Want to meet local people while traveling? There are some tricks to it, the most important being location, location, location. Quite simply, if you want to meet locals, don’t go to the tourist locations! Here are the top 10 places I’ve found for meeting locals while traveling:

10) The café – make friends with people who hang out there regularly.

9) The pub/bar/ale house/etc – alcohol lowers inhibitions. Challenge someone to a game of darts. No good language skills? They’ll chock it up to your alcohol. Unfortunately, you might be limited to meeting local drinkers…

8 ) Sporting Events – introduce yourself to the fan sitting next to you, get them to explain the game to you, then get yourself invited to the post-game party.

7) Couchsurfing.com – arrange to meet a local ahead of time! Great for introverts like me.

6) Church – express an interest in almost any religion and the faithful will befriend you (even if only to convert you). If you’re not interested in being converted, make sure you try a more liberal religion.

5) School – take a class, even a short-term one, and you’ll meet local students who need homework buddies as well.

4) Language pairs – post a flier in any cafes, schools, etc in your area and you’ll find a local who want to talk with a foreigner to experience talking with a native English (or Croatian, Japanese, whatever) speaker.

3) Work – if you’re going to be around for a while, get a job working under the table and you’ll make friends with locals as well as other travelers working under the table.

2) Voluenteer – give back to the community you’re visiting by serving in a soup kitchen, picking up garbage or spending time with invilids.

1) T-shirts – (kind of joking) get a t-shirt made “Traveler from ____, looking to meet new friends. Introduce yourself!” Feel free to fill in ‘Mars’ if you want, the shirt itself will be a conversation starter. Alternatively, any unusual t-shirt will spark conversation, check out Café Press.com for ideas.

If you actually do any of the above, let me know so I can give you a KUDOS!!! If you do number 1, send me a picture of you in the shirt and I’ll post it here for everyone to see.

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Ok, so here’s the thing about driving in a foreign country. It’s freeking scary! I don’t much like driving at home (we only have one car for this reason and I bike to work when I need to go in) so driving abroad is something I’m naturally biased about. However, after my trip to Ireland I was doing some post-trip math and figured out that it would have been much cheaper for our group to rent a car than to buy train tickets. I started doing the math out by person and realized the following:

• Traveling alone, don’t rent a car. It’s a pain, tiring and isolating. Also, it’s more expensive.

• Traveling with two, rent a car if you want to see things off the train or bus lines and if you can find a good price.

• Traveling with three or more, it frequently comes out less expensive to rent a car than to buy three tickets everywhere. Also, with three people you’re not going to meet new people on buses and trains but rather at your lodging locations and sightseeing locations.

• If you’re not renting a car, consider finding out if the people that you meet might be able to give you a lift to some of those out-of-the-way places for a spit of the gas money, it can save everyone some dough and you can make some great friends!

Of course, there are some times when it just makes more sense to travel by car than by plane or train.  If, for instance, you’re going from Los Angeles to San Francisco, you should drive Highway 1 because of the great things to see along the way, such as Hearse Castle.  There are just some great trips out there if you want to drive.  Watch for tips on planning a car trip.

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Even if you’re not a picture fiend or scrapbooker extraordinaire, taking a trip of any sort will increase the amount of time you spend behind the lens. If it’s been more than 5 years since you took any pictures or bought any equipment, you’re in for a bit of a shock with all the changes in digital photo technology.

First of all, yes, you should get a digital camera. It will make your picture taking less inhibited because you won’t have to worry about using up expensive film that you will have to wait until you get back to see if your photo came out. Immediately being able to see a basic of your photo will give you more freedom to experiment and take better pictures that you will treasure later. Here are the 3 basic terms you will need to understand and look for in choosing a digital camera:

Megapixel – your camera should have at least 6. This will determine how large of a print you can get before your photo will become grainy. A 6 megapixel camera will be able to produce prints that will be enlargeable up to poster size. If you can afford more, get more. If you’re on a budget, you need at least 2 megapixels to get a good 4×6 print.

Optical Zoom – ignore the digital zoom capacity. Optical zoom will enable you to get close-up pictures of far-away things like zebras or the top of Notre Dame.

Memory Card – you will need to buy a separate one as the ones that come with cameras are usually only big enough to hold a couple of pictures. Splurge and get one that will hold a couple of hundred of pictures, that way you won’t have to change it out for most trips. Memory cards are small, you don’t want to have to be trying to keep track of them while you’re traveling unless you’re planning on becoming a ‘flashpacker.’

When you get home you can download your pictures onto your computer for editing or take them to your camera store for printing. Happy photo taking!

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If you only take one week of clothing, as I recommend always doing, you will end up needing to do laundry.  So I thought I would write a little bit about doing laundry on the road, but I want to start off with a confession.  I HATE doing laundry.  I don’t just dislike it, I absolutely, ferociously, truly, deeply hate it.  There, it’s my confession, so take my recommendations with a grain of salt.

Having ‘come out’ about my little laundry problem, let me tell you that I’ve figured out how to spend the least amount of time doing laundry as possible.  Which is why, even when not traveling, I do our laundry.  I’m simply faster at it.  So, to get your laundry done quickly and yourself back out there on the trail, here is my method.  SHUSH!!! Don’t tell anyone my secrets though!!!

Step 1:  Use a Laundromat.  Not only are they better for the environment, any Laundromat worth it’s salt will have 4-5 load capacity machines.  If you can find one that has several different sizes that will save you money by being able to choose the right size.

Step 2:  Use liquid detergent.  Sometimes laundry machines won’t disintegrate all the powder fully, which leads to having to wash again.  This is BAD, avoid it by using liquid.

Step 3:  Unless you need to bleach your whites, don’t separate your clothes by color.  I know, I know, that goes counter to everything your mamma and the pink guy at college taught you.  Read on- to make this work you MUST MUST MUST set the cycles to cold/cold.  Unless it is below freezing outside, cold/cold will get your clothes plenty clean, prevent bleeding and shrinking, and make your clothes last longer.  If it is below freezing outside, set it to warm/cold which will do the same thing. 

*****If you have just bought a Manchester United jersey or other similar bright garment, wash it separately in very hot water the first time to get all the bleeding out so you can do this in the future.  Do not wash, even on cold, these things with your other garments as they will still bleed.******

Step 4: Stager loads.  If you are going to do more than just one load (one week should fit into a large double loader in one load) stagger the loads by about 5 minutes.  This way, you will have one ending with enough time to transfer to the dryer before the next one ends.  This cuts down on arguing time at busy laundry mats.

Step 5: Use as many dryers as you can get your hands on.  Spreading your loads out between 4-6 dryers will cut down on drying time.

Step 6:  Fold immediately.  Laundromats have tables the right size and height to make folding/rolling ergonomically easier and faster.  Use them and it will cut down on the time you spend hunched over on the hostel floor folding your clothing. 

Step 7:  Repack.  As tempting as it may be to simply put all the clothes in a bag or on your bed, repack immediately.  Your luggage is meant to be carried, which will make your trip back to your temporary home much easier.

Total time?  Should be no more than 2 hours.

Happy travels!  Of course, remember to hand-wash your underwear, etc. in the bathroom sink to make the time between Laundromat trips longer. 

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Going somewhere this summer?  You should be, and ideally that will be someplace that will require a foreign language.  Not to worry though, if you’ve got 3 months or more you have enough time to learn a language to the point that you can carry on a conversation with a native.  The key?  Learning the right way.  Timothy Lehee ***, author of The 4 Hour Work Week argues that if you can learn the correct way, you can learn a language quickly and efficiently.

How do you do this?  By learning the structure and basics of the language quickly and then by learning key phrases and complete sentences you can learn enough of a language to be able to have a basic conversation with natives.  This will open many doors to you, enabling you to move about more easily, make friends and avoid negative tourist stereotypes. 

Even if you don’t have the time for any intensive language study between now and your trip, make sure to take time with a phrase book and learn how to say some basic survival things.  For the best impact on your trip, learn some fun extras like how to tell people where you’re visiting from, how long you’re going to be in the country and ask them about their kids. 

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