I’ll be honest — when I first heard “boutique lifestyle hotel in the heart of Chicago,” my brain immediately translated that to “way outside your budget, Ava.” I’ve been doing this budget travel thing for eight years now, and I’ve learned to be appropriately skeptical of anything that sounds too polished. But the Cambria Hotel…

My first time hearing about the Hoxton Hotel Chicago, I kind of rolled my eyes a little. I’d seen the Hoxton brand pop up in London and Amsterdam and Paris, always with that effortlessly cool aesthetic and the kind of lobby that makes you want to sit there for four hours drinking coffee and pretending…

Fairmont Chicago Millennium Park: How I Scored a Luxury Stay Without Paying Full Price I’ll be real with you — I’m not usually the person recommending five-star hotels. My whole thing is stretching a dollar until it screams. But last spring, I ended up at the Fairmont Chicago Millennium Park for two nights, and I…

I almost didn’t stay at the Kinzie Hotel Chicago. When I first pulled it up during a trip-planning session at my kitchen table in Austin — back before I fully committed to the nomad life — the nightly rate made me close the tab pretty quickly and go back to scrolling through hostels. But then…

Last spring I rolled into Chicago Union Station with a duffel bag, $180 in my daily budget, and absolutely zero desire to spend most of it on a hotel room. I’d been to Chicago twice before — once for a work conference back in my corporate days (when someone else was footing the bill) and…

So there I was, staring at my laptop screen at 11 PM on a Tuesday, trying to find a decent place to stay in Chicago for under $150. I’d been invited to speak at a small travel conference, and while they were covering my flight, I was on my own for accommodations. The Hyatt Regency…

I’ll be real with you – when I first heard about Virgin Hotels Chicago, I basically laughed out loud. Me? Staying at a trendy Virgin property in one of America’s priciest cities? Yeah, right. That sounded about as likely as me suddenly developing a taste for $200 tasting menus. But here’s the thing about budget…

I’ll be honest with you – the Chicago to Boston route used to make me irrationally angry. Like, yelling at my laptop screen kind of angry. Here’s this super popular business route with tons of daily flights, and somehow I kept seeing prices that made me want to just stay home and FaceTime my friends…

So here’s the thing about the Chicago to Houston route – I’ve probably flown it more times than I’ve successfully meal-prepped for an entire week, which is to say, a lot. My sister moved to Houston back in 2019, and as someone who refuses to pay full price for basically anything, I’ve turned finding cheap…

I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve made the Chicago to Houston run. Seriously, it’s got to be at least twenty flights over the past few years, mostly because I’ve got friends in Houston and honestly, Texas in winter beats the hell out of Chicago’s frozen tundra situation. But here’s what I’ve learned: this…