FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Nov 2000
Location: Atlanta, GA, USA
Programs: Frontier Gold, DL estranged 1MMer, Spirit VIP, CO/NW/UA/AA once gold/plat/comped gold now dust.
Posts: 38,151
I'm roughly at the intersection of being set in my ways, but also being fairly frugal as one of those ways.
Midrange travel can actually be some of the most difficult, because you have just enough money to get a wider range of choice, but much if not most of the choice will be poor value or bad. (Example: $20-30 rooms in KUL or BKK). With the rock-bottomest options you take what comes but don't have to second-guess yourself as much because your options were very limited, anyway.
A lot of difference between midrange and budget travel can also boil down to time vs. money trade-offs, especially when it comes to getting around a region.