When planning our Austin trip, we decided to save money and not rent a car.  Austin is a very walkable city and I never felt the least bit unsafe walking around. Uber and Lyft are prevalent in Austin as well. If you’re looking for something a little cheaper and more exciting, Revel mopeds are all over the place as well as the slightly more dangerous Lime Scooters. If you’re looking to go a little further without going through the traditional rental car companies, I highly recommend Turo.

We now have crowd sourced taxi services through uber and Lyft, grocery delivery from Shipt and Instacart, and food delivery from Uber Eats, DoorDash, and Grubhub. Now, rental cars have become crowd sourced through Turo, which allows you to rent cars directly from people. If you’re interested in unusual cars, Turo has more options than the rental car agencies. You can find a showy sports car, a camper van, or a rugged truck.

Barton Springs Pool

Where traditional rental companies encourage longer rentals, Turo allows you to even rent for a single day, which is what we did to get out of downtown Austin and head to Mount Bonnell. We rented a tiny, electric, Fiat 500, which is the exact opposite of the massive Nissan Armada we got tricked into renting to drive to the Grand Canyon last year (there are only two of us. Why would we need a third row of seats? We didn’t really even need the second row). It was the first time we had ever driven an electric car and that was an experience, but it wasn’t difficult to find free electric charging stations in Austin which made it much cheaper than renting a typical gas powered vehicle. And with a ridiculously low $20/day rate, it was hard to go wrong with that tiny car.

With Turo being so new, they’re not as common outside of the big cities. There were plenty of cars to choose from in Austin but there’s only a few available where I live. Of course, since you are renting someone’s personal vehicle there are mileage limits that the traditional rental car agencies have done away with. So, Turo may not be the best option for your next road trip, but its a great choice if you are traveling to a city and would like to be able to explore it with your own wheels.

Thanks for stopping by! To read about some of our previous trips, click here. If you like my photos be sure to “like” my Facebook Page, follow me on Instagram! You can purchase prints on Etsy and Fine Art America. To see inside my camera bag, check out my Gear Page. For information about our new Guided Photography Tours, visit GuidedPhoto.com.

Turo did not pay me to write this, but if they offer, I wouldn’t decline. 😉

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