Day Trip on a Dime

Not all of us have vacation budgets. Not all of us even have vacation time. But, summer is summer, and I don’t know about you, but I’m still a kid at heart who gets a little morose at the thought of spending a whole summer just working. As a recent college grad and broke newlywed, a whole vacation just isn’t doable for us this year. However, we did manage a quick day trip and wanted to share the savings with you. A day is better than nothing – I’m sure if you have kids they will be quick to agree!

Two theme park tickets (Hershey Park in our case): $108  $70

Parking: $10  FREE

Food (2 meals, 2 snacks, and a souvenir cup): $42 $29

Total for the day: $160 $99

Sound good? If you keep an open eye and do your homework, you can swing this, too!

Let’s start with the basics of this outing: admission. Obviously season passes to a local favorite are HUGE moneysavers. But, again, many of us can only swing a day. Those daily tickets are PRICEY – almost the price of the passes themselves. Well, as you can see, we got our daily tickets for $35 a pop vs. $53.95.

How? There’s strength in numbers. Our church bought multiple tickets at a group rate, which is what we paid. Look into group rates and see if you can get friends or another family to join you for a day. When I told my mother-in-law we were visiting Hershey Park, she mentioned that she gets discounted tickets from her work. Look into your organization to see if this perk is offered. Many larger companies offer discounted admissions to not only parks, but sporting events as well.

Gas is obviously a factor, but it’s doable if you’re driving somewhere local. Hershey Park was a two-hour commute for us, so nothing unbearable. Parking at the park is $10-$15 depending on your vehicle, but someone in our group heard that vehicles of 15 or more passengers parked free. We pulled up in our 15 passenger van with only 12 people, and the attendant was kind enough to waive the fee for us without us even asking! As I’ve said before, free is always the best kind of frugal!

Now for that yucky one: food. We all know that is where these places get you. Prices are sky high and often outside snacks are not allowed. My hubby and I did our research the night before and found that each guest is allowed to bring in one sealed bottle of water (better than paying $2.50 plus in the park!) We did that and also found that any concession stand will give free cups of water if you ask (it’s important to stay hydrated, we DEFINITELY took advantage of this one!)

Now, as we were entering the park, a sign outside of guest services caught my eye: “meal tickets.” This was jumbled among all the other services and not heavily advertised, but I figured I’d see how the cost was, knowing theme park food can drain a wallet pretty quickly.

 I’m SO glad we did. In this case, three options were offered, two of which were shareable. My husband and I shared the middle plan (my brother and a friend in our group did the same) So for $29, we got 2 meals, 2 snacks, and the refillable souvenir cup. The cup alone was $7 or $8 and meals averaged $13 a piece, so you can see we definitely shaved a few dollars off the overall cost.

 The four of us were the only ones in the group to utilize this plan as guest services is often passed by in pursuit of getting in line for rides. This definitely shows that keeping an eye out (or at least asking questions) can be to your financial benefit.

Again, this trip is just an example. I’m sure Hershey is not the only local place that offers some doable deals if you take a few minutes to do some homework. $99 for everything in a day isn’t bad, so go back to those trips you wrote off as too pricey and see what you can do! Everyone should have at least one day of summer fun!