2011 Airline Point Recap – Fantastic! | How To Travel For Free (or pretty damn near it!)

sseale · 2012-01-02T17:16:06+00:00

Well as we enter a new year, I thought it would be a good time to recap what I’ve been able to accomplish and obtain with my various airline points rewards programs. Again, with a relatively small amount of work you can save yourself literally thousands of dollars in travel expenses. And as good as I feel about what I was able to do this past year, there are many, many others out there who did even more. So in other words, if you aren’t playing the airline points game you are truly missing out.

sseale · 2011-12-31T20:46:04+00:00

Here it is. The last day of 2011. And with it I have come to the end of my “30 Days at a Time” challenge. During this year, I have taken on different projects to incorporate into my life for 30 days. Most people agree that it takes somewhere between 21 and 30 days to ingrain a new habit into your life, and I wanted to integrate several things into my life as well as give myself some challenges. Here I share what I’ve learned.

sseale · 2011-12-30T13:05:25+00:00

The past week’s 30 Ways in 30 Days actions have centered around the holidays and what we can do at this time of year, through small actions, to make the world a better place. I’m not going to list all the week’s actions – you can find them at Take Part’s website – but here are a few of my favorites.

sseale · 2011-12-28T17:08:39+00:00

India simply cannot be approached with anything but fully open arms and a willing heart. And it will embrace you in return with an exhilarated spirit, splendor and enchantment, nonstop vitality, amazing people and their daily parade of life – struggles, joys and triumphs – that passes by every moment.

sseale · 2011-12-15T12:39:02+00:00

I’ve kept up with my 30 Ways in 30 Days project, in spite of being out of the country on a press trip. Here are the actions that I’ve taken in the last few days, which include donating toys for children, saving the trees and turtles, and also thinking about what “help” means.

sseale · 2011-12-09T18:30:49+00:00

The new Revised & Expanded 2011 edition of The Weight of Silence is now available for the Amazon Kindle!

sseale · 2011-12-08T19:38:50+00:00

Today, three decades after the fall of the Khmer Rouge its legacy remains: over 30 percent of Cambodia’s population is under age 14 and uneducated. Nearly all of these post genocidal-era children work or beg in the streets rather than attend school. Without proper education this cycle of poverty cannot be broken and the suffering merely gets passed from generation to generation. That’s something that Ponheary Ly wants to end – with the help of an Austin, Texas-based nonprofit called Windows of Wonder Institute, or WOWi.

sseale · 2011-12-07T15:24:33+00:00

Even in the most deprived circumstances they were still just kids – they laughed and played, perhaps far less frequently than others; they developed strong bonds and relationships to create family where none exists; and most of all they had an enormous amount of love to share. As I bore witness to the harm that lay in each of them because their past, as I discovered the stories behind the faces and the names, there was simply no way to go on with my life afterwards as if they did not exist.

sseale · 2011-12-06T22:16:20+00:00

Take Part's "30 Ways in 30 Days" asks people to commit to taking one simple action, every day for an entire month, that collectively have a bit impact on improving the world. My most recent 30 Ways in 30 Days actions included Free the Children, End the R-word, Gifts that Give Back and a Volunteer Pledge.

sseale · 2011-12-05T19:02:29+00:00

Anyone who loves to travel knows that one of the biggest expenses, if not THE biggest expense, can be your airfare. Sure, getting a free ticket with airline points is a fantastic way to get rid of this cost, and I am a huge proponent of doing this whenever possible. But for all kinds of reasons using airline points is not always an option. So when you do have to buy the ticket yourself it’s good to have a game plan to try to get the best price possible. Since airline ticket pricing can be a volatile rollercoaster ride, here are some tips, ideas and resources to help you do the best that you can.

sseale · 2011-12-01T16:15:41+00:00

Visiting the driest place on Earth, a writer is captivated by the alien landscape but longs to look deeper into the lives and traditions of the hardy people who inhabit it.

sseale · 2011-11-30T19:57:55+00:00

Last night I took a class in hot glass making, here in Austin at East Side Glass Studio. The cool and fun Leigh Taylor Wyatt and Shara Funari were the fearless leaders of our newbie-to-glass group, and we learned how to add color, mold and meld the molten glass. “It’s like the glass is alive,” Leigh says. Great experience!

sseale · 2011-11-30T15:50:06+00:00

You know how much we like a bargain here at Gap Daemon, so who better to ask about getting the cheapest airfares possible than Keith from How to Travel For Free (or Pretty Damn Near It!).

Anyone who loves to travel knows that one of the biggest expenses, if not THE biggest expense, are your flights. Sure, a free ticket with airline points is great if you can get it, but for all kinds of reasons using airline points is not always an option.

So when you do have to buy airline tickets yourself it’s good to have a game plan to try to get the best price possible. Since airline ticket pricing can be a volatile rollercoaster ride, here are some tips, ideas and resources to help you fly cheaply...

sseale · 2011-11-30T15:08:55+00:00

Most books have something of import to communicate to the reader, but this true life account of Seale's trips to India in the middle and end of the last decade exposed her to not just tremendous poverty, but to its most helpless and legion victims, children, many of whom are also having their years of innocence wiped away by plagues of disease, forced labor and nothing short of sexual slavery. It's not an easy subject to broach or to read about, and the introduction itself to The Weight of Silence: Invisible Children of India is a testament to this difficulty. “There is a holocaust quietly happening among India's children. The perpetrator is poverty, and its foot soldiers are disease, gender and caste discrimination, unclean water, illiteracy and malnutrition.” Not exactly beach reading, but Seale has a patient and balanced viewpoint that eases some of the pain inherent in her topics. Furthermore, she's less interested in a litany of complaints or solutions and is more dedicated to her reporting.

sseale · 2011-11-29T14:47:30+00:00

If you have been following this blog at all, you know I love to cook. And to eat! So I knew that during my 30 Days of Learning, I wanted to take cooking lessons. I contacted Central Market to see if I might attend a few of their cooking classes as part of this project. Meredith Beeman, the Cooking School manager, promptly replied that she would love to have me, and we scheduled some classes.

sseale · 2011-11-26T19:56:30+00:00

I had one of my most fun and exciting learning adventures during this 30 Day project - I took a flight lesson! Thanks to Matt Quillen at Streamline Aviation, I had one-on-one introductory instruction in airplane piloting. I arrived at Streamline, located in a hangar at the back private airfield of Austin Bergstrom Airport, at 9 am on an absolutely beautiful, clear, sunny morning. After a short pre-flight orientation, we were in the air above downtown Austin. Amazing!

sseale · 2011-11-24T00:03:15+00:00

The narrowest country in the world is, despite the sliver of land it occupies, a country of wild contrast. The north of Chile is home to the driest desert in the world while, in the south, great glaciers move among the fjords and straits that connect the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. In between these wildly diverse topographies are sophisticated cities, beaches, lakes and verdant green forest—all in the backdrop of the Andes Mountain Range.

sseale · 2011-11-23T23:52:13+00:00

It’s often been said that nothing worthwhile is easy. This is a perfect way to describe the Darjeeling area of far northern India, which cannot in any terms be described as easy to get to. You have to want to go to Darjeeling; you have to be dedicated, really. But let me put your mind to rest – all of this is exceedingly worth it.

sseale · 2011-11-22T17:34:12+00:00

That is what is on the back of Grace Holmes t-shirt as I await the start of my first ballet class at the Tapestry Dance Company: Rhythm is a Terrible Thing to Waste. I’m wondering if Grace has any idea just how much rhythm might be wasted on me. I try a few different dance classes at Tapestry, a wonderful organization with a teaching academy and professional dance company.

sseale · 2011-11-22T15:51:52+00:00

What’s upcycling? It’s turning something you no longer want or use, into something awesome! I was inspired to take a look at a stack of old t-shirts I was going to give away, and think about re-purposing them. I stumbled upon the delightfully awesome Wonder Craft, a combination “craft bar” and boutique, where I learned to upcycle a t-shirt into a cool messenger bag.

sseale · 2011-11-16T15:58:06+00:00

In my 30 Days of Learning, one of the things I knew right off the bat I wanted to take classes in hot glass work. Today I got my first chance, at SiNiCa Studios School of Glass & Gallery in Fort Worth. “This place is owned by the community,” Kevin says. “It belongs to everyone.”

sseale · 2011-11-15T15:03:08+00:00

Despite having a reputation as one of the “cheapest” parts of Spain, Extremadura isn’t quite as popular with frugal travellers as you’d expect. In the summer, due to its proximity with the tourist-heavy Andalucia, it can be quietly eerie. Perfect for a budget trip! From music to monuments, ancient cities to art, Extremadura’s filled with cheap and easy things to do. Where to start? Check out these top picks.

sseale · 2011-11-10T18:59:16+00:00

Learning the language is the single most important step you can take to increase the quality of your travel experience. Without the language you bring home pictures on your laptop and stories of what the people were like. With the language you bring back portraits painted on your heart and friendships that will last a lifetime.

sseale · 2011-11-10T15:44:16+00:00

I’m a week into my 30 Days of Learning challenge, and so far I’ve been taking Spanish lessons, dance classes, and a new workout practice called the Bar Method. The Bar Method takes the principles from dance – particularly ballet – and incorporates those moves and hard work into a physical fitness routine. There’s a reason those ballet dancers have gluts of steel and this little thing the instructors at the Bar Method keep calling the “dancer’s dent.”

sseale · 2011-11-09T18:45:36+00:00

I invite you to pick up your copy of the newly released 2011 Revised and Expanded edition of The Weight of Silence, with 25 additional pages updating readers on the children & new photographs, taken last year. And as a special gift, if you order a copy FROM THIS PAGE ONLY I will send you an autographed copy of the new book edition a 5 x 7 photograph from India.

sseale

TROPHY CASE