Exactly two weeks ago, news from the travel industry hit the world like a nuclear bomb. Thomas Cook, the world’s oldest travel firm collapsed. Resulting in chaos at airports and in hotels all over the world. Just like that, Thomas Cook stopped existing.
But was it really just like that?
But was it really just like that?
Honestly, we kinda saw this one coming. Not Thomas Cook in particular but travel agencies in general. The last time we booked a trip via an agency was back in the 20th century. Today there are so many great websites and apps with which you can easily put your own trip together. They’re quick and fancy and most of all, they give you all control. Where you want to stay, how you’ll get there, and how to spend your days is 100% in your own hands.
Nevertheless, also during our big nude Europe trip this summer we met plenty of people who had still planned their vacation via an agency. Their main reasons: (a) it’s easy and (b) they’re afraid that something would go wrong with their own bookings. Once we showed them how they can book everything, from hotels to flights to car rentals to bus tickets to even travel insurance, within minutes and how much money they could save by doing so, they quickly changed their minds.
And today we’re going to show you as well.
And today we’re going to show you as well.
Note: This blog post contains affiliate links. By using them you’re not paying a single cent, penny or rupee more, but you do help to sponsor Naked Wanderings.
Contents
Book your nude accommodation online
If you’ve never heard about Booking.com before, you’ve probably been living in a cave for the last decade or so. It’s the world-leading company for online hotel bookings with about 30 million hotels listed all over the world. Why would someone ever again want to pay an administration fee to a travel agency?
Although we’ve used Booking.com probably hundreds of times already, they do come with two huge downsides:
➡️ Not many nude accommodations are already on Booking.com
➡️ Booking.com doesn’t have a filter function on nude accommodations.
➡️ Booking.com doesn’t have a filter function on nude accommodations.
So here’s what we do.
First, we use NUDE to find nude accommodations in the region that we want to visit. Once we find a place we like, we enter the name in Booking.com. If the place is there, we book via Booking.com. Because the company offers a lot of security against double bookings and other annoyances and there are often promotions to be found. If the place is not on Booking.com, we contact them directly via the contact details on NUDE.
First, we use NUDE to find nude accommodations in the region that we want to visit. Once we find a place we like, we enter the name in Booking.com. If the place is there, we book via Booking.com. Because the company offers a lot of security against double bookings and other annoyances and there are often promotions to be found. If the place is not on Booking.com, we contact them directly via the contact details on NUDE.
Although we almost exclusively use Booking.com, sometimes it’s also worth having a look at Hotels.com or Airbnb.
Book your flights online
Our all-time favorite website for booking flights online is definitely Skyscanner. They’ve been among the first to offer a flight comparison service and very often prove to be the best in finding our perfect flight. The main reason why we like Skyscanner so much are the different criteria they allow us to set.
This already starts with the destination which you are not obliged to enter. If you don’t really have a specific holiday location in mind you can just choose “anywhere” and see where you can get for how much money. Pretty convenient if you travel on a budget. Another advantage is the travel dates where you can select the whole month. By doing so, Skyscanner will show you the different prices for each date. More than once we’ve been able to pay less than half for a flight just by traveling a couple of days later or earlier.
Then come the other fun things. How many stops do you want? (do you really want to switch planes?) When do you want to leave? (who wants to be at an airport before 6 am anyway?) How long do you want to travel? (more than 24 hours in airports and planes, forget it!). You can even choose your preferred airlines or groups if you’re collecting air miles.
Another great website for finding great flight deals is Kiwi. If your dates are flexible, or you are planning a multi-destination vacation, Kiwi is definitely an interesting option.
Although we rarely find a better flight deal than on Skyscanner or Kiwi, you might want to check Jetradar as well.
Rent your car online
If there’s one thing on which you can often save huge amounts of money, it’s on car rentals. Lots of travel agencies work exclusively with large car rental companies like Enterprise, Hertz, or Avis. Although these are definitely good companies, their prices are often like their fame: huge. Many smaller car rental companies are currently popping up around the world that have very competitive prices. Something from which we have profited a lot.
A short example. We did a quick search to rent a Volkswagen Golf in Madrid airport for a week in October. At the smaller companies, we pay about 8 euros per day. If we rent with Avis, that would be 30 euros per day. That’s a lot of extra beers you can have (but don’t drink and drive!).
How can they be so cheap?
Well, here’s the tricky part. The good rental companies save a lot of money by not having an office in the airport but take you to your car with a minivan instead. And they will almost always try to sell you extra insurance. The more shady companies will use tricks like a full to empty gas policy where they sell you the first tank at about double the regular price.
Well, here’s the tricky part. The good rental companies save a lot of money by not having an office in the airport but take you to your car with a minivan instead. And they will almost always try to sell you extra insurance. The more shady companies will use tricks like a full to empty gas policy where they sell you the first tank at about double the regular price.
So it’s very important to read the small text! If you understand how these things work, you can rent cars around the world at ridiculously low prices.
Here’s what you want to check:
Here’s what you want to check:
✅ Gas policy: Always pick Full-to-full and make sure to return the car full.
✅ Damage: Always check your car before leaving for damage and if possible take pictures or film the car.
✅ Insurance: Basic insurance only covers the costs at other cars/property. So if you crash your rental car, you’ll have to pay for it. Full coverage can be bought at the rental agency but check first if it’s not already included in your travel insurance or credit card.
✅ Deposit: In case you want the basic insurance, the rental company will ask for a deposit. Make sure that the credit line of your card is high enough to cover this.
✅ Mileage limits: Some rental cars have limited mileage, often about 250km per day. If you want to travel long distances, make sure to take unlimited mileage.
✅ Pickup/Return time: Especially if you rent a car in the airport, you may want to pick up or return at a ridiculous hour of the day. Make sure that this is possible and that you don’t have to pay extra for this service.
✅ Additional drivers: sometimes they’re included in the standard price, sometimes you’ll have to pay extra per additional driver.
We have several favorite car rental websites and it’s always best to check all of them to find the best offer.
For Europe, we prefer to use EconomyBookings or Rentalcars.com.
In the Americas and Asia, we noticed that Hotwire often gave the best deals.
If you want to rent an RV or mobile home, have a look at Outdoorsy!
For Europe, we prefer to use EconomyBookings or Rentalcars.com.
In the Americas and Asia, we noticed that Hotwire often gave the best deals.
If you want to rent an RV or mobile home, have a look at Outdoorsy!
Book your activities online
No matter where you go, most often you’ll be able to plan your activities on the spot. Hotel lobbies are a good place to do so, but keep in mind that they will often charge a commission. Sometimes from the organizer and sometimes from you. Also, hotels are likely not to tell you about all the options but just those where they get commissions from.
For big events or activities which are likely to sell out, it’s always a good idea to book them online upfront. But even when you’re already at your destination you can still try to find the best prices online.
A great website for all sorts of tours and activities is GetYourGuide. Boat tours, walking tours, skip the line museum tickets, and much more.
Get your travel insurance online
Last but definitely not least in your search for the best nude vacation is to get decent travel insurance. The most important aspect of this is of course to cover health issues. If you or a family member get ill, break a leg, or worse, you want to make sure that you have the best possible care.
Depending on your plans, it’s also important to check if you’re insured for other inconveniences as well. What about flight delays, extreme sports, or rental cars? These might not be included in basic insurances so it’s worth checking if you need additional insurance for this.
The first thing you want to do is check your current insurances. Lots of people are already insured for certain travel aspects via their jobs, car insurances, or credit cards. It could well be that everything you need is already there. In case you still need additional insurance, we can highly recommend World Nomads as your guardian angel on tour.
Additional tips for planning the best nude vacation
In which order do you book?
Most often you can use the exact structure of this blog post as the order for your bookings. First the accommodation, then the flight and then everything else. If you’re booking your accommodation with Booking.com and your flights with Kiwi, you can even do both simultaneously so you’re sure not to miss a great deal.
Only for faraway destinations which require expensive flights, we would recommend you to first book your flight and then your accommodation. Or you could opt for the cancellation game.
The cancellation game
Every online booking comes with a cancellation policy. Especially for hotels and car rentals, it’s often possible to cancel until several hours before arrival. This provides a lot of flexibility for the customer. By playing the cancellation game, you just book the best deal you can find today and then you regularly check for better deals. If a better one pops up before the end of the cancellation period, just cancel your first deal and book the new one.
Important to mention here is that this isn’t really fair towards the companies and especially small hotels suffer a lot from the cancellation game. When you only have four rooms and half of them get canceled a couple of days before the guests were supposed to arrive… It’s not fun. We heard stories from people who make simultaneous reservations at 10 different hotels and in the end just keep the one for which they find the cheapest flight or which has the best weather forecast.
If you do so as well, keep in mind that you might be hurting a family business.
If you do so as well, keep in mind that you might be hurting a family business.
What if something goes wrong?
A big reason why people often keep relying on travel agencies is the feeling of security. If something along the way goes wrong, they can call the guy from the agency for a solution. They don’t realize that travel agents are only “in-between”-people. If you miss a connecting flight, your travel agent isn’t going to put you on a new one. The airline company will.
With every online booking you make, whether it’s a hotel, a flight, a car, a tour, or insurance, you’ll get a phone number of the customer service. If something would go wrong, you can call these people. In the end, they are the same people the agency guy would call to as well.
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Mainly yes, but a few not quites as well for my particular situation as a long distance traveller.
I always book directly with the accom provider if they have any sort of price match guarantee. If you book direct, there is less likely to be a communication problem. You know what you agreed to, and what they agreed to provide to you. I haven’t experienced this myself, but others have said you get treated better by the provider if you deal direct.
The big item for which I still use a travel agent is complicated air fares. Point A to Point B on one flight is easy, but when you have to change planes it isn’t, with code shares and different luggage policies between airlines. Skyscanner will find cheapest fares between say Australia and Spain that involve a number of different carriers. An agent will help guide you through that.
Which brings me to my final point. Doing things on the net can become a cheapest possible price obsession. I’ve seen people make silly itineries because its cheaper to get from Sydney to Barcelona via Beijing or Oman instead of the sensible option. For some people all common sense goes out the window when in search of the cheapest price.
Having said that, on my recent European trip from Australia I did my travel insurance online, my car rental online, my internal Europe flights online and bought some tickets to sporting events. All without any problem. I always worry that my printer will fail just when I’m trying to print out a hard copy though.
We definitely agree that the cheapest price is not always the best option. Back in the day when we were die hard low budget backpackers we also booked ridiculous 30 hour itineraries just to save 200 euros. We don’t do that anymore. And that’s also a reason why we like Skyscanner so much. Except for the cheapest price, they give you a lot of other options. You can filter on direct flights only for example. Or choose not to leave or arrive in the middle of the night.
With hotel bookings, it really depends. We’ve been to hotels where the prices for direct bookings were way higher than the ones on booking sites. We’ve been to others that happily give a discount for booking directly. When it comes to booking security, if you book directly at a hotel and when you arrive it appears to be full, it’s up to the hotel to find you another place. Some will arrange that for you, others won’t and just leave you there. What can you do? But with booking.com for example, it’s booking.com who will find you a new hotel. In these cases, we have found their customer service to be excellent.
Completely agree with the post… I always do my research and then book on bookings.com. After a few trips of this, I’ve got them offering me special discounts to book via them, so now they’re my go-to for hotels, as Skyscanner is for airlines tickets
Hi all, regarding you article about HOW TO BOOK YOUR NUDE VACATION WITHOUT A TRAVEL AGENCY, my opinion is that if you are a person from Europe going for the first time to South Africa for example, you do not know anything about the country, driving, restaurants, accommodation or best sight seeing spots. You do not have to go through a tour agency as well, but my suggestion is to work through a local tour operator. Most of them have their own guides who knows it all, and could even be street-wise, like me. (I am a nudist tour guide in SA for amatungulu.com/eden)