How to Save Money for Travel ON Travel

Did you know that you can basically get paid to travel and shop (for your travel gear and clothing) for things you buy every day? You can and Rakuten will pay you for it. I never buy or book anything without first checking Rakuten. So, what IS Rakuten? It's a fantastic - and free! - site that offers you cash back for purchasing from online merchants. If you plan to make a purchase anyway, you might as well get something for being a loyal (or even a new) customer. 

Here's how it works: Sign up is quick and easy, then you're ready to shop! When you have a hankering to buy something, say, at Sephora, go to Rakuten, sign in, click on Sephora and it takes you straight to the main website. You must go through Rakuten, so they can track your purchase. At checkout, make sure you use the same email address you used to sign up on Rakuten and within a few days, your purchase will show up in your account. 

You can track your cash back total to see how much you saved and then every quarter, Rakuten sends you a Big Fat Check (if you choose that method) or a Big Fat Payment via Paypal. Normally, you get $5 for signing up, but right now get $30 once you make your first qualifying purchase! Who else does that? If there are coupon codes available or special sales, Rakuten will show them to you, helping you save even MORE!

I like to use my cash back as a travel savings supplement. Each time I make a purchase, I rack up cash and then it gets deposited right to my Paypal account. I use that money to purchase travel stuffs, like Groupons, clothing, tours, and more! If I can get more cash back with it, even better! Of course, you can use it for whatever you want. 

Heart your favorite stores for easy access to them on the site.

Stores you can shop at: Rakuten has, literally, hundreds of online merchants you can choose from, including a long list of travel merchants. Just a sampling of those include: TravelSmith, Holiday Inn, Avis, Alaska Airlines, Camping World, Orbitz, Air France, Delta Airlines, HomeAway and even SkyMall! Keep your eyes out for the Daily Double. Each day one awesome merchant offers double cash back on your purchases for the day. 

And now, you can easily get cash back through Rakuten by downloading the Chrome extension on your computer. When you go to a website that accepts Rakuten, the app will add a banner to the top of your screen letting you know, then you can can click on the banner and it will automatically put you through your Rakuten account and straight back to the site. That's it. One click and you're on your way to getting money back. I always like to check out the Rakuten site anyway, because they include any active coupon codes, so you can save even more. 

If you spend a lot of time on your phone, download Rakuten there, too. It's a bit of extra work, since you have to open the app and then find the store you want to shop at from there, but it's always worth it. It's easy to get around, see your account, find your favorites, and see all the places you can get cashback on one screen.

Haven't signed up for Rakuten yet? Do it now.

Shereen Travels Cheap Turns 13

I'm a little behind this month, because so much has been going on, but I couldn't let my blog birthday go by (too much) without acknowledging it. My blog is, officially, a a teenager now! We're finally back to pre-pandemic levels, though this year has been almost 100% trips to California (Palm Springs, San Francisco, Los Angeles), but we're doing our fall trip to Vancouver, BC, and we'll see if there's another short trip before the end of the year. What else can you look forward to?

Photo by Deva Williamson on Unsplash

Our trip to Paris last year really got us back into big travel, but those road trips we did have given us back our love of packing up the car and going a bit closer to home. We road tripped to LA this year and will be doing the same to British Columbia. This saves us money on airfare and car rental. 

We had originally planned to go to Toronto this year, but flights were kind of too much after we spent so much going to Disney and Universal, and we also weren't sure Eric's renewed passport would arrive in time, considering the long wait times right now. I did arrive last week though, so we didn't have to go to our backup plan.

So, perhaps Toronto will be on for next year. We are also tentatively looking to go to The Big Island early in 2024, take at least one trip to Vegas to see family, a possible short trip to Chicago (since they moved the Travel Goods Show there), and maybe another trip TBD. Lots of up in the air stuff, which is usually something that gives me anxiety, but I'm looking at it as a fun, surprise year, because we have so many options. 

Coming up on the blog:

• How to travel light when you're afraid you're going to leave important things behind
• A tribute to Harry Potter, containing all the Potter-y things we've done this year (we'll just ignore that I was too busy to post a birthday post and do a back to Hogwarts one instead) with our non-profit's Wizarding Weekend, my annual Potter party, my visit to Hogsmeade, and other stuff
• Throwing an EPCOT staycation birthday party
• Mix and match packing lists for your fall travels
• Academy Award Museum in Los Angeles
• How to be safe and avoid being robbed on vacation
• Crowdsourcing your trip itinerary

And here are some of the most popular past posts that you may have missed:

• Essential Barcelona Travel Tips
• Celebrating AAPI Heritage Month Through Travel
• Travel to Learn LGBTQ+ History
• How to Plan + Budget for Big Trips
• How to Pack Your Road Trip Cooler

Thanks for following along on my travels and allowing me to give you my favorite travel tips and recommendations for what to do in travel destinations. I hope you will continue to tune in and learn how to travel more, for less, to exciting destinations! In the next couple months, I hope to be launching something new, so watch for that, too. 

Where are you hoping to travel over the next year?

Travel Advisory: Help Maui By Not Traveling There

By now, we've all heard about the horrible wildfires in Maui. The historic cities on the island are being evacuated and many people are facing homelessness, because they have nowhere to go. If you have plans to travel to Maui, change them, and if you were thinking about going to Maui, don't. So, what can you do? 

Photo by Logan Armstrong on Unsplash

Traveling enables us to see new places and help preserve them by putting our vacation dollars into those communities. While you can't see Maui right now, you can still help the communities effected by the wildfires and hopefully preserve the culture and history before it's completely destroyed, ensuring others are able to enjoy it in the future. 

If you want to help those in need, you can do so by donating to the following organizations:

• The Hawaii Community Foundation– Supports communities affected by the wildfires.
• Maui United Way– Provides immediate financial assistance through grants to nonprofits spearheading relief efforts, and to individuals who have been affected by the fires.
• American Red Cross– Disaster relief for those forced to flee their homes.
• Maui Food Bank– Accepting money, food, toiletries, and other household items for those in need.
• Maui Humane Society– Looking for volunteers to foster dogs displaced by the wildfires, as well as donations of pet food, litter, and pop-up kennels.
• Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement– This nonprofit organization that supports Native Hawaiians is raising support “for ‘ohana impacted by the devastating wildfires on Maui.”
• ‘Āina Momona– A Hawaiian nonprofit aimed at providing environmental sustainability, food security and resilience, and social justice to Hawaiians.
• Malama Maui– Here are other resources for helping Maui and Hawaiian families, including resources for residents and where you can donate supplies directly if you're on the island.

What you need to know right now is that all non-essential travel to the island is suspended and people are being asked to postpone or even cancel their trips amid the evacuating and disaster response. Visitors to the island are trying to figure out how to cope, with many staying in the airport and some sleeping in their rental cars and having to flee their hotels with the bare minimum. You don't want to add to that, especially with so many fires burning and spreading across the island. The historic city of Lahaina has been mostly decimated, and there are also wildfires burning on The Big Island, though not as severe.

Photo by Logan Armstrong on Unsplash

Unfortunately, like much of the country, Hawaii has faced a very dry season and high winds, so any sort of spark can use those two things to its advantage and cause a fire to rage out of control. This has happened on a larger scale than Hawaii is used to and the damage has been surprising and devastating. 

The wildfires aren't just affecting those on the islands, but there are many Hawaiians living on the mainland who don't know if their loved ones are safe or not, because they can't get in contact with them, and others who have the same issues with their family and friends traveling amid a disaster. 

If you still want to visit Hawaii, you can still go to the other islands and you can enter to win a trip for 2 to Kauai from Fodor's and Dollar Flight Club. And if you're looking for an alternative to Hawaii, check out these 8 destinations.

Have you ever been to Hawaii? We last went in 2013, but were looking to go in January next year.