Last-minute travel: Want to get away?

We don’t really know whether South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford arranged his recent, um, vacation at the last minute, but the governor’s now-infamous jaunt to Argentina does raise questions for the rest of us about the implications of last-minute travel (regardless of the reasons for your trip). Since spur-of-the-moment vacations can often net you the best deals, we thought it’d be a good idea to mention a few things you’ll probably want to think about before booking:

• Got your passport? If you’re heading out of the country — even just to Canada, rather than all the way to South America — in almost all cases you must have a passport. If you don’t have one, it’s currently taking four to six weeks for standard processing. You can also request a rush job and get it in as little as two weeks. But if you don’t have a passport, the best advice is to get one now so that when you want to travel abroad, you can grab a deal at a moment’s notice.

• Where should you go? In the wake of the Sanford affair, the Los Angeles Times put out a humorous piece about where the governor should have gone. Though the Times’ “advice” was thoroughly tongue-in-cheek, it’s worth considering the column’s point: to get just far enough away, but not too far. You’ll have to decide exactly where that happy medium is (check our flexible travel tools for suggestions), but make sure that you don’t get so far away that for whatever reason (too little money, too disoriented, too much distance from your political aides) you don’t know how to get back.

• Do you really want to disappear? Sometimes we all need to get away so we can recharge and refresh. But before you do so, think about who needs to know about where you’re going and when you expect to be back. If the worst should happen, you’ll want the posse to know where to come looking for you. Even if all goes well during your disappearing act, it won’t be fun to go home to an angry and bewildered spouse, child or parent. And don’t even think about keeping your contact information to yourself if you happen to be in charge of running a government.

• Even if you want to … can you? With e-mail, the Web, BlackBerrys, GPS and the like, you can’t disappear for long. Being out of touch can take a lot of work, and it’s getting harder and harder to fall off the radar. So leave the laptop at home, avoid the Internet cafés and turn off the phone — but don’t expect that you’ll be able to disappear entirely. 

Those are just a few things you’ll want to consider before you book that last-minute ticket. What else should travelers be thinking about? And while we’re on the subject, where do you like to disappear — or where would you want to? Share your thoughts in the comments section below; just leave out details from your steamy e-mails, please.