Life in the slow lane: Welcome to New Zealand!

We are standing in the slow queue at Auckland airport. We inch forward and stop.

Kiwis are lovely people but can't they count? Six customs officers are checking quarantine declaration forms. There are four for the line to our left and two for us!

Tips and tricks to get the best hotel room at the best rate!

Don't be a victim of dynamic pricing:

This first hint applies more to booking an airline ticket than a hotel room but, to be honest, I originally forgot to put it in my post on 'Booking an airline ticket' so it is going in here.  

Dynamic pricing is a fancy term for pricing according to demand. Lets face it, peak season will always cost more than low season - fair enough. The problem is that some businesses have, with the aid of cookies, taken dynamic pricing to new levels. Have you ever checked the price of an airline ticket or hotel room on-line a couple of times and then found it is more expensive when you go to book? If so, you have probably been the victim of dynamic pricing.

Escaping the Czech Republic: Holiday disasters and how to avoid them - Pt. 2

Escaping the Czech Republic: -

I am a stickler for following the rules. I don't do things I'm not supposed to - even little things like jay-walking. This is especially so when I am in a foreign country. David on the other hand has a more casual approach to life which is how we found ourselves in the Czech Republic without entry stamps in our passports.

We drove across the border from Austria, in a rental car with Austrian number plates, following a long line of other Austrian cars.  No-one else stopped at the border, no-one else even slowed down. D was driving.

Holiday disasters and how to avoid them - 'Our Great Cairo Catastrophe'.

Travelling the world, seeing the sights and visiting foreign countries, sounds like a lot of fun - and it is. But it is not all plain sailing. Sometimes things go wrong and when they do it can be downright frightening. There is nothing like being thousands of miles from home to make any problem seem a lot worse than it is.

Fortunately we have never had an irrecoverable holiday catastrophe but that doesn't mean we haven't had our share of  mishaps.  Next time you are away from home and things go wrong just remember you aren't alone - chances are someone, probably lots of someones, have been in the same situation before you and got out alive.

Booking an airline ticket yourself: how to avoid some common mistakes.

Today's blog post started life as a compilation of stories re-telling our worst holiday catastrophes. Horrible experiences which we look back on now with amusement; if not quite fondness. Somewhere about the first paragraph I realised that after almost four decades of independent travelling David and I have probably learnt a thing or two about how to avoid holiday disasters.  I don't pretend to be an expert. The following advice all comes from personal experience