Brazilian Itinerary

Somehow, in all the trip preparation, I forgot to post a detailed itinerary for Brazil. We'll be traveling all over the place down there, so I wanted to give a more detailed account, similar to the one I already posted for the European leg of the trip.

May 31: Depart for Sao Paulo from Salt Lake City

June 1: Arrive in Sao Paulo (2 nights) at 7:30 am

June 3: Bus from Sao Paulo to Rio De Janeiro (6 nights) sometime in the late morning/early afternoon

June: 9: Plane in the morning from Rio to Salvador (5 nights)

June 14: Plane from Salvador to Manaus (3 nights)

June 17: Plane from Manaus to Brasilia (5 nights)

June 22: Plane from Brasilia to Curitiba (1 night)

June 23: Afternoon bus from Curitiba to Foz do Iguacu (i.e. the city by those huge waterfalls) (2 nights)

June 25/26/27: Overnight bus from Iguacu to Sao Paulo (1 or two nights, depending on how much we liked Sao Paulo at the beginning of the trip)

June 28: Plane from Sao Paulo to London (non-stop!)

(Para meus amigos brasileiros, vou estar no Brasil durante Junho. Se quiserem se encontrar, deixa um "comment" aqui, fala comigo no facebook (espero que ja somos amigos la, mas se nao adiciona-me como um), or manda uma email a james.dalrymple52@gmail.com)

I'll have more to say about why and how we're doing this itinerary later, but for now, that's it.

Travel Tips: Buying Plane Tickets

In my last post I discussed (at length) the process by which Laura and I got our tickets for our up coming trip. However, I wanted to consolidate the lessons we learned into one succinct post, in case that might benefit someone. So here are a few of the things that I'd recommend if you're planning a long, overseas trip.

1. Be flexible. With work schedules this can be tough, but it can also save hundreds of dollars (or more). Keep in mind the more flexible you are, the cheaper the trip will be. And that doesn't just mean being flexible with your dates. Consider flying into different airports, visiting different places, etc. Basically, if there are a bunch of places you want to go, look at them all before you get your heart set on anything in particular, and then chose the one that's most aligned with your budget.

2. Use a travel agent for long or complex flight plans. I probably wouldn't call an agent if I was flying to San Diego to see my in-laws for Christmas because I can find ridiculously low fares for a trip like that on my own, in just a few minutes. I also know exactly when and where I'm going. However, for longer trips, where I might have some wiggle room, travel agents are very helpful.

3. Keep in mind, a travel agent will not cost you more. This is a common misconception, but if the fare or itinerary an agent gives you isn't to your liking, you don't have to buy it. They are trying to win your business, so it's their responsibility to be competitive. And a lot of the time, they will be.

4. Plan in advance. The first time I looked up fares for our trip was over a year ago. That means we were thinking about our trip at least a year and a half before it was supposed to happen. Ideally, you'd track the price of your trip for years before doing it, so you'd have a really good idea when the best time to get tickets will be (though an agent should be able to give advice about that).

5. Round up. Decide you're initially willing to spend, then add a few hundred dollars to that number and assume that's what the tickets are going to cost you. Doing this will provide a psychological cushion if things turn out to be more expensive, and if prices turn out to be cheaper (as they did for us), you'll have even more money to spend on other things during the trip. This may mean that you end up waiting a little longer to go on the trip as you save up more, but in the end you'll be less stressed out about money.

Airport Security

In the wake of the recent attempted terrorist attack, security is no doubt going to get “stronger” at airports. Hopefully that’ll mean increased safety, but if the past is any indicator, it’ll also mean longer lines and greater inconvenience. And though I want to preserve life as much as possible, I believe that making air travel more miserable simply isn’t worth the added safety. In fact, I’d gladly accept a slightly higher risk of death if it meant an easier time getting to my plane.

Back before 9/11 flying was kind of fun. Family and friends could go all the way to the gate and travelers didn’t have to take off a bunch of clothes to get through the lines. Things moved more quickly and, at least in my case, it was an all around better experience.

Of course we’ll never go back to those free wheelin’ days, but adding more and more security doesn’t always make sense. Flying today has become a kind of ritualized humiliation, and adding to that isn’t going to make anyone excited about traveling. This is particularly true of the naked body scanners that will probably be deployed soon; not only will you have to take off your belt, shoes, etc., you’ll also have to submit to being seen in the nude by some TSA person.

The result of this increasingly humiliating experience is that revenue will go down, prices will go up, and unpleasantness will proliferate. The added time that yet another machine introduces to the process will further drive flying toward pointlessness. For example, it already takes five hours or more (including driving time getting to airports) for me to fly from my home in Provo, Utah, to Southern California where I grew up. If I have a lay-over, it’s much longer. Conversely, I can drive to the same place in about 9.5 hours, so flying doesn’t even cut that in half. The longer it takes to fly, the more likely I am to drive.

Besides the inconvenience of added security, it’s also questionable just how effective it is. Does confiscating my shampoo really make the world safer? I would argue it doesn’t and that most of the current measures are simply in place to give frightened travelers a (sometimes false) sense of security about their trips. After all, an apparently inept terrorist thwarted the security we currently have; I’m sure that a professional from Al Queda could figure out a way to slip past the naked-scanner.

All this is to say that rolling out more delays just isn’t worth it. The chance of dying in a terrorist attack is still small, even without added security. In fact, it’s much smaller getting in a car wreak or dying in countless other ways. What’s more, people seem to believe that flying should be risk-free, even though that’s an impossible goal. Everything involves risk flying remains one of the lowest risk ways to travel. If naked scanners or other measures actually sped up the process or made it more streamlined, I’d be interested in seeing them used. However, so far no new security measure has ever made things faster. Ultimately, then, it’d be better to simply accept the risk of dying in an attack. If not, we’ll have eventually made airplanes so safe that we never actually let anyone get on them.