traveling out of the country, it’s a good idea to research the electrical situation so you don’t blow up your curling iron. Sometimes you will only need a new connection end on the plug and sometimes you’ll need to actually convert the power to a different voltage.
Here’s a great tool for finding out what you’ll need (see the pull-down menu near the top middle of the page): http://www.walkabouttravelgear.com/adapterIndex.html
More good advice here: https://www.smartertravel.com/2017/06/19/electricity-overseas-converters-adapters-beyond/
There is a saying about traveling through time zones that “west is best; east is a beast”, but I’ve found both are difficult and it varies by person. Honestly jumping forward 8 hours (even with super early European arrivals) is easier for me than traveling to the California falling back 3 hours.
We suggest making your arrival plans based on the time changes you’ll experience on the trip. For example, we recently flew overnight from Chicago to Amsterdam. When we arrived in Amsterdam it was 1:00am “body time” but 7:00am local time in Amsterdam. I had pre-arranged an early check-in at our Airbnb so we went there first and took a nap for a couple hours before heading out to sight see. I knew none of our party slept well on overnight flights so we planned accordingly and it all worked out for the best. That short nap helped us feel rested yet also allowed us to be sufficiently tired at the normal bedtime and just like that we were on European time for the rest of the week.
Here’s some more tips and tricks:
https://www.skyscanner.net/news/jetlag-15-tips-beating-timezone-tiredness
http://www.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/05/09/snyder.jetlag/index.html
Lead. Travel. Pray. 