Bart Lapers
Visiting Every Country In The World
My Best Travel Experiences of 2017
Pic: Lufthansa First Class Terminal in Frankfurt
Another year of intense traveling has come to an end. Time to wrap up with an overview of my highlights of 2017. For a detailed travel report of the first 5 months of 2017, check my post The Luxury Nomad Lifestyle.
Flights
After a record year in 2016 with 116 flights and 160432 miles flown, it was going to be tough to beat my record in 2017. With 3 more flights scheduled on December 29th and 30th, I will break my personal record with a total of:
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- 121 flights, 161352 miles flown, 6.5x around the earth, >400 hours up in the air
- 4 First Class flights with Lufthansa
- 54 Business Class flights with LATAM, TAP, Azul Brazilian Airlines, Ukraine International Airlines, Emirates, Malaysia Airlines, Turkish Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Brussels Airlines, SWISS, Austrian and Lufthansa.
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Lufthansa First Class for 360EUR + FREE Brussels Airlines ticket
The number one reason to collect Miles & More miles…. Lufthansa First Class. In case you’re not convinced yet, here are 5 reasons why you want to fly Lufthansa First Class at least once in your life.
1. Lufthansa First Class Terminal & Lounges
Experience DO&CO’s amazing gourmet kitchen in combination with top premium beverages, wines & champagnes at the Lufthansa First Class lounges. There’s even a dedicated terminal for Lufthansa First Class passengers in Frankfurt!
5 tricks to get the best hotel deals
Last updated: February 3rd, 2019
1. Use price comparison sites
I can’t emphasise enough: Start your hotel search on a price comparison site, they do the hard work for you! HotelsCombined and Trivago are my favorites. Tip: Make sure to create an account on HotelsCombined.com and search for hotels when signed in. For some hotels you’ll see secret deals which are only available when you’re logged on.
2. Use discount codes
Compare the lowest hotel rates you found via e.g. HotelsCombined.com with the rates using discount codes at FlyerTalk.
3. Use cashback sites
Did you know you can earn money with your hotel bookings? Using cashback sites, you can get up to 20% back of the money you spend on hotel bookings!
- Create a cashback site account
- Use the cashback site search function to find the booking site
- Click on the link and earn cashback!
The cashback sites I use:
Quidco (cashback in GBP via PayPal) booking sites
Mr Rebates (cashback in USD via PayPal) booking sites
4. Use HotelTonight
Before you hit that booking button, make sure to check hotel prices on HotelTonight. If it’s your first time using the HotelTonight app, discount code BALAPERS will give you another $25 or €20 off. You can book 100 days ahead using the HotelTonight app.
5. Use Airbnb: up to €79 / $90 discount
If you haven’t used Airbnb before, now is the time to sign-up. Airbnb has temporarily increased the sign-up bonus for new users to €35 ($40) travel credit which can be used for a first time booking of €65 ($75) or more. Even if you don’t intent to make a booking right now, sign-up to secure your €35 ($40) travel credit.
Both new and existing Airbnb users can earn €44 ($50) travel credit by using Airbnb for a business trip. Aren’t we all entrepreneurs these days? 😉 Just add your business email address to your profile via Airbnb for Business and book a “Business trip” (make sure to select Business travel as purpose of the trip). After your business trip, you’ll receive a €44 ($50) coupon code which can be used for any Airbnb booking. Note that your business email address can’t be a public domain. (ex: gmail.com, hotmail.com)
The Luxury Nomad Lifestyle
Another 5 months of traveling have passed, time for an update! Due to professional obligations at my office job, I had to postpone a number of longer trips to 2nd half of 2017. However, I still managed to keep up with my frequency of traveling every week. Let’s have a look at my current travel stats for 2017:
- 42 flights, 55221 miles, 2.2 around earth, 135 hours up in the air
- Business Class with Emirates, Malaysia Airlines, Brussels, Austrian and Lufthansa
- 52 hotel nights in 15 countries (34 nights at IHG, 12 nights at Hilton)
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10 Tips For Better Travel in 2017
1. Plan your trip: Wikivoyage
I’m a big fan of Wikivoyage, the Wikipedia of travel. For each country, region, city you’ll find a page loaded with practical information ordered in recurring sections (Get-in, Get Around, See, Do, Buy, Eat, Drink, Sleep, …) an excellent resource to start planning your trip. I usually combine this with some research on Flyertalk, a huge frequent traveller forum where you can find a lot of info about hotels, airlines and destinations. For example, I found the contact details of a good driver in Bali via Flyertalk. Once I’m at my destination, I use the app Foursquare to get local tips on things to see & do, find good bars & restaurants, etc…
2. Best flight deals: Google Flights
Google Flights is my favorite tool to look for flights. Just enter your travel dates, hit ‘explore destinations’ and Google will show you a map where you can travel for the lowest price. Once you have found the flights you want to book, make sure to check Momondo to ensure you book at the lowest price. Read more tips & tricks to book cheap flights.
3. Best hotel deals: HotelsCombined
You can score fantastic hotel deals with a wide range of tips & tricks which I’ve written about before. The absolute minimum effort you should make before finalizing your hotel booking is comparing hotel rates via an aggregator. HotelsCombined and Trivago are reliable ones.
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