After my August Adventures, I decides to take a month off of traveling. Why?

-I may have overspent on travel.
-My car needed a break. It seemed to be racking up mileage very quickly this summer.
-With a slight change in work, I knew it would be best to tighten my budget during the transition time.
-There were a few projects near home that I needed to eventually get to.
-I needed to reemphasize that there are so many adventures to be had in your own backyard!

So how did I spend a month with zero dollars in my travel budget?

I thrift shopped.

Thrift shopping is my favorite kind of shopping! It’s kind of like a treasure hunt. Even though there were a couple times I walked out of the store empty-handed, it was still worth it to see new stores and the kind of things that were on sale. Since the first weekend of September is the official yard sale weekend in a couple cities near me, I spent half a day checking out yard sales in a rich town and ended up getting some great deals!

Although my initial secondhand purchases were funded by my shopping budget, the things I ended up buying saving or making me more money than I had spent on them. At the yard sales, I bought a pasta cooker and a popcorn air popper. I’ve already used the popper tons to make batches of delicious, healthy popcorn for just pennies. I haven’t used the pasta cooker yet. However, since it doesn’t require electricity, I know it will come in handy while camping and even saving energy at home.

My goal with going to actual thrift stores was a little different. I decided to start flipping cast iron cookware. So even if the pieces were caked-on or rusty, I took them home, restored them, and then posted them on local Facebook sales groups. I sold two cast iron ebelskivers!

I loved the library.

I usually visit the library at least once a week anyway, but this month the library allowed me to fully enjoy my time at home. I explored the DVD selection for some new interesting movies to watch. I also wanted to watch a couple TV series, despite the fact that I don’t have cable, Netflix, or Hulu. (I do have PureFlix, which I watched a few movies with.) Although these shows weren’t in stock at my library, I was able to request several seasons from other libraries in the county. I had them shipped to the library closest to me, so I didn’t have to burn gas going to out-of-the-way places.

Of course, libraries have more books than DVDs, and I enjoyed reading a lot of those too. I call reading an adventurous book a “bookation“, since I can deeply explore a new destination from my own home. (This often backfires, since I usually end up wanting to visit the destination described in the book!)

I went geocaching.

Another adventure was to be had right outside the library! I used to be really into geocaching, but I haven’t done it in over a year now. Since September was about exploring new things closer to home, I realized geocaching was a wonderful way to do this. All this time, I’ve been walking by a bench outside the library, and never realized there was a micro geocache attached to it! Although I only ended up geocaching once, I have a list of other caches to eventually get to that I found on geocaching.com.

I took two-hour vacations.

Have you ever gotten off of work, only to have another job, appointment, or commitment to get to just two hours later? You don’t want to get there ridiculously early, but since you live a half hour away, it’s not worth going home during that time, either. What do you do? I’ve started filling that time with something I call “Two-Hour Vacations”. (Exact time may vary.)

Ever since I got a hammock, I learned that I can relax and vacation just about anywhere. I took my hammock to several different parks in the area. I even did a hike and hammock on a mountain up the street from where I work. When I babysat this month, we’d often go to playground. If they were conveniently located, I would sometimes choose a playground I hadn’t been to for a long time.

Not all my two-hour vacations were outdoorsy. Last week I had to go to Grants Pass, and was there for about an hour with nothing to do. Since this city is the home of the famous Dutch Bros, of course there was a coffee stand on the same block as me. (Thankfully I had an old Dutch Bros gift card with me, making this an essentially free experience!) As mentioned above, sometimes these two hours were spent enjoying the thrift store or library. Even church is a free experience that is beneficial, relaxing, and can fill one or two hours. And as I’ll mention below, this isn’t limited to regularly-scheduled church services.

I attended a retreat.

My mom’s church offered a free one-day women’s retreat mid-September. I signed up to go. Although you could buy a boxed lunch and purchase books from the speaker, that was completely optional. It was fun to spend time with hundreds of other people and be inspired by the presentations.

I entered travel contests.

Having a zero-dollar travel budget doesn’t mean not traveling the world! A couple months ago, I decided to start entering more travel contests. Giveaways pop in my social media every now and then (and if you click on them a lot, the online algorithms will show you more similar contests!), so I decided to take advantage of any that had a remotely interesting prize. This month I entered contests for several all-inclusive vacation packages. I haven’t heard back from any of those yet, but here’s hoping!

To balance those out, I entered some smaller contests as well. These weren’t necessarily travel prizes, but could ultimately save me travel money since I could pack them or spend less money at home by using them. I got a couple small free prizes this month. My second favorite prize was Thieves essential oil. (I’ll probably use all the oil at home, but the small bottle is perfect for travel toiletries!) And my favorite prize was…

I went to a comedy show.

The furthest I traveled this month was to Klamath Falls. It’s nearly two hours away, but I could still make the journey and stay under my gas budget for the month. I decided that this trip would still fit into my staycation goal since I won tickets to see comedienne Anita Renfroe. (The only thing I knew about her was that she performed the YouTube hit “In the Muthahood”.) It was definitely worth it. I even got to meet her during intermission! Like the retreat I went to earlier in the month, I made this cost-free by ignoring the sales table and bringing my own food and water bottle.

 

What do YOU do to make your time in and around home feel more like a vacation? Let me know in the comments!