There was a time many moons ago when you got a better rate for travellers cheques and you could spend them like cash. That has changed a little now, in that the rate is the same and some retailers have stopped accepting them.
There are pros and cons to all of the options, but we tend to just take US dollars in cash these days. Travellers cheques are more secure and safe, in that they are covered if they are lost or stolen but if you have decent travel insurance, your spends are covered on that anyway. I have never been a fan of the currency cards because there are (not so hidden) fees to use them and sometimes you NEED cash, for example for tolls etc.
We came across lots of places in Vegas where they were no longer accepting Travellers Cheques.
I can understand why people are hesitant about the currency cards as it does take a little more work to keep track of your spending and there are those which have hidden (and not so hidden) charges. We had a Travelex Cash Passport one year and, it was only when checking the balance online some 15 months after our return (in advance of topping up for the next trip) that I realised we'd been charged an 'inactivity fee'. We switched to Fairfx at that point and, as we only use the card for paying for meals/large purchases, we don't have any charges to worry about and there is no inactivity fee.
We do still carry some cash - for tolls, small purchases like drinks/snacks, tips etc. but it is usually only around $200-$300 (no more than the amount covered on our insurance).
I feel a lot more "old school".I feel safer with travellers cheques and i find it easier to keep a track of how much ive spent as we tend to try and keep to a daily budget.Last time i bought travellers cheques from the post office i was given the third degree as to why cheques and not the post office card, which really got my back up.Even at the hotel some of the staff didnt know how to change them, also could only change $200 a day.They are still my prefered method though.
I think, in the future, Travellers Cheques will become less and less common and you will come across many places that won't take them/don't know what to do with them. As I said above, in Las Vegas we saw quite a few places with signs up saying they could no longer accpet TCs. However, don't fall for the flim-flam that the travel agents use to try and push their currency cards, where they tell you that they are being phased out. I think that they will naturally phase out because the use of currency cards is on the increase but we haven't come across anywhere on our travels to Florida yet that won't take them.
We intend to take all cash ( and a credit cards for back up emergencies )
I'm sure many will disagree with carrying $1000s in cash on hol but as
PP have said we just split it all into days and spread the cash out. All carry some, some in safe. Some in our of sight money belt.
I don't like cards when away.
We do the same in Spain France and generally money rolls over into next days.
I'm with Wayne on this one - it is highly unlikely that large amounts of cash will be covered on your travel insurance (or home insurance) and you would be completely out of pocket (and up the swanny) should you lose your cash or have it stolen. Friends of ours have actually had money stolen from an in-room safe at an exclusive resort in Orlando so, even keeping it in a safe is no guarantee. We never carry more cash than is covered on our insurance.
The reason we tend to use a currency card, however, is that we like to know that the money is there up-front (stops us spending money we haven't got). And I know there are people (Wayne) who will say that you just save the money and pay the bill when you get home but, without that limit on our spending, we don't think so carefully about how much we're spending and end up with a (nasty) surprise when the CC bill comes through. We tried doing exactly that last month, when we went to Vegas. Thought we would just keep the money in the bank and put everything on the CC. Then the bill came last week and I really had no idea we'd spent as much as we had. When using the Fairfx card, because we keep track of it daily, if we see we are going a bit over budget, we can cut back a bit accordingly and curb our spending to get back on track. With the credit card, we didn't even think about what we were spending as we didn't have to worry about running out of money.