Budget Travel Tips

I understand wanting your kids to absorb culture and scenery during vacations, but there comes a point in every day when they're just plain done. Bring a small portable DVD player and let them watch a movie. You'll all get much more out of the other 22 hours you have together.

If you have a membership to your local science museum and it's part of the Association of Science Technology Centers, you can get free admission to hundreds of its affiliates throughout the country, such as L.A.'s Natural History Museum and the Chicago Children's Museum. In the past year, we've visited eight museums with our children and have saved more than $500 in entrance fees.

While searching for our bed-and-breakfast in York, England, we became hopelessly lost. On the outskirts of the city, we happened upon a small convenience store with a post office and asked for help. The postal worker quickly drew us a detailed map. There must have been a dozen turns, but we arrived safely, and greatly relieved, at our destination. Now, wherever we go, we know whom to ask for directions.

Take along a container of baby powder the next time you go to the beach. Before getting back into your car, sprinkle powder on everyone's feet. The sand falls right off!

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (fws.gov) is a great resource for learning about kid-friendly environmental programs. In southeast Tennessee, for example, look into joining a freshwater biologist on an underwater fish-viewing excursion in the Conasauga River; in Colorado your family can take part in a wildlife-watch workshop.

Some popular museums have secondary entrances. The Louvre, for instance, has an alternate entrance to the famous glass pyramid at the Carrousel du Louvre, usually mobbed with crowds. To find these lesser-known entrances, search online using the museum name and the words "alternate entrance."

Go to goldstar.com for half-price tickets to shows and events in such cities as Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose, Washington D.C., and others. Membership is free, and it enables you to buy tickets online and pick them up at the will-call window. I used the site to get half-price tickets toThe Phantom of the Opera andMamma Mia! in Las Vegas.

If you plan to visit the sky deck of a tall building such as Chicago's John Hancock Center or Seattle's Space Needle, find out if there's a restaurant at or near the top. Customers usually don't have to pay to get into the building and can enjoy dinner or drinks with a view.

On a recent trip to Tucson, I asked the woman at the visitors' information center if she had any two-for-one coupons for area attractions. She did even better, producing two free tickets to the next day's spring-training baseball game at Tucson Electric Park.

When my husband and I travel abroad with our kids, we always plan to spend a day at a local zoo or amusement park about midway through the trip. Our kids really appreciate taking a break from all the museums and monuments!

On a recent picnic, my husband forgot to pack a knife. I had a container of dental floss in my purse, so I used the floss to slice our cheese and our cake. It worked! The picnic was saved, and there were no messy knives to clean up afterward.

If you're on a group tour with several family members or friends, try not to sit together at every meal or bus ride. You'll have a much better time if you occasionally split up and engage fellow travelers.

On a visit to New York City, when our three young kids started to flag from so much walking, I made up the game of "chasing shadows": One person would run a bit ahead and the others would race to catch the leader's shadow. We managed to cover a lot of distance in a very fun way.

On past trips to Yellowstone and Alaska, to keep our crew interested in the scenery during long hikes and drives, we set rewards for spotting animals. An antelope was worth $10, and the bounty on a hard-to-find moose was $12.

The next time you plan a skiing trip to Summet County, Colo., buy your lift tickets in Denver instead of waiting until arriving at the resorts. Discounted tickets for Breckenridge, Keystone, Arapahoe Basin, Copper Mountain, and others are sold at local grocery stores and sports shops.

When heading to the beach, we put a damp washcloth in a Ziploc bag and keep it in our cooler. It's an instant refresher, and it's ideal for removing sand and saltwater residue.

Many large department and discount stores sell several styles of bicycles for kids and adults, usually costing under $100. If you're planning to stay at least a week in a destination, it might pay off to buy rather than rent. At the end of your trip, you can donate the wheels to a local thrift shop for a tax write-off.