Here's a sneak peek for this week's episode.
When you're traveling with a group of people, whether it be once or multiple times, there's always that give and take. Just give and not necessarily take because it's going to make it for a more enjoyable experience with everybody when everybody gets a little bit of what it is that they want and are looking for out of that trip.
I'm Scott.
And I'm Melissa.
And we are the Sunshine Travelers. Our passion is travel and sharing our experiences with those who enjoyed as much as we do, or those who want to learn more about travel, or even those who just want to live vicariously through our travel stories. No matter where you fall along that journey, get ready to hear about our firsthand experiences as we visit some of the most interesting and amazing places on earth. This week, we explore the topic of group travel. Melissa and I mostly travel just the two of us, so we wanted to bring in some experts to talk through the dynamics of group travel and share their experiences. They will give us some great tips on planning group travel, options for organized group travel, and a few tips to make group travel successful. One of the things we've talked to many of our friends and listeners about is traveling as a group of
to many of our friends and listeners about is traveling as a group of friends. Everyone has their preferences when it comes to travel. Some people like to get up early and see as much as they can, while others prefer to have some downtime. Some like to eat early, others like to eat late. Some like to grab a quick bite and others want a leisurely meal. Some like to have everything planned and make reservations, while others prefer to go with the flow. Then there's the topic of budget for the trip. It's one thing to travel as a couple, but adding friends to the mix and keeping everyone happy is a whole other story. Today, we're talking with a group of friends who do just that and record their experiences on a podcast. Please join me in welcoming Kim, Brittany, and Jamal, the Travel Squad podcast to our show. Welcome, guys. Hello, hello. Thanks for having us.
guys. Hello, hello. Thanks for having us. We are so excited to be here. Thank you, Scott and Melissa, for having us on this podcast today.
Yeah, it's a real honor. We're really excited to be here with you guys.
So this is the first time that we've actually talked to multiple people at the same time on our podcast. So we're really excited about this. Usually it's a one-on-one or two-on-one conversation for us. So this is going to be fun and exciting.
It is exciting. And on our end too, we don't do a lot of interviews on other podcasts. So this is special for us. Well, let's let you guys like introduce
let's let you guys like introduce yourselves, talk a little bit about you guys, and then kind of go into when and how you started traveling together as a group of friends.
So Kim and I met back when we were 12 years old. And so we've been friends for a really, really long time. And I actually met Jamal when I was 17. We worked at a Target together. And Kim was my best friend. Jamal when I was We worked 17. at a Target together. And Kim was my best friend. Jamal and I were dating. So the group of us started to hang out. But really, our relationship started to develop when we all moved down to San Diego. Because by this point, we were all adults. And we started to want to travel a little bit more. and we started to want to travel a little bit more. And Kim and for I, budget purposes, we would hike to explore places. So we did a lot of hiking. We hiked all throughout San Diego and we were just talking about all of our hiking adventures and we decided that we were gonna make it a goal to hike Machu Picchu. So we did exactly that. We hiked Machu Picchu, but we wanted to hike with, I didn't want to leave Jamal out. And of course, Kim didn't want to be a third wheel. So we invited another friend along, Jamal's sister, and we all did this great epic trip to Machu Picchu. We did the hike on the Inca Trail. And from there, our travel started. And then on a trip, Kim actually came up with the idea of the podcast.
And that Machu Picchu trip was actually my first time ever going on an international trip. I never did a lot of traveling growing up. I was 26 years old when we took that trip to Peru. And immediately after we planned another trip to Mexico City, and then it was just bang, bang, bang, trip after trip after trip for a good three years until we were in Mexico City again, and happened to start talking about this travel podcast. I had fallen in love with podcasts. As fellow podcasters yourselves, you probably listened to a lot of shows too. All day long, I listened to them. And so they were in my ear and I was like, you guys, we have to talk about this. The excitement of travel is just, it's palpable and we have to share this. And like Brittany said at the time, we weren't rich. We still aren't rich now by any means, but we were managing to go on all of these trips month after month after month, US trips, hiking trips, international trips, all of it. And so we just knew we had something we wanted to share and we did it.
Yeah. Kim was the brainchild really behind it. And I won't lie, we were at a wedding. So we were, I don't want to say inebriated, but we had a few drinks in us. So we had the liquid courage. And when Kim came up with the idea, we were all feeding off of each other saying, yeah, yeah, this is going to be great. People ask us all the time how we do it. And like Kim alluded to, I mean, obviously one of the biggest hindrance of being able to travel a lot is money, but we always had little travel hacks or certain things that we would do to save. And so we thought that would just be a great platform to tell people about it since everyone always asks us. And of course, share the fact that we're all traveling together as a group because not a lot of people really do that. And that's something that we all did that was unique. And you did it a lot
we had the
And you did it a lot too, right? So it wasn't just like, oh, this trip. I mean, it sounds like there at the beginning, like you did lots of trips together, correct?
Yeah, absolutely. So our first one that really kicked it off was to Peru where we hiked the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. And then after that convention, we went to Mexico City to visit a friend, but we also went to China together. We went to Ecuador together. We actually just got back from Costa Rica together. And then we did some domestic trips too. We went to Idaho and some other states where we road tripped around and traveled as this group. So we were trying... A lot of national
of national parks, which is a huge part of what we still talk about.
Right. Yes. I do notice that is that you guys, which is something that we want to do more of. And so like just seeing your content and having your content, listening to your content on the, you know, in the national parks is such a great resource for people, right? Because that I think that is a very popular thing within the U.S. for people to go do.
On one of our most recent podcasts, we talked about that when people ask us like, what's your favorite place you've ever visited? It's easy for us because we can spout off somewhere internationally we've traveled
to. But recently we had someone
we had someone say, what's your favorite domestic place? And we stumbled. We were like, and it's like, how can travel podcasters not be able to answer that question? But the reality was, is that we just love traveling internationally.
So on that, that you prefer international, but the U.S. is so underrated. There's so many beautiful hidden gems in this country.
Oh, absolutely. Without a doubt. There really are. And that's the thing about America. I mean, we really are a young country. So when you're comparing cities, and that's, of course, if you're thinking cities, international is the way to go, because there's hundreds, if not thousands of years of history, whereas here in the US, we don't. So kind of going back to the national parks, that's why we really love exploring America via the national parks, because you really get to see its natural beauty that way. I feel like only a handful of cities in the U.S. really have that kind of character that you could maybe find internationally. Otherwise, a city is a city here. So I don't necessarily disagree with you. Sometimes international may be better if you're going the city route.
Yeah, I absolutely agree with you. And matter of fact, we've even said like, as long as we can get out and go and, you know, we have our health and stuff like that. Like we want to go as far as we can. And then when we can't travel quite as that's when we'll go out in our backyard more often and stuff like that. far, But you're 100% correct. There's a ton of hidden gems. And that's why we like talking to fellow travelers, because you guys come and tell us about the places that you've been. And we're like, oh, yeah, now we got to add that to our list. That's something else. Yeah. And you
And you guys are avid hikers. But I wanted to just say, wow, the first international trip to Montepiccio. That's like, wow.
Jamal always gets mad at me because that's technically not true. Technically, I went from San Diego to Rosarito, which is a 30-minute drive across the border, a week before this Peru trip with a group of girls. We didn't have phones working. We had handwritten directions to where to meet our friend. So that was technically my first little teaser into it. But Jamal doesn't consider that to be true.
And he considers Peru was the real first She flew in versus Peru. Yeah. crossed the land. one. So that's the real international travel right So I'm going there. to take credit that for you.
So that's the
And ended up in Mexico. So then you said after Peru, it sounds like y'all started traveling to a lot of places So now. thinking about it like as a friend group and as like, you know, lots of people with lots of different opinions, how did you start coming up with the ideas that you named off a bunch of places of for the trips, like where to go and what you guys wanted to do? Well, I think it
I think it was a lot of different things. I think one was we would kind of throw a name of a country or state and kind of see the reactions of other people and see if anyone kind of bit. So at one point, Jamal threw out China and we're like, okay, why not? And I think it was one that just kind of landed for us all. Cause I think with us being a group of three or four, you all have your own unique opinions about where to go to next. So first, we just kind of started throwing out ideas. And then once an idea stuck, we would just stick with that for a while, but also sales. We travel on the West Coast with Southwest a lot. Southwest has a ton of sales for flights. And so I think one day we were coming off of a trip. We were in the airport. I was looking through my email. That's where we always end up booking.
we always end up booking.
And so Southwest was having a sale and I just happened to look at like trip to Boise, Idaho. And I said, you guys, this flight is so cheap. And so in that moment, we booked that next trip while we were on one.
Yeah, we talk about that a lot is that if you will, instead of picking a place where you want to go, if you'll look for those great travel deals, you can travel so much more. But if you've got in your mind a certain place that you want to go, then the cost of airfare is what the cost of airfare is going to be.
And there's always places that you're going to want to go to just book that trip. But one thing that we talk about on our podcast a lot and share is that we let the sales sometimes dictate. Like China, yeah, I wanted to go to China, but it was an international trip, flights, tours, hotel, everything if I included, remember because correctly, this was in 2017 trip, flights, tours, everything hotel, included, if I remember correctly, because this was in 2017, but I don't think it was any more than $1,200, $1,300 per person. And I said, how can you go wrong for $1,300 to get all the way to China, spend eight days there and have an amazing time seeing all the history, eating the delicious food. And then Brittany alluded to Boise.
per person.
There was a Southwest but we do that a lot sail, of times. Southwest what's the closest airport to this national park? sail, Can we find it? Are we going to be going hiking? And a lot of the times, to get back to your original question of where do we decide to go, coming off of Machu Picchu, yeah, that's a very strenuous hike, but we like to hike and we like nature and national parks. So a lot of times too, at least domestically, the choices were always geared around the national parks of where we would be going. And when we would go would really depend on the sale of the airfare when we can find it. I think that's an awesome
I think that's an awesome tip, right? Is to kind of have that list and then say, okay, when does this make sense based on the sales? We're definitely millennials because that Boise trip was not just inspired by
definitely millennials because that Boise trip was not just inspired by a sale, but it was inspired by a picture that Brittany and I saw on Instagram. People in these hot springs, they're natural hot springs, but formed pools just outside of Boise. It's snowing, but they're wearing beanies and bikinis. And we were like, we need to go to Boise for this. And we got the pick.
That's cool.
Nice. Let me just ask the question
me just ask the question is, what is your most memorable place that you guys have traveled together?
I think for me, it's the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. It's not just that we traveled there together, but we spent four days on hiking and we had never hiked. We had never backpacked. We had not camped in years. We were doing it at a high elevation. And then we were also joining, I think, four other groups or four other couples along the way. So we were completely out of our element. So to me, forming a bond with them as well as the other people we were with was so memorable. And so how did
how did that, like, what was that like? So meeting other people like on the trip and they were like hiking with you too. And so then how did that like, yeah, what was that like? That's super interesting to me.
It's something that we do a bit of actually, these guided experiences. We'll do guided tours, which is actually what we did for China. So they kind of plan everything, take care of everything, but you're with people. It was the same for Machu Picchu. We partnered with Alpaca Expeditions and we showed up and we joined a group of, I think, yeah, like six or so other couples. We were with them for the full four days. Some of them we even became such good friends with that when we were in Denver, a couple lived in Boulder. We went and had breakfast at their house and met their family. breakfast at their house and met their So even though we travel as a group family. together,
we do a lot of these group type trips that make our group And I bigger. we've had, mean, we've met friends in China that are now still traveling with us. We've met friends in
Ecuador that we keep in touch with. Very
cool. Yeah, that's really neat. Yeah. So let me just ask while we're at this point. So besides the alpaca Expeditions, is there other particular ones that you're drawn to companies that do that? Or do you just kind of look to see things that are of interest to you?
Well, Alpaca Expeditions is a specific vendor who's licensed to do the tours to Machu Picchu. In terms of guided tour companies that we use, if I'm understanding your question correctly right there, yeah, we love and use GateOne. We have only really used GateOne Travel for our group tours that we do, and I wouldn't recommend anybody else. We've always had a great experience with them. You can choose independent tours where the flights, hotels are included, but you're on your own to do whatever you want in the city that it lands you or completely fully guided, like we talked about in China or the Dalmatian coast when we've done Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro. That was a fully guided. South Africa and Zimbabwe was fully guided. GateOne has always been great. And we've met so many friends on those tours that we keep in touch with or still continue to travel with, like Kim said. There's two other companies I would toss in there that we haven't actually
other companies I would toss in there that we haven't actually used. But Here and Now Travel is another one that caters more towards people under 40-ish or so. And we can't go on that
one. They'll take any
any age. It's just you'll probably be with a bunch of youngsters. But G Adventures is another one kind of like that. I'm actually eyeing a Iceland tour with them in December. Nice. That's good to
That's good to catch some of those because we do have people that are just they want to show up and go on something. They don't want to figure it out on their own. They don't want to have to make all the arrangements. Melissa calls that me, but.
It's nice sometimes.
And then out of the three of you guys, who's the actual planner? Who's the one who spends most of their time doing all the planning, putting everything together? And how do you split that up?
I would definitely say I'm number one on planning with Kim being my backup, but I will give Jamal credit in the fact that he does all of the planning in terms of airplane, trains, transportation. He is our transportation planner. He's a driver on trips. He is a driver. But Kim and I do most of the actual planning, contributing to the Word document that we have ongoing and making sure things line up. And I'll start to list out all of our ideas of places we want to go. And then we'll start to list out all of our ideas of places we want to And then we'll go. start to segment it by days and areas. And then if usually I'll get that started first, Kim will then add on to it. And then if we have other people coming with us, usually they'll throw in an idea or two, but they're pretty laid back in the travel planning process. And then once I have that template from
once I have that template from Brittany and Kim, then I put it together to say, okay, are we taking trains if we're internationally? Or what's the best metro route? How do we get from here to there? That way, when we're already in country, I know what line we need to take from what station to what station. And it just makes it a whole lot easier. So I get the template and then I fine tune it. But really it's Kim and Brittany who are really coming up with all of the ideas of what we're gonna do.
And I would say- And Brittany's usually the one who's fulfilling the itinerary morning, noon and night. And then I go in there to say, too much hiking, we need another rooftop bar in here. We need a Thai food restaurant. We need some downtime. That's
awesome. So you actually, you were reading my mind because that was really going to be my next question is how do you balance what everybody like in your group wants to do? And then how do you balance that? Or how does that work on the tours that you do? Like, how can you like help people out? When you're on a guided tour and you're
you're on a guided tour and you're not leading the experience, how does that work out? Well, I would say when
when you're on a guided tour, it really is go with the flow. I mean, you really have no choice. So you just have to read the itinerary of the tour that you're booking ahead of time to know like, OK, we're going from hotel to hotel. We're not even staying in one place two nights in a row and it's just going to be go, go, go. Or some of them of the guided tours, they do have three days or you're only doing something for half the day. Then the other half of the day is at leisure. So you can fill that with relaxation or your own time to do something that you want, but the tour is not doing. So I would say that one's easier to balance because of that, but also harder too, because at some point you really have no choice depending on how extensive of a tour that you booked. In terms of us traveling together, I'll let one of the ladies take that question too. You know, we've kind
of developed a reputation for being travelers and planners and the people that come along on the trips with us are our other friends. They don't typically want to contribute much to it. They really want us to plan the trip and they kind of treat it as a guided tour of their own, really. I was just going to
just going to say, yeah, we often travel, as Kim mentioned, we met a couple in China who actually live in the U.S. They're from Oklahoma. So she'll throw in a, my one request is we do this. And so of course I'm going to accommodate it. But if I ask her for anything else, she's just like, whatever else you guys had planned, whatever you were thinking of doing. And she just likes to show up for the rest of the trip. Most of the time, people haven't
haven't even read the Google Doc itinerary that we put together. They just show up blind.
I will say I did. Scott has become more of a planner now. Sometimes when we have a lot going on, you know, just between podcast things and different things. And so our recent trip to Curacao, he actually planned a lot more and I got blamed for that. Did you not read that? So I totally understand that. Brittany and I will have a little bit of those bickerings too,
bit of those bickerings too, because she'll fill it with a lot of stuff and I should probably go in and look at the document. And if it happens to be a trip where I really am only driving a rental car and don't really have to worry about figuring out transportation in a city, we have that dynamic going on just as well. So Kim gets to witness it all sometimes.
So it's not always perfectly smooth sailing, right? Never is. What tip, I guess, would you have for people to be able to, you know, travel as a friend group. I liked your suggestion, Brittany, about, you know, asking or your one friend says, this is the one thing I want to do. I mean, I think that might be a great suggestion that you would say, everybody, okay, like chip in something, like what is high on your list to do? We've done that with when traveled with our, you know, our grandchildren. But like, what tip would you have for people traveling and planning a trip together?
Go ahead. Go ahead, Kim. My biggest tip would be to actually take the lead. Most people in a friend group won't actually take the lead to say, here are the dates we're going to go. Here's some hotels that we could stay in. I booked it. Who's coming? They want someone to do it and then they'll follow. And at least with the friend groups that I've traveled taking with, that first step to do then it, they'll follow. And at least with the friend groups that I've traveled with, taking that first step to put it into action gets the whole group moving.
My tip would be that to stay flexible because everyone's going to have different places they want to see or eat or activities they want to do. So I think if you're traveling with a friend group, obviously you're going to a destination hopefully you both both want to go to, or your group wants to go to and enjoy, but there has to be some flexibility. You can't just be completely hard on the schedule and not have any leeway because with reality happening, everyone's going to have a different opinion and you just have to let it flow a little bit and just kind of weave in and out of a fluid itinerary that everyone can enjoy. Because if you're traveling as a group, you want everyone to enjoy that experience. It's not just your vacation, it's their vacation too.
When you do a group travel like that, do you spend the entire time together or do you have some time set aside where like you can kind of go off and just do your own thing and let everybody have a moment where they can go their own way inside of a location?
That's a great question. We do. Sometimes we're with each other most of the time, but most often we'll have some times away from each other. For example, we had mentioned we went to South Africa. After going to South Africa, we landed in New York. We spent a few days in New York. Jamal really wanted to go to a, was it a Yankees game? I had no
Yankees game? I had
no interest. Absolutely no interest. Jamal's sister had no interest. So we decided to go grab, go to a deli and grab some ice cream and watch The Bachelor in our Airbnb while Jamal and his friend group, because we were also with another couple and they went to the game and they enjoyed it. So I'm absolutely okay with spending some alone time away from Jamal and away from whoever else we're traveling with. We were actually just in Costa Rica and Jamal and Zaina, Jamal's sister, they weren't able to make it on a hike. So Kim and I spent a girl's day just hiking out in the Costa Rican jungle and we had a great day together. Yeah, I would say if circumstances
I would say if circumstances dictate in the moment, we do exactly what Brittany mentioned. But a lot of times our time away from each other is when we are in our own rooms at night. And when we first started traveling, that wasn't even a luxury because to save money, we would always be hunkered down in the same hotel room too. So that space and luxury is something that's come with time for us. But for the most part, we have never really plugged it in to say, hey, we're going our separate ways. Unless there has been something in an itinerary on a place where we've been, where we just couldn't come to a consensus and we said, all right, we're going to do this. You guys do this. We're going to meet back up here. But that's far few in between, but it does happen. And I think that's a great tip for people
a great tip for people because you think, oh, we're doing this trip together. We literally are going to do everything together. But no, like if you had different couples, like go on a dinner date on your own, or like you said, go to a ballgame, go do an activity that you like. So I think that's a great
a great tip. And so, Jamal, one of my domestic things that's on my bucket list is to go on a, I'm a Braves fan, I want to go on a road trip with them. So like when they're doing a three-city road trip, I want to go to all the games on that three-city trip. I'm right there with you on that
trip, I want
one. I mean, you know, I'm in New York and I know at this point in time, it's not the original Yankee Stadium, but Yankee Stadium is iconic. It's like another time when we were in Chicago, I said, I have to go see a game at Wrigley Field. And I've been to Boston, but it hasn't been during baseball season. But you better believe I'm going to go see a game in Fenway one day. So I understand. I can talk
baseball all night. So why don't you guys tell us a little bit about your podcast?
guys tell us a
bit about your podcast? So not only do you travel together as a friend group, you also decided that you would, as you said, you would start capturing this in a podcast. So tell us a little bit about that. Our podcast is called Travel Squad
podcast is called Travel Squad Podcast, and our mission is to bring the excitement of travel into the podcast audio form. Back when we started, there weren't as many good podcasts as there are now. And so we were trying to listen to them and they just, they weren't capturing how exciting the anticipation of a trip coming up is, or when you come back for a trip, how you're on that high for a while. And so we wanted to bring that. And we also wanted to show people that you can work full time and you can still travel. You can have any type of a budget and you can still travel. So we wanted to give specific details on trips that we would take after work on a Friday, fly in before work on a Monday and how we would make that happen. Exactly how much we spent and how we saved money if we didn't have a big budget for it. And I think that's really been our mission over the last five years that we still hold
today. I have a colleague that one Monday morning we were talking and so I asked her what she had done over the weekend and she had actually traveled to Morocco. And I was like, you don't just travel to Morocco every weekend. I mean, what are you doing? She's like, yeah, we went to Morocco. I think maybe it was a three-day weekend for them. But Oh my gosh.
Oh my
So it sounds like that might be a little bit of what you're talking about. Maybe not quite so extreme.
it sounds like
Yeah, usually not so extreme. But you guys have the luxury of being on the East Coast. And as you guys were talking about, you prefer international travel. Well, it's so easy for you guys because you're around so many different islands. And then you're not far from Europe. Whereas for us, we have to go across the entire United States and then still go to Europe, you know. So for you guys, it's a little bit easier to do those international trips. Because we just we actually just talked about that for me to
just we actually just talked about that for me to go to the West Coast, though, I was in Las Vegas last week for work and it took all day to get there. So, you know, early my day and then get there in the afternoon. You know, we just kind of look at it as when you're going overseas like that, you're going overnight, you're going to sleep, you know, most likely overnight anyway. So it doesn't really count into that as much as like when we're traveling from the East Coast to the West Coast, and it just literally takes you all day long to get there. Yeah, that's such a great point that
you know,
such a great point that you make, Brittany, because we just don't think about that, right? We can hop to the Caribbean, we can hop to Europe a lot quicker if you're on the West Coast. That's interesting. At some point
in the near future, I'm going to move to Florida and then I'll be following in your footsteps with all of the Caribbean travel.
It really is. I tell you, you know, I don't know if you have a certain place that you're looking at to move, maybe be closer to a hub type airport, because for us, we actually have to travel like to either Atlanta or New York to get to South Florida. So you might want to keep that in mind when you're looking.
want to
That's true. If you have a choice. But we have found the good thing is even though now we have a connection airport, if we use things like points and stuff like that, thankfully, it's sometimes even cheaper than it was to fly out of Atlanta. And that was something that we weren't That was expecting. actually a surprise to us.
So that's been a nice perk. Yeah, nice little perk. So going back to the podcast, you guys, you started your travels in what, your five years into it now? Five years into
into the podcast, traveling together, we're going on eight or nine, if I'm doing quick math correct in my head. So long time.
That's great. In the podcast, do you guys focus on any specific areas or you're just documenting kind of what you do?
So I think our podcast, we try to capture as much as we can travel wise. So we will follow all of our trips, whether they be international, domestic, or hiking trips to national parks. We also like to do roundups, best cities to visit in summer or best destinations to visit in certain seasons, certain months. Sometimes we'll focus on the credit card aspect of things. Sometimes we'll have guests on who specialize in different departments of the travel industry. So we just try to capture as much as we can travel-wise. We've always put
We've always put out a Travel Tuesday episode weekly, and those are typically 30 minutes to an hour long. And then more recently, we started putting out mini episodes on Fridays that are about 15 minutes or 10 minutes long that are more of those quick hits, like five apps you should have on your phone when you travel or 10 medications you should always travel with. So we have a lot of stories about not having medications or needing medications when you're traveling. So little things like that, just kind of bonus episodes that aren't necessarily documenting trips that we've taken, but still adding value to the traveler.
Where would you say, so for a lot of our listeners, like this will be the first time that they've heard of Travel Squad Podcast. So where would you have them start maybe in your podcast lineup to kind of get a feel for who you are or like how could they kind of find content that they might be interested in? I think
our website would be the best place to search for it. Travel Squad podcast dot com slash episodes. There's a search bar in there, so you can search destinations that maybe you're interested in traveling to. That's actually how most people find us, right, guys? People are going on a trip. They're searching in Spotify. They come across our
are going
show, but you can do the same on our website. Everything is categorized there. We also have different categories for national park trips, international trips, US trips, or tips. So you can kind of just see what pops up when you click on the category too.
And that's perfect because if you are looking then for hiking destinations and you guys advice, like that would be, you guys would be totally the place to go for that. Because that's not, we haven't done, you know, besides just little short hikes. So, you
know, a friend recently said to us that she wasn't really into podcasts because she feels like she has to start at the very beginning. And I thought that was really interesting because although some podcasts are like a series, a lot of travel podcasts aren't necessarily. And I told her, why don't you just pick up where you find an interesting episode and then just bounce around in that? And I think that can be said for most travel podcasts. You don't have to start at the very beginning. If you see something that was just aired a week or two ago, and that's what really captures you, listen there and then go back into the archive to see what else there is that captivates you.
I think that that's such a great point. So if somebody is on your website've
taken, the exact same trip that we have a podcast on, we have built out these PDF itinerary guides on them. For longer trips, like a week or two weeks, they could be 30 pages long. And it takes you through where to fly into, what to do on day one, morning, afternoon, night, where to stay, where to eat, everything we did basically with the learnings that we had, how much it costs, squad tips, like buy your tickets early because the line is long. And we have quite a few of those now that some are paid that you can download for anywhere between $10 and $30, depending on the trip. So very, very affordable. But we also have a ton of free itineraries that Brittany has been doing so much work to develop so that anyone can download. But Brittany has been doing so much work to develop so that anyone can download.
so that anyone can download. And those free itineraries are for the like one two days in a major city doing just a quick little guide. shorter, day, U.S. something, So those are little teasers for people to just, find one, some good stuff to but really do, see the meat and potatoes of what are going to be in those other itineraries for those longer trips that we have more internationally or week-long road trips that we've things done, of that nature. It's almost like you're on the group trip with us because we are doing
longer trips that we have more internationally or week-long road trips that we've things done, of that nature. It's almost like you're on the group trip with us because we are doing all the planning for you and all you have to do is show up and have fun.
And then they can listen to the corresponding podcast episode, right? To kind of like hear about that trip and then have that. That's awesome. And because I think that is a big hurdle for people is not like knowing where to even start when planning a trip. So you'll have done a lot of the work.
And that's sort of what we've been doing for a really long time is, you know, we would get the Rick Steves guide. We would read that and then we would listen to, you know, something that he had recorded on that. And so between what he had written in the guide and what he was saying in the audio, that's really how we got started.
That's awesome. Now look at us. So we kind of teased this before, but let's come back around and talk a little bit about budget. Because when you're traveling with different groups of people, so how do you make that piece of groups of people, so like, how do you make that piece of it work? Especially if people want to do like credit card points and miles and rewards and stuff like that. I think you two would be
you two would be way better to answer this one than me.
Well, in all honesty, sometimes we have not really talked about a budget because if we're doing it we have not really talked about a budget because if we're doing it a lot of times, domestically, a lot of us will fly And for a very long time while Southwest. we were traveling together, Kim was still in San Diego before she moved to Austin. So whatever the flight cost was for Kim, it was the same for us and we knew it. And if it was going to be expensive, then we weren't going to do it or pivot to something else. Now that we're in different cities and trying to meet up somewhere when we get together, it's kind of harder because then we'll say to ourselves, well, the flight for us is not very cheap during this day. It's better here. We'll see how it matches and we'll try to coordinate that way. But in terms of an overall budget for a trip, it's never really spoken because sometimes a lot of our bigger international ones are the guided tours, which usually give you a lot more bang for your buck. So we have been fortunate enough in our travel group to avoid that. Now, that's not to say that the topic of budget doesn't come up, because if we've taken a few too many trips recently or in the year, so to speak, and one of us throws out an idea, we'll say, hey, we can't swing that right now. How about this? And then we'll do it as a pivot or postpone that trip to be at a later time.
I also think too, when we're in the planning process, if Kim, for example, says, I want to stay at the Atlantis in Dubai, we're going to see, is that possible? And can we all make that happen? But I think in terms of budgeting, our friend group, we're all on the same level where we don't want to go super cheap, but we're also not going to go super expensive unless we have a specific reason to do so. And if we do have a specific reason to do so, then we'll try to fit it in even if it's just for one night. So who's the most bougie out of the
So who's the most bougie out of the travel group? Well, that's easily going to be
to be Kim. There's no denying that. Although in fairness to Kim, in fairness to Kim, you know, she mentioned earlier that Brittany's the one putting jam pack from morning, noon and night, something in there. And on our last trip that we all took together to Costa Rica, we were staying at some really nice hotels, resort hotels. And again, those were included with our guided package with Gate One. It wasn't a guided tour, but they pieced together the hotels and everything like that. And I started to have the epiphany like Kim and say, man, as I'm getting older here, I need more downtime. I need to really enjoy these resorts. I told Brittany next time she's really out of luck here. We're slowing it down a little bit. So those conversations are teased and it will probably come into practice on the next couple of trips where we find that good balance of everybody getting what they want to some degree. But Kim is the bougie one, but Jamal's following right behind her on that. Well, I think you've taught us
taught us something. We have not done a lot of these, you know, planned trips, you know, the booked tours or that kind of thing. Although I do get a lot of the emails, just like all the flight deals and the hotel deals. And some of them, it's like, wow, that really, you know, including the airfare, that can be a really great deal. So we're definitely going to check out. I'll put a link to some of those in the show notes. We're definitely going to check those out, but that's a great point. That can be a great way to say, okay, like we kind of know going in, right? Everything's planned. Here's the price of the trip. Can you make it? And my
my advice is absolutely do it because in, was it 2017 Africa? 2018.
2018.
2018. So this was at the very early stages of my travels and my travel budget was a lot smaller than it is now. Africa was quite expensive of a tour, somewhere around $5,000 for the gate one week and a half tour. And so I doubted myself and I decided not to go. And to this day, it is the biggest regret that I have in my life because I could have, say, irresponsibly, quote unquote, charged it to a credit card. And today I would have had that paid off and I would have those memories and I wouldn't have that regret. So that's my philosophy with budgeting is just do it and you'll figure it out. I think there's some truth.
some truth. Yeah, I definitely think
Yeah, I definitely think there's some truth to that. Yeah.
Especially because we like to focus on the memories, right? It's the memories that we're creating. And it's the whole reason that we do a podcast. We've said before that if no one ever listened to a word of our podcast that we published out there, that's not But if no one ever we're capturing in our own words, thankfully, true. did, in our own voices, the memories that we've created through our travels. And so that's irreplaceable. You know, our family, our kids, our grandkids, their kids, you know, whatever, will have these stories that we tell about our travels right from our own mouths. And so I think creating the memories is a huge part of what we are all doing when we travel. Creating the memories while traveling,
the memories while traveling, but what you said, I wholeheartedly agree because I've said that a million times is my favorite thing about the podcast other than really helping people learn to travel better, give them tips, advice, etc. It's really the fact that when I'm old and gray, I will have digital audio to go back and listen to, to re-listen to my trips, bring back those memories and family, kids, anybody else, they have that same opportunity. And my story or our story really lives forever. So we have three questions that we
questions that we want to ask each of you that we kind of wrap up with. But first, I just wanted to see, is there any other tips or advice or anything else that you want to share about traveling together or just about your podcast in general?
I would say when you're traveling with a group of people, there always has to be give and take. There's been lots of times where Kim has suggested something, maybe more on the bougie end that we didn't want to do, but we're all on the trip together and she needs to have her opportunity where I't want to but do, we're all on the trip together and she needs to have her opportunity where I've wanted to do stuff and everybody has catered to me to do it. So when you're traveling with a group of people, whether it be once or multiple times, there's always that give and take. Just give and not necessarily take because it's going to make it for a more enjoyable experience with everybody when everybody gets a little bit of what it is that they want and are looking for out of that
trip. I'll add on to that too. I think that traveling as a group sometimes has a negative cloud over it. People think we're going to fight or we're going to get tired of each other, but actually I feel quite the opposite. Even if those things do occur on one-off basis, feel quite the opposite. Even if those things do occur on one-off basis, my friendship with these two would never have been as strong as it is today had we not been traveling so much together. And then of course, have this podcast together. I mean, Brittany and I have been friends since we were 12, but we've never been better friends than we are today. And my friendship with Jamal as well. So travel can really, really bring you together and keep you together as friends.
Well, great. Let's jump into these are the same questions we ask all of our guests. So the first is, what's the favorite place you've ever visited?
visited? Oh, that's such a good question. I love this question. For me, I would have to say Uganda. I don't know if you guys have been at all, but we got to experience land safari, river safari, and then jungle safaris and jungle treks, hiking to see chimpanzees and mountain gorillas in the wild. So that's got to be my number one place that I visited. We're
We're doing our first trip to Africa in October of this year. And so where are you guys going to? We're starting in Cairo and going to do Giza first. Then we'll travel to Kenya and do a 10-day safari. Then we're going to leave from there and go to South Africa, down to Cape Town. I'm super
super excited for you guys. You guys are going to have a blast. Africa might be my favorite continent as a whole. But to not be repetitive and say Uganda also, which is top on my list as well, not necessarily number one. It's give and take, right? Is it nature or is it city? And I know we had that conversation earlier, but I'm going to have to go with Japan. Japan's probably been one of my favorite countries that I've ever visited for the food, the sites, the history, the culture, the people, some of the most friendly in the world, cleanliest cities I've ever been in, Japan, top of my list for sure. Did you have a favorite
Did you have a favorite place in Japan?
I would have to say Osaka was maybe my favorite because I'm a foodie and that's a foodie place in Osaka. But Kyoto, you get that classical architecture and it's really not a metropolis at all. I mean, there's 1.4 million people in there, but there's no skyscrapers. You really have that classic Japan. So it's tough. I can't say one or the other, but if I'm going to go off of food and just have to give an answer, I'll go with Osaka. That's consistent with what
That's consistent with what we heard this past weekend from someone who just returned. Kim, what about you? My
what about you? My favorite country is Thailand. I didn't go with these two. I went with a group of another three other people and we spent about 11 days there going through the Southern Islands, Bangkok. All of it was amazing, beautiful, really, really good food, extremely affordable, nice people, lots of tourists there. I like the cherry on top of this trip was the full moon party on Copenhagen. And I'm so glad I did this in my 20s because I don't think I could hang now in my 30s, but it was epic and I'll never forget
it. So what's still on your bucket list? For me, Antarctica. I really want to make it to Antarctica and do a cruise out there. That's just going to be the icing on the cake. I mean, that's most likely the last continent that somebody needs to hit if they've been to six other ones. It's probably Antarctica. And one of these days I'm going to make it. That's for
for sure. So we're trying to organize a listener cruise to Antarctica for 2026. Well, sign us up for that because if that's the case, you guys come and go with which us, it's funny because I think it because if that's the case you guys come and go with us which it's funny because i think it's like
if that's the case, you guys come and go with which us, it's funny because I think it because if that's the case you guys come and go with us which it's funny because i think it's like that's the one place that any guests that we've talked to that we talk about and so i think all of our guests on our podcast are going to be hopefully be on the anarctica cruise with us yeah
excellent well i'm looking forward to it keep us posted on when it's happening i've been actually eyeing new Zealand
it's happening i've been actually eyeing new Zealand a lot recently. I would love to go to both the North and South Islands, more particularly the South Island because it's more known for its hiking, the glaciers that go in there, the wildlife that you can see, the landscapes are amazing. And you could spend easily three weeks exploring New Zealand. So I would love to go there. My bougie side is going to come out when I say
out when I say this, but my next place I really, really want to go is the South of France. I want to go to Nice. I want to go to Saint-Tropez. I want to be on the beach, on a daybed, drinking cocktails by the ocean. Doesn't sound bougie to me. That sounds like a great
Doesn't sound bougie
a great trip. and then i guess finally is
then i
finally is where are you guys going next so jamal and i are actually headed to iceland
and i are actually headed to iceland we leave on the fourth of july we're gonna spend seven days exploring the southern parts of iceland doing a lot of hiking and doing a zodiac boat on a lagoon it's on our
bucket list. It definitely
definitely is, yes. And the reason, the only reason that we haven't done New Zealand, of course, Australia, because again, so for us, then we have to go across the United States, right? To do that is we need the three weeks or like you mentioned, right? To make that trip worthwhile.
But it's something that's got to happen. And matter of fact, I keep saying we've got to do it before we do Antarctica because I really wanted Antarctica to be my last continent.
Makes sense. A lot of people do consider it the last continent they visit. So you got to make that happen soon for your cruise. That's
true. We have a way of figuring out how to fit a lot of travel into unplanned time. So while they are in
they are in Iceland, I'm going to be going on a Mexican Riviera cruise with my family and a huge group that we're going with. It goes out of Long Beach to Cabo, Puerto Verde, and Mazatlan. Those are
all, that's an area that we really want to explore. We've spent a good bit of time in Cancun and that, you know, Riviera Maya area, but we would love to explore more of Mexico.
If you need tips, let us know. We've been all over Mexico. That sounds
good. Well, and that's what I was going to say. So now we have lots of, we've been told that, you know, once you do a safari, like it's kind of like an addiction. So we'll have to go check out, you know, your content on Uganda and any of these other places, right? Before we plan our travels.
I would recommend Uganda be the next one because what you just said is very true. One safari and you have the itch and you just want to keep on going on them and you'll have a great time in Uganda.
Yeah, that one sounds amazing.
So Kim, Brittany, Jamal, thank you for coming on our show. And for all of our listeners, go check them out. They're the Travel Squad podcast.
And tell us, besides your website, besides the podcast, where else can people find you and connect with you on social media? We are Travel
are Travel Squad podcast on all the socials.
Well, thank you guys. Thanks so much for having us.
so much for having us.
Yes, thank you. Have you ever had
had that discussion, Melissa, with a group of friends that in something like, we should all do a trip together sometime?
Yes, and it's just so hard to get everybody to commit, right, to a date. I mean, sometimes just even as hard as, you know, planning to go out to dinner. It's just hard to nail that down and make that plan. So that's why we wanted to bring the travel squad onto our show and share their experiences and how they consistently make that travel happen. And even now, so many years later, they're still traveling together.
Yeah, I mean, I thought it was interesting. They do some travel on their own and stuff like that. So there's a good mix. But it sounds like they're still doing a number of trips together. Good But it sounds mix. like they're still doing a number of trips together.
Yeah. Like Kim and Brittany said, like they make a point to do that once a year trip. And I think often when we just get so busy and it's just hard to get everybody's schedules. But just that tip of saying somebody taking the lead. Right. And here's that tip of saying here is here's the date and making that plan happen and saying who's in, who's out. And this time we were so, really Melissa, having a hard time coming up with the right the date and making that plan happen and saying who's who's out.
plan happen and saying who's who's out. in, And so, Melissa, this time we were really having a hard time coming up with the right title for this episode.
Yeah. So I see a lot of reels on social media that are like, you know, when the girls trip gets out of the group chat or when the group trip gets out of the group chat. And so it just kind of reminded me of that is is just that concept of, you know, and of course, then those reels will show like what happened and, you know, the fun experiences and stuff like that that you can have once somebody takes the lead. Right. And gets that ball rolling. And then everyone says that this is just more important to us than whatever else we may have going on.
important to us than whatever else we may have going on. Well, I think there were some really good tips that they mentioned in the interview that we might want to highlight. So the first one was that they look for sales and they let that guide their next trips. Yeah. And that's something that we have talked about a
something that we have talked about a lot. Right. And a huge tip for if you want to travel more affordably, have that list of places that you might be interested in going. And then when you see that great deal that you hop on. So I think that's a great tip for a group trip. And then they even talked about how, well, how do they make that work with people in different cities and, you know, just everybody kind of keeping an eye on what they can make work. Matter of
Matter of fact, there's a ton of huge sales going on right now, both airfares and hotels that, you know, if you're out there watching this, man, there's some amazing trips that you could be taking.
Yeah. And if you keep an eye on things like Thrifty Traveler and Going, a lot of times I'll see those deals pop into my inbox and I'll share those on Instagram stories and stuff like that. So we're going to put a link to those in the show notes. It might just be something that if you are not familiar with that and aware of that, that can be a great way to just kind of keep an eye on that. And if you, you know, as you're looking in your inbox and a good thing to remember about those airfare deals is that if you book a flight a lot of people think you know airfare is never refundable but it is for 24 hours and so you know hop on those deals and then just see what you can make work out yeah as a
a matter of fact i saw one sale yesterday. It was Virgin Atlantic. And this was a miles deal, right? So for people spending their miles, $6,000 from the U.S. to the U.K. 6,000 points. 6,000 points. Sorry.
Yeah. But that's, I mean, that's really inexpensive. And that's economy.
economy. So, you know, you're not going to fly up front for 6,000 points. However, for only like 28,000 or almost 29,000 points, you could fly first class.
Yeah, that's pretty incredible.
So there are some really good deals out there. Stay on top of them. Follow our social media because Melissa will post some of those great deals out there. Just look to see what's on sale. And then when you find a great deal, jump on it and then book your trip. Another thing that they mentioned was they found that guided trips work for them and can really be a good value for their money. Yeah. And I also
And I also keep an eye on these. I have several different ones that I look at from time to time and they gave a couple of great suggestions, which we're also going to link ones that they talked about. But yeah, looking at those, like you just couldn't set up that kind of trip for what they, what they charge and the way that they're probably able to do that, right. Is because they, you know, have it as a group. And then they've negotiated these rates and stuff like that. But it can be, I mean, they did some fantastic trips. They talked about going to China, Montepiccio.
Africa.
And Africa as well. And so taking a look at that. So, I mean, just not always thinking, oh, we can't, you know, this isn't affordable and we can't go to all these places.
Yeah. I want to say that the China trip was like $1,500 or something like that. Yeah. I think
I think it was less than that. So. Yeah. So that's pretty
So that's pretty amazing. And then if you've got that group of friends that have been talking about a trip for several years now, Kim's advice was really just take the lead and go get it planned. You know, stop waiting. And sometimes that first step is all that's needed to get the ball rolling. And that's absolutely
true. And here's the thing about that is that everybody who is in the group, let's say everybody can't plan that trip. Like it's never going to get planned. We talked about that when we recently traveled with our daughter and her family is that they kind of said, here's what we would like to do. And we are more of the trip planners. And so we really kind of took the lead on, you know, working out the details of the hotels or the Airbnbs, the vacation rentals, the trains, that kind of thing. I mean, they had booked the main thing, which is the airfare to and from, but somebody has to say, this is what we're going to do. And this is probably a good time to reference back to our trip planning episode, which was episode 20, how to plan a trip step by step. And so it's a part of a group, like somebody might be good at finding the hotels and enjoy that. Somebody might be good at finding the activities. If not, I mean, one person might want to do all of that, but that could be a great way to kind of split up, you know, for time wise or for people's skills or, you know, whatever is kind of kind of splitting that up.
Yeah, that was one of the things I really liked about what they were talking about is, you know, Brittany and Kim spend most of the time, I think, thinking about the trip and what they want to do and stuff like that. Then they take that and they hand it over to Jamal and are like, okay, make this happen from a travel perspective.
Yeah, the transportation. Because that's one thing that I always tell you, hey, rent a car for such and such, right? Or let's make sure we've got the inner trains or that kind of thing. Yeah, so they even talked about how they split up those duties.
And kind of on that, you were talking about the trip that we did with our kids. And, you know, I thought Jamal made a great point where he said, got to be some give and take.
Yeah, absolutely. And we haven't really talked a lot about that yet. So we're going to have an episode to come. So stay tuned for that. But one of the ways that we also did that, that I thought about as we were interviewing them was that we would take turns because we had kids on this trip, right? So we would take turns kind of letting them go out, right? And then there was some times that we went out and did our own things. We met some friends in London and we had another like date night just for us. And so that kind of gave us a chance to do our own thing. And then that gave them a chance to have just their family, right? Having a couple of evenings just with them and kind of doing their own thing without us tagging along. So don't think that just because you have this group trip, like they were saying, you have to spend every time together and you have to do every meal That's together. a great way you go to, out to know, dinner you have to on, spend every time together and you have to do every meal together. That's a great way to, you know, go out to dinner on, you know, your own, just one couple or something like that.
But if you do and you, you know, you just find that it's easy to spend all the time together and to do everything together, that's fine too. And that's the beauty of travel is it's whatever is good for you, not necessarily just the way that we do it.
Absolutely.
It's always fun to hear the experiences of other travelers. Melissa and I spend quite a bit of our time when out and about talking to people about their travels. Some have a tremendous amount of experience and are just waiting for that next adventure. Others have a deep wonderlust to travel but just more, don't know where to start. And that's why we love bringing this content to you every week. Whether it's our firsthand experiences or seeking the knowledge of others like the Travel Squad, we desire to help you travel more and better. Do you have a memorable experience traveling with the group? Email us scott at sunshinetravelers.com and let us know. We are always inspired by your travel stories.
We hope you enjoyed this episode and found some inspiration to help you with your travel journeys. If you could take a moment to leave us a review on your favorite podcast platform, it would be greatly appreciated. Your five-star reviews help us get discovered by others and possibly featured on your favorite platform. Thank you.
