The Fin Forum

Although the economy is in the tank, I figure we need to carve out some money for a little vacation once in awhile. I spent some time doing research to see if I can arrange a nice trip while saving money in the process. There are a bunch of major travel websites offering nice travel deals to a lot of destinations.

Basically, in addition to finding the best price for airfare, car rental and hotel, it is important that you to use a travel website that has a reputation for providing a trouble-free vacation.  It also occurred to me that I should find a place where I can find good prices on travel costs, and maybe where I could drive my own car to save even more. Southern California certainly fits that description.

You’ll find a bunch of information and advice related to Southern California at the SoCal Vacation Guru website.  It presently places most of its attention on Los Angeles and Orange County, with a modest but growing emphasis on San Diego County and San Bernardino and Riverside Counties. You will find a lot of information and tips at the SoCal Vacation Guru related to the beaches, Universal Studios, Disneyland, shopping, Knott’s Berry Farm and other attractions.

The SoCal theme parks include Disneyland (with Disney’s California Adventure), Knott’s, Six Flags Magic Mountain, Universal Studios Hollywood, SeaWorld and Legoland. Of course visiting all of those would not be particularly cheap, but you could fit a lot of vacation fun into a short period of time. If your budget allows in this slow economy, you can probably find some great hotel deals, with many hotel operators and other vacation businesses really looking for your patronage.

In slow economic times the theme parks tend to offer more discounts, as to the museums and other activities. Rather than flying to your vacation destination, you may find that, even with the crazy behavior of gasoline prices recently, you can save money by driving to Southern California this year.