Freewheelin’

In and outside of the loyalty and reward points and miles space, there’s plenty of talk about “free” travel, almost all of which doesn’t end up to actually be free travel.  In short, so many people omit details and costs that negate exactly what they claim to be promoting.  I like to create goals, and one goal that lingers every time I’m ready to create a new trip somewhere, is to travel for free – free as in no out of pocket expense.

The path less chosen…the start of 12 miles of hiking on the Highline Trail in Glacier National Park

This episode is about a pretty cool road trip that culminates in a summary of an example of a free trip.  As an early birthday gift to my friend, we flew then drove around and across Montana, Wyoming, South Dakota, and Minnesota in mid-September.  This is our trip:

Alaska Airlines flight, MSP -> SEA -> FCA (Kalispell, MT)

Kalispell (MT)

Glacier National Park (MT)

Big Sky (MT)

Yellowstone National Park (MT, WY)

Beartooth Pass Scenic Highway (MT)

Devils Tower (WY)

Deadwood (SD)

Mount Rushmore (SD)

Wall Drug (SD)

Delta-09 Missile Silo (SD)

Badlands National Park (SD)

We hit just about everything we could in the 6 days that we had for our road trip.  The only other things that I can think of along our journey that would have been nice to see are Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming and Custer State Park in South Dakota.  Each of those would take some time, and in the case of Grand Teton, likely a significant amount of time that we really didn’t have.  Even with wildfires all around us and Covid still going strong, we managed to have a nice trip.

Part of how I overcame extra expenses on this trip was through the Dosh app.  It’s pretty simple, just plug in the credit cards that you use most and cash back posts to your account after purchases.  Please use my code for Dosh if you don’t already have and use it!

Thanks for listening and enjoy!