141 - Rookie flying mistakes

It's the start of our next epic journey - we've left our home city of Auckland and are spending a few days in the South Island of New Zealand before heading to South America. We're a little rusty on the travel front, and have already managed to make a rather spectacular mistake.

When we booked our tickets to South America, Europe, and Asia we booked and paid for one check-in bag between us, more than enough for the stuff we're carrying. However, at around the same time we booked tickets to Christchurch for a week, and the baggage fee was so high we decided we didn't want to pay it and would make do with carry-on luggage.

Well, I imagine you can guess what our rookie mistake was. We showed up at the airport with a bag to check in. We still could have taken it with us - if we wanted to pay $80 each way. That's about two-thirds of the total cost of the tickets! We managed to repack the essentials into carry-on bags and my mum picked up the other one - thanks Mum!

So the tip for today is - check your tickets before you head to the airport. Check the date, the time, and what luggage you can take. It's also a good idea to double-check details like which terminal you're flying from, what you can put in your carry-on bag, and when you need to check in.

Don't make the same mistakes we made, and you'll have a great trip.