Best Planning Tips and Tricks

Thanks to a tip on this forum, I create a Google map for each destination of size, primarily marking sights I want to seek out, though I toss in a restaurant every now then and always include the local tourist office. I'm pretty good about getting the maps made before I leave home, because I find the task goes a lot faster when I use a desktop PC rather than a tablet.

Unless an attraction is so busy it basically requires pre-purchased tickets, I don't lay out an hour-by-hour (or even day-by-day) itinerary. Rather, I make a grid that shows, for each day I'll be in a city, places that are closed or have unusual hours (whether extended or shortened). I also show things like walking tours that may only operate sporadically. Anything tied to a pre-purchased ticket is also included. The grid allows me to see at a glance what my options are each day and whether there's a special opportunity I ought to take advantage of. I should note that these grids are often prepared as I travel; I take some blank forms with me. One reason I do this is that, except for my first and last stop, I often do not know when I will arrive in a given city or even, in some cases, what cities I will visit before I begin my trip.

Although I normally travel with sections from Rick's guidebooks (and sometimes others as well), I still go online to check current hours of museums and other sights I plan to visit before arriving in a city. Not only does that allow me to catch changes that occurred after the books went to press, sometimes I learn a much-anticipated sight is closed--which is disappointing but not nearly as bad as finding that out after I've spent time walking to it.

We seldom stay anyplace more than three nights, we visit smaller and out of the way places, and usually have a rental car. I save places on Google maps of places that are must see locations and begin saving them as I hear of them rather than waiting until I begin planning a trip, otherwise they may slip my mind. Those locations will give me an idea of the route I’ll take once I do begin planning. I then use those locations to research other nearby towns or villages for additional things to see and save them too. That gives an idea of how much time I’ll need in an area. I then look for hotels in the towns I’ll use as bases. Once I know the bases, I just list the places I want to visit in that area. I don’t set a firm itinerary which allows for maximum flexibility. I’ll print area maps, but also download the maps for offline use. In addition to the places I want to visit, I’ll include addresses, opening times, entrance fees, and also save hotel locations and public parking lots. Since many really small out of the way sights are not in my Garmin’s map, I use the downloaded maps and phone as a GPS to get to them.

Like geovagriffith below, we try to keep daily driving time to less than 2 hours.

I have a "Plan A" and a "Plan B" for each day. Plan A is must do, reservations made, tickets purchased, route determined and B is "if we have time for" already researched as to if it's open, closing time and ticket cost. Things take a lot longer than you anticipate so we plan just one thing a day, between getting there, eating, shopping we rarely have time for Plan B, but what shame it would be to miss "X" just because we did not know it was two blocks away! My "B" list becomes my "A" list for the next trip.

Similar to Letizia, we schedule things for the morning hours (reservations, tickets, etc) and have a non-binding plan for the afternoon (which can be traded with a different afternoon depending on interest and energy). My best tip is mornings: get going by 8a, or earlier, and walk. Cafes are open, parks are open, streets and outside viewing is available, and all without other people! If you want to experience a city as it is when the crowds are gone, go out in the morning. Then eat breakfast, and then go to your first scheduled site. Ive been in Piazza Navona, Luxembourg Gardens, when they are practically empty, in July. Its wonderful

I visit any sites I want to see by going to the ones furthest from my hotel in the morning. I work my way back to the hotel towards the late afternoon. After dinner I try to visit what I call stand still sites. Simple places like Trevi Fountain, the Eiffel Tower, lakeside, mountain views, etc. No lines and a view where I can just relax and enjoy the scenery and people watch.

I travel off season, so rarely have to book a site ahead of time; but I do when I don't want to be disappointed. I also tend to geographically group my places of interest and note what may be closed on given dates. I also double check times on their websites...and before departure from home, I have looked to see if there are special exhibits either opening or closing during my time frame and adapt days to suit. I don't over plan my days.
I check city museum passes which might include museums that I wouldn't otherwise visit. Other times, I take advantage of the free days for museums I don't have a lot of interest in. I don't mind the crowds when I only have a cursory interest in the majority of the work.
In Madrid, as I wanted to do some day trips, and most of my interests were the museums; I booked an apartment closer to Atocha train station than the central old town. I don't tend to head out at night, so I didn't need to be near nightlife, and I was 20 minutes from Plaza Real.
I also use TripAdvisor forum for the cities of interest and check when I am on the road as well. I was able to make a last minute visit to an Alphonse Mucha exhibit I didn't know about ahead of time.
Research feast days, celebrations, city saint's day. I made a point of being in Madrid Nov 9th - their saint's day - and got to watch the celebrations. The parade was slow to start, so I headed to the Palace. Good thing, because as I was leaving, the lines were around the block.
I remember my hobbies. As a solo traveler, booking a bird watching trip, or seeing if there is some quilting exhibit in town allows me to mix with strangers with a common hobby and take a break from the touristic days.
These aren't efficiency tips, but they are 'value added' to me.

I put my itinerary in a Word document with dates, times, flight and seat numbers, hotel addresses and phones, train reservation numbers, and all those specifics. At the end is the ever-changing "to do" list before the trip, which hopefully gets shorter as time passes, and lately I've added a packing list which also shrinks as the suitcase fills up. I print that to take along, another copy for my wife if she's not coming, and another e-mailed to my brother who's the emergency contact.

In recent years, going on a couple of RS tours, I've added a sort of activity agenda, first copying and pasting the RS itinerary into Word, then adding my own items for the days before and after, and for the free time during the tour. Occasionally I'll skip something on the tour and replace it with something that interests me more and doesn't complicate the guide's life (no cooking class in Florence, Bargello instead). Doing this forces me to think about opening hours and days, where things are, and other details I might otherwise miss. This is also when I decide about timed-entry and other advance tickets for things not on the tour (or, like the Prado, for a second visit after the tour).

I'm not ready to just leave all this stuff on a phone or tablet, I might do that but I'll also print it out. And, like others, I'll cannibalize a guidebook to save weight and bulk.

Hi Dana, I could write about this topic all night since I love travel planning - LOL!

First, I make everything as visual as possible. I begin with a large piece of paper and write the cities I might like to visit in one country on spots on the paper similar to how they would look on a map. Then I look up the train schedules to see how much time between locations and draw a line between each city with the time, i,e, 1.5 hours. Sometimes that step is enough to drop off a place that’s too far compared to how I want to use my days.

The next step is doing a quick Google images of any town near the ones left on this paper. For instance, in 2019 I went to France and added Le Mans and Angers after having Chartres and Tours on my paper. So if they’re interesting, I add them on this first draft.

Next step is checking for any festivals at any of these locations or main museums closed day-of-week. In Italy, I saw that to attend the Stresa Music Festival, Verona Opera and Arezzo Jousting Festival, I would need to shift my 3-week time period forward to begin the last week of August.

Next step is using colorful Post-its and a flip-chart size piece of paper. I create a calendar and place one post-it per day. If I’m planning to be in a city for 3 days, there’s three consecutive days with the same color and title, This lets me think about everything for awhile, modify how many days, shift everything forward a day, etc. very easily. Each post-it has one or two activities penciled on it, It’s very easy to see the whole trip visually and make sure it’s fairly solid. I also do a check - do I have enough variety in categories I care about - indoor/outdoor and museums/more active events and city/small towns, etc.

Next step when I’m happy with the previous is to load the days into the TripIt app. I also use the app as a placeholder for anything or any restaurant that might sound like fun. I’ll just create a fake time for it, so it shows up in the correct city day. When I’m traveling on the train to the next town, I scan over my ideas for that place in the TripIt app and just choose what appeals to me.

For plane, hotel and event reservations, etc. I am old-school. I like to have a paper copy. When I use Booking.com, I print the copy in their local language- just a nice gesture that is appreciated. All of those go into a mesh zippered bag, and I throw them away as I reach the subsequent town. There have been a couple of times where those reservations in my hand have cleared up a potential issue. The front page of the mesh bag has an Excel spreadsheet of the overall itinerary. I don’t really use that as much anymore since I started using TripIt a few years ago,

I have a packing list that stays pretty consistent, so I just print two copies - one as I’m gathering items, trying on clothes, etc. and the second copy is my final packing copy to physically check off items. It keeps me from packing “extras” that I don’t need.

Hope that helps!

May I fit in a question about Tripit?
Does it save your trips after they are concluded?
I use an Excel spreadsheet, which comes in handy years later when reviewing the itinerary, lodgings and prices / final budget. I do like to come home, enter what I really spent beside the budget figure and either get a reality bite that I u derestimated, or better yet....have money left in the travel kitty for next trip.

Great thread! MariaF - yes, TripIt saves your trip after it is completed. Listed under “past trips”

MariaF, as Sue mentioned TripIt does save the past trips. But the Excel spreadsheet goes into my file envelope afterwards as part of my records for that trip, along with brochures of museums, special tickets, etc. I’m a retired engineer, so I love having all of the data from the trip, also! I make pie charts of how money was spent, compare it to my pre-trip estimate and to past trips. I even compare it to a similar RS trip if there’s enough common itinerary, accounting for half of the dinners, transportation, hotels, etc. All of that analysis is just for fun; it doesn’t drive me to be frugal on my trip, especially in the “Activity” category. I’ve learned over time that that category is the one I will remember much more than a slightly more expensive hotel.

Actually the best record I have of past trips is that I take the time to post a Trip Report here in the forum, sharing both the highlight events, a few stories, plus what I learned from the trip or would change next time. I print that and place it in my file envelope. That and the on-line printed photobooks are my favorite two things I like to use to “relive” my trip. All of those have been enjoyed multiple times, especially this past year!

I'm very anal about knowing how to get from point A to point B. I'll map out options and routes from airports and train stations to my hotel and then the best walking/public transit routes from hotel to the sites I want to visit. I'll even walk a route via Google Maps so I can get a feel of what the area is going to look like. I've also found many videos on YouTube showing a walking route from place to place including airport walks from the terminal to the train into town. This process starts months in advance and usually by the time I'm on a trip I have the map in my head and I just need to take one quick glance at a real map to confirm where to go.

**This even worked for me in Venice...sometimes...

Planning is part of my travel enjoyment. With the internet I can spend hours learning about people, places and things I’d never knew existed. Thus, for me, internet research is a planning must.

I’m also a traveler who appreciates a flexible itinerary. I’m traveling to enjoy myself and refuse to beat myself up if I don’t get to a “ must see.”

I’ve mentioned before I always research TimeOut magazine online. Do this fairly consistently a couple of months before departure. On a London trip a few years ago reviewed TimeOut and discovered the Royal Albert Hall Classical Spectacular. Via the internet booked my ticket which I would obtain at will call. Printed out my proof of purchase and reference number. A day before the performance went to The Royal Albert Hall ticket office ( had confirmed opening hours) and by having the printed proof of purchase copy retrieved my ticket. Must say one of my most favorite evenings of London travel was attending the Classical Spectacular. I still smile thinking about it.

I keep an itinerary on TripIt ( so accessible via my iPhone ) and a tangible paper trail. The latter printed out and stored in a flexible binder from Staples. The paper trail includes Xeroxed copy of passport, driver’s license, medical insurance card and prescriptions as well as who to contact in an emergency info. Reservations are also kept in the binder. A copy of the passport and insurance card and emergency contact info is folded and carried in my money belt as well.

Lastly as I most often travel in the Fall or early winter my coat has an interior pocket where I carry a thin notebook with shrunken but readable copies of the above information. I throughly enjoy making these travel notebooks. I start at either a 99 cent store, Staples or Office Depot. Where ever I can find a small calendar or blank pocket sized notebook. I then spend time creating my personalized notebook by tearing out colorful magazine pages then
tearing them into pieces and using clear scotch tape to attach these pieces to the notebook cover. I also cut out and adhere advert sayings, travel article headings. Essentially creating a personalized travel log that I can reference on the road. It’s hard to explain but I love creating these and referencing them following a trip to read up on my notes. On more than one occasion I’ve taped business cards from restaurants I’ve found into the notebook. I’m very careful about not allowing this personalized travel log to get too bulky. I like creating these one of a kind travel notebooks as each one has the locale and year of the excursion. Good for reference and remembrance.

Lastly, I always look at church bulletin boards flyers. On one London trip learned about the Eel Pie Island Artists Christmas open house. Such a fun unplanned discovery which I throughly enjoyed.

Planning helps but so does serendipity!

Thanks for the Tripit details. I tried it early in its life, but wasn't a fan. May be better now, but as all my details are in an email folder - accessible anywhere with internet, rather than just an app, perhaps it is one duplication too many. I'll try it on a short trip.
Claudia, your pocket note journal sounds fun. I am a terrible journal writer, so maybe I just need bullets, and a friend adds 'top 5 things today'..again as bullets.

A lot of these have already been mentioned but my favorites -

-plot anything of interest on a map. Not just must-see sights but restaurants I read about, cafes, bars, small sights that are interesting but not essential, everything. Add a quick note about why it's interesting. Keep the map on my phone (I use an app called citymaps2go, but there are plenty of other ways to do this). Then if I'm in an area with time to kill I can look at the map and see that I'm near that church that sounded kinda cool, or that bakery with the famous pies. Things I wouldn't necessarily seek out but since I'm there will make my hour to kill more memorable.

-before I get there, use google street view to "walk" around the neighborhood. Helps with a sense of familiarity and sometimes I see things I didn't know about nearby, so can look up and mark on the map (see above)

-If you have the kindle app (free), it comes with an email address that you can send files to and they show up in the app as PDFs. I use this for all sorts of things. Hotel confirmations. Guides of highlights that you find on art museum websites. Maps from tourist bureau sights. Bus schedules. Backups of my train tickets (can re-print from here if something is lost). My own notes. Anything, really. Then you can access this info anywhere without lugging around paper. If somehow the app is lost or deleted, the documents are in my account and can be re-downloaded on another device.

-GPS on smartphones is not dependent on having data. If you don't want to pay for a data plan and turn data off, you can still look maps that you downloaded from many apps and see a blue dot marking your location that moves in real time. This is a lifesaver when lost in places with no street signs - you can see which way you are going and which alleys go where, which in warrens of twisty streets, is much harder than it sounds.

-Want to see famous things uncrowded? Go as early as possible. If it's a sight with entry times, be there before the doors open and be the first one in. If it's an outdoor sight that is open all the time, be there as close to sunrise as you can. No one is at the Trevi Fountain at 6AM, but by 9, maybe earlier, until all the way past midnight it's insane. Most tourists don't want to get up that early, and those on bus tours staying outside the city, or day trippers, can't be there that early. It's you and the street sweepers, with the best lighting for photographs!

-Also stay out late. Evening walks are great, long, late dinners are great. So...up early, out late - what gives? The siesta exists for a reason! An afternoon rest gets you away from the worst crowds and lets you rest so you can be out at more fun times. Early and late.

-Plan 1 or at most 2 important things per day - this includes morning, afternoon, and night. So maybe my plan is "Art museum morning, wander and explore afternoon, dinner reservation at FancyRestaurantX". I'll do more than that, but there's flexibility - during "wander and explore", I'll pop into sights, eat something interesting for lunch, and so forth, but there's nothing I HAVE to rush around for, nothing scheduled between the morning museum and the evening dinner.

-Lastly, for popular sights that I actively want to see I make sure to book tickets ahead if at all possible. Sometimes I just don't care that much, but I'll go to see how the line is. Sometimes the going early plan works and I get right in, but sometimes it's just too long and I decide it is not worth it. Which is fine - but if I really care to see it I will book ahead to make sure this does not happen.

My first step is finding and noting all national/ regional holidays during my planned trip time. (Avoid travel on the days just before and after holidays.) I photocopy pages from a big monthly calendar and draft out locations and travel days. Make sure I know when specific museums I want to see will be closed -- adjust plans as needed. Use Tripit to consolidate all hotel and transportation reservations (forward confirmation emails to Tripit) and to provide itinerary to daughters at home. I also note which accomodations have washers or are near laundromats so we (I) can do full laundry every 7-10 days.

Great thread and thanks to everyone for your posts.

A part of "planning" once on the ground at your destination............

Upon checking into our apt/hotel we ALWAYS take a walk around the block to see what we can learn about food opportunities. Lesson learned during a 2005 visit to Barcelona when we never could seem to find a good convenient spot for a bit of breakfast, until the last morning of our stay when we ventured onto the street behind our apt building! The place has become a destination for all our return trips.

I rent short let apartments with some sort of kitchen facilities. As Canadian flights to Europe are typically overnight flights, and I leave from work late in the week; I arrive tired and jet lagged. But I arrive during daylight hours and with adequate time to do some grocery shopping day 1. So before leaving, I use google maps to find grocery or convenience stores close by. Then I visit their websites to get addresses and hours of business. For those who 'pin', this lets you do so before leaving.
Who knew the French CarreFour was a big deal in Spain? They have wonderful small 'mini market' type locations with good extended hours.

When starting a plan - I'm a spreadsheet person (moved from Word to Excel to Drive). I have a format that has columns for Date, day of week, Morn/aft/eve.. then Activity, and city. I start with one tab for the initial plan - then as plans evolve I can either adjust within that tab - OR start a new one. This past/future year's has evolved from one tab to @ 15. I can insert additional rows for additional info (restaurants, hotels, reservation numbers, museums, day trips etc.).. gives me a way to "see" how active each town may be and how long we might wish to spend. I also start tabs for costs/ final hotel $/confirmations, etc.. Just before hitting the skies - I do print out most (confirmation for hotels, museums, flights...) and keep in an accordion file. DH keeps all on his smart phone. As each "page" has passed - I move to the back of the file so "today's activities are up front. The file folder is a great place to retain all the paper ephemera that seems to multiply. Once home - the file is re-sorted and added to the "travel" shelf. Amazing how fun it is to quickly find the hotel we stayed in 12 years ago and is no longer on Booking.com.. but now I can search the web for their new site.

I plot route ideas using "driving" desktop google maps site - on my pad or phone for some reason G-M only allows point to point info. On the desktop I can plot up to @ 12 cities at a time. Even if we will probably use local transport (Rome2Rio helps there) this helps me get an idea of timing. Trip Advisor's offerings of multi day tours add ideas for routes and ideas for things to do near major cities...

OH and all of your "where we had fun, found new things" comments. What fun to learn that my hoped for visit to Madrid - includes Nov. 9th this year...

@quilter7, I was in Madrid Nov 9. Be sure to see the Saint's Day festivities, but take hat and gloves. If you also like cultural dress, you will have lots to admire. The parade of the saint back to her church takes a looong, time to get started. I gave up waiting after the festivities in the plaza were done. So I went to the Palace instead and that was fortuitous. The line up to get in as I was leaving (and the parade had been completed) was very long. You can also view all the collections of flowers that had been added to the external memorial at the church the days prior. I know it is supposed to be lovely inside as well, but the church had limited access that day and the rest of my time was accounted for elsewhere.

As mentioned by Mira.. "before I get there, use google street view to "walk" around the neighborhood. Helps with a sense of familiarity and sometimes I see things I didn't know about nearby, so can look up and mark on the map (see above)" We use Google Earth Street View before every trip now. Very helpful in finding one's hotel after a long flight. For me, I can remember places, first person, visually much better than reading maps. Street View also gives you a sense of "skyline" markers to use for orientation.

I type out my hotel name, address and phone number on an index card and show to the taxi driver. I also do it for other places I need to go, like a meet up restaurant for a tour, etc.

Dana,
We have done more than one self driving tours with a rental car, or our personal car while living in Germany years ago.

1) I plan the entire trip, with lodging (with free or inexpensive parking for our B&B or small hotel), day tours and travel from one city/town to the next.
2) Always have a rental car with a navigation system.
3) I do a mapquest from each place to the next at home and print out each one, just in case.
4) We plan to drive no more that two hours each day from place to place. When we did 4 weeks in Wales and England in 2017, we had only two days were we exceeded that rule.
5) We try to avoid driving near large cities, like in England, stay away from the London Orbital (I think it is the M25 parking lot).
6) We book lodging near city center, where we can walk to key points of interest.

I over-prepare, thinking I will have more difficulty than I actually encounter in navigating myself around the towns I visit. I printed maps from google maps before my last 2 trips to Europe. I write myself directions too.

For my last 3 trips I made myself a written itinerary listing names of the days. For each day I listed the first site I would see, and the time of the day I expected to show up. For some days I put "if time" and then listed one or more additional sites. For long distance train and bus rides I wrote the time the train was going to leave if I had advance tickets, or I just wrote something like, "bus to ---, leave late afternoon". And I listed the hotel and address once, and/or something like "1st night in ---" or "Sleep in---".

I keep looking at maps and guidebooks while typing my itinerary.

Obviously I didn't invent for myself the idea of writing this sort of itinerary.

I like to use Google Maps to save places I'd like to visit in the future. When I see a travel article about a place, or a mention on a forum, I'll look at it. I generally start with Google images to see what the place looks like and decide whether it's the kind of place I'd enjoy (e.g. I prefer medieval over 17th century buildings). If so, I'll save it as somewhere I'd like to visit on Google Maps. When I travel in the area, I go back to Google Maps and try to include those flagged places in my itinerary.

It's always wise to plan for travel time. I also limit my overall travel to keep it manageable. I try to limit travel time to no more than four hours on a travel day. If it's longer than four hours by car, I look at a train. If it's more than four hours by train, I consider a flight. Or breaking it into several travel days.

I also try not to string travel days together more than necessary. Sometimes a half day is all you need somewhere but too many of those in a row becomes more of a slog than a vacation.