24-YEAR-OLD MANAGES TO TRAVEL AROUND THE WORLD UNDER $1000

A simple term ‘vacation’ can bring a smile to your face. In today’s time, it has become a luxury. Every day, we hold our phones in our hands and go through our social media feeds. And watching our friends or family members traveling places makes us want to do the same. Then why don’t we do it? The mere thought of taking a vacation, bombards us with so many things, like, budget, time, how to proceed and where to go? Argh! You get the gist, right?

But there are some travelers who surpass every problem that they face ahead of them. All they want to do is travel. You should definitely read about this 24-year-old free soul who traveled so many places under $1000. Yes, you read it right. We swear to you we are not making this up. How did she manage to visit so many places in $1000? Was she traveling alone or with someone? It is impossible to travel for under $1000. Wait, wait, all your questions and thoughts will be answered. Just have patience and get ready to be inspired by her. Make sure you take notes because this is not only an article but a guide that will help you plan out your pending vacation. It is about time.

Let The Trip Begin…

She boarded the plane from New York to Vancouver to Hong Kong to Bali. She spent around 26 hours on the plane to reach her destination. We all know how tiring a journey can be. Sure, airplanes have reduced the distance between places but jetlag, they are annoying, right? We bet, this girl here will change your views about jetlag.
As we already told you that she was on the plane for 26 hours and landed in Bali. Imagine about her jetlag situation. She was aware that she didn’t have enough time to rest, so she just decided to do what she came for. Travel, explore and have fun with all the time she has in her hand. Four days.

Where Next? What Next?

She only had four days to enjoy Bali, but she managed it well. She went surfing in Kuta, did some partying in Seminyak, enjoyed the beautiful sunset at Balangan Beach, and bathed under the famous waterfalls of Ubud. She did this all and spent less than $1000. She had everything planned out. She googled out every interesting place that one should visit in Bali. And because she knew how effectively she can spend her 4-days vacation on a limited budget, she chose only the best places.

All About Bali

She has written everything about Bali on her blog that she manages. She wrote, “There is simply nothing like a Balinese sky around 5 PM.” The above image is of her enjoying the beautiful sunset. She even tells us about the local people from Bali,” I still feel that Balinese people are the kindest in the world.”

A beautiful place with beautiful people, what else you need? Just don’t rush yourself into packing your bags. Where are you gonna stay? Let us help you out.

Perfect Stay

She tells about this island of Bali which is the southern city of Nusa Dua. “The first time I visited in 2016, my time on the Southern tip was limited yet I instantly fell in love with it. A year after my first trip to Bali, I came back to stay at the Ritz-Carlton in Nusa Dua – a spectacular property and quite honestly my favorite Ritz-Carlton that I’ve stayed at to date.”

So now you know where to plan your next vacation and where to stay. She was on the plane for 26 hours and spent 4-days in Bali in an awesome hotel and all under $1000. How? We will not hide a single detail. We want you to have a perfect vacation just like her. Keep reading.

Girls Just Want To Have Fun

You may wonder, how did this girl do all of this? Let us tell you, that she is not a travel writer or a glamorous jet-setter. She’s a 24-year old financial analyst working at an e-commerce and postage supply company. Shocked? Not your fault. We were too. She has made traveling her life’s goal and too without spending a whole lot of money. And just by looking at the image we think she is doing an incredible job fulfilling her travel goals and dreams. What do you think?

Who Is She?

You all must be excited to know about her, life and how did she do it? This free-spirited and dream achiever is Elona Karafin. Just like her present life, her past is also very inspiring and motivating. She overcame a very dark phase of life and here she is today, working, independent, and traveling all around the globe.

The Globetrotter

A true New Yorker that she is. But her love for traveling can be seen from the list of places that she has been to. The list includes Sri Lanka, Iceland, Mongolia, Belize, Puerto Rico, Paris, Portugal, and many other places. Even when she is tight on a budget she doesn’t drop the idea of traveling, but in that case, she decides to travel domestic. And the best part is, every time she visits a place she writes about it in her blog. Perfect!

Real Motive to Motivate

You must have come across a so-called traveler, who clicks photos of themselves with a beautiful place in the background and writing a philosophical quote, like, “I belong here”. Okay! Then stay and don’t come back. Jokes aside, Karafin had a real motive. She doesn’t want to show off and make people jealous. What she wants is to tell people that they can travel on a budget too. And all her traveling pictures prove that. So what’s your excuse?

No Time To Waste

When Karafin was 10, she got very sick. She was diagnosed with bone cancer. She spent two years in treatments, and today, you all can see she is perfectly healthy and active. This experience taught her about the real meaning of life. “I don’t want to waste away my youth and I don’t want others to waste away their youth and I don’t want them to do it because people think they don’t have enough money or enough time,” she explains. So what’s her mantra?

Money’s Not An Issue

If it is money that stops you from traveling then trust us when we say this, Karafin doesn’t have a solid financial background like most people have. “I work a full-time job and I’m fresh out of college, so I’m not exactly making the big bucks,” she says. But she didn’t let money become a problem. “People around me, people my age or people older, everyone is dealing with something that stops them from doing what they want to do.” She didn’t let life win then and not even today. She turned the tables around.

Every Hour Counts

The first thing that you should note down, it is never about the number of days you have for a vacation. Karafin has visited all sorts of places. In Amsterdam, she spent two days and still has a lot to tell about her experience on her blog. Even when she visited Dubai she spent only four days there. She recalls about a sudden plan where she spent only eight hours in Poland, “I surprised my best friend for her birthday, I flew out on a Saturday.” Isn’t she amazing? Traveling all around with so much ease. You can too.

Her Trip To Bermuda

If you are living in New York and planning to take a trip, then Karafin has a perfect destination for you, Bermuda. It’s just one and a half hours from New York and has some beautiful beaches comparable to the Maldives and the Exumas ( we are not kidding). She described it all in her blog. The best attraction of this place is the Horseshoe Bay Beach. If you are one of those people who doesn’t have time for vacation, then my friend this place is calling you. Don’t wait and book your tickets. We also have a few tips for you if want to book cheap tickets. To know about that keep reading.
Trust us, these tips from Karafin will save you a lot of money.

The Beautiful Bahamas

What if we tell you that you can experience the Maldives even if you are not in the Maldives. Doesn’t make any sense, right? When Karafin visited the Bahamas she recalls, “Well, while the beaches in the Maldives remain one of the most sought-after and luxurious destinations in the world, I was pleasantly surprised to find quite the resemblance in the beaches in the Bahamas. For a lot less money, too.” So you get the crux of the story.

Why The Blog?

Karafin started her blog to prove to people, that, yes even you can travel the globe, even you have a regular job and life. In her blog, Elona the Explorer, she has made traveling so much fun and exciting that after reading it you will have this urge of getting out of your house, leaving everything behind and just travel all you can. When was the last time you had a perfect vacation? Keep thinking because people do have a vacation but not like Karafin has. She has provided us with plenty of traveling hacks that can come in handy. We all are busy and we don’t get time to read the blogs but in this article, we have made your work easy as we are giving you all the traveling tips in one place. Read them and start planning your next trip.

You Can Do It Too

Karafin has explained the thought of being busy is just in your head, she says, “You have time. You can make time. Even the busiest people in the world, they have time,” she explained. “That’s why I focus so much on weekend trips.”
Do you get it? Even if you are the busiest of all, still you can take out time. You can always plan your trip on weekends. That’s not bad, right? Let us tell you how?

Flying On A Budget

Karafin suggests that looking for affordable flights is important when you’re on a budget. And she has got some pretty awesome suggestions on you can book cheap tickets. She uses this trick all the time. Firstly, when she is looking for tickets she makes sure that she has disabled the cookies on her browser so sites won’t calculate the airfare cost based on previous purchases (genius!). “They assume that’s what you’re willing to pay,” explains Karafin. Ready for the second trick?

Be Spontaneous

Everyone has a list of destinations written on the piece of paper, diary or it could be in your mind right now. But Karafin recommends that you should consider destinations that you have never thought of. And why is that? You ask. Because you can get cheap airfare tickets plus an affordable vacation. That’s nice. “I use websites that allow me to put ‘everywhere’ as a destination, and New York as my origin,” Karafin explains. But research has always been her first priority.

The More You Know

Karafin spends a lot of time on her personal research. She keeps on researching until she doesn’t find affordable flights and accommodations. She even asks for help when required. “I visit many blogs for tips and message the blogger with questions.” She also uses Excel to keep a tab on her research that later comes in handy. What next?

You Should Always Plan Ahead

Planning out things is a good idea even if you are making short trips. But you should also have a Plan B in case the unexpected happens. You should never book your tickets in advance because you might miss out a better deal. “I try to meet locals right away. If I’m sitting at a restaurant, I ask the waiter/waitress, what’s the best way to get into a sight or an attraction,” says Karafin. Not only she tells you how to save on traveling but she also has some other ideas. Check them out.

Save As Much As Possible

If you also wish to travel as often as Karafin does, you have to start spending less on your regular life. She is a financial analyst and she’s got some really good ides, like depositing some of your money into a savings account that has high-interest rates return. She doesn’t just buy stuff, she waits for it to go on sale. Even she has a regular job and knows how to live on a budget. But the real question is, how does she do this?

Work And Play The Right Way

As we have already told you that Karafin has a full-time job. What she does is that she accumulates all her paid vacation days per year and then uses them very wisely to have a perfect vacation. “Many people think that taking time off is frowned upon in a corporate environment,” she explains, “I tackle this misconception by working really hard and constantly asking for new projects and tasks to take on. The latter proves that I am serious about my work.” Even her time management is a must read.

She Manages Time Wisely

Karafin combines all her paid leaves with her weekends that makes it easier to travel and have a tension free vacation. “I take two, three days off at a time and combine them with a weekend, creating a long weekend,” she says. That’s how she managed her Bali trip that too under $1000 where she spent only 4 days but she had the best time of her life. But you know what is more beautiful than visiting these places, it is the beautiful and soft heart that she has for cancer patients as she understands the pain herself. She is a multi-tasker.

This, That And Everything

From working a regular full-time job to traveling the world, Karafin also runs a charity. At the of 10, she was diagnosed with bone cancer and after beating cancer she changed her way of living and seeing life. She saw life in a different light and respect. She made, living the life to the fullest, her only goal and we can say she is doing a perfect job. Inspiration comes from within and Elona Karafin is a living example of that.

A Caring, Giving Heart

Karafin wanted to help kids who were battling with Cancer. So, in 2013, she founded Checkmate, Cancer! The charity raised money and she was able to participate in the Pediatric Cancer Foundation’s Walkathon. It is good to know, that, the organization has earned more than $100,000 through fundraising. To provide emotional and financial assistance to families with kids who have cancer they use this money raised from the fundraiser. You go, girl!

In the next few slides you will find all about the places she has visited where we will tell you how did she manage, where she stayed, and how much did she spend. Everything.

Trip To Seattle

Seattle is a gem of North-west coast in Philadelphia. People don’t realize how beautiful and exciting this place can be once you decide to visit there. What can you do in Seattle? Other than attending the Microsoft Conference (sounds boring) you can always explore the EMP museum. This museum will take you back in time. From Jimi Hendrix to Nirvana, you won’t find such versatility in any other place.
After that, you can visit The Marine Bay, where you can rent the boat for yourself. Take it for a ride and cross the ocean, but not very far, as you have to return the boat back.

Unusual Shopping

Did you bring the boat back? Okay, good. Now it’s time to do some shopping. Wait, where are you going? To the mall? Please. Let us tell you that you can visit this Amazon Go store. Did you know that in Amazon’s logo the smile represents something? The smile which starts at A and ends at Z symbolizes the vast variety of things that Amazon offers from A to Z. So you know what to do in the Amazon Go store. Go inside and grab whatever you like. It is all there.

 After Seattle It’s Malta

A small place which has so much to offer to its visitors that can make the trip of this place a memorable one. But here are some tips that can help you prepare for your next trip to Malta. As you all know, this place is very fond of within tourists. So you should book your tickets in advance. One thing that we face while visiting a place is because of the language. But in Malta, the locals do speak English and this makes the vacation easier for us. Are you thirsty after all the traveling? Here have some tap water. Yes, in Malta you can have tap water without worrying because of the water which is as clean as mineral water. Lucky people of Malta.

Six Places You Can’t-Miss In Czech Republic

This country has so much accompanied with its name that it is impossible to leave it from our list of places-still-left-to-visit. This country has the lowest unemployment rate in Europe. The crime rate is low and this country stands as the sixth safest place to live in the world. Not only that Beer is cheaper than water. The Czech Republic has the biggest water park in Central Europe, the largest castle in Europe and internet speed that is out of the charts ( you can stay in any cheap hotels, still you’ll have the best internet speed). What else?

Mitrowicz Castle

If you are in the Czech Republic you will find the place, Mitrowicz Castle. The castle is open for general public and you even rent the rooms: 18 castle rooms for just $700 for each room (just wow!). One of the apartments inside the castle has a private balcony that gives you a mindblowing view of Saint Anna. This is just a start. Next few will surely peak your interest in the Czech Republic.

Orlik Chateau

In the 19th century, it was renovated to a Neogothic style. The Orlik Castle is found in a very quiet and secluded area over the Vltava river which gives it a very private touch. The outer area which has very big ground and where you find beautiful peacocks that love to get clicked.

Český Krumlov

It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and it might have given you the idea why it is here in the list. This small architectural masterpiece in Southern Bohemia is known to be one of the prettiest cities in Europe. Český Krumlov is the second most popular city after Prague. You get the idea why tourists are crazy about this place.

Kratochvíle State Chateau

Remember to visit this place because it is very different from what you would expect from a typical castle. This castle has a very unique beauty of its own. Inside the castle, you will find Renaissance art which acts as a time capsule. This place is worth the visit.

Hluboká Castle

Many call it the most beautiful castle in all the castle that the Czech Republic. In this castle, there are 140 rooms and 11 towers filled that has a variety of luxury furniture, hand-carved wooden interiors, paintings, and porcelain.

Lipno

Lipno and Vltavou is a village in the Cesky Krumlov region. Although the place is relatively small, Lipno still manages to surprise you with its one of the most incredible structures, The Treetop Walkway. And if the weather is good you can even slide down from the top of the walkway which is another experience in itself.

Ostrava

It is called the steel heart of the Czech Republic. This place has a rich history of the steel industry and you can learn all about it when you visit an industrial site which is now turned into a museum. Did you know? Usain Bolt calls Ostrava his second home and even there is a cafe named after him, The Bolt Tower. Next time don’t forget to have a cup of coffee.