We do many of the same things mentioned above. It's amazing how much the change in the jar adds up to! But my favorite trick for saving for Jamaica each year is this -- when I'm out and about, and think of stopping at DD for a coffee, or picking up a bunch of flowers, or, God forbid!, stopping for fast food snacks -- if I'm able to talk myself out of it, I take the same money I would have spent, and stuff it into the back pocket of the passenger seat. Every couple of weeks I take $20-30 and put it away. When I clean out my wallet, I take all the extra ones and put them in the same place. By the time we go to Negril, I've saved enough to pay for all our spending money -- and the dollar bills comes in very handy for tips -- don't have to go to bank and request them! The airfare we charge and pay off in advance, and the hotel bill we pay off when we return. I always call ahead to the credit card companies before we leave to determine who can offer me the best rate (and now you have to ask how much they charge for the foreign transaction fee, what a scam!) Somehow this has worked.