Timing is everything.

Hopper is a great tool for scoping out days. They’ll show you by three indicator colors which days are the lowest in price on a calendar as well as how long you should wait before you actually purchase. When it gets to a $100 range I usually make the purchase but having the validation helps.

This is going to sound strange but there are three places I like to check for hotels: Airbnb, Hotels.com and….Groupon. Yes, I said Groupon. Turns out you can still find $99 hotels with 4.5 star ratings via Groupon.

Groupon is great for U.S. cities but my runaway favorite for overall travel is hotels.com. Every ten nights offers you one for free (and being under the umbrella of Expedia it has seemingly endless listings.) We once used a free night for a beautiful stay in Hong Kong’s Icon Hotel so try and save them for when you can get the most bang for your buck.

Plan, digitally.

Hotels are booked, your flight is sending you notifications reminding you to check in and also that you can upgrade for the mere cost of your entire trip. What now? Go to the airport I guess…

There are a couple tools that come into play for me that make the airport surprisingly relaxing. Never underestimate the power of feeling like you’re winning a losing game, even marginal success feels incredible.

TSA Pre-check means flying through lines not just airports and affords you the luxury of keeping shoes and other such accessories on. The process is pretty simple, an interview and application as well as $100 fee for five year coverage. I highly recommend the Global Entry as it includes customs in various airports. I have clocked in at under 5 minutes at SFO here in San Francisco from door to seated at the gate.

Foursquare for airports aka Loungebuddy lets you see a list of lounges available in nearly any given airport and offers the option of buying a $30–45 average day pass. This comes in especially handy if like me you decided it would be a good idea to do a 18 hour layover in Dubai and need a shower. Desperately.

Travel like a local.

Foursquare is my cross reference for pretty much everything. Unlike Yelp you usually get positive and helpful reviews. I know this is an unpopular opinion but the ability to save lists is its most valuable feature.

The list is crowd sourced from a mixture of interweb bloggers, recommendations from friends and good ole’ Google search. Once I land, I pop open the map and look at saved locations that happen to be nearby. In this way I have more than enough to choose from at each location intentionally. If I save a “can’t miss” coffee shop in every neighborhood I’ll be exposed to at least one throughout my trip. In fact I now bump my list to fellow travelers so they can try the places I have or check out some of the others I never made it to.

Eating is a challenge in of itself, especially somewhere I don’t speak the language. In these moments I pull up foodspotting. Users contribute photos of the food they are eating so language is no longer a barrier. Browsing a visual representation of menu items at that specific restaurant is the difference between ordering fish tacos and receiving an entree or finding that it really should have been re categorized as an appetizer.

And when in doubt, make sure you have a messaging app downloaded. I use KaoKao Talk, Whatsapp and Viber to cover the respective popular messaging platform depending on where I’m traveling at the time.