1The Benefits of a Staycation

Of course, the biggest benefit to a staycation is the money you get to keep in your pocket! Traditional vacation plans often are weighed down by exorbitant airfare (or other transportation) costs, which you will be able to entirely cut out of the picture by staying local. But the benefits aren't only financial: you will be saved the hassle of packing and unpacking, the annoyance of waiting in long lines at the airport, and the unpleasant experience of being treated like prey by overly-ambitious entrepreneurs that abound at major vacation destinations. All those nasty experiences that somehow inevitably get wrapped up as part of the package of an ordinary vacation will not be an issue during your staycation.

 

2Where to Staycation

A staycation can mean staying in your very own home, or perhaps staying at a local hotel or camping grounds. It is common to find deals for locals at hotels, as you may serve as a valuable word-of-mouth vessel for their establishment in the future, ushering in subsequent customers for them. A staycation can incorporate a little of all three of these options, and since you've got minimal travel expenses and the benefit of using your home as your base, switching from one venue to the next couldn't be easier.
Here are some great staycation tips:

• If you choose to stay at home, then try to make the experience somehow different from all the other days and nights you spend at home; otherwise, you run the risk of feeling like it's just another day, another week, and you may end up realizing activities (like work!) that don't fit into the staycation plan.

• Switch off your work phone if you have one, log out of all your IM services on the computer, don't check your work email account: do whatever it takes to simulate the experience of a vacation.

• Let your boss know that you are, indeed, “on vacation” and are not available to come in for work, and will be out of touch for a given period. This will give you the freedom of turning the staycation experience into something truly unique and different.

• Consider changing things up a bit inside your home, like rearranging furniture and trying to put a little more zen, a little more feng-shui into the arrangements.

• If you've got kids, a great option is to set up a tent in the yard and let your kids spend the night in it, telling ghost stories and roasting marshmallows over a bonfire.

Just try to create a different effect in your home, so that you have actual physical reminders that this isn't just like any other day you've spent at home.

3What to do on Your Staycation

In addition to arranging your home in a new, creative way—an activity that in and of itself ought to give you plenty to do—you will want to have a host of staycation activities to do to make your staycation unique and completely different to your “regular” time in your community. Do some research before the date of your staycation arrives, and find out what things there are in your area that you've never checked out or done.

• Whatever is within a few hours' drive from home is worth doing on your staycation, so if you've got things in the surrounding area that you've been itching to visit or do, but never have managed to get around to, go ahead and do them!

• Take advantage of your natural surroundings and plan activities based on them.

• Rent a boat and a leisurely afternoon floating on a river or lake with a picnic on board.

• Take a tour of a local wildlife preserve or national or state park.

• Go see the cheap or free museums in your area you never have visited.

• Make it to the coast and spend the day in the sand getting a tan.

If it is close by and new to you, then get out there and check it out. And even if some such activities come with a bit of a cost, consider how much you saved already by having a staycation (and not a vacation), with all the sacrifices that implies. The point is, you've been responsible and managed to save, so allow yourself one or two slightly expensive activities—like an evening of fine dining, or a day at a nearby health spa—to really give yourself the sensation that you are not just staying at home like usual.

4Honoring Your Staycation

In order for at home vacations to become enshrined in the aura of joy and optimism that all your other vacations probably have, you need to honor your staycation equally, which means taking photos and videos and creating a special album to commemorate the experience. After all, many people later associate a particular vacation with a particular album on their bookshelf, and your staycation should be no different.

Keep some souvenirs, put together all the photos and videos (these days, of course, web albums seem to be more common than physical albums), and share these things with family and friends just like you would have done after a regular vacation. In the end, knowing how to have a staycation is all about knowing how to adapt and alter your mentality, and not allow the fact that you're still in the same place to mean that the quality of your time and entertainment has to be the same, too.