Trip Coach: March 20, 2007

I used a well-known travel site to price tickets for a trip to Las Vegas. The flight I wanted was available, but I decided to wait to see if prices would come down. That flight stopped being listed after a week, and the next best flight kept getting more expensive. About five weeks later, I checked prices from a different PC. Whaddya know? The original flight was available, for $50 less than that next-best flight. That same evening I checked again from my PC. The flight I wanted was not available,so I deleted the cookies for the site and tried again. Voilà! The flight I wanted at the price I wanted. Moral of the story: Clean up your cookies—it could save you money!

You won't always save by bringing the rental car back early. Alamo has an early-return policy at all of its locations, designed to discourage customers from returning cars early. If you show up at the lot a day or two ahead of schedule, Alamo will recalculate what you owe them at the daily rate; if it turns out to be less than what you would have paid for the week, they'll charge a $15 fee. Yet another reason to read the fine print on your contract carefully!

Carry a twist tie in your wallet. Among other ingenious uses, a twist tie can temporarily replace a lost screw on a pair of glasses. Just peel the paper or plastic off the tie so you have bare wire, insert it where the screw once was, and twist to tighten. Unlike Scotch tape or a safety pin, a twist tie is small enough to remain hidden and strong enough to hold until you're able to replace the screw.

If you're a woman traveling alone, or your accommodations don't inspire confidence, simply wedge a small rubber doorstop at the base of the door when you're inside the room. It'll be virtually impossible to open the door from the outside.

When you travel to a beach destination, bring your own snorkel gear. We bought snorkels, masks, and fins at home for half-off (at an end-of-summer sale) before a trip to Hawaii. They didn't take up much room in our luggage, and we would have spent as much or more renting the equipment.

My husband cut an old contact lens case in two and uses the halves to carry his medication when we're traveling. He prefers them to regular pillboxes because lens cases are watertight and compact enough to carry inside a shirt pocket.

Pack light, or that great deal you found on airfare won't seem that great. On a Ryanair flight between Glasgow and Dublin, my husband and I were charged over $100 for excess baggage weight (the airline tickets themselves cost less than half that). Be sure to check the weight limits—especially on low-fare airlines—before you leave home.

Online check-in isn't just for airlines. After reserving an Alamo car over the Internet, I was offered online check-in just by entering my credit card number and driver's license information for approval. At the airport, following Alamo's instructions, I informed the shuttle-bus driver that I had checked in online and reserved an economy car. I was dropped off in the lot and told to pick whichever car I wanted. I drove it to the exit, where my credit card and driver's license were verified on the computer, and I was done.

I unpacked a pair of black slacks recently to find them covered with white fuzz. I didn't have a lint brush handy, so I used the luggage sticker from my bag--the gummy side took the lint right off.

During a visit to Mexico City, I was sitting in a plaza near a fountain, watching the locals stroll around in their Sunday best. Nearby, an older gentleman was playing a concertina; his music perfectly framed the scene. I took lots of pictures, but I didn't have a way to capture that music. Now I pack a small tape recorder along with my camera.

Before traveling to any city, do a search on the Internet of the city name and the word "coupon" ("New Orleans coupon"). You will find many sites offering two-for-one, percentage-off, and dollar-off discounts. On a recent trip to St.Louis, we saved $100 at restaurants and attractions.

Easily packable, local specialty foods make great gifts for family and friends at home. At the huge Safeway in Kihei, Maui, we found a great selection of chocolate-covered macadamia nuts and Kona coffee beans in elegant gift boxes for far cheaper than in tourist-oriented shops. European grocery stores abound with gift ideas: British teas, French mustards and vinegars, and Italian olive oils are just a few examples. Just bear in mind that meats, produce, and other fresh items are a customs no-no.

Bring a single-hole punch and lanyard on your next cruise. Once aboard, you can make a hole in your plastic key card and attach the lanyard, allowing you to carry the key around your neck. This is especially useful when your dress or slacks have no pockets. Just be sure to put the hole where it won't interfere with the card's magnetic strip.

Put a few plastic trash bags in the outer pockets of your suitcases and carry-ons. If you arrive at your destination and it's raining, you can cover your luggage with the bags while you make your way to your hotel. Just cut a slit for handles or straps.

Anyone traveling with multiple electronic devices (laptops, PDAs, cell phones, digital cameras, MP3 players) can easily confuse all the accessories that come with them. To keep all battery chargers, USB cables, media cards, and owner's manuals safe, dry, and organized, place them in individual Ziploc bags. You can put a label inside the bag to identify the contents, and one label wrapped around each cable to identify it.

Baby wipes aren't just for babies. Slip a travel-size pack into your carry-on bag and use the wipes to kill germs on public toilet seats and in phone booths. In a pinch, they can also remove stubborn stains from clothing.

To find the perfect destination with airfare that meets your budget, try Travelocity's Dream Maps travel tool (travelocity.com). Select a maximum fare and a type of destination (city, national park, etc.) and the Web site will display a variety of trips matching that description.

Whenever I go somewhere, I bring a supply of postcards from my hometown. I write my name, address, and e-mail on the back, and offer a card to new friends so we can keep in touch. I also pack small souvenirs (key rings, etc.) that carry my local sports teams' logos. They make meaningful but inexpensive thank-you gifts for the small kindnesses that ease one's way during a trip.

When my husband and I would stay in a hotel with our two-year-old, a full night's sleep was out of the question. The minute our son opened his eyes (at 2,3,or 4 a.m.), he woke us, thinking it was time to play. We now pack a pop-up tent and set it up in a corner of the hotel room with books, a blanket, and a few small stuffed animals. The tent folds down to a 14-inch circle and weighs about a pound. It works great! My son has his own "room" to sleep in when we vacation, and we all get to sleep through the night!

My hearing loss once made it impossible to hear any alarm clock. Then I found the Shake Awake, an alarm clock that vibrates. I no longer stare at the ceiling all night prior to an early flight in fear of oversleeping. I clip Shake Awake to my pillow or place it on a hard surface near my bed, where its rattling definitely gets my attention.

Pack a travel-size shampoo container refilled with detergent and a one-gallon Ziploc bag for when you need to wash hosiery, bras, and other delicate undergarments. Put a few drops of detergent into the bag and fill it part way with water. Place the garment in the bag, close it up, and shake it around for a few minutes. Instant washing machine! For larger pieces of clothing, I've used the plastic laundry bags supplied at most hotels. Just hold on to the open end tightly.

Put an address label on your one-time-use camera. At a Final Four game in Indianapolis, we exchanged identical Kodak Fun Savers with another traveler so that we could take souvenir photos of each other with our respective cameras. But afterward, we couldn't tell whose camera was whose. Luckily, I remembered how many exposures remained on mine, so we got ours back. Next time, I'll just label it.

If you book a package over the Internet, print out all the details of what's included and take it with you. When a hotel desk clerk in Paris said that the breakfast buffet we had enjoyed for the previous seven mornings was not included in our package, I was able to show him the printouts and prove him wrong. He apologized profusely and wiped the breakfast charges from our bill.

Carry the exact change for public transportation. In Venice, we were annoyed when a vaporetto (water taxi) ticket-taker refused to give us our change. Later, we discovered that if you don't have the exact fare, ticket agents make no promises about giving change.

Before my last long flight, I went to librivox.org and chose a bunch of books, short stories, and poems to download to my iPod--for free. The site has both adult and children's books, and the list is growing. All of the titles are in the public domain, and they're read by volunteers, so there's no question of copyright infringement. Even if you don't own an iPod, you can download them to your computer and burn them onto a CD.

I always snap photographs of scenic highway markers, park entrance signs, and the like. These informational photos are put into our album to help identify the many sites that we visited.

I live in coastal Florida, where the electricity sometimes goes out during violent storms. Before a trip, I place a few ice cubes in a plastic bag and put the bag in the freezer. If the ice has melted and refrozen by the time I get home, I'll know we've had a power outage and that any food left in the refrigerator may be unsafe to consume.

Preserve even the small number of frequent-flier miles you may obtain by making occasional use of a particular carrier; the miles can be worth money. Even if you don't regularly fly on Delta, Northwest, Continental, or several other airlines, sign up for their frequent-flier programs when you book a long or overseas flight. Points.com allows you to redeem miles for magazine subscriptions, music downloads, and other products. You can also use miles to get small discounts on purchases at retailers such as Amazon.com.

Before leaving on a trip, I print the names and addresses of my friends and family onto clear mailing labels. (All standard word-processing programs have preset templates for creating address labels.) Then, I take the address-label sheets with me on vacation. Since the addresses are already saved in my computer and the mailing labels are adhesive, addressing postcards has become really easy.

When buying bottled water, look at the bottle cap to see if the seal is still intact. While visiting the Acropolis on a very hot day this summer, I caught a young boy refilling empty water bottles from a tap and recapping them. He was then selling the bottles to thirsty tourists.