All the way back in May I found an incredible deal on airfare to Washington D.C. Frontier Airlines announced that they were starting flights to Dulles Airport. To celebrate they were offering $16 airfare on select dates. I looked at the school calendar and realized there was one 3.5 day weekend that we could actually do this! I bought roundtrip tickets for $84 per person (only one way was $16, the other way was a tad bit more). In October we were going to be tourists in Washington D.C. and we had months to prepare for our trip!
We use coupons so that we have room in our budget to do things like go on a trip to Washington D.C. It is about 625 miles between our house and Washington D.C. That’s 1,250 round trip. At about 18 miles per gallon (it may be a little better, but we haven’t done a long car trip in awhile so I don’t know the exact number), that is 69 gallons of gas which equates to around $215 for fuel to drive there. Then there is the whole issue of paying to park (which was $30 per day at the hotel). And let’s not forget that there would have been 9+ hours spent in the car each way. The $338 for airfare made sense.
There is so much to do in Washington D.C. that is FREE!!! Here is a list of things we did without paying a cent while we were tourists in our nation’s capitol.
– Tour of the White House (sign up through your representative 6 months to 3 weeks in advance)
– Saw how money was made at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing
– Went to the Holocaust Museum. They have a kid friendly section that was perfect for my girls.
– Saw the Washington Monument (didn’t take the tour, but it is free)
– Museum of American History
– Museum of Natural History
– Library of Congress
– Toured the Capitol Building
– Supreme Court Steps
– Lincoln Memorial
– World War II Memorial
To get around Washington D.C. we opted to use Uber. There is a $30 credit for signing up (here is my referral code so you can get your credit), which we used to get from the airport to the hotel. Plus we saved $10 with the Twitter AmEx Uber offer. AmEx is currently running a promotion with Uber where cardholders who sync their card to Twitter and then use that card to pay for an Uber ride can earn a $10 statement credit for any Uber purchase of $10 or more, essentially giving users a free $10 for a single ride by December 31, 2014. This promotion is valid for both new and existing users and can be combined with the new user credit, so you can save $40 off your first ride. The ride from the airport to the hotel was $56, but we only paid $16 after our credits. Isn’t that amazing savings? (My husband used Uber for the first time on the way to the hotel…..and I used Uber for the first time on the way back to the airport, since the credits are per person/per card).
If you have a booster aged child, there is a booster called the BubbleBum which is a blow up booster that is perfect for traveling.
Do you have a favorite monument to visit in Washington DC?
Leandrea is a married mom of two girls, ages 13 and 12, living in Atlanta, GA. She is passionate about helping people save money one coupon at a time. Read more