Everyone loves a classic road-trip, but what stops most people is the root-of-all-evil, money. These tips and tricks below may help you on spending less while on the road. 

Typically, the most money spent on a trip is for accommodations, to save money here consider sleeping in your vehicle. There are many places where you can park your car and sleep hassle free. One website I frequently use is freecampsites.net. All you do is put in the area of where you want to stay and it will list all the free camp sites near-by, if there is any. Most of what comes up is BLM land. This website isn’t always right but it is still a very helpful tool.

Another go-to of mine are trail-heads. Not all trail-heads allow overnight parking, but most do, especially when there are options for backpacking. Other places I consider are truck stops that are open 24/7, Walmart parking lots and apartment complexes. If you want to sleep somewhere with a little more luxury, maybe purchase a small, used pop-up trailer/tent you can tow with your vehicle.

The second most likely way to spend money on a road-trip is food. Most people tend to eat out while on vacation and eating out three times a day, everyday gets expensive, fast! Try shopping at a local grocery store either buying ready-to-eat meals, or if you have a backpacking stove, consider cooking some meals. You may be surprised on how much money you save just doing this.


The next best approach that will save you money is looking at your itinerary. What are you doing that is costing you money and is there any way around doing it for less? Lets just say for your ten day vacation you are going to four National Parks. Instead of paying for each individual entrance fee, is purchasing the annual pass cheaper? How about the amusement park you’re going to. Is it cheaper to buy the ticket at the gate or is it cheaper to purchase the ticket on-line in advance? If you are taking a plane, are you taking advantage of all the search engines that can save you money? For instance, I use skyscanner.com. This searches all the airlines and gives you the best price. Can you get any discounts on anything? If you take a little bit of time and evaluate everything you are doing on your trip, you may save a lot of money!

There are all kinds of ways to save money on your adventure. Don’t let money stop you from taking the vacation you need. You don’t need to be rich to travel and the best part is, traveling makes you rich. You will be rich in memories. You are not going to remember the time you came home from work and mowed the lawn, but you will remember when you came home from work and went on the vacation to visit Southern Utah’s Big 5!

If this article interested you, you may also want to read another article I wrote called, How to save money for your dream trip.

I hope this helped and if you have any other tips, feel free to write them in the comments below. I’d love to read them!!!

Thank you for reading!

Sincerely,

Livingonthedirt/Shelly