20 thoughts on “December 18, 2019: Trip Planning”

  1. Which is why I recently started a Google doc with notes for a trip that will take place in October 2020. 🙂

    1. This is my wife's planning method - spreadsheets, notes, research research reasearch.

      My method is more - "Hey, let's walk in that direction. and see what we find"

      Our recent side-trip to Morocco was a nice coming together of the two. I was like "Hey, let's go to Morocco, it's only $90." And she then wrote a doctoral dissertation on how to visit.

      1. yeah, i'm on your side. i'm more of a "let's go to this one place and see what else is going on" instead of planning out 5 shrines to visit in a day.

      2. I'm the same way. Our compromise is Mrs. Runner identifying a slew of things that would be nice to see (with a little input from me) and then when we're there, we check the next day's weather to decide where we want to go first and we'll hit other list items as time allows (or check out things we hadn't considered ahead of time). You're just setting yourself up for disappointment when you make up a regimented schedule ahead of time that isn't flexible and doesn't account for weather, traffic, bank holidays (which can affect The Underground schedule!), etc.

        When everything is said and done, hopefully we didn't hit all the things we wanted to see so we have a reason to make a future trip back to visit some more.

      3. To be sure, I don't always take this approach. In this case, the jalapeno and I are going to be on our own in a foreign country, and I need to figure out how many days we're going to be there, which cities we want to spend time in, and what sorts of things we might want to do in each city. So the document right now is kind of a dumping ground for the possibilities.

        For domestic trips, trips where we'll be with family/friends who will have recommendations, and places I've been before, my approach is way more laid back. And I definitely recognize that some of the best parts of trips are the unplanned moments.

  2. You pick a location. You drive there. What's so hard about that?

    ::Checks previous HJ posts::

    I stand by my assessment.

    1. When kids aren't involved, pretty much all of our trips to new places involve looking into what might be interesting and then winging it. Italy, Spain, LA, and Munich have all been done that way. If something is can't miss, we'll make a reservation (like touring below the Vatican), but everything is mostly up in the air in case we want to linger or find somewhere unexpected.

  3. I just did a quick trip to Paris/Copenhagen for a week with a small amount of planning. General strikes in France and scary emails from Air France made me push my flight to Copenhagen by a day. I stayed at the hotel in Paris I was planning to visit the trip, but found it not so great and too expensive, so I switched it to something else (down by Nation and Bastille).

    I planned (and did) 3 things in Copenhagen - dinner at a foraging restaurant Kokkeriet - which was very good. I also went to the National Museum - very interesting - a lot of ancient Viking artifacts. And I found this 100m ring swimming pool about a mile from my hotel, with a good sauna. The rest of the time there was just wandering around.

  4. We are going to be in Berlin for a week starting Monday. The Mrs has been trying to impose Germanic efficiency. I have not yet mentioned that she is Jewish. Would that be awkward?

Comments are closed.