fixed focus one (dingjiaoone) original

author | wang lu, su qi, aile yi, zheng haojun

editor|wang lu

the national day holiday coincides with the beautiful autumn weather. many young people have already packed their suitcases and are ready to go out and relax.

this year, the pursuit of cost-effective "budget travel" has become a hot topic among everyone. some people do not want to be emptied by accommodation, so they choose to spend the night in bathing centers and internet cafes instead of hotels; some people switch from long-distance travel to county tours and special forces tours; and some people search for we have compiled various strategies and implemented the concept of saving money in all aspects such as tickets, accommodation, tickets, meals and so on.

although air tickets and high-speed rail tickets are hard to get during the national day holiday, and hotel prices have also risen, it is not a problem for young people who are budget-conscious. they feel that as long as the strategy is in place, no matter how popular the holiday is, they can still achieve high cost performance.

we talked with four young people who planned to travel on a budget during this year’s national day holiday. their trip lasted at least three days, but their per capita budget was significantly lower than before, and some even suffered “fractures.”

most of their travel expenses aretransportation and accommodation, the main money-saving strategies also focus on these two aspects.

some people choose to stay in hotels outside the city center and use their friends’ newly registered accounts to enjoy order discounts; some people remodeled their cars and decided to live in them, saving accommodation fees; some people choose to travel by green train, staying in a youth hostel will maximize your savings; some people feel that the premium for group tours is too high, so they choose to rent a car and travel by car in nearby provinces.

however, they all emphasized that traveling on a budget ≠ traveling on a hard journey.the purpose of saving money is not to waste money, not to reduce the quality of travel, insisting on "province the province, spend the flowers", and pursue high cost performance.

at this moment, they are preparing to embark on a "long-planned" happy travel with the prepared strategies.

travel during off-peak hours, downgrade your accommodation, and only go to free attractions, saving one or two thousand

xiao gu | 29 years old, beijing education industry

i am not a person who likes to travel on a budget. in the past, if the trip was longer than three days, the minimum budget would be around 10,000 yuan. however, because i recently resigned, i had to "downgrade travel" this year.

i wanted to watch the sea and relax, so during this national day holiday, i chose dalian, a coastal city i haven’t been to yet, to be with my partner.the two of us are traveling on a budget for 4 days. apart from hotels and accommodation, i plan to keep the spending on fun within 1,500 yuan.

the big expenses are tickets and hotels, and this year i mainly save money in these two areas.

when it comes to travel, we gave up flying and chose the relatively cheap high-speed rail.

we will depart from beijing on september 29th and return from dalian on october 2nd. we chose this time period mainly to avoid the peak period and make tickets easier to buy.

the round-trip ticket cost nearly 2,000 yuan for two people.

there is a lot of room for adjustment in accommodation, but i have requirements for accommodation. the price should not be too expensive but the conditions should not be too bad. it is best to be a four- or five-star hotel or a chain hotel. this made me look for a place to stay on and off for two weeks.

i first looked for a hotel in the city center, thinking that it would be convenient to go anywhere because of the convenient transportation, but all the qualified hotels exceeded my budget of 2,000 yuan for 3 nights. later, i turned my attention to surrounding b&bs, and i was worried about health and safety issues. i chose to give up, and finally found a satisfactory chain hotel after moving from a hotel with convenient transportation to a non-city center.

after determining the hotel location and brand, icompare prices on major online travel platforms, and also made a table to select the one with the highest platform discounts to place an order. but some platforms are very familiar with it, soi asked a friend to use a new account to place an order. after calculation, i saved 500-1,000 yuan on hotel expenses.

for this budget trip, we have already spent 2,000 yuan on round-trip tickets and 1,500 yuan on hotel accommodation, leaving a budget of 1,500 yuan purely for fun.

i think it's completely enough. i mainly go to free attractions in dalian. if i want to go to paid attractions, i will choose to order and buy tickets on the online platform. for food, i focus on local snack streets, not ordering takeout or going to internet celebrity restaurants. during the whole trip, i will only eat and play. , resolutely do not buy additional items such as souvenirs; when you can walk in the local area, walk first, and if you cannot walk, choose the bus or subway, and take less taxis; develop the habit of "bringing your own", bring water, power bank and other things, and try not to spend money in scenic spots penny.

i think budget travel is very good. if you don’t budget carefully, you will spend at least 1,000-2,000 yuan more on this trip. moreover, i understand that budget travel does not mean saving on everything. if you want to save on everything, it is better not to travel, but to pursue high cost performance, not too much. affect your own travel experience.

change your group tour in western sichuan to independent travel in inner mongolia, saving two-thirds of your travel expenses

ru yi | 26-year-old marketing in beijing

during the national day holiday this year, two friends and i went to inner mongolia together. it was a 6-day trip, with the first three days in hohhot and the last three days in ulanqab.

in fact, i chose this destination out of considerations of saving money.at first, my friends and i just decided to go out together during the national day, but the destination was not decided.

our initial discussion was to sign up for a group trip to western sichuan. this group's itinerary was to visit three snow-capped mountains. it was euphemistically called "snow mountain tour". it sounded very sacred, but the more we researched, the more expensive it became. the tour fee is more than 5,000 yuan per person. although accommodation and a car are included, the air tickets must be paid by yourself. the group's gathering place is in chengdu. our round-trip ticket costs more than 6,000 yuan per person, and the budget for the entire trip is about 12,000 yuan. this price is enough to travel abroad, and it feels like a loss no matter how much we think about it.

later, we discussed changing the route to inner mongolia for a self-driving trip so that the trip could be more relaxed and chill.a trip to inner mongolia with flights and drinks can cost more than 2,000 yuan per person. the bulk of the trip is two-thirds less than the trip to western sichuan., the two of us hit it off.

after booking flights and wine, another big expense is renting a car, which is not cheap. the two of us booked a car on a car rental platform. we ordered an suv with a high chassis. the rent was 400 to 500 yuan per day. the total cost per person was more than 1,000 yuan.

but then we thought about it. the original intention of renting a car was to drive by ourselves and not to be disturbed by others.we thought about finding a guide, but a better itinerary would start at 300 yuan a day, and we would have to share a car with others. the average car rental cost per person per day is only more than 200 yuan. thinking about it this way, we still save money and make the trip more comfortable.

there are two reasons for doing these money-saving strategies when traveling during national day. one is that my previous impression of national day travel was that it was expensive and overpriced, so before i spent national day either at work or back home. this year is the first full national day holiday that i will officially spend, so i want to be more prudent. another reason is that i plan to travel to japan in december and want to save some travel expenses.

i also came up with a few ways to save money on my next trip. first, when i travel, i usually get my nails done and buy new clothes or equipment.but i thought that many of the new clothes i bought for traveling would not be worn after i came back, so i saved this budget.secondly, when we arrive in inner mongolia, we plan to reduce the remaining expenses such as eating and shopping to more than 500 yuan per capita, and we will not spend any money unless necessary. and by the end of the year, i will not allow myself to buy big-ticket products in my daily life.

my tourism philosophy is that the province deserves its flowers.the purpose of saving money is not to waste money and make every money spent worthwhile, rather than to travel purely on a budget and reduce the quality of travel in order to save money.travel itself is for enjoyment, and enjoyment itself requires a certain budget, otherwise wouldn’t it be putting the cart before the horse?

i remember that i once stocked up on a hotel promotion coupon and stayed in a star-rated hotel at a very low price. when i arrived, i found that the hotel was very old, without any modern facilities, the quilt was very damp, and there was a strange smell in the room. i felt that if i really didn’t want to spend money, it would be better not to travel.

sleeping in the car during a self-driving trip saves money on transportation and accommodation expenses

feifei | 25 years old suzhou manufacturing industry

during the national day, my girlfriend and i plan to go out from the 1st to the 6th. since we are going by train, it won’t be too far. we started from suzhou and planned one route to go to nanchang, passing through jixi, jingdezhen, lushan, huangshan and other places. the other route was to fuzhou.

i'm still deciding which one to choose, but i'm tentatively planning to go to yiwu on the evening of september 30th to eat middle eastern food, and then choose a route based on weather conditions and highway traffic jams.

we are usually busy at work, so we can only go out and play when we have time during holidays. in addition, highways are free during holidays, which can also save some money.

when we were making a guide, we considered that hotels in some places were not easy to book, and some prices were ridiculously high, so we decided to simply sleep in the car.we bought a car mattress, which automatically inflates when you open the valve, and a mattress extension board. i didn’t want to be seen while sleeping in my car, so i bought a sunshade to perfectly solve this problem. i was worried that there was not enough space in the back of the car, so i installed a front trunk so that all sundries could be put in it. a total of more than 400 yuan was spent on these things.

the car was renovated, and we brought more than 100 yuan worth of snacks, water and other things. consider taking a shower in a service area, hourly room, gym, bathhouse or other places for subsequent bathing.

the main principle of our trip this time is cost-effectiveness and will not have a strong purpose. the planning only focuses on the general direction. when it comes to where to go, it’s more random. when eating, i also find random places. i focus on experiencing local characteristics. i don’t choose too expensive meals and prefer to find small restaurants by myself.

if we travel by regular train, based on the distance to nanchang, wethe round trip fare is about 1,400 yuan. including the cost of public transportation or taxis between scenic spots, it is estimated to be close to 2,000 yuan. however, if you drive by yourself, the electricity bill should only be around 200 yuan, and you can save nearly a thousand yuan by sleeping in the car. accommodation fee.

in addition, we generally don’t buy some souvenirs because they can be purchased online. we basically don’t use the paid photography services at attractions. we take photos ourselves. also, we don’t go to some attractions that are not fun but charge a fee.

i think when traveling, you must take a good rest when you need to. in addition, take a taxi when you need to travel, which saves time and energy. you can also save money on tickets for some of the more unique and interesting attractions. for example, we went to the grand canyon in gansu before. , so i bought more expensive tickets and played more things.

traveling on a budget is more of a mentality. there are ways to play with a sufficient budget, and there are ways to play with a low budget.traveling on a budget means you have to accept some mental trade-offs.for example, we would rather go to a farther city like chengdu, but air tickets and hotels are very expensive. if we go there on a budget, the experience will be very poor. it is better to lower our expectations, go to a closer place, and play on the road.

taking a green car and staying in a youth hostel, the total budget for seven days is 2,000 yuan

xiao zhou | 21-year-old college student from zhengzhou

i am a junior student. this national day, i plan to go to nanchang and jingdezhen with three classmates. the plan is to leave for nanchang on the evening of september 30th, transfer to jingdezhen on october 4th, and return on october 7th.

the main reason for going to nanchang and jingdezhen is that these two places are relatively close and not far from zhengzhou, so you can go to more places with less travel expenses.

the four of us are relatively rough male college students and don’t have high requirements for accommodation and travel, so we are planning to save more money in these two aspects this time.

the first is travel,we chose the ordinary green sleeper train that departed on the night of september 30th, slept in it and arrived in nanchang the next morning., the price is only about 200 yuan, and the price of high-speed rail is basically close to 400 yuan.

however, we chose the high-speed rail for the next two tickets, because nanchang is not far from jingdezhen, and the price difference between the high-speed rail and the green train is only a few dozen yuan, but the time difference is 4 hours. in order to have more time for fun, we i chose the high-speed rail. we only had high-speed rail tickets to go back to zhengzhou from jingdezhen, so we had no choice. overall, each of us spent less than 700 yuan on tickets.

for accommodation, we chose a youth hostel, which is similar to a university dormitory. there are four or six people in a room with bunk beds. the price is about 100 yuan per night. the four of us can look after each other without worrying about safety.although the youth hostel is cheap, it is very close to the attractions and has convenient transportation. we can also spend less time on the road.

although i try to save as much as possible, tickets and accommodation still account for the largest portion of expenses. my budget this time is around 2,000 yuan. i spent about 1,400 yuan on tickets and accommodation, and i still have a budget of 600 to 700 yuan for fun.

we wanted to eat more local delicacies and spend almost no money on tourist attractions, so we went online in advance to find guides about free and low-cost tourist attractions in nanchang and jingdezhen.

if you don’t budget carefully,just switching from a youth hostel to a chain hotel will cost us more than 100 yuan per person per night. in terms of transportation, if we take the high-speed rail from zhengzhou to nanchang, we will have to spend another 200 yuan more, as well as visiting some more paid attractions. in total, every day personally, i estimate that it will cost an additional 1,000 yuan overall.

as for whether to travel on a budget, i think the score is good. like us, traveling with several people can save more money on accommodation, but if you are traveling alone, i think you should choose a hotel with better conditions. after all, your own safety is the most important thing.

*the title picture comes from pexels. at the request of the interviewees, ru yi, feifei and xiao zhou are pseudonyms in the article.