1. Be sure to take off work during your vacation. Nothing spoils a trip to Hawaii like having to commute six thousand miles back to work every day.
2. Before traveling abroad, first check with the U.S. State Department to make sure the country you’re traveling to actually exists. Remember, the Byzantine Empire hasn’t existed for 500 years, so you can’t actually go there anymore.
3. Mousetrap is an incredibly popular game the world over. Remember to bring it with you and you’ll be sure to make friends wherever you go, especially Laos.
4. In the Arctic, the sun doesn’t set for months at a time. It’s never night time, so you don’t have to sleep and can save a lot of money since you don’t need a hotel room or a bed. Bartenders are also never sure when it’s happy hour.
5. While airplanes do have an excellent safety record, they still occasionally crash. Keep in mind that there hasn’t been a Zeppelin crash in over eight decades. The record for manned kites and ironclads is even better.
6. To save money traveling overseas, just swim. A healthy adult should be able to make it across the Atlantic in only a month or two. Don’t forget your goggles.
7. Most foreign countries have their own currencies. But sometimes U.S. arcade tokens can be used in foreign skeeball games.
8. When abroad, you may need a knob converter to open foreign doors.
9. A handy phrase to remember is “I’m an American and your laws don’t apply to me.”
10. Never leave home without your spelunking trowel. Ever.
11. Time can drag on a long flight, so have some reading material on hand; like Churchill’s 20 volume history of WWII, or a pamphlet about Rock City. Either will do.
12. You might be tempted to get some local culture while abroad, but don’t be suckered into seeing local music. It usually involves weird instruments and costumes, not guitars.
13. Almost every country on the planet has its own species of magpie. Make sure you pack your magpie detector.
14. If you’re vacationing in the United States, remember that it has a handy interstate highway system for driving. Their names often start with a letter and end in a number.
15. Finland has no month of October on their calendar, so if you travel there during that month, keep in mind that for them it’s actually November.
16. Snakes can be found in many regions, if you’re into that sort of thing.
17. Duty free shops in international airports are where you can pick up stuff without paying taxes. Go for high-priced items like jewels or cars. You can try selling stuff there, too, but make sure you stand near the exit.
18. If you really like a place, consider staying there and never coming back. We don’t want you anyway.
19. Make a game out of your vacation by seeing how much work you can do away from the office.
20. Challenge yourself by using a large plastic bag as your only luggage. See what you can fit inside.
21. The point of going on vacation is to relax, but foreign countries can often befuddle one with their confusing customs. If you’re American, try eating only at popular American fast food chains to calm your nerves.
22. It is often said that what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. This is not true of Portugal.
23. Hiking can be fun, but you do risk getting lost. If this happens you might be tempted to walk in the same direction to find your way. The world is round, though, so trying something of a spiral pattern would work better.
24. It has often been said that aboriginal peoples know their surroundings better than people living in the developed world. If you get captured, distract your captors by asking them what the plants and animals are called.