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travel hacks

The Man in Seat 61. Jump on a Train and Go.

02/15 by The Frug Leave a Comment

mourgefiletrain

By Brad Beckstrom

I’ve always enjoyed train travel. I figured out years ago that it’s often faster than traveling by air when you factor in getting to and from the airport and ever intensifying security. This is especially true in the Northeast, traveling between Washington DC and New York City. If I’m going downtown, I can step off the train at Penn Station in Manhattan versus cabbing to and from the airports, dealing with lines and weather delays. Sure, trains get delayed occasionally but at least you’re in a large comfortable seat with power outlets and can read a book or get some work done. As a bonus, no bag fees and up to 70% less CO2 versus a plane.

seat61.com
seat61.com

I really caught the train bug while traveling in Europe. There are some fantastic trains like the 186 MPH double decker TGV in France or the Frecciarossa ETR500 in Italy, also clocking in at about 186 MPH. Like Formula One, they are very serious about trains in the EU and UK.  You can take a comfortable high-speed overnight train, have dinner in Munich, and breakfast in Rome. In addition to some great sunsets and scenery, you’ll be saving money you’d otherwise be spending on a hotel room.

Trains create stories

[Read more…] about The Man in Seat 61. Jump on a Train and Go.

Filed Under: Travel Lean Tagged With: Frug Hacks, saving money, Saving time, travel hacks, Travel lean

10 things you should know about great dive bars

02/14 by The Frug 4 Comments

By Brad Beckstrom

keep it classy

Years ago I worked for Miller Brewing Company. Part of my job was visiting wholesalers who were independent distributors of our beer. I worked in marketing, so after my pitch on the latest programs from the brewery we would visit key accounts including bars and restaurants in the market.  We’d say hi to the bar owners, buy some beers, discuss what the competition was up to, and how our programs were stacking up in retail.

Many of these beer distributors were in small towns.  I visited places like Snoqualmie WA , Cumberland MD, Ocracoke Island NC, and Harpers Ferry WV.  As a recent college grad, this was a great opportunity to see the country and spend time with experienced business owners.

The distributors would take brewery reps like me to their best accounts. These were generally taverns that sold a lot of beer. They were always independently owned (not chains) and had a large local following. The formula in all of these accounts was remarkably similar. Keep it simple, sell ice cold beer and great food. Keep it relatively dark and cool inside and hang a lot of interesting stuff on the wall. These were classic dive bars.

In search of local dives.

Fast-forward many years and true dive bars with good food are getting harder to find.  This is especially true if you are living in the suburbs. Around Arlington, are always plenty of places to eat including chains, ethnic spots and high-end concept restaurants owned by restaurant groups and celebrity chefs. Some of these restaurant groups even do a nice job at re-creating the feel of an Adirondack Tavern or a Nantucket Sailing Club.  Sure you may feel like you’re in a hundred-year-old tavern, but you’re paying for it.

There’s nothing wrong with this once in a while, but just because you enjoy something like a great bottle of wine at an expensive restaurant, doesn’t mean you need to try and recreate that experience every week or even every month.  In an expensive area like Arlington Virginia, trying to recreate this dining experience weekly can add up to a couple of car payments every month.

This is where the local dive becomes important. They’ve spent very little on decor. There is no wine list, just what’s on the table tent.  The focus is on value.  If you’re a Frug, you need to seek these places out. You need to support them.  I’m not talking about hipster dive bars. These are very easy to spot. I can find any number of them over the bridge in DC. They may look like dive bars but they charge eight to ten dollars for a cocktail or seven dollars for a microbrew.  Sadly they are often the victim of location (high rent district) and no short supply of urban hipsters. More power to them but they’re off my list.

How to spot a true dive.  These are getting harder to find.

  1. It’s coveted by the locals. Reputation and repeat business from regulars is what keep these places going. Ask around.

  2. The floor may be dirty but the dishes and glasses are clean. Serving ice cold beer or a cocktail in a perfect spotless glass is a true dive bar’s bread-and-butter.

  3. The menu is simple, and generally unhealthy, but the quality is there.

  4. The price is right. They should offer a good selection of old-school domestic beers like Miller High Life and PBR for about three dollars.

  5. The taps are clean. If you get a funny tasting draft beer, be suspect. A good dive bar will have very clean beer lines, just like a great Irish pub will pour a perfect Guinness.

  6. The customers are definitely more interesting than those you may find at a local chain restaurant,

  7. The hipsters may have discovered it but the owner doesn’t care,

  8. A good amount of the decor has been provided by local beer and liquor companies. Some of the stuff hanging on the wall is over 50 years old.

  9. It’s not well lit, which helps hide many imperfections.

  10. The kitchen is simple and clean. You can hear the cook complain about your order.

If you like to go out once a week or so, try seeking out the best local dives. Heres how.

  1. Explain to your wife, friends or significant other that you want to try something different and that this will be a new experience.

  2. Do your research. After all if you find your favorite local dive you may be going there for 10 years or more (like we have) so it’s worth a little bit of effort.

  3. Start with Yelp or Foursquare. If you don’t have the app  it’s just as easy to visit  Yelp.com. Create a free account so you can bookmark your dives.

  4. Do a search for dive bars or dives. Look for 4 star ratings on Yelp and Google Maps or a rating of 80 or higher on Foursquare.

  5. Don’t just stop there, browse some of the food comments this is always a good indicator of the quality of the dive.

  6. Do a test dive. Don’t just show up for dinner on a Saturday night.  Maybe stop by for happy hour and try some chicken wings to get a feel for the place.

It may turn out not to be a place you want to eat but the drinks and bar food may look great. While you’re trying it out share your thoughts on the yelp app or foursquare.

Keep searching. Like most other things in life, you only need to find one.

 To get you started here’s a list of my favorite dives, http://goo.gl/kgWvkl

The Frug

Filed Under: Live Lean, Travel Lean Tagged With: Dining out, Frug Hacks, Frugal, Going out, less equals more, live lean, saving money, The Frug recommends, travel hacks

How to create your own personal search engine and remember everything.

01/14 by The Frug Leave a Comment

– Brad Beckstrom- Thefrug.com.

Have you ever scribbled a quick note, found something on your smartphone or online and bookmarked it, only to never find it again?  Sure, the bookmark in your browser worked fine, it’s just you’re having trouble remembering some of the details, like what it was you thought was so great about the company, idea, article, gadget or piece of information in the first place.  If the thought comes to you again this certainly makes it hard to find.

This can be especially frustrating at work. What was the name of that company that makes that free widget? Wazzle, Ziplot, Xplant.  Search even becomes more difficult with all of the similar sounding Web 2.0 names out there.  There’s just not enough information in most domain names or descriptions to make bookmarks very useful.

I have hundreds of bookmarks, dating back years. They are basically useless broken links from companies I don’t recall much about. I’ve found a better way.

On May 9, 2009 at 10:07 AM, I discovered Evernote. A free note taking, smartphone, web and desktop app linked to the cloud. I remember this because every note is automatically annotated with a date time and location. I took a picture of a place I wanted to stay at the beach. The photo automatically included a map and was now searchable by the address, name of the property, date time month location etc. Even the text in the photo of the sign was automatically synced and searchable. This included text in logos like Sunspot below.

I was just getting started. I also added the free Evernote App to my iPad , Google Chrome, and the desktop version for my Mac.  All of these sync with one free Evernote account.  This is where the personal search elements really come in handy. Once you add Evernote to your browser, you can clip and quickly tag information on any webpage. Evernote then saves all kinds of information to help you find that page in the future. You can add your own tags like “Taxes” or “Vacation“ or “To Do.” This browser plug-in / extension is available for most modern browsers and is super convenient for quickly saving a simplified version of any article, stripping away all of the extraneous screaming headlines and other unrelated information like banner ads with dancing monkeys.

 For traveling, I like to add the airport code as a tag or note to make things easier to find. like PDX for an upcoming trip to Portland. The Frug likes to make reservations way in advance and this comes in handy when trying to instantly pull up flight, hotel and event details I lined up four months ago.  It’s also helpful when you visit a city several years later and want to pull up your old info, like a cool restaurant or hotel you found. You can also clip any type of information and attach it to a to do or reminder in Evernote. Example: book this hotel next May.

The greatest feature of Evernote is the search function.  You can obviously search in the app or in your Evernote account but the most useful feature is the search plug-in for your browser that displays all of your past related notes directly in your Google search results. So, if I search Dewey Beach  not only do I get that note I created back in 2009, but also some important info related to a client program and a hotel reservation.  

After a very short time, you will find yourself remembering everything and being of great assistance to friends, clients and family members who can’t remember the name of that thing we found or place we stayed. Because you’re primarily searching just your results, there’s much less muck to dig through to find what you’re looking for.

Here are my five quick steps to creating your own personal search engine with Evernote:

  1. Go to Evernote.com and create a free account.

  2. Download the desktop app and browser plug-in available for most computers.

  3. Activate the browser plug-in or extension, Evernote calls this web clipper.

  4. Get the smartphone app.

  5. Start clipping, snapping, tagging and sharing anything that interest you. You’ll be glad you did later.

You’ll also be able to get rid of all those notes and scraps of paper that pile up on your desk and in your wallet.

Filed Under: The Frug Recommends, Travel Lean, Work Lean Tagged With: declutter, Frug Hacks, The Frug recommends, travel hacks, work lean

Dial up adventure, Dial costs down with TripTuner

09/13 by The Frug Leave a Comment

Triptuner2

Dial your vacation costs down, and crank adventure all the way up, with this great new travel tool. Recently I’ve been sharing some of my favorite travel hacks like kayak/explore. I have found a new travel tool that’s a lot of fun to use.

On Tuesday night, I met Ted Devers at a DC Lean Startup Circle event in Arlington, VA.  Ted used his experience as a DJ, and in the online travel industry, to create an equalizer for your travel experience. It’s called Triptuner. Old guys from the 80s like me are very familiar with equalizers. Every boom box and home theater system had to sport one. You can still find them on iTunes and with most music software.

equalizzzer

This equalizer is different. I call it an “experience equalizer.”  So, instead of cranking up the bass, like I used to, I can crank up “active”, or “beach” or “urban” so this great tool can help me find the location I am in the mood for.

TTequalizer

Of course, the Frug wants to push things to the limit by turning the “high end” button all the way down to the “thrifty” setting and the “active” button all the way up.  Once I did that, a lot of my favorite destinations started to show up, including Puerto Plata in the Dominican Republic, Playa Del Carmen, Mexico and great cities like Barcelona, Spain and Corfu, Greece.

Based on your Triptuner Equalizer settings, you get a quick match percentage on your ideal destination. For the Frug, The Dominican Republic came up as a 98% match. This could explain why we’ve vacationed there three of the last four years.

Let me know where it takes you. Enjoy.

 

Filed Under: The Frug Recommends, Travel Lean Tagged With: Frugal Travel, saving money, Saving time, The Frug recommends, travel hacks, Travel lean

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