Travel Lean

How to create a Frequent Flyer Points Machine.

The tools you need to automatically earn 2% or 2X points on nearly every dollar you spend, creating a perpetual flow of frequent flyer points.

Most airline frequent flyer programs have become a joke. When I started travel hacking years ago, you could get a decent domestic ticket for 25,000 points and get tickets to the Caribbean and Mexico for around 35,000 points. No more. Sure you might be able to find one of those 25,000 point tickets they promote between two Rust Belt cities with a 5 AM departure and a three hour layover. Forget about flying anywhere near the holidays and get ready to hear them laugh if you’re looking to cash in points for a family of four directly with the airline, to let’s say the Caribbean, Europe, or even Florida. The airlines seem proud of the fact that they’ve become so superefficient through mergers and online ticketing algorithms that they only need to cough up a few regular seats per plane for frequent flyers, unless you’re willing to pay the premium, double sometimes triple points (then the seats will appear). I plan over six months out and I still can’t track decent ones down.

Unless you are flying alone, dealing with airlines to use your points is a waste of time. If you do get lucky and find a seat you can use points for, some airlines like British Airways will hit you with a $500+ “fuel surcharge” on top of the points you’re coughing up. On more than one occasion that surcharge to the UK or EU was more than the entire cost of the ticket from another discount airline like Norwegian Air or WOW airlines. Check out their $199 fares to Europe.

There is a solution.

I’ve been able to travel with our family of four once, sometimes, twice per year using high 2% reward credit cards. And yes, we were all on the same flight departing from and arriving to the airport we wanted. To do this we created a frequent flyer points machine using two cards from Chase, one business, one personal and an American Express card from Fidelity. [Read more…] about How to create a Frequent Flyer Points Machine.

Creating a high tech, paperless office that can fit in a backpack.

09/15 by The Frug Leave a Comment

11 Creative and free ways to declutter your office, and work from anywhere.

By Brad Beckstrom

I’ve always admired digital nomads. Those folks who can work from anywhere. They can get stuff done in a noisy seaside café in or a mountain cabin with no Internet access. They are extremely mobile, in fact, many of them can stay mobile all the time. The ability to travel light and run a small business or creative endeavor from a laptop takes less wizardry than you may think. You don’t have to be a vagabond or a digital nomad to benefit from the technology that is making this more possible than ever before.

So, for those of you who have not gotten the secret memo, you can work from anywhere, skip the commute and simplify your work environment to the point where you can grab it and go. All of the technology I am recommending here, I’ve used for years and believe it’s more secure than most office environments.

All of the applications are cloud-based, backed up, and protected by two step verification (defined below). They will all work on a Mac, PC, tablet, or smartphone and automatically sync n save. The setup also allows you to work with clients and other folks who still work with ancient versions of Microsoft Word, request that things be faxed or snail mailed (like certain Fortune 500 healthcare, banking and insurance providers), or try to move large video files and presentations around by email.

So, here’s the setup I recommend for anyone who’d like to work remotely. It will work well even if you never travel. It will allow you to go paperless, reduce your office footprint, and simplify your work environment. Most of the software listed below is free or free with very reasonable rates on cloud storage.

A Mac. I’ve used the same laptop for five years. I’ve upgraded the RAM on my 2010 MacBook Pro to keep up with modern software and newer operating systems that seem to be released every six months. I generally stay one cycle behind the current operating system. So, for instance, if Apple is releasing OSX 10.10, I’ll stay on 10.9 until the next release 10.11 etc. is announced, then upgrade. This allows everything to run smoothly as other providers upgrade for the latest OS while fixing bugs for the next one.

The completely new face of travel. High-speed travel hacking and toilet paper races.

08/15 by The Frug Leave a Comment

How to hack a quick trip.

By Brad Beckstrom

Last month I visited Portland, OR. I was in town for 5 days attending a conference. The conference included lots of evening events spread throughout the city, as well as daily events downtown. I also had a dinner and a breakfast meet-up with friends on opposite sides of the city and a day long photo shoot, many locations. I did not rent a car, call a cab or set foot in a hotel. I purchased cross country nonstop flights separately on Southwest at a total cost of $391. The return nonstop flight was particularly impressive arriving 20 minutes early and crossing the country in 4 hours and 40 minutes! Price for that leg was $186. What jet lag?

I was elected captain of the toilet paper race team on one of the flights. These things just happen to me, I hear they don’t happen as often for other people.

While in town, I stayed at a very nice private home. The home was a short ride from the event and less than two blocks from hundreds of restaurants and bars on 21st and 23rd street in Portland. The owner left out an assortment of fruits, nuts coffee for me. My total tab for four nights in these deluxe accommodations $323 about $80 a night.

I got around the city just fine using a combination of my feet, UBER and Portland’s cool light rail system called Max. If I were just to go back 30 years to 1985, many of my travel habits today would be completely unrecognizable. I’m not talking about flying cars or high-speed magnetic rail trains. Some might have predicted those back then if you asked them to describe the future of travel. [Read more…] about The completely new face of travel. High-speed travel hacking and toilet paper races.

Going where you’re wanted….

08/15 by The Frug Leave a Comment

Discovering towns, or entire countries, that will hustle for your business…

By Brad Beckstrom

I was in a jam. I usually take the family away for a few days around my birthday. This year some plans fell through and we skipped it. I was getting some heat from SuperK about getting away for a few days in July. The reason I was getting heat wasn’t because we don’t travel, we travel a lot. However, lately I’ve been visiting cities like Bangkok, New York, Seattle, Portland, Baltimore and Fargo as part of my creative quest to photograph 1000 different places in 100 different cities. The family was feeling a bit left out.

So, I wanted to make good on my promise and scrambled to find something very quickly. [Read more…] about Going where you’re wanted….

Whop Bam Bang.

06/15 by The Frug Leave a Comment

The Delta 2064 FAR-MSP…..CAT…..DCA Story.

By Brad Beckstrom.

Sitting at Gate 21 Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport. I had about 40 minutes until my next flight en route from Fargo, North Dakota to Washington, DC. Hanging out with Rami Matan Even-Esh, better known by his stage name Kosha Dillz. Rami is a freestyle rapper that rhymes in English, Hebrew, Spanish, and often in a language all his own. I met Rami last year at Misfitcon, a small event in Fargo North Dakota for creatives, misfits, and troublemakers.

Like everyone else I met at #misfitcon, we hit it off, and we were catching up on all the great people that we hung out with in Fargo this year and talking about what’s next. Rami is getting ready to head out on the Vans Warped tour this summer and is slammed recording new music and launching a kickstarter campaign. He mentioned he really wants to tour Asia but said he just doesn’t like flying that much.

I, of course, jumped in and said go. I gave him my whole ”I waited too long” spiel about world travel. And, I added, flying is safer than driving or walking around US cities, looking at maps on your iPhone. He offered me some coffee but I told him I planned to sleep all the way back to DC. I was also swearing off alcohol for at least a week after all the amazing cocktail and beer “sampling” I did at misfitcon. I wished him luck on the tour and headed off to my gate. I was going to go grab some spicy chinese food. My plan was to enjoy my szechuan chili chicken, do a bit of reading, then pass out. None of that would happen. [Read more…] about Whop Bam Bang.

See It All. Adventures in Thailand with a backpack and an iPhone.

03/15 by The Frug 1 Comment

My Longboat Captain and First mate.

I was hanging out on Khao San Road enjoying my last beer in Thailand. It’d been a whirlwind 12 day trip, exhausting, but in a good way. I was speaking with a couple from Australia, who joked, in a friendly way, that I’d seen more in two weeks and they’d seen in three months.

For a minute they must have been thinking “over scheduled American can’t relax”. Seeing more with less time was my plan all along. I met more than one person who was visiting for 3 to 6 months. With SuperK and kids back home, I did not have that luxury this trip.

I did, however, find that having a rough outline of a schedule, and using mobile apps, I actually ended up having more free time than I’d planned on. There’s a lot written about travel hacking and grabbing flights and hotels at the lowest price. There’s not as much about hacking your trip once you arrive.

For me, the planning process is part of the whole journey. Just 3 or 4 years ago, you’d have to carry around a thick travel book and clumsy maps and do your best at navigating the chaos of a city like Bangkok. This is not just about tourist attractions, In fact, mobile apps allow you to find the best restaurants, bars, hiking trails, and off the beaten path destinations.

Here’s a list of the apps I used for my Thailand visit, as well as recent family trips. All of these apps are multi-platform and sync across my desktop, tablet and mobile device. [Read more…] about See It All. Adventures in Thailand with a backpack and an iPhone.