If you’re looking to plan your perfect trip, you’re in the right place! Trip planning gives me such a rush and literally keeps me awake at night. The worst feeling is coming back from a vacation and then hearing about something that you should’ve seen.
After visiting 10 countries while studying abroad in Europe and many road trips and day trips in the US, I have honed my trip planning skills. Here are some tips to plan your perfect vacation, whether it’s two weeks in Paris or a weekend trip to a nearby town. I like to research and put everything into a OneNote page, and then build my itinerary on a clean page.
On average, I’d say it takes me 4 hours to plan a weekend trip, so a 10-day trip takes about 20 hours of planning. I might be a little crazy, but this process does work very well for me, and I can truly say I maximize my time on vacation/off work!
11 Steps to Plan Your Perfect Trip
1. Pick your destination and where you’re going to stay
Honestly, I don’t know if you can go wrong, there are so many awesome places in this country and the rest of the world! Keep in mind that summer and holiday weekends are the busiest, so flights and accommodations will be more expensive, but it’s all about what you can fit into your schedule. I’ve stayed in motels, hostels, and Airbnbs, but sometimes hotels can actually be cheaper! If you choose to stay in a hotel, be sure to check Rakuten. Hilton, Marriott, Best Western, Holiday Inn, Fairmont, and more offer cash back!
2. Ask the people you’re traveling with if there are any places they really want to go
The goal is to maximize the trip for everyone. If some people want to relax, you need to plan for some time by the beach or the pool. If some people are expecting to go out on the town, better research some nightclubs and bars.
3. Research restaurants on Yelp
Some people like to go all out on a bougie hotel, but I’d rather go all out on food! Life is too short to be eating at restaurants with only 3 stars on Yelp! The rating is out of 5 stars, so 3 stars means there were probably at least two things wrong with the restaurant, whether it was less-than-ideal food, service, prices, or ambiance. I’ve started to only look at restaurants with 4 or more stars. If you want to go to a popular restaurant in a big city on a Saturday night, try to make reservations at least a week in advance! If you don’t care about Yelp ratings, most major US cities’ food scenes are also covered by food writers at The Infatuation and Eater.
4. Use Pinterest to find blog posts about your destination
Pinterest is essentially like Google, but for blog posts. You can just search for your city like “Barcelona food,” “Yosemite National Park,” or “East Coast road trip.” If you’ve read any of my travel blog posts, you’ll see that I try to provide as much information as possible. Bloggers aim to share their experiences and opinions to help others who want to visit that destination. Blogs often have nice photos, and their posts are often pretty thorough and helpful, providing recommendations for where to stay, places to eat, and things to do. Bloggers often also do a lot of research before their trips, so they often find some unique activities and attractions that you won’t see in articles if you just Google “things to do in _________.” If you’re only planning a 2-day trip, research 3 days’ worth of stops and activities just to have a little extra. For 7+ days of travel, I just do full-on research until I can’t find anything else to do.
5. Look at tourism accounts on Instagram
Most states and major cities have tourism boards whose jobs are literally to make you want to visit their state or city. Their Instagram handles are usually like @Visit_______. For California, there’s @visitcalifornia, for Seattle, there’s @visitseattle, for the Czech Republic there’s @visitcz. It doesn’t work for every city, but you get the idea. If you want to go to Los Angeles, some of my favorite accounts are @discoverLA, @lifehacksLA, and @instaworthyLA. Local magazines, news channels, and newspapers are also in charge of reporting on things going on. I also follow @lamag, @dola, and @losangelesbucketlist. I’d also look through all the photos that tagged those accounts.
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6. Look on Google Maps for extra places to stop
Google Maps is your ultimate tool for planning your perfect trip. I like looking at the big green areas and beaches just in case they’re hidden gems. The photo icons are accurately placed and usually mean there’s something worth taking a photo of.
7. Now that you’ve done all your research, it’s time to map everything out
To hit as many spots as possible, you want to make sure you’re not spending all your time in the car or Uber crossing town all the time. Input all your top places into Google Maps and see if there are any clusters of places that are close together. Make sure to map out your restaurants as well.
8. Start to schedule and estimate how long it will take you to hit all your places
I like to type everything out in OneNote and link all restaurant menus, hiking information, museum prices, or any other relevant information. Start with the time you want to get going and then estimate the time it will take to get to your first destination. Then estimate how long you’ll stay at the first destination, then how long it will take to get to your next destination, and so on. If you’re driving in a big city, be sure to buffer driving times just in case there’s traffic or if you think it could take a while to park.
For hikes, I’d plan for 20-25 mins per mile if you’re fast, or 30-35 minutes per mile if you’re on the slower end. For quick service-type lunches, I allot 45 minutes, and for sit-down dinners, I allot two hours for a family of four. Make sure you give yourself enough time at each place, so you’re never in a huge rush. If you get there and end up having extra time, you can always do an activity you planned for the next day. My itineraries end up looking like this:
9. Make sure you include downtime
Even though I’m very much a person who likes to be out and about by 8am and walk 10 miles a day on vacation, even I get tired. After two or three jam-packed days, make sure to plan a less crazy day and either start the day a lot later or have some free hours in the afternoon to chill or take a nap. This also allows you to have time to be spontaneous, do something that you didn’t research, or go back to a place that you really liked.
10. Prepare backup plans
Bad weather, road closures, allergies…something could go wrong during your trip, so it’s good to have a few backup activities. I always look up some indoor activities and shops in case of rain and because I have my long list of things to do from my research, I can always find something else to do. Since I mapped everything out, I know which things are close to other things, so it lets me be adaptable.
11. Send the itinerary to your traveling buddies for feedback!
Maybe a restaurant you chose doesn’t have enough vegan options for your friend or you planned too much hiking for your family. It’s a good idea to have everyone review the itinerary so everyone can plan what to pack and how much money to budget for the trip.
Hopefully this helps you plan your perfect trip! If you have any other tips, let me know in the comments below!
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