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Have you ever dreamed of traveling to an exotic location? Many people have but not everyone actualized their hope of riding a riverboat down the Nile, exploring the back roads of Burma, attending the Ice Festival in Sapporo, Japan, or touring the Louvre in Paris. What does it take to make your dreams a reality? Inspiration is step one because without it, you won’t feel the motivation to plan, finance, and prepare for your dream vacation. The good news is that by following several very realistic guidelines, it is not beyond your reach to get from here to there to your special destination.

 

What does inspiration lead to? In this case, it gives you the strength, dedication, discipline, and perseverance to sit down and do the hard work of long-term budgeting, planning, bargain-hunting, and logistical preparation that a dream trip calls for. Here are the five core components for turning your goals into a real-life vacation.

 

 

Step one is getting your personal spending under control. Note that control entails two things, which are identifying exactly what each expense category is and setting its limit. For example, if you are thinking about applying for an education loan, you can use a student loan repayment calculator to figure what your monthly payment would be. This is a smart way to not only categorize a particular expense but to set its amount to a finite dollar value. You can do the same with things like utilities by enrolling in average-pay plans. People often focus on cutting monthly budgets and completely lose sight of the need to also set exact amounts for spending categories in order to eliminate variation. Once you do set all those limits and name each expense, your monthly spending will be on track.

 

 

Inquire at your destination country’s embassy about getting a cultural, rather than a tourist, visa. Not all nations offer them. The advantage lies in the fact that you can usually stay longer when you visit, have access to discounted airfare, and have the chance to visit many historic locations that are closed to regular tourist travelers.

 

 

Leave nothing to chance. When you begin to plan your journey, make a detailed timeline, week by week, of each milestone. Include events like document preparation, hotel arrangements, and anything that happens between now and the day you depart. Be sure to put targeted savings goals for each month-end so you’ll have a way to see if you are ahead of schedule or behind.

 

 

Some travelers start with three or four dream trips in mind and then compare prices to see if any are out of reach or might be special bargains. For example, every few years, nations like Vietnam, Japan, Germany, Ireland, and a few African nations offer special deals for visitors in the way of free hosted tours, discounted hotel, and more.

 

 

Once you decide on your itinerary, find out how far in advance you can purchase air tickets to snag a discount. Airlines are fickle and change their specials on a whim, so remember to call around and see if you can lock in an advance booking discount.