Love beer, cider, great food and awesome music?

Feel like hanging out by a beautiful mountain lake in British Columbia for a nice afternoon in May?

Then this is the contest for you!

The contest is closed! Congrats to Harmonie, who just won two general admission tickets to the Great Okanagan Beer Festival in sunny Kelowna!

If you don’t have tickets yet, hurry up, you can still grab them here! https://gibbonswhistler.com/festivals-events/great-okanagan-beer-festival/tickets/

The Great Okanagan Beer Festival is back in our gorgeous home base of Kelowna, BC, Canada from May 10th to 12th 2018! It’s hosted by the fun folks at Gibbons Whistler, founders of the insanely popular Whistler Village Beer Festival.

In addition to hundreds of world class wineries, Kelowna and the Okanagan Valley are becoming a top notch destination for beer lovers as well. There’s already tons of fun things to do in Kelowna with the family but the Great Okanagan Spring Festival is a festival for the above majority age crowd.

You’ll find some of our local favorite breweries and restaurants at the Festival, like the Train Station Pub, Grimm’s Fine Foods, BNA Brewing, Tree Brewing, Freddy’s Brewpub, Okanagan Spring, Boundary Brewing Company, BC Tree Fruits Cider Co., Wards Hard Cider, plus plenty of other great craft beer and cider brewers from all across Canada.

The Great Okanagan Beer Festival main tasting event is on May 12th, and they’ve invited us to cover the main event at Waterfront Park, as well as some of the fun extracurricular events happening around town leading up to the main event.

It’s our first year at the GOBF, and we’re pretty excited to take in all the fun (plus all that tasty food, beer and cider!).

Love your beer? Do like us and check out a Kelowna Craft Brewery tour in the days leading up to the Festival, and follow along on Twitter and Instagram stories to check out our Pregame Brunch from Grimm’s Fine Foods starting at 11:00 am May 12th at the the Train Station Pub.

The GOBF features 70 breweries, plus 140 varieties of craft beer and cider, and plenty of tasty food trucks, games and more. There are also four live bands for the May 12 main event, plus a DJ.

We’re especially excited as they’ve given us two general admission tickets to give away!

Buy your GOBF tickets here now!

Want to learn more about the GOBF? Check out this article from Murissa at the Wanderful Traveler (another awesome Okanagan-based blogger), the FAQ for the GOBF, or the video below.

Enter now for your chance to win two general admission tickets to the May 12th main event!

The contest is open to legal residents of Canada, excluding Quebec, who have reached the age of majority in British Columbia, and ends May 05, 2018. See the entry form for terms and conditions. Absolutely no minors are permitted within the grounds.

So how do you enter? It’s easy.

See the contest widget below? To start, all you have to do is to enter your email or log in via Facebook!

Follow the Gibbons Whistler Facebook page for up to date announcements on all the GOBF fun!

What’s included in each ticket (remember you could win TWO tickets!):

• Official GOBF sampling mug
• 3 beer tokens
• Live music
• Access to 60 breweries and 120+ beer varieties
• Access to food vendors and exhibitors
• A rad time with thousands of festival-goers on the stunning Okanagan Lake

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The Barefoot Nomad is not responsible for prize fulfillment.

I have to admit to being a bit of a hot mess lately when I travel. I have a passport in one pocket, my boarding pass in another, a pen stuffed away in a backpack, and my wallet with my credit cards and cash somewhere else. It makes for a lot of disorganization and confusion.

I’m the perfect candidate for a good passport holder.

When the folks at Talonport reached out to have us review their new affordable luxury passport holder I jumped at the chance.

It’s a gorgeous, streamlined passport wallet that keeps your passport, travel documents, pen, cards, currency and more all in one place. There’s a unique fold-out document wing, it’s handcrafted in genuine leather and has a lifetime guarantee. See it on Amazon.com here.

Talonport also makes gorgeous luggage tags in leather or stainless steel.

Their new luxury passport holder premieres on Kickstarter in mid September, but they’ve agreed to let us help them give one away first!

Enter to Win!

Now we get to give you a chance to win your very own luxury passport wallet and luggage tag with a MSRV of $109.98 USD.

The contest is open to residents of the USA and Canada, except Quebec. See the entry form for terms and conditions.

You can even invite friends for more entries and free travel gear (shipping and handling included)!

• Invite three friends and be entered to win a handy luggage hook
• Invite five friends and be entered to win a luggage strap to easily identify your luggage on the carousel
• Invite ten friends and be entered to win a liquid proof barrel designed toiletries bag
• Invite fifteen friends and be entered to win a set of six packing cubes

Simply invite friends and for every friend that enters the contest you’ll get an extra entry plus your choice of a FREE item with shipping and handling included.

Now the best part – your chance to win

Win a Luxury Passport Wallet and Luggage Tag

So how do you enter? It’s easy.

See the Gleam widget above? To enter, all you have to do is to enter your email and name!

This article was sponsored in part by Talonport. We only work with partners we use and recommend personally.

The Barefoot Nomad is not responsible for prize fulfillment.

This is a real life, in the trenches, honest look at how we travel carry on only as a family of four.

We traveled carry on only for our family of four for three months through Canada, Mexico, Belize, Colombia, Ecuador, including the Galapagos Islands and the USA. We managed this despite needing to carry extra blogging gear, including several cameras, a camera bag, tripods, and two laptops. We also carried clothes for two climates: the hot 80 degrees or more of the Galapagos, and the cool early spring climate in Canada on our return.

The truth is, we weren’t always light packers. In fact, we’ve even written about our luggage over packing woes before.

That said, we have learned a couple of key things from our tendency to over pack. First, it is not fun to lug heavy suitcases up steep, multi-story staircases in Spain and Portugal. Second, we honestly didn’t use many of the items we used to pack “just in case” in our huge suitcases.

So, after a few years of packing way too much, we decided to see if we could try carry on only for our family. The good news is that it worked splendidly and saved us hundreds in extra check in luggage fees.

What do you need to pack?

To do the switch to carry on only, we needed to first change our attitude about packing. We let go of the idea that we needed to pack things just in case we needed them. Instead, we only packed items that were essential.

When we packed, we put all of our “just in case” items in a separate pile. After we put all our essentials (see our list later on) in our carry ons, we cherry picked a few of our best items from the “just in case” pile to go with us.

What luggage do we use?

Split between four of us (two adults, and two kids, aged 8 and 11), we use:

• Two 22″ carry on wheeled expandable suitcases. One suitcase holds Charles’ clothing and toiletries, the second has Micki’s clothing and toiletries.
• One 21″ carry on wheeled suitcase that we’ll likely exchange for another 22″ expandable one. This one carries the kids’ clothing. It’s similar to this Chester Minima carry-on suitcase.
• One duffel bag, carry on size. This contains our extra shoes, towels, sunscreen, sunglasses, and snorkels and masks.
• 3 small backpacks, small enough to be considered personal items by North and South American airlines. The largest backpack carries all of our electronics, the second backpack holds our kids’ toys and jackets, and the third backpack holds snacks and other odds and ends that we pick up on our travels. See our list of the best travel backpacks!

Who will these carry on tips work for?

• Parents with kids out of diapers. In fact, this carry on system will be difficult if you have a young child who’s in diapers, and who needs a stroller, diapers, wipes, a cot, and other baby items or if one of the parents needs to constantly carry one of their children.
• Parents with one child who can pull a carry on size wheeled suitcase reliably, especially when boarding the plane.

Traveling carry on only as a family of four would have been hard to manage if our eldest, who’s 11, couldn’t wheel his own bag, and carry one of the lighter backpacks. That said, you could travel carry on only for a family of four if one adult was willing to pull two wheeled carry on suitcases, and stack a personal item-size backpack on top. This tended to happen when our son was otherwise preoccupied but I will say that boarding the plane was tricky with a backpack and 2 carry ons.

How did we carry the bags?

Charles pulls the heavier 22″ carry on, and carries the heavy electronics backpack. He also does double duty taking Cole’s bags if Cole’s hands are full with food or toys.

I pull the second 22″ carry on, and carry a lighter backpack. I also set the duffel on top of my wheeled carry-on, wrap the duffel’s straps around the carry on handle, and pull the duffel on top of the carry on. This works well as long as your carry-on’s weight is evenly distributed. Charles’ carry on is front heavy, and if we set the duffel on top, the suitcase topples forward.

Our 11 year old pulls a 21″ carry on and carries the lightest backpack.

What is in our family carry on?

Once we pared our belongings down to only the essentials, and a few nice-to-have items, our family carry on only packing list looks something like this.

• 4 light summer jackets
• 4 light raincoats
• 4 pairs of sneakers (we swapped them out with our sandals depending on the weather)
• 20 T-shirts (5 each)
• 12 long sleeve shirts (3 each – Charles had 2 casual dress shirts)
• 8 pairs of pants with long legs (2 each)
• 8 pairs of shorts (2 each)
• 28 pairs of underwear (7 each). Yes, that’s a lot of underwear. But we figured that it was easy to re-wear clothing. Underwear, not so much.
• 8 swimsuits (2 each)
• 2 dresses
• 4 pairs of pajamas
• 2 toiletries bags, each about 8″ x 6″ x 6″ square, filled with toothbrushes, shaving kit, medicine, etc.
• 2 snorkels and 2 masks
• 3 lightweight towels
• 6 toys (3 toys each for the kids)
• 2 laptops
• 2 iPods
• 3 eReaders
• 1 GoPro and accessories
• 1 DSLR camera and lenses
• 1 tablet (which we rarely used)
• 2 external battery chargers
• Cables, wires, chargers, tripods, and other electronics odds and ends
• Sunscreen, sunglasses, hats and other personal items

We carry personal items like our smartphones and wallets in our pockets at all times, so I excluded them from the list.

Tip! We keep clothes organized in the suitcases by using packing cubes!

What kind of luggage do you need?

First, a wheeled carry on is essential, especially if a child pulls it. We especially love carry ons with four wheels, which allows the suitcase to be pulled in any direction. For us, using a backpack as a carry on would have been a bit awkward, as we were already using a small backpack as our personal item.

Tip! Purchase an expandable carry on if you can. Not only can it give you that little bit of extra space if you purchase more clothing as you travel but it makes it super easy to compress your bag when it starts to become unwieldy. Just expand it, close your bag then un-expand it. Voilà, instant compression bag.

Second, we recommend using a duffel as one of your carry on pieces, especially if one of your children are still too small to handle a carry-on. It straps easily to the top of one of our carry on suitcases, and it holds an incredible amount, because none of its storage area is taken up with wheels or retractable handles. It can also be slung across the body which comes in handy having to carry it up large flights of stairs or boarding the plane.

Third, get durable luggage. If your child is pulling a carry on, it’ll end up being dragged over curbs, sidewalks, and slammed in corners. On our trip, our luggage was slung on ferries, shoved in lockers, squeezed into Ubers far too small for four people and our luggage, crammed into the cargo hold of a ten seat airplane, squashed into countless overhead bins, thrown in bus cargo holds, and even strapped to a golf cart. By the end of our trip, it was pretty easy to see which carry on was good quality, and which we should have spent a little more money on.

Want some more family travel tips and packing tips? Check out our articles on traveling light with electronics, and how not to fry your electronics while overseas.

Hard sided or soft sided luggage?

The biggest benefit of soft sided luggage is extra pockets, no scuff marks or possible denting, better breath-ability and that it only opens on one side allowing it to be placed on stands easier however clothes is piled deeper. It also has more flex and is more often than not also expandable.

The biggest benefit of hard sided luggage is better security, more water proof (our one soft sided piece of luggage had to be completely emptied due to a sudden downpour that soaked every last piece of clothing in it while our hard sided ones were fine), better protection of the objects inside, easier access to all clothes since it splits in the middle though this means it takes more space to open.

I would say that hard side vs. soft side mostly comes down to this. If you like pockets, expandability and less scuff marks go with soft sided luggage. If security and protection is your major concern, go with hard sided.

Where to get durable luggage

Getting durable carry on luggage may mean ponying up some cash, or waiting until quality luggage goes on sale.

If you’re looking for sales, check out large stores, as they carry a bigger selection, and often have great pieces of luggage on sale.

Amazon is a great place to start looking.

They have a huge selection of luggage, including Samsonite, Heys and Swiss Gear, and you can browse their luggage selection online. You can even buy online, and return to your nearest store.

Check luggage prices and selection on Amazon.

Now for one of our favorite parts of running this blog! Best Buy Canada has generously sponsored a giveaway for a quality Samsonite luggage set to one of our readers!

Enter to Win! * Contest is Closed*

This contest is closed! Congratulations to our winner, Judy.

We get to give you a chance to win your very own Samsonite Stamina NXT 3-Piece Hard Side 4-Wheeled Expandable Luggage Set with a MSRV of $599.

The contest is open to residents of Canada, except Quebec (sorry!). See the entry form for terms and conditions.

Now the best part – your chance to win!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

So how do you enter? It’s easy.

See the Rafflecopter widget above? To enter, all you have to do is to enter your email or log in via Facebook!

The contest runs from April 24, 2017 to May 8, 2017. The winner will be contacted by email and the prize will be shipped soon after.

Do you travel carry on only? Do you have any tips to share? Let us know in the comments below; we’d love to hear from you!

The Barefoot Nomad is not responsible for prize fulfillment.

This article was sponsored in part by Best Buy Canada. We only work with partners we use and recommend personally.

Luckily for you, before we get to that, we get to give you a chance to win your very own 9.7-inch iPad Pro Wi-Fi 128GB (Silver Edition) and Acronis True Image 2017 for 5 PCs with 1 TB Acronis Cloud subscription!

The generous folks at Acronis are letting us give away this prize package to our readers:

• 9.7-inch iPad Pro Wi-Fi 128GB – Silver MSRP $829.00
• Acronis True Image 2017 for 5 PCs with 1 TB Acronis Cloud subscription MSRP $49.00

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Here are the details:

The contest is open to residents of the United States and Canada, except Quebec (sorry!). See the entry form for terms and conditions.

Now the best part – your chance to win!

So how do you enter? It’s easy.

See the Rafflecopter widget just above? To enter, all you have to do is to enter your email or log in via Facebook!

The contest runs from December 19, 2016 to January 2, 2017. The winner will be contacted by email and the prize will be shipped soon after.

Your privacy is important to us. We want you to know that the details you submit will be supplied to the prize sponsor, and they may be used for marketing purposes. You’ll be able to opt out of any emails you don’t want at any time.

Tip! If the Rafflecopter entry form doesn’t appear, please wait a minute for it to load.

Now, for what all the fuss is about! Here’s our look at Acronis True Image 2017 backup software.

Acronis True Image 2017 Review

Our Acronis True Image 2017 Review

So, what do I think of Acronis True Image 2017? First, let me tell you what it is, and how it can help you keep your digital photos, work files, and even the information on your smartphone safe.

Acronis True Image 2017 is a backup software for your PC or Mac that installs in just two clicks.

You can use it to back up your photos, documents, files, Facebook account and everything else on your computer as well as your phones and tablets (iPhone, iPad and Android devices). You can even use Acronis True Image 2017 to back up your operating system, settings, NAS devices and more.

To make it easy, you can schedule backups, and even remotely run a backup for someone else.

Where is your backup stored?

You can use Acronis True Image 2017 to create a backup on an external drive, on your computer, on the Acronis cloud, or any combination of those.

What I like

I found this software to be very easy to use. The dashboard is simple, organized and logical. If you’ve used powerful backup tools before, you know that sometimes their dashboards feel like an intimidating NASA-level programming interface. Not so with Acronis True Image 2017, which has a lot of powerful features, but also manages to be user friendly.

The cloud backup! We travel constantly, meaning we don’t always have access to our home computer. Having a cloud-based backup of our files has been an absolute lifesaver more than once!

What I love

My personal favorite feature of Acronis True Image 2017 is the mobile backup.

I like to have a backup of my phone photos and videos on both the cloud and on my computer. Honestly, it’s always a pain to get a PC backup from my phone. I’m on an Android phone, so I usually manually plug in a USB cable, and drag files over to my PC to back them up. It’s not especially fast, and I usually only back up my videos and pictures, leaving my contacts, calendar, and messages on the phone, with no backup. I do have my photos and videos set to automatically backup to the cloud, but have no idea how to set it to backup my contacts, calendar and messages.

I have to say using Acronis to back up by WiFi is a world easier. It’s so easy to use that I had my mobile phone’s backup started in less than five minutes.

Here’s how the Acronis True Image 2017 mobile backup works.

Make sure your mobile phone and computer, which is running Acronis, are on the same WiFi network.

Install the Acronis True Image 2017 mobile app. Start the app and pair your phone and computer by using the QR code in Acronis on your computer. This sounds technical, but it honestly only took about two minutes, and the Acronis app guided me through the whole process.

Next, set up what you want to back up, and if you want it backed up to the Acronis cloud, or to your PC. Then click Backup, and it goes to work for you.

What I don’t like

Honestly, there’s really nothing that I truly dislike about this software.

I’ve read other reviews that complain that the Acronis Facebook backup doesn’t restore directly to Facebook, but that’s not really Acronis’ fault. As far as I can tell, no backup software can restore everything to Facebook in one click, simply because Facebook’s back end API doesn’t allow it. Facebook doesn’t even let you manually restore an entire Facebook backup in one swoop.

Instead, you need to manually re-upload your photos, manually add friends, and so on. That said, it should be a lot easier to restore a hacked Facebook account from an Acronis backup that lets you see your old friend list and grab photos from the backup.

When you use Acronis, you backup to either your PC, an external drive, or the Acronis cloud. There’s no option to backup to other services like Amazon Cloud, Dropbox or Google Drive. The advantage of this is that your data’s kept on the secure Acronis cloud.

Cool features

You can use Acronis True Image 2017 to back up your mobile devices like smartphones and tablets to your computer.

You can even use it to back up your Facebook.

You can also use the remote feature to run a backup for someone else. I’m going to love this feature for backing up my Mom’s computer remotely!

The bottom line

I’d rate Acronis True Image 2017 a solid A. It’s jam-packed full of features, easy to use, I love the mobile backup, and it offers a cloud storage option, which is an absolute essential!

Click here to get Acronis True Image 2017  from $49.99!

Want to try it out first? No problem, you can get a free trial of Acronis True Image 2017 here.

The Barefoot Nomad is not responsible for prize fulfillment.

Today’s post is written by one of our great sponsors, Escapes.ca.

Escapes.ca understands vacations. They’re a Vancouver-based, family-run online vacation company that specializes in all-inclusive holidays and destination weddings. They’re known for their great service and amazing deals.

Watch for their new website this fall, complete with loyalty rewards and even more features to help you find the perfect all-inclusive vacation.

With a wide range of travel destinations, you could treat yourself to a trip to Cuba, Mexico or even Italy! And for once, you won’t need to worry about your carbon footprint. Escapes.ca is committed to giving back to Mother Earth.

For each vacation package booked, Escapes.ca plants ten trees to The Eden Projects. In addition to that, for every online booking, they donate $1 to WWF Canada. (To read more about their charitable work, click here: http://www.escapes.ca/escapes-cares.

So not only is this a company you can feel good about supporting, their competition is set to be downright fun!

All you have to do is tune in to Escapes’ Facebook Live stream and watch Christine Turner, travel agent extraordinaire, as she broadcasts live from the Hyatt Ziva in Cancun. That’s right, you basically get a mini vacation in Cancun while also entering a contest for a REAL vacation.

Here’s what Christine has to say about the Hyatt Ziva Cancun:

“This is my favorite luxury all-inclusive resort in Cancun. It’s surrounded by the ocean on three sides, with stunning beaches and pools you want to dive right into. Lots of dining options including the elegant French restaurant, fun 50’s diner, a candy shop and their own craft brewery – all included! No matter what age you are, you’re sure to love this resort as much as I do!”

How to enter:

Check out Escapes.ca’s Facebook page on Monday July 18th to watch Christine’s Facebook Live stream at 10:30 a.m. PDT. Make sure to watch out for the ‘code word’ Christine will give her viewers during the video.

Go to the Giveaway tab on the Facebook page to enter the contest, using your e-mail and the code word. Share the video with your significant other/friends and get an extra entry for yourself if they enter.

The contest runs from 10:30 a.m. (PDT) July 18, 2016 to 11:59pm (PDT) July 19, 2016. The giveaway is open to residents of Canada only, aged 18 or over. The winner will be contacted by email.

The Barefoot Nomad is not responsible for prize selection or fulfillment.

Canada is a country built on exploration and adventure.

Canada’s geography has everything from prairies, forests, deserts, the Arctic tundra and the Canadian Shield, to the rugged peaks of the Canadian Rockies, all surrounded by the world’s longest coastline. It’s no secret that this is terrain that’s challenged explorers for hundreds of years.

As Canadians ourselves, we’re lucky enough to have had many chances to explore Canada’s great wilderness.

We’ve had our share of outdoor adventures, from canoeing down the mighty Yukon River, to boating in Ontario’s Lake of the Woods, to camping and hiking in the Rockies, to kayaking along the coast of British Columbia. No matter where you are in Canada, there’s adventure waiting around each corner. Like many Canadians, we know firsthand that Canada is a beautiful, wild, and sometimes challenging, place.

In a country full of people like us who kayak, hike, mountain bike and climb mountains, what would it take to earn the title of Canada’s greatest explorer? Quite a lot, I think.

Woods Canada’s Greatest Explorer

The Woods Canada’s Greatest Explorer challenge aims to find Canada’s best explorer. The challenge pits 12 highly skilled Canadian outdoor adventurers, chosen by Canadians, against each other in a series of epic outdoor challenges built to test their outdoors skills and knowledge. The challenges can be physical, skillful or artistic outdoor challenges, all held in undisclosed locations across Canada.

Each challenge is revealed to the participants on the day it’s performed, and losing contestants are eliminated after each challenge. Challenges start airing on June 10, 2016.

The winner gets the title of Woods Canada’s Greatest Explorer (WCGE) and a $25,000 grand prize.

Who’s racing?

You can check out the contestants and pick your favorite here.

Beyond having exceptional outdoors skills and knowledge, the winner must also embody the values, personality and emotional benefits of the Woods brand.

We’re thrilled to be partnering with Woods Canada to introduce you to the very first challenge: Challenge 1 -The Woods Wilderness Relay.

Challenge 1: The Woods Wilderness Relay

The wilderness relay took place at MacDonald Lake, Ontario, in the Haliburton Forest Reserve, and had three parts: a 17 km mountain bike ride, a 10 km run, and a 9 km canoe race with portage.

To put the wilderness relay in perspective, a standard Olympic triathlon is a 10 km run, a 1.5 kilometers swim, and a 40 km bike ride.

Having had the dubious pleasure of portaging a 50 lb. (24 kg) canoe once or twice, I can tell you that it can be a struggle simply to portage a canoe across a parking lot to the lake. I can’t imagine having to portage and paddle, in addition doing a triathlon-like run and bike ride.

I am, however, a bit envious of the gear that the racers have (and we Barefoot Nomads love our outdoor gear). They need excellent outdoor equipment to stay hydrated and dry, like this 2L Woods Hydration Pack with a double diamond rip-stop construction and padded air mesh back.

The 12 contestants were randomly divided into six teams of two contestants, and raced as a team. The run and the bike were treated as a relay, with each member performing one of the two events. The canoe race was completed as a pair. Both competitors canoed to the end of the course together, and the team that crossed the finish line first, won!

Local Expert: Sean Ruppel

Expert judges will be used for all the Woods Canada’s Greatest Explorer challenges. Sean Ruppel was the expert for Challenge 1: The Woods Wilderness Relay.

Superfly Racing was founded in 2000 and Sean Ruppel and his team manage a large series of trail and mountain bike challenges including the Ontario Cup Series, 24 Hours of Summer, Solstice Challenge, Albion Fat Bike Festival. Superfly are also professional trail builders who routinely build trails for adventure racing events in Ontario. Sean has also run numerous events at the Haliburton Nature Reserve and knows the race location intimately.

How do I watch the challenge?

Just head on over to the Woods Canada’s Greatest Explorer competition at WoodsExplorer.ca to find out more.

Let us know which of the 12 contestants you’ll be cheering on!

We’re thrilled to bring you a chance to win a $2,500 travel voucher, compliments of KANETIX.ca!

To enter, just head on over to the contest on KANETIX.ca, and get a quote for travel insurance. There’s no obligation to buy anything.

Think about what you could do with a $2,500 travel voucher! It would definitely go a LONG ways towards beating the winter blues for any Canadian!

What to do if you win?

Anything you want!

This time of year, $2,500 would definitely help getting you somewhere bright and sunny, preferably with endless margaritas, a turquoise ocean, and white sand.

If sun and sand aren’t your thing, you could hop on a plane to visit family you haven’t seen in far too long, or take the kids on an epic vacation to Disneyland.

Been thinking about visiting Paris, going on a cruise, or just want to have a great stay-cation to check out some great destinations in your home province? You can do that too!

Now, our very favorite part – your chance to enter to win $2,500 towards a dream vacation!

Here’s how to enter

Entering is easy.

To enter the contest, just go to KANETIX.ca and complete an online travel insurance quote. Until March 31st, 2016, eligible Canadians are automatically entered into a draw to win a 2,500 travel voucher. You will need to give your email address so they can contact you if you win.

What could you win?

The lucky winner will receive a $2,500 travel voucher.

Contest details

The contest starts Jan 21st, 2016 and closes March 31st, 2016. Terms and conditions apply. See the official contest webpage on KANETIX.ca for contest details.

The Contest is open to Canadian residents only, excluding residents of Quebec, who have reached the age of majority in their province or territory of residence at the contest opening date. You must have a valid email address to participant in the contest.

Just click here to go to the contest webpage on KANETIX.ca and complete a Travel Insurance quote to enter to win $2,500 toward your dream vacation!

About KANETIX

Launched in October 1999, KANETIX was Canada’s first online insurance marketplace and today provides over a million quotes per year to consumers looking for insurance, as well as comparisons for mortgage rates and credit cards.

The KANETIX comparison service is a one-stop shopping environment for consumers. Each day, thousands visit KANETIX to comparison shop their various financial needs. Shoppers choose what they want to compare, obtain a quotation and complete an online application or, with the help of KANETIX connect with the provider to purchase or apply for the product over the phone.

Through its Software as a Service team, KANETIX is also the leading provider of online insurance quotation technology, developing online quotation systems, mobile solutions, actuarial tools and websites for many of Canada’s largest insurance brands.

This post was sponsored by the folks at KANETIX.ca, but our love of travel and contests is all our own.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The folks at Raincoast Books are working with us to give away a prize pack of two great Lonely Planet titles: Best in Travel 2016 and Wild Word.

Lonely Planet’s Best in Travel 2016

Lonely Planet’s Best in Travel 2016

This book’s all about the hottest travel trends and destinations for 2016. If anything will get your wanderlust fired up, it’s this book.

It’s even helpful for planning your travels in 2016; there are  35 events mapped out by month, plus 16 top travel lists.

You can buy Lonely Planet’s Best in Travel 2016 on Amazon or your local bookstore.

Lonely Planet’s Wild World

Lonely Planet’s Wild World is a formidable book.

At 256 pages, this book is has some good heft. It’s a true coffee table book at over 10″ x 14″.

Inside you’ll find some of Lonely Planet’s best photography of places that are just a little off the beaten path.

You can buy Lonely Planet’s Wild World on Amazon.

Want to win your own copies of Best in Travel 2016 and Wild World?

So how do you enter? It’s easy.

See the Rafflecopter widget at the top of this page?

Just go to the Rafflecopter form at the top of this page and enter your name and email, or log in with Facebook.

The contest runs from midnight (PSE) November 30, 2015 to midnight (PST) Dec 9, 2015. The giveaway is open to residents of Canada only, excluding Quebec, aged 18 or over. The winner will be contacted via email.

The winner will get a copy of these two books!

• Lonely Planet’s Wild World
• Lonely Planet’s Best in Travel 2016

Best of luck!

Raincoast books supplied us with copies of the books for our personal use and the giveaway. As usual, all opinions are our own. This contest is open to Canadian residents only, excluding Quebec. 

We’ve been stationary a little while here in beautiful British Columbia.

As winter settles in, wanderlust is getting the better of me, and I’m itching to find the nearest airport.

Since we’re committed to spending most of this winter in Canada, pretty much the only way to scratch that travel itch is to do some travel planning for upcoming trips.

Enter TripVerse.

TripVerse is a travel planning tool that lets  you to create and share your own itineraries or view itineraries created by other travelers in the community.

Cool, right? I especially love that you can read your trips offline (because unreliable WiFi and data connections are the known bane of travelers everywhere). Entering your attractions is easy with autocomplete suggestions from Foursquare and Google Maps.

I’ve been using TripVerse to do some planning for an upcoming trip to Anguilla, as well as trips in Kelowna, Madrid, Lisbon and Playa del Carmen. Check out our planned trips on our TripVerse profile.

I’m spending a lot of time on my smartphone these days (probably too much time to be honest), and I’m really loving being able to use the free TripVerse app on my mobile device. The TripVerse Android app only came out a few months ago, and they wanted to celebrate by giving away a brand new Google Nexus5X smartphone!

Since one of my very favorite things is getting to give away great prizes to our readers, I jumped right on the bandwagon.

Enter to Win a Google Nexus 5X Smartphone!

What’s the prize?

A Google Nexus 5X Smartphone worth $499.00 MSRP.

You can enter by scrolling down to the Rafflecopter widget below.

The giveaway runs from November 16 to December 14 2015. SIgning up on TripVerse is a mandatory entry (don’t worry – it takes less than a minute to sign up!). From there, you can earn more entries!

Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Over 13 years ago, Charles and I walked onto a Malaysia Airlines flight bound for Kuala Lumpur via Taipei.

We spent the next year exploring Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand.

Spoiler alert: Scroll down below to enter to win a prize package with 3 Lonely Planet books (Canada only)!

By then, we were bitten by the travel bug, and bitten hard.

To this day, I’m not entirely sure what inspired me to take that first step onto that flight. The inspiration may have come from stories from other travelers. Maybe it was the adventures promised between the pages of our guidebook. Maybe I was just born with the need to travel.

But we’d like to hear from YOU today.

We’d like to hear the reasons that get you on the road.

You can share a story about a person that inspired you to travel, or you can tell us something else that inspires your wanderlust.

We’d love to hear: What (or who) inspires YOU to travel?

Let us know in the comments below. We’re curious to hear!

Plus a Giveaway from Lonely Planet!

Even better, the folks at Raincoast Books are working with us to give away a prize pack of three great Lonely Planet titles: Ultimate Travelist, Lonely Planet’s Travel with Children, and How to Survive Anything.

The Lonely Planet’s Ultimate Travelist is due for release October 6, 2015, but we got a sneak copy.

This is a big book filled with jaw dropping photos of some of the world’s most interesting destinations. Some of the places, like the Galapagos and Cambodia’s Angkor Wat, are well known but we found some off the beaten path destinations as well, like the Salar de Uyuni (the world’s biggest salt lake) in Bolivia. The only downside to this book is that we can guarantee that your bucket list will probably grow exponentially by the time you’re done reading.

You can pre-order the Lonely Planet’s Ultimate Travelist on Amazon or your local bookstore.

Since we’ve traveled with our kids since they were tiny, and tackled five continents with them in the process, we were primed to like this book. This is an especially great book for those who are new to traveling with kids, with comprehensive coverage on kid-friendly destinations and trip preparation.

You can buy Lonely Planet’s Travel with Children on Amazon.

When How to Survive Anything first arrived, I set it on our coffee table. I was in the middle of sorting through piles of work, so it took me about a week before I had a chance to pick it up.

When that week was over, Cole (who’s 10) had read it cover to cover, and his sister Jordan (who’s six) had read a good chunk as well.

On top of that, every single person who came to visit us picked it up off the coffee table, and read it almost cover to cover.

So when I finally got a chance to pick up How to Survive Anything a week later, I was pretty curious as to what was keeping everyone so entertained.

Honestly, it’s a damn entertaining read.

Visually, the comic-book sketches make it read a lot like a graphic novel. Inside, there are sections on how to survive an eclectic mix of situations, including how to survive a spacewalk, an earthquake, and even locking yourself out of your hotel room naked. I hope never to need that last bit of information.

I’d highly recommend this as a coffee table book; it’s entertaining and funny, and it even gives some helpful practical advice.

You can buy How to Survive Anything on Amazon.

And now your chance to win!

So how do you enter? It’s easy.

See the Rafflecopter widget below?

Just go to the Rafflecopter form below and enter your name and email, or log in with Facebook.

The contest runs from midnight (PSE) Sept 25 2015 to midnight (PST) on Oct 10, 2015. The giveaway is open to residents of Canada only, excluding Quebec, aged 18 or over. The winner will be contacted via email.

The winner will get a copy of all three books!

• Lonely Planet’s Ultimate Travelist
• How to Survive Anything
• Travel with Children

a Rafflecopter giveaway
Raincoast books supplied us with copies of the books for our personal use and the giveaway. As usual, all opinions are our own. This contest is open to Canadian residents only, excluding Quebec.