Travel hacks from happiness expert to make travel more convenient, never miss a credit card payment and 5 free things to do anywhere you travel

Insider Letter #035

👋 Hey friends,

Welcome to Travelling Lens Insider Letter, where every fortnight I send you a carefully curated letter of all things travel, travel photography and points & miles.

I just returned from a trip to the US, it was so lovely to see friends and familiar faces again.

Now, onto this week’s letter…

✈️ Travel, Points and Photography

💳 Here’s how to never miss a credit card payment. It’s so simple you might have missed it.

✈️ Airlines have become heavily reliant on credit cards for profitability. So much so they’re choosing which they to fly based on how it’ll influence the spending patterns of credit card customers. If you’re curious about the points and miles credit card world, this is a really interesting read.

🧳 Happiness expert Gretchen Rubin and her Hollywood show runner Elizabeth Craft share dozens of travel hacks in this episode. All to help make traveling more convenient and less stressful. You might pick up an idea or two from here!

🚗 When we visited Tuscany in July we got an international driver’s permit so we could hire a car to drive around Italy. But do you need an international driver’s permit when hiring a car overseas all the time? No, not always. This breakdowns where and why you might need one.

📸 The latest update to Adobe Lightroom has just made editing landscape photos easier and smarter. This 10 minute tutorial shows you exactly how to use the landscape masking feature to pick and choose elements of your photo to edit—cutting out a ton of manual editing time!

In case you missed it 👇

📸 This Week in Notes

Your credit cards, points, and miles. All in one place.

If you’re a frequent flyer or are just getting into the points and miles game so you can travel for cheap, keeping track of your points and miles can feel overwhelming.

I’ve been using Notion to easily organise everything related to points and miles. So, if you’re looking a simple and flexible system to do just that, join the waitlist to be the first to know when my Points Hub PRO in Notion becomes available.

👀 Substack Finds

• I love this idea of sending a postcard when you travel. It’s a fun and light weight activity you can do. Plus it’s a lovely souvenir gift to yourself if you send it back home (to yourself). Psychologist Katie Blake, PhD shares 5 great reasons to send a postcard next time you travel.

• After reading this book review from Michael Wriston, I’ve added Flashes of Brilliance to my reading list. If you like taking photos, I think you’ll find this book interesting as well!

• Daniel Catena shares 5 free and fun things you can do almost anywhere you travel to.

📚 Travel Reading

The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel.

This is an oldie but a goodie, one of my favorite personal finance books that’s not really about money at all.

Your mindset and behaviors matter more than what you know mathematically about money. Because we make choices based on our real life problems, feelings, past experiences, beliefs and habits.

Spending money on coffee, travel and camera gear might be right for me—but be wrong for my next door neighbor.

Housel shares 19 short stories to show you how to think about money to make decisions that’s right for you.

If you haven’t read it, I think you’ll enjoy it!

💬 Final Words

Creating memorable experiences is a smart use of your time and money.

I’m on a mission to help you create memorable travel experiences, capture personal documentary-style travel photos and get the most out of your points & miles so you can see the world more often (and in comfort!)

Got a question? Send me an email or a direct message, I’d love to hear from you!

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If you enjoyed this, comment, restack or share it with one person—that’s the best compliment I could receive from you.

Your friend,

Janice

I'm a travel writer, photographer, points & miles optimiser and Notion Consultant. To get in touch, email hello@travellinglens.co.

p.s. Want to an easy & organised way to plan your next trip? Get my free Travel Hub trip planning system in Notion.