10 BEST AIRPORT TIPS - From a FLIGHT ATTENDANT - Travel Hacks

I'm always at the airport. Really? I am always at the airport because I'm a flight attendant. I feel like I've been in so many airports throughout the world. I have certain things that I always do kind of like my tricks or my hacks that I always do when I'm at the airport, if I am traveling for personal reasons. So I'm going to share with you guys my top 10 tips, and we're going to start with tip number one, which isn't even a tip it's just do it. Get to the airport early. Like I, I shouldn't even have to go into detail about this one. I am telling you guys getting to the airport early is probably my, just my best tip and trick. After you're at the airport, like everything else is downhill. Everything else is smooth sailing. Everything else is a bonus. If you miss your first flight, most of the time, the airlines are charging you a fee to book you on the next flight. Just depending on like what ticket you bought, if it's a flex ticket or what. But most of the time you're getting charged if you miss your original flight. So just be there, be there the two hours early that they say. I'm, I'm telling you. Number two is I always tell people is to take a car service to the airport. You don't have to burden your friends. Like, Hey man, you think you could drop me off at the airport? It's like, Oh, I guess, sure. They don't want to drop you off at the airport. They don't want to go to the airport. I'm telling you. You can also drive your car to the airport, but you got to remember where you parked it. The airport parking lots are super confusing. You have to pay daily anyways. So you might want to see the daily overnight rate compared to how much it is to take a car service to the airport and kind of see where you end up. If you're driving, I sometimes feel like maybe there's a little bit of added stress, so I always say car service. It's easy. It's so easy. Just take a car. Number three tip is to get rid of your checked bags as soon as possible. Just get rid of them. Let them go. Most of the time at the airport, there's curbside check-in meaning you pull up in your car, in your car service, because you didn't drive there, you took a car service and you see the curbside check-in and most of the time there's nobody in the line, or maybe there's one or two people in the line, you check your bag. They, you know, check it to your final destination. You can walk into the airport with nothing but your carry on luggage. It's so nice. If you guys are running a little bit late, I would definitely say do curbside check-in because the inside line most of the time is really, really long. So curbside, you're in, you're out and you don't have to worry about it. Now I will say sometimes there is a little bit of an additional charge for or there's not a charge, but tips are encouraged. Number four is to use the restroom outside of security. I always do this. You guys, most of the times in the terminal flights are just getting off or flights are about to go out and the restroom lines are always out of control. Well, at least for women, they are. I don't know about men's bathroom lines, but the women bathroom lines are always so long that I say, you know what? I'm just going to use the restroom outside of security. And if I happen to need to use it again inside the terminal, fine. It's just really easier to use it before because it's just really never that crowded. And you know what? I say sometimes those restrooms outside of security, since they don't get used often, are cleaner. So, yeah. Number five, best trick tip. One of my favorite travel items to travel with is to bring an empty water bottle. Don't go through security with water in here because they're not going to let you. You're going to get thirsty traveling. I always try to drink water on the plane. The flight attendants will even fill up your water bottle for you most of the time. And most of the airports now, they have those water stations where you kind of just go up, you put your bottle under and it goes right in. Or there's water fountains. You can fill it up or you can go to almost any coffee shop or restaurant in the airport and ask them if they'll fill up your water bottle. I don't want to have to pay for the water in the airport and I don't want to have to buy another plastic bottle. So, best tip. This should have been number one. But no, getting there early is definitely number one. Number six is when you go through security, be ready. Just know when you go through security, you're going to have to have all your liquids together. You're going to have to most likely take off your shoes, take off your jacket, take off your belt, empty your pockets, take out your electronics, your computer, your laptop, your tablets. You have to take that out, put it in a separate bin. You're going to have to put your luggage on top of the conveyor belt to go through the screening. They really want to check everything when you are going through security, which is great. It's awesome. You know, I'm so glad for TSA and all the security. But really, guys, just be ready for all of that. Know that all of this is going to occur. Your shoes are going to have to come off. Like everything's going to have to come off. You're going to be stripped bare bones. Maybe go on, check the TSA rules and regulations when going through security and just kind of mentally be ready. That way you breeze on through. You don't have any confrontations, you don't have any problems, and you're ready to get into the terminal. Number seven is to sit at a nearby gate, not necessarily your boarding gate. First thing I do when I get into the terminal is I go check like that big kiosk with the blue screen, with all the flights, the departures, arrivals. And I check and see what gate I'm supposed to be boarding at. And then I won't. I'll go like peruse by that gate and just kind of look, see if there's gate agents there already, see like what the boarding time is going to be or how long until boarding. But I don't actually sit at that gate. I'll look around and see if there's an empty gate nearby and I'll go sit there. That way I'm not in all of that crowdedness, all of that like stressed out anxiety. I feel like the boarding area is always like everybody is like standing up. As soon as the gate agents get there, people stand up. They're like ready to board that plane. They're in group nine and they're like at the front like, I'm ready. Like, ma'am, we're on group one. We're just going to need you to just wait just one moment. So I always just like to sit at a nearby gate and then I don't have to deal with all that stress and all that drama. And most of the time I can get a good seat at a nearby gate and charge all my electronics, get a good plug. And I don't have to be around all the drama of the gate of the boarding gate. That leads into number eight is to set your alarm for boarding time. I can't tell you how many times I've been around the airport just kind of perusing, walking around, not paying attention. And then I realized, oh, my gosh, I think boarding started. And I look at my phone. I'm like, ah, like running to my gate. Just set my alarm. OK, 8 a.m. boarding starts. The alarm is set. It's going to go off no matter where I am in the airport. I know when that alarm goes off, I'm making my way back to the gate and I'm ready for boarding. Setting my alarm has saved me so many times. I started doing this because one time I really almost missed my flight and and I was already a flight attendant. I couldn't believe it. I just was completely zoned out. I was sitting at a nearby gate. I wasn't paying attention. It was about five minutes before the boarding door was about to close. And I heard them actually page my name over the loudspeaker like, this is your final call. If you're not here, the boarding door is going to be closing soon. I was like, what? I grabbed everything and ran over there. I was like, oh, my gosh, I just completely spaced out. So now I just set my alarm and I don't have to worry about it. I don't have to stress. OK, number nine is probably one of my favorite tips and tricks that I do at the airport when I have a little bit of extra time is to read magazines or books at the newsstands or the little shops, the bookstores in the airport. Most airports have bookstores or newsstands and they have all the latest and greatest, most popular books that just came out. They also have like a ton of magazines. So my guilty pleasure is I love reading like People magazine, Us Weekly, OK magazine. I love those fun gossip magazines. But I don't really get these magazines in like real life. I don't have subscriptions and I don't ever like see magazines around. So that's always one of my favorite things. And the people at the newsstands or the bookstores are always so nice. They're so helpful. So it's just one of my favorite things to do if I have some time to waste. And number 10 is to pay for the lounges. Now, I'll only pay for a lounge if I have longer than a three hour sit. So if I'm flying somewhere and I have a connecting flight and like in between that connecting flight, I've got like a three or four or sometimes even like a five hour sit, I will pay for the lounge. Most of the time with these lounges, you're going to get free food. You're going to get free beverages, Wi-Fi, going to be nice, comfortable chairs to kind of relax in. There's going to be newspapers, magazines. There's sometimes there's even like TV on, movies playing. Sometimes there's quiet rooms and sometimes with these lounges, there's even showers. It's a better deal to purchase a lounge ticket for your sit time instead of waiting for several hours out in the airport terminal, kind of with like not knowing where to go, especially if you're in like a foreign country. And you're just kind of like, hmm, my plug doesn't work here because it's not, you know, my country's outlet. I don't know how to get onto the Internet. What should I eat? You know, what's good? I just say go for the lounge. And it's kind of really nice, kind of a little bit of a splurge. But you also feel like, oh, I'm on vacation. I'm treating myself. So those are my airport tips and tricks. Those are the things that I always do when I go to the airport, if I'm traveling for personal reasons. If you guys have a tip, let me know. Let me know your best airport tip. Or if you guys have used any of these tips or you're planning on it, let me know. Guys, thank you so much for watching. And as always, be nice to your flight attendant and I'll see you on my next video.