7 Costly Cross Country Road Trip Mistakes – Episode 133

Danielle Desir Corbett

00:32
Hey, finding too savvy travelers. Welcome back to another episode of the thought card podcast. I knew that the US was massive, but I really got a chance to see it for myself up close and personal. When our family packed up our bags and set out on an epic cross country road trip. I want you to get ready for a candid episode that spills to beans on some of the costly mistakes we made.

Danielle Desir Corbett

01:08
During our 1200 mile cross country road trip, which spanned 10 states. I'm Danielle Desir Corbett, and this is a thought card podcast where we talk about travel and money. Thank you for joining me for another episode. From unexpected car rental trouble to expensive tolls, skip the pitfalls, and make your adventure 1 to remember. Without, I would say, the financial setbacks.

Danielle Desir Corbett

01:58
Before we jump in, the international driving authority IDA wants you to travel with ease and confidence. If you're planning to travel abroad, apply for an international driving permit from the IDA. By translating your driver's license to 70 languages, it's a simple and affordable way to ensure you can drive safely and legally in foreign countries. Benefits of using the IDAs translation service include peace of mind, convenience, and affordability. After the episode, tap the link down in the description to get started, and enjoy the ease of driving overseas.

Danielle Desir Corbett

02:25
You can also find the link in the accompanying blog post over at dot card dot com. While come to the thought card. A podcast about travel and money, where planning, saving, and creativity leads to affording travel, building wealth, and paying off debt. We are the financially savvy travelers. Alrighty.

Danielle Desir Corbett

03:07
So why go on a cross country road trip. Well, first and foremost, I was born in the US and I will admit that I haven't seen everything in the US. I haven't gone to all 50 states and I still have a lot to do on my travel wish list for the US edition. And 1 of those things was going on this cross country road trip. And being that I live on the East Coast, something that's really common that you hear a lot of people talk about is driving from, like, New York City or wherever you're based all the way down to Florida.

Danielle Desir Corbett

03:31
So I've grown up, you know, with my family doing these kinds of trips. But I personally never did this kind of trip. So I never did a cross country road trip. And I kinda felt like from home to Florida is like a great introduction versus, like, from home to, like, the opposite side of the country. Like California or Las Vegas or something like that.

Danielle Desir Corbett

03:54
So road tripping to Florida, if I'm honest, wasn't our first choice. But I'm really happy we did it. We didn't realize we had picked travel dates around Easter, which meant that flight prices were ridiculous. So no. We did not wanna spend 1200 dollars per person for economy seats.

Danielle Desir Corbett

04:25
So we decided to rent a car instead. We were like, we're gonna go to Florida no matter what. And we're just gonna road trip it instead. And since we were traveling with the grandparents, My in laws and I booked a 7 passenger SUV for just over a thousand dollars. So instead of a spending 1200 dollars per person and they were, like, a group of 5 of us, we were, like, you know what?

Danielle Desir Corbett

04:40
We're gonna just all pitch in. And we're gonna just rent this car, this large SUV for a thousand dollars, and that would shave our budget. And I was pretty happy about that. I was, like, okay. Alright, Fonichi Savvy travelers.

Danielle Desir Corbett

04:48
Okay. We're doing we're doing it. Right? Cost savings, still traveling. But here's where things got tricky.

Danielle Desir Corbett

05:27
So let's dig into the costly mistakes, the costly road trip mistakes. So number 1, we didn't have a plan b for any car rental issues that arose. And in the accompanying blog post, I'll go more into detail about it. But for the brevity of this episode, I'll just say that we got to the car rental counter and there were no cars on the lot, like, absolutely 0 cars to rent. Mind you, we had booked this car rental, like, a minimum of, like, 3 to 4 months ahead of time.

Danielle Desir Corbett

05:55
So we were really upset that the day we came to rent the car that Nothing was ready for us. Nothing was prepared, and it was very, very infuriating. And I would say, like, really sloppy on their part. But something I learned is that with car rentals, I'm so used to it being a thing. Like, I booked a car rental months ago, I'm gonna go to the counter the day of and pick up a car rental.

Danielle Desir Corbett

06:12
But what happens if there's no cars available? Like, what's your plan b? For us, we had to pause for a second to be like, what are the alternatives? It's we're leaving tomorrow. And for us to find a last minute rental, does it make sense?

Danielle Desir Corbett

06:32
Does it make financial sense? So we decided to actually take our cars instead. And there was a bit of back and forth in terms of, like, we lease our cars. And with the lease, you have a certain amount of miles that you have to stick to every year. So I was kind of concerned about are we gonna go over this mileage?

Danielle Desir Corbett

06:52
Because this is like a 1200 mile trip. But overall, we decided instead of renting a car, we are gonna just drive and use our own vehicles. Imagine if you don't have a car that you can just do that with. Right? Here you are the day before your trip.

Danielle Desir Corbett

07:22
Or maybe the day of your trip and there's no cars, what do you do? Right? So having a plan b for your car rental issues, I think is really important. And I'm not quite sure what the solution to that is if we were in a different situation, but maybe that's, like, more pressure, calling customer service, complaining, and I'm sure would've gotten figured out. But it was very upsetting the day of that there was no cars in a lot.

Danielle Desir Corbett

08:23
And that could've potentially delayed our trip and cause a lot of issues because we had a really long road trip ahead of us. Alright. Costly mistake number 2 was buying water bottles and leaving them in the car. And the issue here is that because the car was hot, for extended amount of time, we ended up not being able to use and drink those waters on those water bottles, which ended up being a waste. So the solution here, instead of wasting all the money on bottled water, is to bring reusable water bottles personal ones for each person and also water jugs that are like a gallon plus that allow you to okay If anything happens, I can just refill this water bottle versus, like, having these plastic water bottles that if they're in the car too long, if they're heated too long, really become a health hazard.

Danielle Desir Corbett

09:03
I know this is like a basic tip, but we definitely spend AAA couple of dollars, lots of money on this mistake over and over and over again on our long road trip. Now the next costly mistake is that I forgot our gift cards. So 1 of the things that I do when I'm traveling is I look through my drawers to make sure that, you know, if it's abroad, do I have any, like, currency from that place if I've been there before? And do I have any gift cards lying around that I could use? Whether that's gift cards to a particular establishment or a general gift card?

Danielle Desir Corbett

09:24
Because Okay. I could use those gift cards for different purchases while I'm on the road. And specifically, I wanted to use these gift cards to treat us to some snacks at Disney. And when I realized that I forgot my gift cards, I was really disappointed because now we had to come out of pocket. For all of these expenses.

Danielle Desir Corbett

09:53
Mind you, we had about 200 dollars in gift cards that we were planning to use. So it was a bit of a downer that we didn't get to use these gift cards. So this is definitely a tip that I would say is, okay, when you're heading on your road trip, make sure you just pack all of your gift cards. And just, like, your loose change lying around because it's definitely gonna come in handy. Now 1 of the other mistakes I think this is probably, like, 1 of the big mistakes besides, like, the car rental issue was not having easy pass.

Danielle Desir Corbett

10:29
And I'm gonna say that the state where I live is Connecticut. And we don't have any toll roads, meaning that you don't have to pay a toll going from 1 part of the state to another part of the state or when you're crossing bridges. And there are a few states in the country that don't have tolls, but for the majority of them, there are tolls. And With a cross country road trip, I thought about tolls, but I really didn't, like, put a lot of thought into it. So it's like it was a thought.

Danielle Desir Corbett

11:08
But if I could go back, I would have gotten EasyPass and connected my electronic transponder so that I can just not have to worry about all of these toll payments, which has has become quite of a mess. With that being said, we had to pay cash for some other tolls, some other tolls, they took a picture of our license plate and they said that they would mail us our bill. Some tools allowed us to accept accepted credit card. So that's what I'm saying. It's a little bit of a mess.

Danielle Desir Corbett

11:38
Like, there's just multiple ways to pay tolls in the United States. And it's just hard to know what payment method is going to work. I know that there are apps that can help you with this, but at the time, I did not think of that. So I didn't have an app while I was on the road to help me navigate all of these different types of toll roads. And it was kind of a surprise for each 1.

Danielle Desir Corbett

12:21
And unfortunately, we didn't bring enough cash for all of these tolls especially when we're coming back home. So from Florida, coming back to Connecticut, there was just a lot more. Especially going through states like New York and New Jersey, there were just so many expensive tolls and we didn't always have cash for them. So it was just really tricky. In the accompanying blog post, I'll definitely write out more about this after I've done a bit more research about tolls, but all I can say is understanding the toll payment system in the US, including the cash payments, electronic responders like easy pass and license plate tooling are all things to consider.

Danielle Desir Corbett

12:49
So my mother-in-law who had easy pass Didn't have to worry about much. Like, everything was Bill to their easy pass, and they didn't come home to a bunch of bills. So when we got back from our road trip, I had quite a few bills waiting for me for these tolls. Now all of this is actually gonna make an impact, and here's why. Because some of these tools, they actually required you to take a ticket.

Danielle Desir Corbett

13:21
And I believe this happened to me in Jersey. Where they asked us to take a ticket, and for whatever reason, we completely missed taking the ticket And so when we got to the toll booth, they charged us 25 dollars. Instead of 5 dollars for the toll. So an additional 20 dollars penalty because we didn't take a ticket, a piece of paper. Y'all, I was so upset.

Danielle Desir Corbett

13:35
I was so livid. I'm like, for a piece of paper, should we be not using paper environmentally friendly? Like, can't y'all just bill me? It just boggles my mind. It's just it's just so I can't even speak.

Danielle Desir Corbett

13:54
I'm so upset. But yeah. So missing 1 of these toll tickets, we had to pay an extra 20 dollars. And then in Delaware, they sent us the bill, and they added an extra 50 dollars in administrative fees. 50 dollars.

Danielle Desir Corbett

14:18
What? What is going on? So yeah. The whole toll situation was a hot mess. And if I were to do it again, I would have a better understanding of how tolling works, keeping track of like having my easy pass, keeping track of, like, Do we need a ticket?

Danielle Desir Corbett

14:50: Do we not need a ticket? It's just a lot. You know, especially, like, you've been driving for hours on end, and you're trying to follow the signs, and you are trying to navigate, and you miss something. And as a result, you have to pay so much extra money outside of pocket. This is definitely a costly mistake that I felt like we could have definitely avoided if we were thoughtful, intentional, and definitely moving forward, they ain't gonna get me.

15:19
I'm not the 1. Moving forward, I'm not the 1. I kinda teased this earlier, but not bringing enough cash definitely had an impact on our expenses because there were some places that they required a minimum spend of 5 dollars on your card. So especially when we, like, took pit stops for at the gas or something, and we're just like, oh, I just wanna pay something quickly with card. They were like, you have to spend more because there's a card minimum.

16:01 And this is not something I typically have to worry about when I'm home. Like, we're pretty much a cashless family where we wholeheartedly believe in points and miles and using plastic whenever possible. So we kept that same mentality on the road with us, and that is gonna actually lead you to spending more money than you anticipated because of this, like, minimum spend requirement. So I would just recommend as you're doing your cross country road trip, Think about bringing extra cash with you for, like, issues and incidentals. And so you don't have to meet any minimum requirement.

No. Just pay cash and be done. And then for the tolls too, you could just pay cash for your tolls and not have to come home to crazy ridiculous bills. Alright. So the last thing I wanted to say in terms of my costly mistakes is not packing alcoholic beverages with us.

16:57: So I think I've mentioned this in other, like, episodes as, like, you know, financial mistakes. But I think that's important because when we got to the hotel and I I'll say think I'll help to another episode on just planning our Disney road trip. But because we were traveling with baby k, we didn't wanna just straight shot go to Florida. We decided to spend the night in North Carolina. And when we got to in North Carolina, we were exhausted.

17:29: We got there pretty early, I would say, around, like, 7 or so. We didn't just wanna, like, go to bed immediately, so we decided to go to the bar. Downstairs in our hotel. And I really feel like if we had thought ahead and gotten alcoholic beverages like beer or wine or whatever, you pick whatever it is, we wouldn't have rent up a tab at the hotel. And we know hotel bars are just notoriously more expensive.

17:58: So we ended up actually, like, making it up because we ended up getting alcoholic beverages on the road when we got to our official hotel for the rest of our stay. Like, we actually didn't spend as much money. At bars and different things like that. So I would say that definitely packing your alcoholic beverages with you which is probably gonna be a lot cheaper where you are based locally. It's gonna definitely save you a lot of money overall.

18:17: So as a quick recap here are my costly mistakes for our first cross country road trip. So having a plan b for car rental issues is just important. Just in case if something happens and you There's no rentals. What are you gonna do? Right?

19:05: Insuring that your plan b includes a reliable car, whether that's another car rental or considering if you're gonna take your own car or a car of a family member or friend or whatever the case may be, but, like, having a plan b is something I didn't think about before, and it became a real reality for us, and we had to make decisions very, very quickly. Which could have ended up, you know, making us spend hundreds of thousands of dollars as a result of this last minute decision. Using reusable water bottles, of course, it's, like, great for the environment as well. But it wasn't something that we were thinking about, like, these single use water bottles. And, like, I have plenty of reusable water bottles at home, and I could've used that to prevent us from, like, having to spend all this extra money on that.

19:28: So just again, something practical to think about. You're remembering to bring your gift cards for potential savings if you have them. Understanding the toll system in the US, it is complicated, and I will do my best to break it down in the blog post. And just like avoiding these penalties of missing these toll tickets. Like, gosh, this extra 50 dollars.

19:54: $20 it's just so unnecessary. It's not at, like, at the expense that I really wanted to it's, like, it's just not necessary. And then, lastly, doing your best to bring your snacks, your food, your alcoholic beverages, pack them with you in your car. So you don't have to stop at restaurants all the time or you don't have to, like, go to the hotel bar. You can just have your drinks with you.

20:33: These are just, again, things that just these little things that definitely add up. And I feel like as Fonichi cyber travelers who may be considering road trips for the summer and beyond, It's just things for you to keep in mind and things for you to know. Now, I am working on a blog post all on my cost breakdown for how much money we spend, road tripping, across the country, and you can definitely expect some Disney content coming up very soon. I go to Disney, I think, a few times a year and I'm always like, can I create Disney content? I come home, and then I don't.

21:06: But I'm really excited that I'll be creating more Disney content for you all. So be on the lookout for a cost breakdown blog post and also a cost breakdown for Disney in particular. So lots of breakdowns to come. Overall, it's always a good idea to have a buffer in your travel budget to account for unforeseen expenses, which for us ended up costing us a couple of extra hundred dollars that we didn't plan for. So just keep that in mind.

21:33: If you enjoyed this episode, this road trip style episode, I encourage you to listen to episode 01:02. Where I broke down 28 plus items to bring on a road trip. And also episode 01:12, if you have a baby and you're considering row tripping with your baby. I give 10 additional tips for that. And then lastly, You know, summer is almost here.

21:59: And in episode 01:06, I broke down 12 ways to save on summer travel. So there's just lots of episodes to listen to. Those 3, I think, will be great to listen to after this 1. And a special thank you again to IGA International Driving Authority for partnering on this episode and we'll make sure to include all the links mentioned in the show notes. Until next time. Bye.