I often get asked how I squeeze so much into my trips away – smart planning is the answer, below I’ll share my methods with you, to save you having to learn the hard way.
This meticulous planning skill has come over time, over multiple trips, and with painstaking errors I have since (hopefully) learned from.
Tip 1: Check out what there is to do
This one may seem like common sense, but you’d be surprised how many people are days away from travelling somewhere with little to no idea of what to do once they get there. CultureTrip is one of the apps I recommended in a previous post.
CultureTrip is filled with useful articles like “what to do in ______”, “how to spend 24/48 hours in ______” and “best restaurants in ______”, CultureTrip makes the planning process that bit easier, whilst there are alternatives like TripAdvisor and regional travel websites.
Tip 2: Be realistic with your time
You need to realistically assess how many activities/sites you can squeeze into the time period you are away for.
If you’re in London for 2 days, you can’t visit 14 museums, Buckingham Palace, a football match and the Cliffs of Dover.
However, with full utilisation of public transport and a little advance planning you can do Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square, China Town, Buckingham Palace, Westminster, peer at Downing Street through a gate, the Tower of London and Tower Bridge in a day, and then do a football match the next (I am speaking from experience).
Tip 3: Prioritise what you want to see
I try to live life in an optimistic sense, every time I buy a lotto ticket, I convince myself I will win and will be able to travel full time. However whilst planning, it’s safer to take a Murphy’s Law approach – and assume everything will go wrong; thunder storms, public transport strikes and riots are aplenty.
What’s more likely than the above scenarios happening is there being a local festival on, or seeing something you hadn’t factored in and getting enthralled in it. What that could be? Literally anything. It could be a nice park, a cosy looking pub/coffee shop, a restaurant, a quirky market stall, or a museum you hadn’t anticipated visiting. We hadn’t anticipated it, but we ended up spending hours in Geneva‘s Botanic gardens after visiting the UN headquarters because it was near us.
If you’ve looked at what you want to do, and pick the essentials out – at least you can do the most important stuff.
Tip 4: Factor in location
If 2nd, 4th and 5th from your priority list are all located nearby each other, or on the same underground line, do them all one after another and then visit number 1 later on that day/the following morning. Moovit and google maps were 2 more of my recommended apps. They are your friend and will have you navigate your new surroundings by foot and public transport.
I also recommend Downloading a map of the areas public transport, and take note of the stations near your desired destinations – this will allow you to have your routes pre-planned and helps you save a bit of time when you need to switch trains too.
Tip 5: Factor in travel/food time
Whilst 2 hours may be enough time to see all that you wanted to in a museum, you can’t just automatically apparate to the next location. Google maps can tell you how long it takes to travel between locations via public transport/foot/car- consider this time whilst planning to allow you to plan more accurately. Also factor in eating and necessary breaks (coffee/resting on a bench etc). You’re better having a little time left over than running an hour behind because you stopped for spaghetti!
Tip 6: Check places opening times/days
This is another tip that probably seems like common sense, but to my detriment it wasn’t. We were supposed to visit the Catacombs of Paris on our Monday there. Alas they were closed – we did however manage to squeeze the Louvre, Notre Dame, The Eiffel Tower and Arc de Triomphe all into the day beforehand. It wasn’t all bad planning.
A lot of European cities tend to effectively shut down on Sundays, so check that in advance too – and plan your activities for the rest of the week days. Though a quiet European Sunday is the perfect excuse to spend a day in the park weather permitting, or spend it in the pub if the weather isn’t great (you can also compromise and spend it in a beer garden if the weather is good – the best of both worlds).
Tip 7: Collaborative planning
Group trips can be tricky – some people can take the reigns and try and drag people to anything/everything. At the other extreme, groups can be too indecisive and almost need someone to take the reigns and plan something. Have an open group chat where everyone can make suggestions of activities/things to see, and factor in at least one thing suggested from each person, and then opt for the most popular further activities afterwards.
From the itinerary at the start of this post for Gdańsk, we did everything we wanted to do except the museum.
This happens though; during my trip to Prague the astronomical clock was undergoing maintenance and was behind scaffolding when I was there – same thing with Big Ben when I was in London (what is it with big clocks avoiding me?)
I’ve heard stories of people going to Iceland with the sole purpose of viewing the Northern lights (Aurora Borealis) and not seeing them because they happen sporadically and can only be predicted a few hours in advance.
Like I said – when travelling these things happen, but with a little forethought and planning, most of the other things you want to do on a trip, can be very easily done! And you can always look at missing out on these things as an excuse to revisit these places in the future!