Nomadic Matt's Travel Site

IMPORTANT and URGENT Message for All RSS Readers!

2013-06-16T21:24:20Z

Do you read this site via RSS like Google Reader? Then I have an important message for you that requires urgent action. On July 1st, Google will be shutting Google Reader down.

That means you won’t have easy access to all the great travel tips and stories featured on this blog but here are two easy things you can do so you don’t miss any posts:

1. Find another feed reader and add this: http://feeds.feedburner.com/MattsTravelSite

You can use Feedly, which is an awesome free site.

2. Join 35,000 other people on my weekly email newsletter, where you can get my posts, awesome tips not found on this blog, exclusive discounts, and money saving travel deals I find each week.

And, if you sign up below, I’ll even send you the first chapter of my book for free!

If you read this site via RSS, you have an automatic way to stay up-to-date with this blog. Don’t let Google take away that ease. If you want to keep reading my newest articles, move to a new feed reader or take your savings to the next level and join my newsletter where you will get all my great posts plus tons of other goodies.

Thanks for reading!

The post IMPORTANT and URGENT Message for All RSS Readers! appeared first on Nomadic Matt's Travel Site.

What’s It Like Taking a Night Train in Europe?

2013-06-13T13:53:10Z

Earlier this week, I talked about European train passes and whether or not they were worth the money. As part of the continuing train series, in this week’s video, I highlight my night train from Madrid to Paris, a long twelve hour ride on an old Renfe (Spanish) train. (Quick note to Renfe: upgrade your trains!)

Here’s the journey:

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While I had a good time and the journey was comfortable (and the food surprisingly good), as I said in Monday’s post, I don’t find overnight trains to be good value with their high costs. If you are traveling through Europe and want to save money on accommodation, a second class seat will work out cheaper than a hostel or hotel but avoid the cabins. They are too expensive.

Unless you are a train enthusiast, I’d save my money, take a cheap flight, and avoid twelve hours of travel. Unlike the famous Ghan in Australia, or the VIA rail in Canada, I don’t find anything special or unique about the overnight trains in Europe (I’ve taken three).

Editor’s Note/Disclosure: This post is the beginning of a series of blogs, videos, and giveaways revolving around train travel in Europe. As mentioned in the beginning of the post, Rail Europe gave me my pass for free and also paid the reservation fees. Rail Europe has been a site partner since 2009.

The post What’s It Like Taking a Night Train in Europe? appeared first on Nomadic Matt's Travel Site.

Are Eurail Passes a Giant Scam or Do They Save You Money?

2013-06-10T14:24:02Z

Every two years, I use a train pass to ride the rails of Europe in an effort to answer the most important question travelers have on the subject: do these passes actually save you money or are they a giant waste of time?

Back in 2011, I found that rail passes were worth the cost if you took lots of high speed, long distance, or overnight trains and were traveling last minute. This year Rail Europe again gave me a pass to determine whether that was still true. I set off on a journey from Lisbon to Berlin, taking a variety of trains in order to explore the differences in value.

Over the last couple of years, I’ve heard from fellow travelers that passes have gotten harder to use due to limited seat availability and increased fees. It used to be that you could buy a rail pass, hop on a train, and go wherever you wanted. And if you needed a reservation for the seat, it didn’t matter whether you had a pass or not — if there was a seat on the train, you got it. Now there are often only a set number of seats available for passholders on any given train and many countries have instituted high-priced reservation fees (I’m looking at you, France!).

Additionally, as railways have had to deal with the rise of budget airlines, they have changed their pricing model to more closely imitate airlines. Now they now tend offer cheap early bird prices and expensive last-minute fares.

Under these new constraints, I wanted to see if passes still make financial sense.

The Math: How Much I Spent

It’s all about the money with the passes. So how does it work out? Here’s a breakdown of what the expenses looked like:

Train	Cost With Pass	1st Class (w/o pass)	2nd Class (w/o pass)
Lisbon – Madrid (overnight single)	97	151	60
Madrid – Paris (overnight single)	192	202	180
Paris – Brussels	18	124	72
Brussels – Amsterdam	0	62	34
Amsterdam – Berlin	0	199	123
Total	307	738	469

Note: Prices are in Euros and reflect last-minute departure prices that were given to me at the train station at the time of booking.

The pass I was given was a first class 15-day, two month Global pass that costs $1,189 USD. (Why first class? Because it’s the only pass you can get when you are over 26.) This means that I can use the pass for 15 non-consecutive days of travel in a two month period. The value of each journey works out to be $79. Since I was only in Europe for two weeks, I didn’t use the entire pass, but I used a variety of different trains for my tests. My five train rides then have a base value $395.

So with all the fees plus the base ticket price, did I save money? My total costs were $800 USD (the base cost plus fees). The added fees were for seat reservations. On night trains, they are required. In some countries, like Italy and France, reservations are also required for day trains. So that means on top of the base fare, you are also paying a small fee for the seat (anywhere between 2-9 Euros ($3-12 USD)). Without the pass, my first class tickets would have cost me $975, a savings of $175.

(A second class pass is $774, or $51 per trip. Without the pass, it would have cost me $620 whereas with the pass, costs would have been much less.)

Using the pass
I never had any problems finding a seat, except on the Paris to Amsterdam journey. The Thalys train has a limited number of passholder seats and since I didn’t pre-book a ticket, instead of travelling direct, I had to make a number of stops. It made the journey cheaper but also a lot longer than it needed to be. Other than that, I had no problem using the pass or finding seat availability.

Should You Buy a Rail Pass?

So are Eurail passes worth it?

Maybe.

A lot of people assume train travel in Europe requires a pass, purchase one without looking at the numbers, and then complain about the cost.

But rail passes are all about money. If it doesn’t save you a dollar, it’s not worth getting, and that means you have to do a lot of math, which can be a time-consuming process, but is certainly worth it in the end.

Just like the airlines, prices are now variable and no longer fixed. Depending on when you book, your ticket cost will fluctuate. If you are willing to pre-book months in advance, you’ll easily find some unbeatable bargain deals such as Paris to Amsterdam from $46, Rome to Venice from $38, or Amsterdam to Berlin from $78. Denmark offers orange tickets that are 50% off the normal price. Since rail passes cost roughly $79 per trip, you can’t beat booking individual tickets far in advance.

But who pre-books a multi-month trip to Europe?

If you are planning on a two-week trip months from now and you already know your dates, it’s not going to be the best idea to get a rail pass. Even though those early bird tickets are non-refundable, they are still pretty cheap and you probably won’t be changing too many of your dates.

But if you are traveling around Europe with no fixed plans, rail passes can work out to be a better value than buying same-day point-to-point tickets. To me, the pass is about flexibility and being able to hop on and hop off trains when you want. If you are traveling long term, you aren’t going to pre-plan months of travel. You are going to want the ability to go with the flow, which using a pass will give you.

I think one of the best ways to use the passes is to mix and match, using the rail pass for the expensive trains while paying for cheap tickets individually so you can maximize value. For example, for 11 days of train travel in Europe, it’s cheaper to buy a 10-day Eurail Global pass plus one point-to-point ticket for the cheapest train. Additionally, I place a value on flexibility. If the math is roughly the same, I’ll buy a pass because maybe saving $3 isn’t worth trading the flexibility a pass gives.

That being said, reflecting on the high costs of the sleeper trains, I don’t think I would take an overnight train again. If you don’t mind a seat, it’s a great deal — but I can’t sleep in seats and am not a huge train enthusiast to begin with, so I would opt for flights instead. At $79 USD, day trains work out to be cheaper than last-minute flights (baggage and service fees add up) but the added fees for night trains might make airfare better value.

Special note: Train passes also come with some other perks that you can see here. For example, by just being a passholder you get 50% off ferries in Greece, Italy, and Germany, 40% off ferries in Finland, and some other bus discounts. If you look over the perks and plan on taking advantage of those as well, those savings should be factored into your decision as to whether a rail pass makes financial sense for your trip.

How to pick the option that is best for you

Rail passes are all about math. The only way to know for sure whether a rail pass or point-to-point ticket would be cheaper is to work out the point-to-point prices for most of the trips you’re planning using the various European train operator websites.

After you have a general idea as to where you want to go, visit the national railway websites and work out two sets of prices: one for tomorrow (i.e. a last-minute fare) and one for two months from now (i.e. an early bird fare). Add up the prices in each category.

Next, head to Rail Europe, find your rail pass, and divide the rail pass price by the number of days you’ll be travelling by train to figure out the cost of each journey on the pass.

See which is cheaper and take that option, bearing in mind that your journey may change or you may take more high-speed rails. If I know I’ll be in a lot of countries that don’t charge reservation fees and the prices are for booking early versus using a pass are close, I’ll probably go with the pass as there is value in flexibility (I change my mind a lot).

In the end, a train pass isn’t right for all trips but for most people spending a long time in Europe and traveling vast distances, having a pass will save you money. While the reservation fees stink, the basic principles of the pass still hold: if you are traveling vast distances, using a lot of high speed trains, and are traveling last minute, a rail pass is still going to save you money.

The post Are Eurail Passes a Giant Scam or Do They Save You Money? appeared first on Nomadic Matt's Travel Site.

My Favorite Travel Companies and Gear: 2013 Edition

2013-06-07T01:33:03Z

Many years have passed since the last time I wrote about the travel companies I use and a lot has changed in those years. Now, there’s a ton of travel apps, new search sites, and resources available to help plan your trip. And while many of the companies I use have stayed the same, many have changed as has some of the gear I take with me.

One of the most frequently asked questions I get is:

“Matt, who do you use when you travel?”

Since the last time I answered that question was 2010, I am overdue for a response. Below you will find a list of all the companies, apps, and gear I use:

Travel insurance – I still am a loyal user of World Nomads. I’ve been using them since I started traveling in 2006 and I’ll continue to use them until I stop traveling. Their prices are competitive, they offer comprehensive coverage and great customer service. Overall, they just rock. They are the official travel insurance of both Lonely Planet and National Geographic and I figure if they were good enough for them, they’re good enough for me. I’ve never been disappointed.

Backpacks – When I went to Africa last year, South African Airlines lost my REI Mars backpack. It was my baby. After 6 years on the road with me, it functioned as good as the day I took it home from the store. I still miss that bag – it was a constant on the road. It went everywhere I did, saw everything I did. So after mourning its lost, I walked into REI and bought the same one. Their products last forever and come with a lifetime guarantee. I’m a customer of theirs for life. Now, let’s just hope this backpack doesn’t get lost either.

Guidebooks – I don’t always use a guide book but when I do, it’s Lonely Planet. Everyone has their own guidebook preference; Lonely Planet is mine. I like the look of their guides as well as their light weight. After a redesign in 2011, the books are now better organized with more photos and better maps, and I enjoy their emphasis on budget travel.

Camera – I used to be a Nikon guy, but Canon has really improved the quality of their night photographs. Since my Nikon point-and-shoot was a little outdated, before I went to Africa, I bought a Canon SX 500 because of its really impressive zoom lens. I mean, look at the detail on this moon photo! That’s pretty amazing detail. Now, I keep the Nikon around for city shots but if I’m taking a lot of nature shoots, Canon is what I use.

Video Camera – For the videos I post on my site (I’m starting to publish weekly videos, so be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel) I use a Panasonic HC-X900M. It’s supposed to be the top-of-the-line HD video camera under $1,000. It shoots in full HD at 1920×1080 and since starting to use it, I’ve noticed a vast improvement in my video quality.

Computer – For all my website design, video, and photo needs, I use a Macbook Pro. I find it easy to use and it never breaks down. I love my Mac. Once you go Mac, you never go back.

Hotel booking sites – When it comes to hotels, I am a Starwood hotels loyalist. I don’t often stay in hotels but when I do, I love the W and I use the points I get from travel hacking to stay for free. But if I do have to research I like to use Hotwire, Hotels.com, Expedia, and Booking.com.

Travel Apps – I don’t use many travel apps; I’ve never been a huge fan of them. Why would you be checking apps while on the road? I never find myself in the middle of a jungle or on a beach thinking “damn, I wish there was an app for X!” But a few do come in handy: Google Maps (the handiest app of all), Skype, and Currency cover my basic needs. The rest are just filler.

Airline booking sites – I tend to be loyal to American Airlines. I fly a lot so being loyal as a frequent flier pays off. But when I am looking beyond AA, I use the following sites: Momondo, Skyscanner, Vayama, and ITA Matrix. Those sites are the start of any search I run for airfare prices.

Hostel booking sites – The best hostel accommodation site out there with the largest inventory, best search interface, and availability is Hostelworld. I use them for my bookings and I like them so much that I started a partnership with them two years ago.

Tour company – I took my first overseas trip to Costa Rica in 2003 with G Adventures. That trip turned me into the travel junkie I am today. I like their commitment to the environment and local communities, small group sizes, and balance of free time and scheduled activities. It’s the way touring should be done. They too have been a partner of the site for a while and in a couple of weeks, I’ll be making a major announcement regarding them that will save you a ton of money!

Airline alliance – While I travel hack the world and use points to fly just about anyone I can, when I am paying for my flights or have the miles, I am a Oneworld loyalist. While the Star Alliance has more airlines to choose from, American Airlines (the US partner) is far better than United and I’m also a huge fan of Cathay Pacific and British Airways! Win, win all around.

Travel credit card – This is a bit tricky since deals, cards, bonuses change so often. I sign up for a lot of cards in order to travel hack so I can fly for free. But when it comes to my everyday spending, I rotate between three cards: Starwoods AMEX (business expenses), American Airlines (points for free flights), and Chase Sapphire Preferred (some points, plus no foreign transaction fees).

So there you have it: my favorite travel companies – the ones I use constantly throughout my travels. These are the ones I recommend throughout my site because they constantly get me great deals, offer great customer service, and are just all-around amazing. Are these the perfect companies for every traveler in every circumstance? No, of course not — but if you’re looking for some consistently good companies to check out first, these are the ones.

The post My Favorite Travel Companies and Gear: 2013 Edition appeared first on Nomadic Matt's Travel Site.

The Top Things to See and Do in Madrid

2013-06-05T16:37:32Z

My first time in Madrid was a failure. I got sick and only ended up making it out for half a day before retreating back into bed, cursing a cold that kept me from experiencing one of Europe’s great cities.

On my train trip through Europe last month, I entered Madrid tired from an overnight train but in wonderful health, and I set out to right a wrong. Madrid would be explored, dissected, drank, and eaten through.

A couple of weeks ago, I took you on a food tour of Madrid. This week’s Wednesday video highlights the top six things I loved about the city.

(Want more travel videos? I now update my YouTube channel each week with a new video. Subscribe here and get free videos!)

Madrid has a lot more to offer than what’s included in this video, from food tours to flamenco dancing to outstanding nightlife to a growing gin and tonic obsession.

You’ll never be bored in Madrid. There’s so many things to do there, but the activities mentioned in this video will give you a good starting point.

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Love, Fear, and a Chance of Drowning with Torre DeRoche

2013-06-03T16:31:17Z

Did you ever read Eat, Pray, Love? Did you like it? I didn’t — and when I saw the movie on a flight, I wanted to throw a shoe at the screen. I’m not really a “chick flick” movie guy (exceptions: Love Actually and The Notebook, two great movies). But then my friend Torre DeRoche published her love story, Love with a Chance of Drowning, about meeting the man of her dreams and sailing across the Pacific despite an intense fear of the ocean.

To my surprise, I really enjoyed the book. It was less of a love story and more of an adventure story about getting over your fears. I found the book to be descriptive, funny, and inspiring. (Also, she is a much better writer than I am.) So today, I virtually sit down with Torre to learn how a girl who was afraid of water sailed across an ocean with a man she met at bar.

Tell us your story. How did a girl afraid of water end up on a boat?
In my mid-twenties, my life in Melbourne had stagnated, so I quit my job and booked a one-way flight to San Francisco. Not long after I got there, I met a man in a bar who had a humble boat and a ready-to-go plan to set sail. Since I’ve always been terrified of the ocean, I had no interest in his adventure, but he was fun to be around so I kept seeing him.

Over many months, he charmed me with pictures of the remote islands of the South Pacific, and I found myself wondering what it would be like to reach such a paradise by the power of the wind.

Curiosity got the better of me, and I grew excited by the challenge of facing my fear. I was also in love. So I decided to jump aboard and island-hop across the Pacific to Australia on a leaky, 32′ boat.

For that matter, how did an Australian girl who doesn’t like water fly over an ocean to end up in California?
I was scared of a lot of things: the flight over, starting from scratch, loneliness, finding a job and a place to live, making friends, and getting by on what little savings I had. But I forged ahead because I had always wanted to live in the US, and because I felt that if I didn’t face my fears and go, I’d be sentencing myself to a predictable, boring life.

You weren’t afraid of ending up on the “Lost” island?
When you’re floating mid-Pacific in a boat that’s smaller than a bedroom, you’re far too vulnerable to let yourself get worked up about fictional stories. It was the creepy, real-life threats that I feared, like freak waves, white squalls, or orcas attacking and sinking the boat (yes, this really happens!).

When did you get over your fear?
After we spent twenty-six days at sea sailing from America to the Marquesas, I felt pretty invincible. I was still nervous about deep water and long sea passages (see above for reasons why), but the throat-clenching, phobic fear that I’d felt at the start of the voyage was gone.

With your book Love with a Chance of Drowning, how did you go from self-publishing to being published by a traditional publishing house?
I queried agents for six months and, after having no luck with that, I decided to self-publish. A couple of weeks after launching, I received a Twitter message from a Hollywood producer who had chanced upon an excerpt of my book through a series of random clicks. He wanted to know if the film option was available.
A month after self-publishing, I received two offers: one from the UK publisher and one from the Hollywood producer. Armed with two offers, it took me about four days to sign with a New York agent. From there, the book went to auction, and we quickly sold to five publishers around the world. The film rights were also optioned.

What’s life like now as a big time author?
I’m hand fed caviar and peeled grapes around the clock by an entourage of Herculean men in leather thongs. No, that’s a lie. Life as a published author is exactly the same, only with a vague understanding that a bunch of strangers are reading my words right now.

I’m asked to sign books, which never stops being strange. At a book event, someone said to me, “Could you please write a little piece of wisdom in my book?” I’m not very skilled at wisdom-on-demand, so after a long, thoughtful pause, I wrote, “Thanks for coming tonight.” Whoa — watch out, Dalai Lama!

I always find it weird people want my signature too.
It really makes me wish I’d invented a cooler signature.

What do you want people to get out of your book?
On its most basic level, Love with a Chance of Drowning is a lighthearted, fast-paced travel memoir that takes the reader across the Pacific Ocean via a string of remote islands aboard a leaky boat. It’s a love story set on a sailboat, but it’s not just for armchair travelers, sailors and romantics.

At its heart, it’s a book about going up against fear and taking big risks. If you have the courage to step outside your comfort zone with an open mind and an open heart, the world and its possibilities becomes infinitely larger. Big risks yield big rewards.

It may force you to question your own life decisions, it may give you the inspiration you need to embark on your own scary adventure, or it may simply take you on a hair-raising boat trip through the South Pacific with a terrified woman and her clumsy-but-lovable Argentinean boyfriend.

Is there a movie in your future?
Somewhere in Hollywood, Love with a Chance of Drowning is being adapted into a script right now. If all goes to plan, there will indeed be a film. Watch this space.

What were some of your top three moments sailing the pacific?

Smelling land for the first time after twenty-six days at sea.
Meeting a beautiful 60-year old woman who had been sailing for forty years, and learning that she also had a fear of deep water. She taught me that adventurers are not always fearless, which inspired the name of my blog Fearful Adventurer.
Being welcomed with huge bear hugs by islanders in destinations accessible only by boat. We were taken in like family.

I’ve always wanted to sail around the Pacific. How do you do it? What if I don’t want to buy a boat? Any advice?
There are a few ways to see the Pacific without having to buy your own boat:

The Aranui – This is a freighter ship that delivers food and goods to various remote islands around French Polynesia. It also takes passengers on its route through the Marquesas, the Tuamotus, and the Society Islands. The ship doesn’t stay in port long, but you’ll get to see many remote islands that can only be reached by boat.
Crew on someone else’s boat – A lot of sailors take on crew to help with the sailing and chores. Many of them want people with prior experience, but if you’re a particularly charming backpacker with the right attitude, you can hitch a ride across the Pacific on anything from a structurally questionable wooden boat to a Fortune 500 CEO’s mega-yacht. You may end up with a loveable captain, or a complete freak — but that’s all part of the adventure, right?
Charter a boat out of Fiji, Tonga or Tahiti – There are a number of companies that offer charter boats. You can hire a skipper and crew, or you can bareboat. From Tahiti, you can sail a couple of days northeast to reach the Tuamotus. There you’ll find some of the most beautiful -— and treacherous! — atolls in the world.

What would you tell a person who wants to try something new, but who is afraid?
I believe that if you get that nagging urge to try something new and you find yourself hesitating because of fear, the only reasonable path to take is to follow through with it. If you do, possibilities will open up and you’ll get an incredible sense of empowerment from breaking down your own perceived boundaries. If you don’t follow through, the opposite will happen. Your world becomes smaller. You’ll lose faith in yourself. A little piece of you dies, and regret grows in its place.

And really, isn’t that a hell of a lot more scary than whatever it is that’s holding you back?

What’s next for you?
I haven’t figured that out yet! I’m so focused on trying to get through this wild adventure of writing and publishing a book that I haven’t yet had a chance to plot out my next moves.

As far as writing goes, I would love to attempt fiction next.

For more of Torre, you can visit her website, Fearful Adventurer, and you can get her book on Amazon or in your local book store (I highly recommend it!). There’s also her witty tweets on Twitter.

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May’s Reader Video Q&A

2013-05-30T15:38:28Z

It’s the end of the month so that means it is time to answer your questions. This month I got a ton of questions and, since I’m trying not to make the videos three hours long, I only answered a few but plan on getting to the rest in June.

I’m really getting into video and am going to start doing weekly travel videos – not only answering your questions but giving travel tips and highlighting destinations around the world.

Here’s me answering some awesome reader questions this month!

(Want more travel videos? I now update my Youtube channel each week with a new video. Subscribe here and get free videos!)

Next month, I’ll be answering an extra large amount of questions so if you have one, leave a question in the comments section. Moving forward I have a great idea on how to handle all the questions I get but that’s going stay a secret for now. Why spoil the surprise?

The post May’s Reader Video Q&A appeared first on Nomadic Matt's Travel Site.

The Accidental Traveler

2013-05-28T16:36:43Z

I can count on one hand all the places I visited before I was 23. Travel wasn’t part of my upbringing. It wasn’t something my family did outside of the occasional road trip to visit my grandmother in Florida.

In college, I skipped studying abroad because I was afraid I might miss something. I went to Montreal twice because when you’re under 21 and can’t afford Spring Break in Cancun, Montreal is the closest place to go when you live in Boston. It wasn’t until I was 23 that I left North America to visit Costa Rica and I only did that because that’s what I thought you were supposed to do when you work. With two weeks vacation a year, you’re supposed to go somewhere and have fun, right? It wasn’t that I had a burning desire to travel; it was just something I thought I had to do.

But that trip to Costa Rica changed my whole life. After that, I was hooked. I was in love. I was addicted. I needed travel in my life.

A couple of months ago, I told this story during a radio interview and the host called me an accidental traveler.

I liked that phrase. The accidental traveler.

I’d never thought about it that way before, but it’s fitting.

In the beginning, I had no burning desire to travel; it was just something that happened. Travel became part of my life only as an afterthought. I never woke up wanting to be nomadic.

Being called an accidental traveler made me think about the journeys we take as people.

Are they deliberate, or do they just happen? How many times do we discover our journey only while we’re in the middle of it?

I think about the journey I’ve taken. It begin first as a simple desire to travel more, then changed to a stronger desire to take a gap year and then wanting to travel forever. I fell into travel writing as a way to make that happen.

Now, I can’t imagine doing anything else with my life.

Each step, each twist and turn, happened without any prior planning or thinking. In the words of Robert Frost, way lead onto way.

I found my path only while I was on it.

My mind sometimes goes back to when I was 23 and in Costa Rica. What made Costa Rica so special was that it showed me I could live life on my own terms. Travel allowed me to do what I wanted, when I wanted. It made every day Saturday and filled it with endless possibility.

I think of my friend Chris Guillebeau, who recently finished his journey to visit all the countries in the world before his 35th birthday, and how he described his journey of one that evolved over time.

You want to see a couple of countries.

Then a couple more.

One day you wake up and you’re on a quest to see every country in the world.

Just like one day you wake up and you realize you’ve become a world traveler.

You don’t know how it happened. You can’t really pinpoint the exact moment you or your life changed.

But it did.

Your one year plan turns into eighteen months, then thirty six months, and then, suddenly, you are celebrating five years on the road.

You’re a traveler. It’s in your blood. It’s who you are.

And you sit and write this in your favorite coffee shop in NYC and you reflect on how you got here and think about all the other big moments in your life and you realize that the best ones all happened as accidents.

And as you get ready to travel again, you realize that sometimes just falling into something can be the best thing to happen to you.

One day, you set out on a path and the road twists and turns and you think you’re still on that same path until you stop and rest — then you look around and realize you’re not where you intended to be, but someplace even better.

Then there, in this new world, as you get ready to celebrate another year older, you come to the conclusion that no plan might be the best plan and you’re happy letting life’s accidents lead the way.

The post The Accidental Traveler appeared first on Nomadic Matt's Travel Site.

Taking a Delicious Food Tour in Madrid

2013-05-26T12:52:59Z

While I was in Europe earlier this month, I finally managed to visit Madrid. Years ago I went to Madrid but was deathly sick and didn’t do much while I was there. So as I spent spent a week riding the rails around Europe, I made Madrid a definite stop on my tour.

Since the city is famous for food, I decided I wanted to take a food tour and numerous people pointed me to the Madrid Food Tour, which turns out to be run by a fellow blogger I met at a conference last year (small world)!

So Lauren and James, who run the food tour, took me around Madrid and taught me the history of food in the city (warning: excessive ham eating occurs in this video):

I ate my way around Madrid during the four days I was there, moving from market to market and tapas restaurant to tapas restaurant. Regardless of whether you go on a food tour or explore for yourself, Madrid is full of delicious offerings and I hope this video helps you find them the next time you’re in the city.

Disclaimer: Despite me offering to pay, Lauren and James provided the food tour for free.

The post Taking a Delicious Food Tour in Madrid appeared first on Nomadic Matt's Travel Site.

A Guide to Traveling with Technology

2013-06-10T23:47:10Z

This is a guest post by travel tech guru Dave Dean of Too Many Adapters, a site devoted to technology for travelers.

Wondering what to take on the road when it comes to electronics? You’re not the only one. Long gone are the days where a cassette player and film camera were the height of travel gadgetry. Walking into a hostel common room now you’d be forgiven for thinking you had accidentally stumbled into the local electronics store. You’re likely to be surrounded by laptops and tablets, smartphones and DSLRs, and more softly-glowing Apple logos than you can shake a stick at.

Often unsure of what they really need, people end up carrying a lot more tech gear on the road than they should. After several years of travel and working online though, I’ve figured out what works, what doesn’t, and what you really need.

Laptop

With the slow disappearance of internet cafes in favour of WiFi hotspots, a laptop is something that is definitely worth considering. It is the easiest method of staying in touch, backing up photos, and wasting time.

I use mine to work from the road, so I went for something relatively powerful, but for more typical use a thin and light laptop like an Ultrabook (eg: Asus Zenbook Prime) or a Macbook Air can provide everything you need at a lower weight and, potentially, cost. Things that matter include:

Size – Nothing larger than a 13” screen or that weighs much over 1kg, and less is definitely better. Consider the size and weight of the power adapter too – those things can be huge!

Strength – Something made well that won’t fall to pieces the first time it gets knocked in your bag. Get a protective sleeve to prevent scratches and cushion minor bumps, and read the reviews of its durability.

Battery life – Five or six hours is the minimum, 8+ is much better if you plan to take long overnight buses or trains.

Storage space – Don’t skimp on the amount of storage you have – 128Gb really is the minimum, and more is much better. All of those photos and downloaded movies take up more space than you think!

SD card slot – It’s not an absolute must, but having an SD card slot built into your laptop is very handy. Assuming your camera uses SD cards (most do), an inbuilt card reader makes copying your pictures super easy. All you do is insert the card and transfer!

Cost –The less you spend, the more money you have to spend at the bar, right? Not to mention the computer will be cheaper to insure and replace and less of a target for theft. Don’t spend much over $1000.

If your budget doesn’t stretch that far or your needs are more basic, you could go for a tablet instead. Older technology like netbooks could also do the job, although they’re becoming increasingly hard to find.

Tablet

If I didn’t work online, I’d ditch the laptop and carry a tablet computer instead. Smaller, lighter, cheaper and with better battery life than a laptop, the most well-known example is Apple’s famous iPad (mini or full-size). While either of those will do the job for a traveller, the best value for money at the moment is in the Android range – a Google Nexus 7 or larger Nexus 10 would be my recommendation.

There is a lot to be said for choosing a tablet if your main use is consumption (ie, reading web pages, books and emails or watching movies) rather than creation (writing, editing video, etc). Again, choose one with plenty of storage (either built-in or via microSD card).

To back up your photos, both Apple and Android devices let you plug in an external SD card reader – pick one of those up as well.

If you have absolutely no other choice, you can also use the camera on your tablet to get that must-have shot. Just be aware you’ll look rather silly doing so.

Mobile phone

I carry a Samsung Galaxy S2. It has rapidly become an indispensable piece of travel technology, with all of my music, photos, apps and entertainment stored on the microSD card, and was both cheaper and easier to customise than the iPhone I used to use.

I made sure to buy the unlocked version of my phone, meaning that I can use a pre-paid SIM card anywhere in the world and take advantage of much cheaper calling and data rates. Your mobile company at home will charge incredibly high rates if you use your normal number overseas, making roaming calls and data prohibitively expensive for most travellers.

Switching to a local cell company when you arrive in a country can save you a small fortune – I personally know people who accidentally left data enabled when on vacation for a week and came home to a several thousand dollar bill. If you can’t unlock your phone and absolutely have to use it while travelling, at least turn the data connection off to lessen the pain

I use literally dozens of travel apps, but three of the best are:

Skype: As a general rule all of my international calls take place via Skype over WiFi or 3G. It’s quick and easy, and buying a few bucks worth of SkypeCredit means I can call any phone in the world for hours.
TripIt: I’ve tried all sorts of ways to keep track of travel bookings, but TripIt is the easiest. Many confirmation emails can simply be forwarded to add them to your list, and it doesn’t take long to manually add the others. With the Pro version, I even get notified of timetable changes and delays. Having every detail at my fingertips has saved me more than once at airport check-ins and bus stations around the world.
Google Translate: Google just updated the Android version of its translation app, now letting me download language packs for offline use. Even before that, the app was handy for figuring out what on earth was on the menu, or saying/displaying a few words in the local language to get my point across. Now that I can use it anywhere, it’s indispensable.

E-book reader

I resisted buying an ebook reader for a long time – I’m a ‘physical book’ kind of guy. Now that I’ve made the leap to a Kindle, however, I’m very pleased with it.

It’s incredibly small and light – more so than even a little paperback – and can store hundreds of books, travel guides and whatever else I might need. I picked up the Keyboard 3G – it cost more than the WiFi-only version, but the ability to download new books from anywhere with cell phone coverage is invaluable.

An unexpected benefit lies hidden away in the ‘Experimental’ section: a slow, clunky web browser. Why is that so great? Because with the 3G connection I have free access to email, Facebook, etc. in over 100 countries.

I’d never want this to be my only way of getting online – it’s too painful for that – but in a pinch it’s fantastic. This is the only Kindle model that has this feature – all the other 3G versions only let you access Wikipedia and the Amazon store.

I considered a tablet instead, but for reading on the road there was really no contest. The Kindle is cheaper, smaller and lighter, the battery life is measured in weeks rather than hours, the screen is so much better in sunlight and I can happily lie on the beach without worrying about it.

Thanks to a cheap case I bought off eBay, it looks like a plain notebook if I need to pull it out on the street to check directions. There’s no way I’d even think of doing that with any tablet – I’d be far too much of a target.

Backup

I worked in IT when I wasn’t travelling, so data backup has long been a concern of mine. I just know too many travellers who have lost irreplaceable data due to hard drive failures and theft among other reasons. Do you want to lose every single photo from your US road trip, your cruise on Halong Bay and everywhere else you’ve been? Probably not.

I copy photos to my laptop each night, then use Crashplan+ to do the rest. For a few bucks a month it automatically manages backups to both online storage and a portable hard drive that I keep in my pack, all without me having to think about it. Before splashing out on that subscription I backed everything up manually, but found that I was forgetting to do it too often for my liking.

Although I use a Seagate portable drive and it works fine, I’d be looking at the rugged Transcend version if I was buying a new one.

For the small amount of hassle involved, the peace of mind is more than worth it. Don’t risk losing all of your digital memories.

Miscellaneous

Other than the chargers and cables that always seem to tie themselves in knots overnight, the only other gadgets I put in my pack are a universal power adapter and a 4-way power box.

You’d struggle to spend more than $25 on the combination if you tried, and they take up very little room in my bag, yet are worth their weight in gold every time I get to a dorm room with one power socket for the 12 people staying in it. I plug all of my devices into the 4-way box, connect it to the wall socket via my universal adapter, and I’m done. Easy.

Choosing the right gear to travel with doesn’t have to be a daunting task. Making a few smart choices and limiting yourself to what you truly need will give you all of the benefits that technology can bring while avoiding most of the downsides. Spend a bit of time and money getting it right before you leave – trust me, it will save an awful lot of frustration once you’re out there on the road.

Dave is one half of the team at Too Many Adapters, a site devoted to technology for travellers. A geek as long as he can remember, he worked in IT around the world for fifteen years, combining his love of all things nerdy with an overwhelming travel addiction. Now based out of a backpack long term, Dave writes about travel and tech from anywhere with half-decent internet and a great view. You can also find him talking about the life of a long-term traveller at What’s Dave Doing?

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