Vegan Budget Travel with Calen Otto | 200th Episode 🎉

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🎉 This is our 200th episode of The World Vegan Travel Podcast—and we’re so excited to celebrate it with a truly inspiring guest!

In today’s episode, we’re talking with Calen Otto, the creator of Unruly Travel and host of the Unruly Podcast. Calen is a vegan writer, activist, and adventurer who has traveled to over 30 countries—often on an incredibly tight budget—all while centering compassion, sustainability, and community in everything they do.

They’ll be sharing creative tips for making travel more affordable—like scoring free flights with credit card points, using local rideshare platforms, CouchSurfing, and house-sitting. Calen also talks about how their travels are deeply rooted in activism and alternative living, including queer-friendly volunteer trips, immersive cultural experiences, and staying off-grid in places like ecovillages and sanctuaries.

You’ll hear about their first big adventure—biking across the US at just 19 with only $300 in their pocket—as well as how they now help others plan meaningful, ethical, and budget-friendly trips around the world.

💚 If you’ve ever dreamed of traveling more but thought it wasn’t possible financially, this episode is for you.

🌿 We're heading back to Vietnam in 2026 and you're invited!  A few spots are still available — Click here to learn more and book.

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📸 Follow our adventures on Instagram: @worldvegantravel

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Transcript

[00:00:00]  
 

Hello Calen. Welcome to The World Vegan Travel Podcast. I'm so excited to have you on. Before we get started onto the topic of this podcast, would you mind telling our listeners what it is that you do in the vegan space and in the vegan travel space? But you are kind of busy. 

 I am kind of busy, which is funny because I try to be not as busy in my life and try to live a little more slowly, but when you have so many ideas and people you love all across the world, as I'm sure, you know, things get busy. So over a decade ago now, I went vegan, even though I'd been vegetarian for a long time. And I also started traveling. I was an exchange student in Chile for almost a year. So at the same time, these two passions sort of ignited, and I was falling into them both at the same time. Out of that grew an online travel blog that I have. I do writing about veganism, also about travel. I have a podcast where we explore the intersection of [00:01:00] these two things. This year I started doing very budget-friendly volunteer vegan trips, taking groups with me that are also queer-friendly. So this is all sort of tied together, right? Because sometimes there's a listener from the podcast who wants to join the trip and they've been using my travel blogs, and yeah, just trying to use these spaces online and in person to hopefully create a more compassionate world. 

I love it. I love it. Tell us about the trips that you are creating. 

Yeah, so they are inspired by trips that my partner and I go on every year. We take at least a month to go traveling and backpacking. And so far, I've been to five continents, over 30 countries, and I especially love Central and South America. So I started thinking,I travel with friends and I organize a lot, and I'm there as like, emotional support, and planning, and itinerary. Why don't I take this and take these people that I know [00:02:00] online in person? We just had our first trip in Costa Rica where we stayed on an ecovillage and had all plant-based meals, did volunteer activities, and went on adventures that sort of surround environmentalism and wildlife, and volunteering, growing food and things like that. We have some other exciting ones coming up where we're going to be doing similar things. There's a little bit of volunteering, whether it's on an animal sanctuary or it has to do with plants, and then a lot of adventure. And we try to combine the fun with getting your hands in the soil at the place that you're actually at. So they're very immersive trips. 

Oh, that sounds so fun. And where are you based when you are not traveling? 

I'm near Asheville, North Carolina in the US. 

Ah, I've heard lovely things about Asheville. 

Yes, it's a place that calls in a lot of creatives and very interesting people.[00:03:00]  

Fabulous. Fabulous. Today you are going to share your knowledge and expertise about saving money for travel and saving money while traveling. And of course, every money saved is a dollar that you can use to extend your trip or for your next trip. So, going to just hand it over to you and be guided by you in terms of the tips and tricks that you have. 

Yeah, so there's a lot of tips and tricks and I've realized what you said is so true. I think because I started traveling when I was in my teens, and you don't have a lot of money, and I still don't have a lot of money. You realize how far a dollar can go and you learn ways, I think, especially if you're super passionate about traveling; to live every day, mindfully, knowing that you're saving up for, maybe, a trip orthis place you've wanted to go to. So the last 10 years has kind of been lived [00:04:00] like this. I have tips for people, broken down into different sections, like accommodation, food, getting cheaper flights, different things like that. So I would love to hear what you think your audience is most interested in.  

Well, let's start with flights, first of all, like getting to the destination. 

Yeah. So when we're talking about flights- a lot of people talk about flight points, right? When I first heard about using flight points from credit cards to get free flights, I thought, 'Ooh, this is very exciting. I want free flights.' And then I realized you usually have to spend a lot of money to get those points to get a free flight. So that was very frustrating for me, and because I'm always trying to find a workaround and just make things a little more accessible. I've learned how you can hack this a little bit with credit cards. I have a whole blog post on this that your listeners might be interested in. But one thing, when it comes to flights, always Google Flights. I think it [00:05:00] has been the best resource for just, flat out, seeing where are the cheapest flights all around the world. But then, if people feel responsible enough and comfortable enough to sign up for a credit card with a bonus on that card. Say for example, one of the many ones I've done is, you spend $3,000 in the first month. The first three months you get 75,000 flight points. So this, if you're savvy, could be a round trip flight to a different country, a round trip flight in your home country. What I have done, is pay that credit card off as soon as I'm spending on it. And I save all my big expenses for when I have that credit card, if I can. So I'm looking forward at the end of my year when I know, all right, each year I'm getting a new credit card with flight points, and because I'm responsibly paying them off, they're letting me do this still. So I get a new credit card, make my big purchases. If my friends have big purchases, they'll put their purchase on my [00:06:00] credit card. It's sort of like this join in thing now, where everyone's like, 'Oh yeah, we know that you need to spend money on this card.' You can also authorize other users to use your card. So if you have a partner or a parent who has a big expense coming up that usually you wouldn't have that much money yourself, and you trust them, you can let them put that on that card. So I've found ways to hit that limit. Get those points. You can use them in exchange for a free flight, and pay it off, and you could do it again the next year. So I think that's one way that people with not a lot of money, or if you do have money, you can get even bigger bonuses with the flight points. So that's a great way for flights. And when it comes to other ways to get around, there's- you know, all my stuff is called the Unruly, you know, podcast book. All of these things. We're trying to think outside the box. And so I've talked to people who have walked across the country. I've done a bike trip myself, so there's many creative ways if you can sort of tap into [00:07:00] them that are a little less expensive. 

Absolutely. And I'm just thinking about what you are saying about the points. My partner Seb, he's really big into collecting points, and we do get to use these points a lot, but I think a lot of people don't realize, that Seb is spending a lot of money using those cards. We are in this wonderful position where we're able to purchase like hotel rooms in very expensive hotels for 25 people. So you can imagine that these payments are significant. 

Right. 

Which definitely helps. It definitely helps with collecting the points for sure. I'm not the one that buys flights in my household. Luckily, I'm grateful that Seb also does that, but my little bit of playing around with Google flights is kind of good because if you can be flexible, you can really pick up some good deals, and I really like how they'll tell you whether a price for a flight is [00:08:00] considered like good or very expensive. So you can kind of tweak things around. Have you noticed those features? 

Yes. They also have a really helpful calendar where you can see, all right, this exact day, it's this much, this is exact day, it's this much. You can, and if you're flexible enough, which I am, usually, you can even plan months out. Like you can see one month is half the price as another. So that's a great tip for listeners. 

So you talked about how you've done trips that don't need flights at all, including this incredible bike trip that you did across the US. That is amazing. I know that isn't really the topic of this podcast, but I'd love to know what inspired you to go, and how the experience was for you during, and looking back on it. Was it like type two fun, where it was only fun when you looked back at it, or did you enjoy it at the time? 

So that's a good way to put it. It was so many things. It was intense. Let's say that. So when I came back [00:09:00] from exchange, I was like 19.I didn't have a lot of money. I was training to be a yoga instructor, but I had broken my foot on exchange, so that was out of the cards. The one thing I was relying on to make money, I just could hardly do anymore, and I really wanted to go travel. But I was very impatient. I didn't want to wait and save up and fumble through jobs, especially when I had such little experience. And so I thought, 'What is a way that I don't have to spend a lot of money, that I can get out there today, tomorrow, within the next week?' And I wasn't a cyclist by any means, but I thought, what the heck? A bike is a sort of free way to get around. And I was very ambitious, so I thought, I'll take a bike and I will go across the country, and I'll just work for everything I need along the way. And, that's what I did. I started in Virginia, ended up in California, and then actually went to Hawaii for the first time. And I was from Ohio. I had never been west of Ohio. I had never been out [00:10:00] there in the US. So I had no idea what to expect, and there was use of CouchSurfing, and Craigslist ride sharing, and all of those good things. I didn't bike, per se, the whole trip. I did a lot of hitchhiking and things like that. But I met amazing people along the way. I had very intense experiences, just trusting people to stay in their homes. I'd get random gigs like cleaning their houses, watching their kids. So there was a lot of trust on their end and my end. And I would say, it was a lot of fun. There was a lot of self discovery, especially when you're 19, and it's like the rules were out the window, but it was intense. As soon as it was done, or even in the last five years, if you had asked me to do it again, I'd be like, 'No way.' 

Fabulous. Okay, so let's talk about some tips that you might have, like when you arrive in the country, I guess we could put them into different buckets. How do you save money on transportation?[00:11:00]  

I know it's, people are probably annoyed at this point when you say travel like a local. But usually that is the best way to save, is like, what buses, what subways, if that's available, what are the locals using to get around day by day. And so that's often what I'm doing when I get to a place, and for example, I also try to look and see what their version of rideshare might be. So if I'm used to Craigslist rideshare in the US. When I went to Spain, I was like, do they have anything like this? And sometimes they have something better. So for example, in Spain, they have BlaBlaCar, where just a random person is driving from point A to point B. People pay in, probably a fifth of what it would've taken to get a bus ride to where we were going. And you end up in a car with real people, and you spend way less money, and it's way more comfortable. So I think asking locals, 'Hey, is there a resource that you really like[00:12:00] that is cheaper than a bus?' And you'll be surprised what's out there. 

That is fantastic advice. Here in Canada, we have a similar app to BlaBlaCar, which is Poparide. I don't know whether it's available in other places, but I often use it to go from where I live into the city, and it's half the price of a bus here. And I've never had a problem meeting my ride. A couple of times they canceled on me- the car's broken down or something like that. I don't think they've just decided not to go to work that day. 

Yeah. 

I think it was a legit thing. But yeah, it's really great. And you get to meet people if you want to. Sometimes people just sit there in silence and that's fine too. 

Yeah, that's the thing. You never know what you're going to get, you know? You kind of have to be ready to go with it. 

Absolutely. Absolutely. And accommodation, I think is one of the most expensive things. That you have to pay for when you are traveling. Like I think most people would want to have [00:13:00] a safe place to sleep each night. I'm curious if you've got any tips for that? 

Yeah, for sure. Throughout life I've gone from sleeping on the couches of random strangers that I met, which many of them, I felt like were sometimes safer than when I've stayed in a hostel or even stayed in an Airbnb or something, because people can be quite unpredictable. But I think at this age, and with the people who are listening, that's right, they want something more private. They want something more official. And I would say that looking, if you're traveling long term, if you're traveling slower, looking for exchanges that you can do. Maybe a trusted house sitter where you're staying in someone's house. Sometimes you have access to their car. There's services where you can watch their pet, right? So you're just taking care of their companion animals staying in their house for free. I feel like you get to travel like a local that way. There's even a sister house swap on Facebook, like groups you can join.  

[00:14:00] Yes, I've seen that.  

It  

Yeah. 

seems  

like a really fabulous community over there. 

You're like, I wanna go to, I don't know, Los Angeles in October for a week. Does anyone wanna swap homes with me? So I think that these sort of exchanges, even if you're doing like a work exchange through Workaway or something like that, is a great way to find a really great space and save money. 

Absolutely. And Airbnb is getting a really bad wrap recently, and for many reasons. But I think one way to sort of mitigate that, is instead of taking like an entire home, which is always going to be more expensive.  

I think that can be really fun. Have you had any interesting experiences when you've been CouchSurfing? Or maybe you can explain what CouchSurfing is, and how it works? Because I'm surprised. It's not that well known. 

Yeah, I feel like it had a boom, maybe a decade ago or something, where it was more well known, and it's fizzled out a little bit. But [00:15:00] CouchSurfing is an online platform that you can use all over the world. I've seen it in almost all countries, where people, I don't know, like you and me, they might have a whole house. It might be this huge house in the suburbs or they might live in like a one or two room house. You never know what you're going to get. And they put it out there and they say, 'Hey, people, travelers can come stay with me for free.' You don't pay them. There's no monetary exchange. And you might be sleeping on a couch, you might be sleeping on a bed. All of this has worked out ahead of time. So it's not like you show up and you're surprised, right? There's like a formal system to it, and then once you stay with someone, you write and review them. So people have real reviews from real travelers, and there is now a fee for CouchSurfing. I think it's pretty small every year, maybe like 15 bucks or something, which I think is worth it. And so that's a great tool to use anywhere where you're going to check and see if they have that. There's also a new app called Quouch, which is [00:16:00] CouchSurfing, but basically for queer people. So it's a little bit safer if you're queer, if you're trans, maybe you're a lesbian couple, something like that. The world can be scary. So that's another great resource that is basically the same thing. 

Fantastic. And a lot of people push back when, or get frustrated when there's an annual cost to these kind of services. And I would argue that I actually think it's a good thing because by having a fee associated with it, it is a bit of a barrier for time wasters, like people who are not really going to take it seriously. They invested a little money into this, so they're keen and excited. Tell us about, maybe, one example of a CouchSurfing experience that you had that sticks out in your mind? 

Yeah, I'll say, I've had some really exciting experiences when I was doing that bike trip. I couch surfed with a guy named Sam. He had hosted, I think over 200 people. He [00:17:00] had couch surfed countless times himself. And he had a spotless home. He was a great host, and I was just going to stay with him a few nights. But my plans fell through. I was waiting for a friend in Idaho, and he said, 'Oh, what the heck, you can stay for a week.' So now I'm like, 'Oh, I have no money. I'm in the middle of nowhere. I have to wait here a week.' And we just became the best of friends. He took me to Yosemite for the first time, to national parks here in the US. So in that time we got to go on so many adventures and tell stories to each other. And when he needed space, he got it. When I needed space, I got it, and I think it was like much needed for both of us. We still chat sometimes to this day. So I think great friendships can form, but on the side of monetary, I will say, in the last couple years, I wasn't on CouchSurfing. The fee came, and then I was like, you know what? I should pay it. I've gotten so much out of this. I had a layover in Switzerland for one night, and the cheapest Airbnb we could find was a hundred dollars a night. [00:18:00] And I thought, let me look on CouchSurfing. It was really last minute, but I found a place where there was multiple vegans living there. It was this shared community house, and they had one room just for travelers, so for free. We took a 10 minute bus, got to their house, had dinner with like-minded people. I went to sleep, woke up, left the next day and saved a hundred bucks and had great community along the way. So I think financially, it can be worth it to pay that fee as well. 

Yeah. I think it's, I mean, that's an amazing story. The free accommodation in Switzerland, people, that does not happen very often. My goodness. 

Right? What a gem. 

And I think it must be like really nice for people, particularly those that live alone, and maybe, can just enjoy the company of others, and are just more worldly looking, and maybe they can't, for whatever reason, travel internationally themselves. [00:19:00] So why not have travel come to you and get to know people from a different place, and just show people lovely hospitality and a great experience. And, really, you are being an ambassador for the place that you live, the country that you are from. I just think it's such a lovely thing. I wish I could get Seb to do CouchSurfing. It will never happen. But, I have had some fun experiences before we got together, where I just accepted an invitation to stay at someone's home when I was in Morocco. And it was one of the most amazing cultural experiences of my life. When you open yourself up to these experiences, you can just have such wonderful things. 

I can imagine in Morocco. That's so cool. 

 Oh, it was so fun. They took me to the local salon where I got my makeup done, and my hair done, and we had a henna tattooing night, and was just like these five kids and me. We stayed in this one small room, and one who [00:20:00] was particularly devout, she was praying like five times a day. I would wake up in the night and see her praying, and it was just so new to me. It was really special. Anyway, yes. So I'm curious, if you have any strategies, again, this is a necessary expense that we must do, whether we're traveling or not, in regards to dining or eating. Is there anything that you do specifically in that topic? If you eat at restaurants two or three times a day, that gets huge. 

Yeah, so again, my partner and I, when we travel abroad, each year now, it's like we are really trying to find those local spots. And when you're vegan, of course, it can be a little bit harder because you might look on Happy Cow, and what you're seeing is not the most local spot, right? It's like a popular restaurant that's maybe a little more touristy because it's vegan. So we still try to save some money, and know we're going to spend this on really good food at a place like that. And then, more than half the time, we [00:21:00] go to a local spot where the dishes are a third, a fourth of the cost. But besides that, we do look, when we're looking for stays, does this place have a kitchen? Because if you can make budget meals at home, you can often make them abroad. And I will say, this year, we went to Tunisia in the North of Africa. That was one of the hardest places I've ever been as a vegan. Just the options were quite limited, the knowledge about it, and we didn't do it on this trip, but we would for future trips in spots like that, bring our own sort of spice packages or bring some food ahead of time that we know that we can cook once we're there. Because that can start to get costly, right? When you're hungry, all of a sudden you're fumbling for options. You're just going to go to this first spot you see, and that might be the most expensive. So yeah, sticking to those local places. And we always bring our reusable utensils and also Tupperwares because, again, like in Tunisia, we would go out to eat and the [00:22:00] meal would be huge. Usually you'd sit there and think, 'Wow, this could be my lunch and dinner tomorrow.' But if you bring a Tupperware, it can be your lunch and dinner tomorrow. So that's another great way to save a little bit of money. 

Yes. I love that. I actually just recently put together- it started off as kitchen in a bag, and now it's become like a house in a bag. It's just in one of those, I don't know whether you are aware of this, but you can buy these, I think they're called Scrubba. Anyway, it looks like a dry bag, but inside this dry bag that's, I want to say, a couple of feet high and about a foot wide. It's got all of these nodules inside. So it becomes like a washing machine, like a laundry. You can scrub clothes, and I've bought these like little laundry detergent sachets, and things like that, so that I'll be able to wash in the house, in the hotel because very often I will end up without any clothes. And then having to spend an entire morning doing [00:23:00] washing, and I'm just done with it. I'd rather just do a little bit of washing before I go to bed each night. Anyway, the kitchen in the bag has like a sharp knife, of course, I would always check it in, and a collapsible Tupperware, and a few other things as well, which will just make prepping food easier. Because if I'm going to do it, it's got to be easy. 

Yeah. You're already like in a new place, probably working, doing all of these things at once. It's, it's a lot. 

Another thing that we like to do when we travel as well, of course, is having fun activities. You can go all out with this kind of thing or you can try to keep it cheap. For example, you could go and do a bear watching tour, which we did last week when my nephew was in town, and it was like $200 a person, Canadian. 

Wow. 

Or  

you can do things a lot cheaper. So do you have any suggestions on how to save some money when it comes to activities? 

Yeah. I think going back to one thing we talked about, in touching on your experience in Morocco, is [00:24:00] when you stay with local people through CouchSurfing, through maybe trusted house sitters, something like that, they will take you out and show you a fantastic time. And instead of hiring the $200 guide, they'll usually just take you for free because they're just as good as the guide. They're a local. So I would say, when you travel like this, your activity expenses just seem to naturally be cut down a lot. I also think there's great sites that you can go on to see what people are doing, GetYourGuide or you're just Googling and things like that. But I would say, also look past the first page of Google. Maybe you see something there that you like. It's, say it's a birdwatching tour. Can you get even more nitty gritty local? Like maybe there's a local tour operator that just started. Or they're a small company, right? They're probably going to have more reasonable prices. They're going to appreciate your business more than this huge company that's just getting all the tourists off the first page. So I think if you can dig in a little bit, then yeah, [00:25:00] that's a great way to save some money. 

I absolutely agree. I've seen this often, whenever I go onto Airbnb experiences or GetYourGuide, and maybe, in a moment you can explain what GetYourGuide is. I will go through every single one because it's the more obscure niche things, not so many people go to, therefore they don't have as many reviews. It's not as popular. So if you go all the way down to the bottom of the page, you can find the really cool stuff. Can you explain what GetYourGuide is? Because I think, a lot of people wouldn't know what that platform is. 

Yeah, so I think it's newer or maybe it just got popular in the last few years, but it's an online platform where they've basically rounded up all the travelers' favorite things to do in an area. And you can book through them. So it ranges anything from tours with really big companies to like, here's the local guy in the car that he has, and his uncle's coming with him, and they're going to take you on a day tour. So you can really find [00:26:00] all sorts of things. Once again, it's rated by real travelers. So you can see if it's going to be a good match. And I will say, when you go through GetYourGuide, there's a higher fee, because you're going through a third party. But it is very convenient to use, and if you're like me, like a travel blogger and you've gone on this experience, you can send that link to someone else and get a little bit of commission if they do that as well. So people will come across them on travel blogs, and if you do book through that link, because we're not really getting paid to share our favorite itineraries or tips and tricks, and that's a great way that you can give back to that writer or blogger. 

I love it. I love it. Calen, I want to thank you so much for being on the podcast. Before we say goodbye, I would love to know the answers to a couple of questions that I have. Do you have a trip on the horizon that you are either close to taking or it's imminent? Would you share that with us? 

Yes, in [00:27:00] October, I'm heading back to the Amazon of Peru, taking a group of travelers there on an all-vegan trip, where we're going to volunteer at a wildlife sanctuary. So that is what I have coming up pretty soon. 

That's amazing. I was going to ask you what's inspiring you to go there, but I think you already answered that. 

Well, you know what I would say, like the Amazon, of course, it's inspiring to go there. There's this really great rescue, that works with monkeys, and all sorts of birds, andlarger animals that you would see in the Amazon. So I actually saw their social media, and they're actually rewilding animals, and they're like rewilding the forest around them. So that's why I was so inspired to take people there. 

Amazing. And what is one thing that's, maybe it's a little bit unusual that you don't travel without? 

 I think that there's a lot of travelers out there who like to write, and we've gotten [00:28:00] really accustomed to doing it on our computers. But now, before every trip, I will go buy a special journal. And even if I'm working on articles, paid articles on a book, something like that, I will write it all by hand. So I always try to take a special pen and a notebook intentionally, and leave my computer behind, often. I never thought I could, but I've been able to do that, so I think that's maybe a little different. 

What's the one unusual thing that you leave behind. A computer is pretty big. 

Yep. 

Amazing. Amazing. So Calen, before we go, would you mind sharing all of the platforms that you write on, post on, so that people can stay in touch with what you are doing, and maybe join your trips. 

Yeah, for sure. So they can find almost everything at unrulytravel.com. If you scroll to the bottom, you can connect with me on social media, @unrulytraveller. With two [00:29:00] L's in traveler, on most things. And there I have a travel guide called, 'The Art of Unruly Travel on a Budget', that I wrote after this bike trip. And it lists out those sections we talked about. All of my favorite resources, to travel with less money more ethically, more creatively, and then you can listen to the Unruly Podcast, wherever you listen to podcasts. And if you do go online, to the website, you can sign up for the email newsletter where I send out new trips coming up, and more travel tips, and different things like that. 

I love it. And what is the topic of your podcast? 

So it's quite an intersection of travel, veganism, queerness, and alternative living. We might have a sanctuary owner on, talking about all these incredible animal experiences they've had with the animals that they rescue, and then they tell us about their traveling back in the seventies or something like that. So all these topics usually intersect in the conversations. 

I love it. I love it. Calen, [00:30:00] thanks so much for being on the podcast. I really appreciate it. 

Yes. Thank you so much for having me.