hey there today i am showing 9 travel safety tips whether you are traveling
alone or the tour company whether you were going to Europe or any destination
in America these nine travel safety tips are going to help you I will talk about
RFID technology and travel safety apps in more if you are a solo traveler you
are already helping yourself by watching this awesome travel tips by Laurie video my
name is Laurie I want to say welcome to my channel and please leave a comment below
and introduce yourself and while you're down there while you're thinking about
it hit that subscribe button the traveling safety tip number one is to
plan ahead before you travel be smart before you start enroll in the smart
traveler enrollment program it is by the State Department this is a free service
to u.s. citizens and nationals when you are traveling to a different location
you can enroll in their free program this is going to enroll you with the
nearest US Consulate or embassy and you're going to receive important
information from the embassy like if there is civil unrest at your travel
destination or a natural disaster and especially the reason why I recommend it
is for family emergencies they know where you are and how to contact you I
also think before you go you should email a picture of your travel documents
your passport to a family member or close friend and the reason why I say
this there are lots of skeptics out there the reason why I say this tip is
because if you are the one incapacitated and in a coma or something and you
cannot get to your email yes email yourself the passport picture and all
that stuff but also email a friend because if you are the one who's
incapacitated the friend or family member can get to it quickly and act
quickly we use a travel belt that goes inside like our pants I also have used
this little buddy pouch the velcro is very thick and that's how we like it
there are several pockets in and your passport does fit in there this
little pouch does have an opening for you to charge your cell phone if it's in
there I have a subscriber who uses a neck wallet instead of this belt type
one that we use around her neck and if you have not seen my 33 travel hacks or
my 23 travel hacks videos there are two of them check out the 33 one because
there is a great travel hack or travel tip 2 using a carabiner hook to help
with pickpocketers like if you were in Barcelona I recently bought an RFID
blocking travel on crossbody bag it's nothing pretty but I can get a lot of
stuff in there as well as a slip a belt in the back of here if I want to
just have a fanny pack or a belt what's the new term for it belt bag and of
course there are the RFID pouches and sleeves if you don't want the whole belt
if you don't want a whole wallet holder and it doesn't need to hold everything
then there are just little sleeves and pouches that you can get now I used to
think that if your credit card had a chip that that meant that it was RFID
capable but according to an article I read by loss prevention media they said
that there are only 1% of the cards out there that are actually RFID capable
like where that someone can really steal your identity off of your cards so find
out if your actual card is really capable of having its identity stolen
through one of those RFID machines and an RFID machine is a technology that
uses radio frequencies to steal your identity off of those cards the chip
that is implanted in your card is an actual theft prevention extra secure
measure it has nothing to do with whether or not it's RFID capable and
that's what I thought that chip was there for but if it is RFID capable that
means if you are able to wave your credit card or whatever
you're using above a terminal and payment actually go through that means
that that card is RFID capable of the identity being stolen and in an article
by a far com I will lists both of these below by the way in the description box
there article says that even your passport picture and all its contents
can be stolen but here's the good news it's almost impossible to do that with
the RFID machine to steal your passports identity and picture it has to be within
six inches I mean that's that much okay six inches from your actual passport
booklet and the booklet has to be open if your booklet is closed that's what it
becomes almost impossible to steal anything from it because in the cover of
your passport booklet there is a really secure tape that is in there that makes
it pretty much impossible like I said travel safety tip number two is to travel
in numbers there is safety in numbers I recommend searching the area that
you're going to and searching tour group companies there is albatross calm and
there's also Guardian calm oh and you can even search foodie meetups like this
one in Barcelona before you go to a certain city especially if you are a
solo traveler I know albatross has specific tours that
are geared towards single people or solo travelers and that way you would be in a
group but then you would sleep and would have some alone time as well but you're
traveling with a guide and with a group a small group you also want to walk down
streets where there are people I know in Venice we got lost my husband and I got
lost and it was pretty shady and some of those little bitty back alley streets
that lead to houses it's amazing but just be smart about traveling where
there are crowds or groups of people travel safety tip number three is to
write down those numbers for instance if you have your credit card stolen how are
you going to cancel it you don't have the phone
to the credit card company yes you can keep your credit card account number but
they can find that over the phone for you so write down in the like contact
section of your phone like make your credit card company have an actual
contact number where you could hit the phone out and actually make a call to
them you can also keep the number in the notes section of your phone let me know
in the comment section below if you think it would be smart to keep your
phone away from your wallet travel safety tip number four is to be
observant look up notice sounds notice quick moves notice followers who are
around you Barcelona is the number one City for pickpocketing and our good
friend Roxanne was victim of this they were on las ramblas street her husband
was smoking a cigar and two people came up to him while he was smoking his cigar
to ask for a light and she thinks that they were casing them like looking under
the table looking where their bag was was it attached to anything and sadly
she knew this but she did not attach her bag to like the leg of the chair even
though it can be cut away it's one more thing to deter them just a little bit
and then a man sat like two tables from their table and started carrying on a
conversation with them really engaging fun conversation and she thinks that
that is when somebody came over and just pulled it out right from under her chair
be sure to look at my travel hacks video for that carabiner hook way to attach
your purse to a chair the good news is is that they both had their credit cards
in their own or on their own person so she was able to use his credit card
phone number on the back of the card to call their actual company and cancel
service report theft that's what she call it
traveling safety tip number five is to go on food tours it's a great way to
stay in a group and you get below the surface behind the crowd behind the
touristy section areas of the city to visit you really get to know the
local history the customs of that area in other countries food tours give you a
lot of food just so you know and another tip about going on a food tour is
remember to take cash for the tip because that is not included and they
make their money from tips and you will fall in love with their personality
honestly they're so fun I forgot to take cash on our food tour in Maine and I was
so embarrassed because there's such a small group they know that you're not
tipping them I was so embarrassed but I hunted him down and mailed via the US
Post Office my tip to that awesome guy in Portland Maine travel safety tip
number six is to ask the desk clerk for a non touristy place to visit or a great
place to eat let me know if you think that's a good idea
especially if you're traveling alone like would they know then that you're
traveling alone I don't know but I do think it would be helpful and also to
search YouTube for things to do in that city tours to take I have made several
videos about places around the world and reviewing that location for what to do
YouTube is the number two search engine after Google so don't negate the power
of YouTube Travel safety tip number seven is to
use travel safety apps in an article by too many adapters they recommend using a
free app called trip whistle SOS and what that's going to do is it is going
to give you all the emergency numbers for Police Fire ambulance that you may
need in the different countries and out of 196 countries there are 70 different
emergency numbers and with the free app you will be able to contact them with
the swipe of a button but do you really swipe a button or do you swipe an app
hmm speaking of TSA I do not think it is preventive to put a lock or a
combination lock on your actual suitcase before you put it in the airport or
baggage claim it if si si needs to get into it they're gonna cut it and it
might ruin your zipper or your suitcase if you need to find
if pre-check is worth it or how to sign up for tsa PreCheck
I have a video that I'll link here and the other videos in the description box
below I also have what not to bring on the airplane and it is a from a list
from tsa.gov they are shut down right now so you can easily contact them by
using their phone number it's a 1-800 number call them I've done it three
times since the government shutdown in 2019 and they have answered my problem
they also redirected me to the State Department step program that I
mentioned in step one so use their services travel safety tip number nine
is to listen to podcasts about travel I listen to women who travel it's by Conda
nest I believe and it was okay to start with but if you have something specific
that is an avenue to search you can buy all the rfid-blocking and things you can
search youtube you can plan ahead but it is peace of mind you are already helping
your peace of mind by researching and planning before you go so be smart
before you start and thank you again for visiting my travel tips by laura youtube
channel