We spend a good bit of our time thinking about travel, as you might expect. And we use sites like booking.com and travelocity, just like everybody else does. But we’ve also use some less well-known websites that for specific purposes. Here are our very favourite travel websites. Some of them you will know, but a few may be new to you.
Transportation
Rome2Rio is the first place we go when we aren’t sure how we want to get from one place to another. They’re especially good with complicated, long-distance journeys, say, across a continent, or when you might be combining modes of travel, and they break it down by time and cost. But they’re also reliable for local transportation options e.g. if you are in a place surrounded by water and want to know if car or boat will get you there faster. Going sends you information about flight discounts from several airports you choose, often at substantial reductions. Good especially if you are interested in going to lots of places, and need help deciding.
Skyscanner is where we go to see a range of prices for different options, say, the same flight on consecutive days, or flights on the same day, or to different cities in the same country. They also offer last-minute deals on flights. The Man in Seat 61 provides a wealth of information for train travel around Europe and the U.K.
Lodging
Unusual hotels is just that, offering rooms in lighthouses, igloos, castles, hotels with a Hello Kitty theme, etc. We don’t actually book rooms from them very often, but we absolutely love seeing what’s on offer.
We don’t stay in hostels much either, but hostelworld has much more than just hostels, including lot of unique low-cost lodgings. And Hotel Tonight can save you if things don’t work out the way you expect; they have big discounts on last-minute hotel rooms. (Also, sometimes, deals up to a week out.)
Other
Black Tomato offers personalized luxury tours. But what makes this one of our favourite travel websites of all time is that it’s not only divided by location; it offers months of the year, type of traveller (solo, multi-generation), and interests (camping, yachts, slow travel, food-based, nature, cities, etc.). We find it a constant source of inspiration.
