Michelle: Welcome to the Savvy Travel Moms podcast. If you are a mom who wants to travel more with your family without spending a fortune, you're in the right place. I'm Michelle, the bougie one.

Joy Smith: I'm Joy, the practical one. are two moms with different travel styles, but the same savvy mindset. In our show, we will break down family-friendly travel tips, points and miles, and realistic strategies that fit into a busy mom life. From hotel robes and room service to free breakfast and budget wins, we will help you turn everyday life into unforgettable family memories.

Michelle: Real moms, real travel, real strategies. episode is all about ways families can save money while traveling. Some of these are things we've personally used and others are really cool programs and destinations that a lot of families don't even realize exist. And some of these can honestly save you hundreds of dollars on a single trip.

Joy Smith: Okay, let's jump in. I'm gonna say one of my favorites, but honestly, I think these are all my favorite just because I've personally used so many of these options traveling. And I think that's just the key to being a savvy traveler and a savvy mom, right? you want to do as much as you can with your family and save as much money as possible. let's jump straight into that I ⁓ used, but I wish I have taken more advantage of and I regret only using it once.

Michelle: So true.

Joy Smith: and that is the fourth grade national park pass. So if you have a fourth grader, you can get a free national park pass. ⁓ goes from September through August, and can go to any national park in the country for free. And that pass can get your whole family in to that national park for free, which is the best part. we used this ⁓ ⁓ two years ago when my son, he's now in sixth grade, but when he was in fourth grade, we used it to go to the Grand Canyon. And that was his choice. I let him choose the national park we went to. And we ended up actually doing a mother-son trip and meeting our best friends in the Grand Canyon. They met us there because our best friends moved away a couple years before that.

Michelle: Love that. ⁓

Joy Smith: And it was one of my friends and her son who's also a fourth was a fourth grader at the time. And now it's an annual thing. We go on a mother son trip every year. But this was our first one. We went to Grand Canyon. We flew into Vegas. We rented a car and we made a whole trip we did the Valley of Fire State Park. We did the pink sands desert up in southern Utah. We did Horseshoe Bend. We did North Rim at Grand Canyon. We did South Rim at Grand Canyon. We did Sedona, Hoover Dam, and back up to Las Vegas, and it was one of the best trips that we were able to plan all around leveraging the National Park Pass. I really wish I would have used it more, when daughter gets to fourth grade, I know for sure I'm already gonna use it two times, and I might try to plan a few more trips out of it too. ⁓ What you, Michelle? I know you've used it too, right?

Michelle: Aww, I love that. I love that. Yeah, I've only used it, so I'm trying to think. I didn't realize that it went by September to August when we did it the first time. ⁓ because homeschool, ⁓ we can of muddy the waters a little bit of what grade you're in, you know? So this past summer, we used it at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Park here in Michigan. a really fun pretty beachy National Park that you can go to ⁓ and then Emsley Still be in fourth this summer. So I haven't actually gotten the pass Because she's in fourth grade right now ⁓ I'm going to get the for when we go to hola-kala National Park when we go to Maui and I think that might be

Joy Smith: Ooh.

Michelle: $80 that it saves with the National Park Pass. some of them cost more than others, right? you know, some national parks, it does save a ton of money to be able to have the National Park Pass. So ⁓ other than I think that's all we've used it for. And that's why I totally agree with you that we should be utilizing it more because there's so many national parks ⁓ that ⁓ It would be really fun. It's just hard because, you know, we love to travel internationally. So it's hard for me to do a lot of domestic travel, ⁓ that would be really fun to have a year maybe when Hadden, like you were saying with Janelle, do that with Hadden. When Hadden comes to fourth grade ⁓ year ⁓ is our travel. ⁓ national park like adventure year. So I think if you like plan ahead for that, that could be really fun. And then for sure that would save tons of money.

Joy Smith: Yes, I'm already gonna play in Yellowstone and Redwoods for sure. When we went to Grand Canyon, we were trying to squeeze in Death Valley because it's not very far from there, but it was just too much in the timeframe that we in the wrong direction from where we were going. there's so much you can do with the National Park Pass. And the best part is you can build.

Michelle: Yep.

Joy Smith: these really great free vacations. If you couple it with points and miles for your flights and your hotels, you're focusing on nature and you're getting in the national park for free. And then you can do other things around there and it gives you the ability to splurge on Hoover Dam ⁓ I don't even remember if we paid to see. No, I think we paid just a little bit to go to Horseshoe Bend ⁓ or Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada.

Michelle: Yeah.

Joy Smith: There's other things you can do that are just so minimal in those nature areas that just makes it a ton of fun. So I love the National Park Pass and I wish that they would talk about it more in schools and scream it from the mountaintops for all parents of fourth graders and even in third grade start talking about it ⁓ that you're prepared to apply for it and just scream it from the rooftop so parents know about this option for their kids.

Michelle: Yep. Yup. Do they talk about it in school?

Joy Smith: I don't think they do. I only learned about it. It was like halfway through the year when I learned about it. And it was because another mom posted it in a Facebook group.

Michelle: Yeah. Yeah, you're right. is, mean, know, with homeschool, I don't really, you know, we figured everything out for ourselves, but that's interesting that they don't promote it in schools because you think they would be talking about it. That's weird. But that, yeah, that would be amazing.

Joy Smith: Yeah, I wish they did more. And if they do, if they do, my son did not come home and tell me about it and he did not bring home any paperwork on it. So.

Michelle: Yeah, you would think they would have a pamphlet that would go out at the end of third grade hey, this a really cool way for you to get out as a family and do fun things. So it is kind of interesting that they don't talk about it in schools. ⁓

Joy Smith: or even the beginning of fourth grade, hand it out in the beginning of the year, because for us, school starts in August, the past starts in September, it'd be perfect timing to let me go ahead and apply for that right now. Now I know for when my daughter's there, but I think this is such a great savings that so many parents are sleeping on. ⁓ Especially most people, like for us, we use it at Grand Canyon.

Michelle: yep. Yup. Yep.

Joy Smith: And most people only go to the South Rim, but we were like, let's make a whole thing out of it. And we did the North Rim too, which is so completely different from the South Rim. getting that different perspective of National Parks too is huge.

Michelle: Yep. It is. next way that we can save a little bit of money as families are finding hotels ⁓ where either stay for free or eat for free, which we all know our kids eat a lot of food. So that is a really great way to be able to save some money. ⁓

Joy Smith: Yes, and I actually have a personal experience with this. We're getting ready to go on our, at time of filming right now, we are getting ready to leave for a trip for our spring break trip. And I booked a hotel, it is a Holiday Inn & Suites, and that brand does not come with a free breakfast. And when I was looking at our room types, there was a room type option that was includes breakfast. I. almost purchased it because I know we need to start our day with a good breakfast. But then I started researching a little bit more and remembered they have a rule where kids always eat free. So therefore I was not about to purchase a room that includes breakfast when I know my kids are going to be free and I'm only going to be paying for myself because my husband is not a breakfast guy. ⁓ He'd much rather have a protein shake and go about his day. So It was just a really great reminder to me to think I don't need to pay for it in my room rate and I can save money that way. ⁓

Michelle: That's a great idea. I'm trying to think, there's a lot, I think there's quite a few luxury resorts that do this too. So, Ondaz Papagayo in Costa Rica is one of them. We didn't get to utilize it because our kids were too old. But if you have little kids, a lot of resorts will have them be free for food. So at the Ondaz, five and under are free for meals. So, and the kids meals are $15 a kid.

Joy Smith: Mm-hmm.

Michelle: actually heard in some of the Facebook groups, lot of parents will use it. they're three-year-old, eats anything, so they'll get the chicken strips or whatever, and then mom and dad will eat the chicken strips. if you have littles, it's a great way to able to get out, go to some of these nicer places and go on vacation, and then you can save even a little bit more because you can just eat your kids' food, which is free. ⁓ ⁓ Which is exactly what I would do if my kids were that little. So I'm kind of bummed that we didn't get to go to any of those luxury resorts while my kids were still little. ⁓ would just like Joy was saying, check on the website because you would probably be surprised that a lot of places actually have kids free for certain things and we just don't realize it.

Joy Smith: talked about that in our first episode where we had all our questions and we talked about eating while we travel, how I always eat chicken nuggets because that's one way we save money is I just don't order a meal. I love that. I'd be all about that.

Michelle: We did. Yes. Yup. It is. know. But yeah, but think about that. If you were at a luxury resort where the adult meals are you know, 30 to 50 a meal, you know, eat have one parent get the chicken strips, which maybe we'd prefer anyway. And you've saved 30 to 50 bucks right there. And you can do that every day. So I think I know. So I'm like,

Joy Smith: Nice! Nice! You know what?

Michelle: I wish I would have traveled more when our kids were little.

Joy Smith: On that line of luxury resorts or nice resorts, when you're going to try to save money and plan your trip, looking at where you're going and the activities to do. So one thing I've started doing, especially with my daughter, because she's only in first grade, she's harder to do these huge activities and sightseeing all day and keep up with. So I try to plan some trips that are more around the experience. So picking a hotel that I can pay on points. that's going to provide a lot of activities for her, from water park within the hotel to water slides to just kids activities, being on the beach, ⁓ just for more of a hotel resort that's going to occupy the kids and remove that feeling of having to go out and spend money and just be out and about all day long.

Michelle: Yeah No, that's true. I feel like most kids, all they wanna do is go to the pool. ⁓ don't care about any of the stuff that we wanna do. ⁓ So think picking a resort that does have a lot of fun kid things to do also makes it more enjoyable for us because there's a lot less whining and complaining when they have stuff to do that they enjoy.

Joy Smith: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And I know you don't love all inclusives, but it is a game changer when your kids can order whatever they want at any point during the day and you don't have to worry about, know what, if they don't finish it is not throwing money away. And especially when it comes to strawberry daiquiris, my kids drink their weight in strawberry daiquiris when we went to an all inclusive ⁓ they are begging to go back for it. ⁓

Michelle: Yeah, that would be, ⁓ that'd be so nice. Yup. Yep. Yep. I love that. I think I'd like them more if I could find one that fits for for the actual points price. Cause I think ⁓ that's beef with Hyatt is ⁓ I think there I think there's a Hilton, there's that Wyndham that ⁓ Joe was telling us about. I think I just need to look more into it because I think I haven't really done a lot. ⁓ just, everyone always talks about Hyatt Ziva or whatever.

Joy Smith: Mm-hmm.

Michelle: It's a lot of points a night and you still have to pay for the kids. So then it becomes, well, if I'm gonna spend, you know, a thousand to $1,500 on the kids for the trip, is it really free? I mean, it's not. You know, so it starts to get, it gets really expensive. So I think that's kind of my beef with all inclusive is people are like, it's such a good deal. And well, I think it's a good deal if you go without your kids, but if you have to pay money, then that defeats the purpose of it, you know, but I think I just need to dig a little bit more into all inclusives to find some of those other brands that will allow all four and it's covered. And then I think that would be great.

Joy Smith: mean you do have to pay a little more but look at it this way. It's your all your food, everything. I think when we went to Jamaica I spent $15. ⁓

Michelle: That's true. Yeah, but I think if your kids are $150 a night per kid, that's $300 a day. I don't spend $300 a day on food when we go on trips. you know, so to me it's you're actually paying more money, you know?

Joy Smith: That does add up. Yeah, I think it would just depend. It'd be a matter of doing your homework and depending where you're going, what you're doing. I don't know. I loved the one we went to in Jamaica. It used to be a Hilton and it's now a Hyatt, but I loved, it was such a great experience. Yeah. So talking about hotels with free activities, let's move on to choosing cities that have free activities. I think one thing that we forget is we start looking at cities and we start looking at all the big tourist attractions and those

Michelle: the math. ⁓ I love that. That's awesome.

Joy Smith: can add up really fast. One of my all time most favorite underrated cities to visit for families is St. Louis. And so many people tell me they've never been there and they don't understand why it is. When you start to look at destinations to go, I first always research free things to do as a family because there's so many free things that you can do in every city. It's just finding the ones you want to do that are going to match with your personality of your travel. But St. Louis is a city that I go to over and over, granted I have family that lives there. But I go there over and over again because they have one of the best zoos in the nation and it is absolutely free. You can go to the Arch. It does cost to go up in the Arch, but going to the base of the Arch, walking around the Arch Park, everything there is free. They have their Science Center is an awesome Science Center. It is free to go to. There is, the Bush family has a place called Grant's farm that they own. And it's this more of an exotic type zoo type thing. I don't know how to really explain it. It's been a while since we've been there, but you sit on this little tram and you drive through and there's bison everywhere and then they have animals and they have interactive things. And then it ends with a beer tasting and it is all completely free. ⁓

Michelle: That's cool.

Joy Smith: They have the Bush family has opened up some other things that are free for kids to do as well. And then there's Union Station that you can go to. Now the activities in Union Station you do have to pay for by just being able to go and see it. And you can pick and choose what you want to pay for while you're there. ⁓ I I love cities like St. Louis. Another really great example is Washington, DC. Everything is free in DC. ⁓

Michelle: Yep, that's a great one.

Joy Smith: London has so many free museums in London. So picking a city where there's free things for your kids and your family to go do occupies your time and really helps you limit what you're spending your money on and just makes the trip so much more enjoyable. Where have you been Michelle with a lot of free stuff?

Michelle: That's a good one. Yep. Are those, I was gonna say, are those free for everyone or is it just free for kids? do adults still pay or that's free for everybody? ⁓ I like that. Yeah, I haven't done, ⁓ I done St. Louis or Washington DC yet. I know. I haven't been a lot of places in the United States. ⁓ I ⁓ I

Joy Smith: free for everyone. You have to go to St. Louis. ⁓ my gosh, you have to go to St. Louis and you need to go now while your kids are young. One place you have to pay for in St. Louis though is called the city museum. And it's unlike anywhere else I've ever been. And I'm going to butcher and trying to describe it. So it is this huge warehouse where the guy who built it bought the warehouse and took all these scrap parts from ⁓ and construction.

Michelle: Excited.

Joy Smith: and created this massive kids indoor dream playhouse. I'm talking like slides, climbing, hidden tunnels ⁓ they go underneath the floor in these tunnels. They go up in the ceiling. And then one floor is an indoor skate park. And on the top, they have stuff on the rooftop. And then they have a 10 story slide inside of it that you can do. ⁓

Michelle: Really? ⁓ that's so fun. That's amazing.

Joy Smith: ⁓ and it's just, that is a place you have to pay for, but the city museum is unlike anywhere else I've ever been in my entire life. It's not free, but it's worth this purge.

Michelle: So how many days do you feel like you need in St. Louis? I live eight hours from St. Louis, I think, driving. could you do a long weekend or do you feel like you need a whole week?

Joy Smith: St. Louis is one of those cities that you can so easily get to. think however much you can do, you're gonna find stuff. I mean, always, we go back there a lot because my brother and his family live there and we still always explore something new when we go there. And I grew up two hours from St. Louis. I grew up going to St. Louis, but there's so much stuff that is open since I was a kid, so.

Michelle: Okay. I love that, yeah. Yeah, I know I really need to go because for us really because it's only eight hours we could drive to if we wanted to do a long weekend road trip kind of thing. So I really need. Okay, ⁓ that's good. Yeah, and then yeah, because if you flew then you have to rent a car. So probably in my case it would probably be easier to just drive, you know drive and do a road trip there instead. I like that. Yeah, I we haven't done a lot of that honestly, you know in. ⁓

Joy Smith: You need a car in St. Louis.

Michelle: In Europe, you can sometimes you were saying with London, you can find a lot of places where kids are free. So we experienced that in Norway and in Denmark. Adults we still had to pay, but 17 and under were free, which I actually thought was really cool because a lot of times in the US, two and under is free and then maybe 10 and under or 11 and under. But you get to

Joy Smith: Ooh.

Michelle: a little bit older and then they consider them adults, which is silly because they're not adults. They are kids. You know, so that was one cool thing that I liked about Scandinavia was there were a lot of things for 17 and under. So it truly was ⁓ kids are free, which I really liked.

Joy Smith: Now you just made me that much more excited for our Denmark trip this fall.

Michelle: Yes, yeah, so I'm trying to think, where did we go? the Viking Ship if you're going to go to Roskille, yep, kids are free, have to pay for adults. If you go to the Roskille Cathedral, again, you'll have to pay for adults, but kids are free. and there's lots of places that we didn't even get to that I'm sure are the same way where.

Joy Smith: Yes, that's on my list.

Michelle: the kids are free. So I like that, which is nice because your son's getting a little bit older and he's almost at that adult price, which is silly. It's so silly.

Joy Smith: Well, he is an adult considered Disney and Universal.

Michelle: I know, isn't that weird? It's so weird, I know. So that was one thing I thought was fun, was it's truly kids are free, which I appreciated that. I like that. And the trains are like that too. So at least they are in Sweden. I can't remember if they, it all starts to blur together the more places you go, but ⁓ pretty sure Denmark is the same, but I'm pretty sure in Denmark and in Sweden, kids are free on all the trains.

Joy Smith: I love it. I love it. Nice.

Michelle: So you only have to pay for adults. And that saves, it's another great way to save money too. yep. So tell us Joy, ⁓ go ahead Joy. We're both gonna say it at the same time.

Joy Smith: Yeah, I love that. Well talking. gonna say so talking about Disney and Universal that leads us into our next point which is theme park ways to save on theme parks outside of going to Disney and Universal so you can still get that thrill. One of my favorite tricks and we've only used this once I would love to figure out a way to use it again would be the Lego land trick which is where you can buy one get one free and kids go free so if you have a Lego store near you

Michelle: Yup.

Joy Smith: You can go get the magazine. It's for free in the Lego store. And you get the magazine and every single Lego magazine you open it up. It has a free coupon code. It's a QR code. You scan it. Kids go free. So if you are planning this year to maybe do a theme park trip, but you don't want to pay the Disney or Universal prices, Lego land, especially if your kids are five to 13, it's a perfect age to go there. Enjoy it. And really just save that money because your kids are going to be free with your purchase.

Michelle: I think that's such a good one. And then you have also, well, you haven't been yet, right? But you are going to Dollywood and you said that's another good free one, right?

Joy Smith: Yes, we are going to Dollywood this summer. We went once last year. It's in East Tennessee. Since I live in Nashville, it's about three and a half hours from where I live. ⁓ So Dollywood is really unique in the way they it's called the Imagination Pass. ⁓ And if you've ever heard of the Imagination Library, something sponsored by Dolly Parton and what she does, and I think it's nationwide now. It used to just be in Tennessee.

Michelle: Yes. ⁓ Yep. Yep.

Joy Smith: but she sends free books to babies from ages birth through five. So you register your kid and you get a free book sent to you every single month. But back to travel deals, Dolly also does an imagination pass at Dollywood, which is for preschoolers. So up until the age five, your kids can get an imagination pass to Dollywood and go free, which I love because whenever you take a kid to a theme park, they're not going to ride the big stuff.

Michelle: I it. Yep. ⁓ that's fun.

Joy Smith: And even you're paying the kids price, they're not really riding as many rides as you want them to for the most part, because they're nervous or scared, or maybe they just don't want to do it, or it's jerky or whatever it is. So that's why I really like that imagination pass, because you can go for free and try it out and see what they think of theme parks before you go pay the price for Disney or Universal or somewhere much bigger.

Michelle: Mm-hmm. Ooh, that's fun. I know I've never had Dollywood on my radar, but now you kind of make me think it would be a fun place to go.

Joy Smith: Gatlinburg Pigeon Forge is a really fun place to go in general. Great, get a national park in, you get the Smoky Mountains National Park. It's free to go to anyway. But I like Gatlinburg Pigeon Forge. It's really pretty ⁓ there is a lot to do. I love a good mountain coaster. We have a ton of fun on mountain coasters as a family too. ⁓ So yeah, we have a long weekend in June planned to go back and do Dollywood when it's not insanely crowded like it is at fall break. ⁓

Michelle: Yes! I love- Yay! Well, I can't wait. We'll have, I'm sure we'll have an episode all about it when we get closer, because that'd be so fun. I love that. We should! Because we could do Gatlinburg, Dollywood, all that. That would be kind of fun. Because that's a good in the States

Joy Smith: We can do a Gatlinburg episode. mean, we've been there a couple of times, but I'm always down for it. Yeah.

Michelle: How far of a drive is it for you to get to Dollywood? Three and a half hours. Okay, I'll have to put it in my map and see how long it takes me to get to Knoxville, but that's another really good one. Like you said, it's where people from all over can get there. So I think that would be another really good trip for families that maybe don't want to fly, but they still want to take a fun trip. That would be another really...

Joy Smith: Like three hours. You have to drive.

Michelle: Yeah, that would be another really good driving trip for families to take. So that's a good one.

Joy Smith: That's another episode idea. Best driving trip for family.

Michelle: I was actually just thinking that's a really like driving trips. We've got one. We've got an episode driving trips. Yeah, that's a good idea because not all families want to fly and that's okay. that if they don't want to do that and there's still lots of really fun trips that you can take that are driving trips. So that's a good one. ⁓ Yay, they got one.

Joy Smith: Absolutely. All right, and our last theme park tip now that we've talked about Legoland and Dollywood is I don't know if you guys know this, but there are tons of theme parks around the country, but in the world that you actually don't have to pay to get into the theme park and you can pay by the ride or you can buy packages. So on my Harry Potter trip, I talked about one of them when we spent the day in Minneapolis at Mall of America.

Michelle: Yep. That's fun.

Joy Smith: That is a theme park you can fully walk through within the mall that you can pay by ride. Some other really great options for this are Coney Island in New York. You can walk through and pay by your ride, which we did that last summer in Coney Island was a lot of fun. There's a place in Orlando called the Fun Spot. They actually have two of them in different sides of Orlando. ⁓ that is another really cool older style theme park. And they have some pretty big coasters there and some big rides.

Michelle: I love that. All fun. Hmm?

Joy Smith: And it's big, we spent probably a good six, seven hours when we did the fun spot and you can pay by ride. So especially if you have younger kids or kids that are a little hesitant, ⁓ is a really great way to get them introduced to theme parks and let them choose without the guilt of we paid for you to come here. And this was a very expensive day that you get at Disney or Universal or some of these other bigger ones.

Michelle: Yep.

Joy Smith: you can just kind of pay by ride and then they don't have to be as nervous or feel bad if they don't want to do it.

Michelle: I that. I love the idea of doing that because exactly like you said, not everybody wants to ride everything or maybe you do just want to go for one specific ride. You don't have to pay hundreds of dollars for the whole family to be able to get in somewhere. So it's a great way to save money too, which I love.

Joy Smith: And there are lots of parks like this throughout the country. If you just Google it, I mean, there's a list upon list that you can pull up. So it is kind of fun to look through those lists and see what's near. I mean, when we go to California, if I had more time to fit in more theme parks while we're there outside of Disneyland and Universal, I would definitely hit up well, Legoland, but then I would hit up more because there's so many theme parks out at different peers and different places

Michelle: And kids love that kind of stuff. They love the rides and all that kind of stuff. So I feel like it's a great, happy, makes the kids happy kind of trip.

Joy Smith: It's- It's like those old school mall parking lot carnivals that used to travel and come to the mall parking lots, but it's a stationary one and it's on steroids. That's what it makes me think of.

Michelle: Yes! That's amazing. And I love those. I think they're fun. I love that. ⁓ So now you do. You don't go them anymore? I don't feel like we, I feel like they're almost non-existent now. Don't you feel like? I don't feel like we have them. as a kid, we did, right? But I don't even know if we have them in Michigan. if stuff like that comes around anymore.

Joy Smith: I know too much now as an adult. I don't go to them. ⁓ When we were in Dallas a couple weeks ago, we were driving and we saw one in Dallas. I don't see him very often, but we saw one in Dallas. That's why I thought of it. oh, look, it's a parking lot carnival.

Michelle: Really? And Joy's like, no, run! She turns the car the other way. No, no, we're not going here. We're not doing it. Okay, so let's switch it up a little bit. We've talked about the amusement parks. So now let's go beach themed. I feel like...

Joy Smith: We're not doing it.

Michelle: Beach is a little bit different. You know, a amusement park is the fast paced, on the go type of trip. But the really fun part about beach trips is they can save money because you're sitting at the beach, right? It's free. It's free to go to the beach. A lot of resorts or hotels will either have free beach chairs and towels or you can rent them for the day for a small cost.

Joy Smith: Yes.

Michelle: So this is a great way to be able to have a fun trip that's different from where you live, but it's not going to cost you a lot of money.

Joy Smith: And I love little hidden gem beach towns that aren't huge have a ton of attractions. I'm talking when you get to places like Hilton Head, that is just this little island that doesn't have a whole lot there to do in itself other than the beach ⁓ and a few things, of course. Or you get down to Sanibel Island and there's such great shell hunting because ⁓ that they're known for shells. I mean,

Michelle: Yes.

Joy Smith: Things like that where you're not gonna be pulled in a million different directions or be beach or, you you go to Charleston, you're like, beach or activities, beach or tourist, you know, you're constantly pulled. And I feel Savannah's kind of the same way, but there are so many little hidden gem beaches that you can go to where you're not gonna be pulled in a million different directions and you can just be present a little bit more and save money that way too.

Michelle: Yes. Yep. you can come to see me and then you can come to all the hidden gem beaches because where we live, I know, living in West Michigan, being next to Lake Michigan, ⁓ literally the summer, that's why we don't travel in the summer. you know, lot of times people think, ⁓ it's because of homeschool, but, and I do like to travel in shoulder season, but I like to travel in shoulder season because ⁓ Michigan, ⁓

Joy Smith: You know, I've not been to Michigan.

Michelle: summers are so amazing. I don't want to go anywhere else. I literally want to be here enjoying the beach, ⁓ doing ⁓ the summer things because all of our towns right along the coast, each of them has something cute and different than the other one. So you can you could come for a week and every day pick a different beach town and explore and have ice cream and go shopping and then go to the beach for the rest of the day. And there's just so many things to do, especially because we're very much you know, Memorial Day to Labor Day is the busy season, you know? So because that's the good weather and that's when everybody comes out. we get a lot of people from Chicago have summer homes here on the lake. So it's a really fun beachy place to come as Michigan. So that's like a lot of people do think of Florida and places like that, but Lake Michigan ⁓ is absolutely And our big thing in Michigan is it's the no salt, no sharks. We're called Michigan Unsalted. So that's there's a lot of people have t-shirts that say Michigan Unsalted and they'll have a little shark. Yeah, so that.

Joy Smith: have heard that! I love it!

Michelle: So that's kind of our fun little thing here for West Michigan is hey, we don't have the salt and we don't have sharks. you can come and swim in a beautiful big lake and you don't have to worry about any of that stuff. Your kids can just roam free and have fun.

Joy Smith: You know, I, another place in Michigan I really want to go visit is Mackinac Island.

Michelle: Yup, amazing. One of my favorite places. I know we love Mackinac Island. We don't go every single summer because it can start to get redundant, right? you've done it enough times. it's not as exciting, but we've been, ⁓ both Haddon and Emsley both been to Mackinac Island. We went once when Emsley was little. and we left Haddon at home because he was like an itty bitty baby. And then we went again a few years ago with them together and we stayed at the Grand Hotel. So the Grand Hotel is kind of what Mackinac is known for. Unfortunately, Mackinac is really hard because you can't do it on points. You have to pay cash to stay somewhere. But it's so fun. And it is because you know right that they don't have cars. ⁓ everything.

Joy Smith: golf carts, right?

Michelle: So they have, well, there's a lot of horse carriages, horse drawn carriages that will take they'll take people and luggage, but so there's tons of horses. So they actually ship the horses in every summer to stay for the summer. they're the big Clydesdale horses, the big horses. So they do, yup, yeah.

Joy Smith: You can see those in St. Louis. Those are awesome to see.

Michelle: So yep, so they do the carriages and they take the luggage and the people. There's tons of bikes. So there's a bike path that if you think of Mackinac Island, it's not a perfect circle, but you think of it as this, you know, there's a bike path that goes all the way around. It takes about maybe an hour and a half to bike if you just bike the whole thing and don't stop. but you can rent bikes and you can bike the whole island. There's so many different things that you can do in Mackinac Island. that is a really fun. Yeah, there's so many fun things in Michigan. honestly, that's why we don't leave Michigan in the summer because that's our good weather. that's when we wanna be outside exploring and going to different small little towns and finding fun little hidden gems. And it can be free, pack lunches. ⁓

Joy Smith: Ha ha! Yeah.

Michelle: pack a cooler with lunches and pack your sandwiches and go to the beach for the day and you have a completely free trip, especially you said, you pair it with a hotel ⁓ and that trip so little out of pocket, but you're having so much fun.

Joy Smith: Yeah, and you get to be present and intentional and that's what I love the most. All right, so we have one more on our list before we close it out. And Michelle, I'm going to let you take this one because I have a confession. ⁓ I have never stepped foot in the library in Franklin, Tennessee.

Michelle: Yes. Yep. Yes. What? I bet the library is so cute because Franklin is so cute. ⁓ my gosh. What?

Joy Smith: It probably really is. And now I need to go check it out. But I have never stepped foot in the library to even know what they have there. So our last one on our list of ways to save for family trips is a library museum pass. So Michelle, tell us all about this because this is one I'm unfamiliar with.

Michelle: ⁓ my God, joy! Yeah, so I don't know. Now I don't know if it's just a Michigan thing. So this could be not helpful to anybody else except for the people that live in Michigan. But we here have a whole ⁓ ⁓ through the state of Michigan of places that you can get into for free or discounted with your library. ⁓ What do you call that? Membership. You know, it's free. library membership is free, but you know, you get your card. as long as you're a library member, you can access these free or discounted places. So a great example, you know, I'm just thinking of Michigan, cause maybe it's the only place that has it. the Grand Rapids Children's Museum. that's a really big children's museum. Lots of people love to go there. It's probably what? Maybe $80 for a family of four to go free. if you use your library pass. So our library has this thing sitting on the counter and you can take this little, it's sort of looks a little card, maybe like a bookmark. I would kind of describe it looks like a bookmark and you check it out from the library and then you take that with you. ⁓ and you get in for free into the Children's Museum. And there's all different places like that in Michigan. You ⁓ it online and then look at the list. And then some of them you have to go into the library to be able to redeem it. And some of them you can do online by entering your library, membership number, and then you'll either get it for free or discounted. So you really should look.

Joy Smith: And now I have to go check this out.

Michelle: because maybe Tennessee has it or literally maybe it's a Michigan thing. I have no idea now that we're talking about it, but ⁓ just assumed that everywhere had it. I didn't realize that it could just be a Michigan thing.

Joy Smith: Now I do know that, we used to have a zoo membership here in Nashville a while back when we lived closer to it and they had a reciprocal. So if you had your zoo membership, you could go to other zoos around the country and get in for free on your zoo membership and get the membership discounts in the stores and restaurants and stuff. ⁓ I know the science center has that same type of reciprocal thing. So that is another way you can save is if you don't necessarily have a Science Center pass or you've never bought a membership, but you do want to travel more, it might be worth purchasing the membership or asking for it as a ⁓ gift for your family from your in-laws or your parents. ⁓ then you can travel with that and get savings at other museums and places around the country, which is really cool. every Science Center or zoo around the country, they're all so unique and have different things that they offer. ⁓ my son hates to go to aquariums, so I can't really do aquariums anymore. But I do love to go to science centers. You know, when we were in Dallas, we went to this huge place called the Perot Museum and Science Center. And it was so, it's just really cool to see the different exhibits. You know, they're just all so unique in their own way.

Michelle: love that kind of stuff too, I know. Yeah, I love the reciprocal. I agree with you. I don't have any of those passes, like season passes, but I think that's a great idea if you plan ahead, like you said, because we have, ⁓ what is one? In Grand Rapids, have the Frederick Meyer Gardens is a well-known one, and I know that they have a reciprocal program with other. ⁓

Joy Smith: Mm-hmm.

Michelle: places like that throughout the United States. So if you know you're gonna have a trip somewhere, especially like a road trip, you can find those things and then go, okay, well, it would cost us $20 a person each time, but if we get the pass.

Joy Smith: Mm-hmm.

Michelle: it's actually gonna be the cost of one time. So then you're gonna get all those other times essentially for free. So I think you're right, it's planning ahead because I bet you a lot of us probably have discounted things that we could do when we go places, but we just don't think about it. We just go and we pay and we don't think to check stuff like that, you know?

Joy Smith: wonder that would be something though to research depending on what state you're going to if they have the free library pass and then just find out where the local library is and go in and ask about it.

Michelle: and get a membership. Well, I wonder if you have to, because can you get, I don't think you can get a library pass for another state though, right? doesn't your driver's license have to show the state?

Joy Smith: Girl, I am not a library girl. have no idea.

Michelle: You don't know, you don't go to libraries. Okay, doesn't go to libraries, but I was just gonna say, I'm almost certain you can't do that, but I think only because I think, because I think where did we go? When we went to Florida for a week, I thought about getting because my kids we are library people. So we love libraries, because they usually have play areas and activities for kids and all that kind of stuff. But I'm pretty sure when I looked, you had to have a Florida driver's license to be able to get the library pass. But I could be wrong. I don't know for certain. I don't know. But you'll just have to check into those kinds of things. really, the moral of the story is there's probably so many free things that we all are under utilizing that we could be doing to save money. That's so true.

Joy Smith: Eww. Hahaha! Yes, and another one is like military passes and I know this is military families know this, but you know if you have a military family member that lives near you're going to visit them, you know, make sure they can go get you tickets for a much cheaper price. So that's just another thought too to ask about. I know my my brother-in-law is in the Navy ⁓ and live in Jacksonville, which is a little bit away from Orlando, but when we sometimes do some Orlando attractions,

Michelle: Yep.

Joy Smith: They come with us too, but it's they'll get our tickets for us because they get such a great savings.

Michelle: And don't people in the military get all of their credit card annual fees waived? Yes. Yes, I'm like, yes. All the printed cards, I know. I was gonna say, of course they 100 % should and deserve it, but that is a nice, that is a really nice perk that

Joy Smith: if they're active duty, So you can get all the premium credit cards. Absolutely, yeah.

Michelle: I once I figured that out, was what? was you can get as many Amex Platinums as you want. it doesn't matter because they don't cost you $800, $900 a ⁓ card. So I don't know if all military families know that, but that's a really cool perk of you know, I don't know when you're serving, if you get a list of all of your perks or if you have to figure it out as you go. But I think the credit card one is pretty cool because that saves a ton of money.

Joy Smith: It does. And you can have all the premium cards and get all the benefits of the premium cards. So you get all those perks and you don't even have to pay for it.

Michelle: So it does. Yup, yup. or even cause they come with lounge access. So lounge access is covered, you know? ⁓ to be a if you are military and you don't have a premium card, you're really missing out because you're getting that lounge access for free.

Joy Smith: Well, they have military lounges too, but I don't think they're as nice as the premium ones too. ⁓

Michelle: ⁓ Yep, ⁓ that's cool. I love it. Well so hopefully today we've kind of given you some fun ideas of how you can save a little bit more money on your trip because right Family travel doesn't have to break the bank. It doesn't have to be crazy expensive Sometimes you just need to know about the destinations and the programs and that is going to make it so much easier For your trip for your family to be able to travel for less If this episode was helpful, share it with a friend who loves traveling with their family. And if you haven't already, leave us a five star review. It really helps our podcast grow. Thank you so much for listening and we'll see you next time.