1. Back up important documents in electronic
form.
New Jersey lawyer and frequent traveler Karl
Piirimae offered the following advice for backing up
any documents that would be catastrophic to lose,
such as your passport, travel insurance policy,
itinerary confirmations, scans of your credit cards
and more: "Important documents should always be on a flash drive on your person; for overseas travel
include a PDF copy of the face page of your
passport." If you want to use a more remote approach, you
could put backups on a service like Dropbox, or for
even more security, use InfoSafe.com, which
employs encrypted and password-protected
security methods to protect your information while
allowing access from any Internet-connected computer. Tip 1b: When I write down any sensitive
information,

2. Collect and store all street addresses ahead of
time.

Before you travel, send yourself a single email that
contains all the local addresses you will visit on
your trip (hotels, offices, attractions, museums, etc.),
then make sure to save it on your phone (that is,
make sure you check your mail on your phone
before your regular email application pulls it off the server). Then, as you tick off your various destinations, you
can check back on the same email, and click on the
addresses to launch a mapping application. Say you do this at the airport on public Wi-Fi, but
are shortly going to be without Internet access,
such as in a rental car. If you switch to "List View,"
you will be able to read turn-by-turn instructions,
even if your phone is not tracking your location in
real time. I've done it -- it works great. This tip assumes you have a smartphone, but could
also be applied to your laptop or tablet, or to any
publicly accessible Internet connection, such as
Internet cafes, library computers, etc

3. Log your parking spot electronically.

It's not a great feeling to get jostled on an airport
parking shuttle bus as it slumps around an
immense parking lot, and have no recollection at all
of where you parked. By the time you walk away
from your car at the airport, your mind has already
moved on to other logistical concerns, and your vow to remember the location can be very quickly
deserted. Instead of relying on your memory to come
through after a long trip, take a photo of the
parking lot section sign with your phone or digital
camera. Then forget about it until you get back,
when you can check your phone or camera for the
picture of the parking lot sign closest to your car. You can also record the info in a voicemail to
yourself -- anything but leaving it to memory and
chance.

4. Check multiple airline seating chart websites.


Ceci Flinn, an American based in London who travels frequently for business and pleasure, says
simply, "SeatGuru.com rocks!" However, it is important to note that when mergers happen,
airlines sometimes change their seat configuration
and numbering systems. During these states of
flux, even a reliable site like SeatGuru may not have
100 percent accurate information. If your airline
has undergone any recent changes, it can't hurt to check more than one seat review site to be sure
you're getting the most current info. Others include
SeatMaestro.com or SeatExpert.com. Andrew Wong at SeatGuru parent site TripAdvisor
wrote the following to me in response to an inquiry
about this issue: "We [do] our best to keep up with
the changes and generally we are. Where there is
some confusion is when a user is thinking they are
flying on one airline and then it's operated by another airline. On our map search tool, we use
OAG (airline) data to show which aircraft type is
scheduled to operate a particular flight. We then
land a user to the appropriate map based on this
data. This might change from time to time which
adds to the complexity."

5. Count front to back, do the alphabet right to
left, on ALL planes.

Despite changing seat maps, some things you can,
well, count on. Traveler Tre Horoszewski offers the
following simple tip: "Realize that there is a system
to seat numbering on ALL planes regardless of
airline. This saves time in finding and taking your
seat. Higher numbers in back, letters run from right to left as you face the back of the plane. I can't
recall the number of people who don't seem to
know/understand this and hold up boarding." Yes, the seats are right to left -- when facing the
back of the plane, A is the window seat on your
right.

6. Get water on the other side of security.
Everyone seems to know that air travel dehydrates folks considerably, but you would never know it from how little water is provided by current in- cabin service routines; often you'll get only 8 - 10 ounces of water all told even on a long flight, unless you are chewing your ice. Of course, you can't bring water with you from home, because security checks allow even less liquid: three ounces (or 3.4 ounces, to be more precise). You will have to stave off dehydration yourself, which is why I recommend buying a big bottle of water immediately after you pass through security.

7. Similarly, buy your own food -- or order
ahead.

Another recent development onboard is the
frequent need to feed yourself, even when airlines
offer meals for purchase. To decrease waste (and I
believe also to decrease craft weight), airlines are
understocking on food, and seem always to run
out of the best menu items halfway down the aisle at mealtime. The simplest approach would be to eat before your
flight, or bring your own food. A more hardcore
approach is to order a special meal when you book
your flight -- it could be vegetarian, or kosher, or
anything that gets your meal off the main food cart
coming down the aisle. Two things happen when you do this: your meal is served first, before the full
cabin service starts, and the food tends to be more
fresh. I traveled with a friend more than 25 years
ago who always requested kosher dishes, as he
knew he would get fresh, hot meals, and it still
works often enough.

8. Bring your E-ZPass tag with you.

Whatever electronic toll collection system you use at
home might also be valid on the toll roads in the
place you're visiting, so check ahead. When I got
my own E-ZPass tag, the instructions said I should
glue it to my windshield. I chose not to do this, and
now throw it in my carry-on whenever I am traveling to an area that accepts it; then I just put it
on the dash of my rental car for the duration of the
trip.

9. Do a double pass when you pack.

IndependentTraveler.com Senior Editor Sarah
Schlichter has a foolproof packing process, useful
both coming and going: "For me, packing is a two-
step process: gathering everything I need and then
putting it all into my suitcase. So I use my packing
list accordingly. Each item gets a check mark once I've laid it out on my bed or dresser, and then I
strike through it once it goes into my bag -- which
helps me make sure that everything I intend to take
actually comes with me! "The very last thing I pack is my packing list. I use it
to double-check that I'm not leaving anything
behind in my hotel room before I come home. (On
the rare occasions when I check a bag, the packing
list also serves as an inventory of everything I've
brought, just in case the airlines lose my suitcase.

10. Don't check security line lengths; check how
fast the security agent is working.

Any hardcore traveler (heck, any grocery shopper)
has bolted for the shortest line only to have it take
the longest time. Gillian Williams, President of the
Rensselaerville Institute - School Turnaround, offers
the following tip for getting through security faster:
"When needing to bolt through security, look at the screener at the machine to determine shortest line
time -- not the people in the line (well, except
babies and wheelchairs)."

www.independenttraveler.com/travel-tips/travelers-ed/10-hardcore-tips-for-frequent-travelers

cc; lalasticlala , seun, ishilove.justwise . Bigfrancis21

A nice thread I must say,nice job op