HOW TO PLAN A TRIP FROM SCRATCH

Although I’m not a Digital Nomad and do jiggle my many trips and travels around a day job, I did my share of travel planning and organizing. I definitely know how to plan a trip from scratch, believe me.

After countless trips – long and short – I was really surprised when I read the other day a lady asking on Social Media for help where to begin planning her trip.

But come to think of it, helping others plan their trips has been one of the main reasons I started to write a blog, after all.

So I was analyzing and structuring what I’ve been doing without much overthinking for years now. Then, I put it in words and in chronological chapters. This way, everyone who is a newbie to travel planning can design the trip of their lifetime. Of course, without the help of any of these big, costly companies.

And once you’ve done it for one destination, it will be a piece of cake doing it for the next one. As well as for all the upcoming ones. Because, actually, life is long enough for more than just the one trip of a lifetime.

The sketched strategy is based on a two to four weeks vacation. It is suitable for solo travellers as well as for families or groups.

The concept and structure can be adapted to a shorter trip or even just a weekend.

If you are travelling for more than a month, you might not need to get that organized beforehand. Getting stuck in a place or ‘losing’ a couple of days won’t affect you so much.

If you have only a quite limited amount of time and you want to see as much as you can without racing mindlessly, the following approach will certainly help you make the best of it.

I’ve sketched in the following four steps how I do it and how it works best for me.
I leave it to you to copy my strategy step by step or just get some inspiration or new ideas. Anyway, there is an extra chapter at the end supplying you with a safety net – just in case….

All I want is to encourage you with this thorough planning to try travelling by yourself. If I can do it, there’s no reason you can’t – and I’m glad to assist!

Choosing a Destination

I guess that everybody has a bucket list of places to be visited before…kicking the bucket. If you will be travelling by yourself – and possibly for the first time, there are places more recommendable than others.

 I guess Europe should be easy everywhere, no matter which means of transportation you choose. There is an extensive system of public transportation basically everywhere. Of course, you also have the option to rent a car.

In the US you’re fine as long as you’re driving. This might make you not only a single traveller, but a lonely one, too.

Since I’m not driving, I did everything by public transport which can be a bit complicated and tricky. So travelling the US by yourself, you’re most likely to really stay entirely by yourself. Hence, I would recommend starting in another region where you’re chances of meeting other travellers are bigger.

Japan is a very safe place – but you’ll probably be quite isolated and prone to get lonely. Although the Japanese are very polite and friendly, they are not as open and outgoing. Also, the traveller community is not as developed as in other South East Asian countries such as Thailand or Viet Nam.

Actually, in Asia, I’d recommend Thailand to you rookies. There are many single travellers – men and women alike. You’ll find a decent system of public transport. Also, you have the option to join organized trips to remote points of interest. This allows you to get in touch with other individual travellers, if you like.

For the same reasons, in South America, I’d go for Peru. Here you can buy a bus ticket that brings you from Lima all the way down to Lake Titicaca along the so-called “Ruta del Gringo”. It is passing all the destinations of interest where you can individually stay as long as you wish before taking the bus to the next stop.

Composing an Itinerary

A assume that you don’t want to spend your entire vacation at a beachfront hotel. To do this, the only advice you need from me is to stock up on sunscreen.

If you want to see as much as comfortably possible over a limited amount of time, I suggest you get a good guidebook and consult the internet. Since I’m living in Germany, I cannot recommend guidebooks in your language. In German, I like Dumont a lot, but they are quite conservative. A good guidebook will already trace a certain route. This way, you will already have a first direction on how to travel.

According to your interest, you can skip or add stops or travel the suggested route in the opposite direction. But a book will be only the basis of your planning. You should always cross-check and double-check your itinerary and the stops on the internet. Here you can also inquire how long it takes to go from one place to another. 

Don’t even think about calculating your travels based on distances in miles resp. kilometers. Going from Hamburg to Berlin takes 90 minutes by rapid train. The same distance by bus in a Latin American country will take like 6 hours. So the best way is to look for the bus and train schedules online. There you can verify how long it actually takes to go from A to B.

I’d recommend foreseeing at least two nights in a city. If it’s a good gateway for day trips, add one more night for each trip.

Unless it’s a big city with a large number of points of interest, I plan to arrive in the (early) evening. This way, I can still go for a short walk and grab a bite. Then I spend an entire day and leave at noon or in the early afternoon of the third day. Hence, I arrive at my next destination again in the evening.

At beach destinations, I add about two nights to relax. In addition, this gives me the opportunity to run some errands, for instance doing laundry. Although most laundrettes will have your laundry ready within 24 hours, it’s always safer to slate for an extra day.

Talking ’bout clothes. Like I wrote before, I’m not doing backpacks, especially when I’m meandering in a country and don’t stay long in one place. My experience is that after a while you either a) carry a big load of mixed mess around because all your stuff is cluttered, or b) you are repacking your junk at every destination anew, or c) you end up wearing the same clothes day by day to avoid a) and b). I’m using a large travel bag with wheels.

Note: Starting your planning, keep the time difference in mind, especially when travelling East; you will lose a couple of hours. It happened to me on my first couple of trips to Asia. I didn’t consider that I’d arrive only in the evening, in addition, tired from the long flight, so I just crashed. This way, having booked two nights, I had only one day for a big city.

Actually, a little visualization helps, so maybe you want to download one of these free calendar templates

Obviously, if you happen to planning a trip to one of the countries I’ve travelled, I supply you with a ready-made itinerary that you only need to adapt to your needs’n’wishes. You’ll find all the places I visited over the past years categorized on the homepage.

Checking Schedules and Determining the Length of Stops

Putting together your itinerary doesn’t mean only checking domestic flights, trains, and buses. You should also check Public Holidays in the region you’re travelling to avoid getting stuck or paying too much (e. g. Semana Santa, the “Holy Week” before Easter, it’s the peak holiday season in Latin America. Don’t even think about not booking beforehand or you won’t get tickets and end up at the most expensive accommodations).

You should find the answer to all your questions regarding your trip such as visa regulations, vaccination requirements, flights, and accommodations, voltage – or public holidays – in the links I assembled in my World’s Most Complete Traveller Information.

You should also check visit info of attractions you want to see like for instance museums or even national parks. In the US, at many museums, there’s a – sponsored – day where the entrance is free or on a pay-what-you-wish basis. You might want to take advantage of that. In Europe, most museums are closed on Mondays. However, others choose Tuesdays, so you better check their website thoroughly beforehand.

You should also pay the official online tourist info a visit to check if there’s something special like a theater play, an exhibition, or a sporting event taking place that you’d like to see.

So after checking all this, you’ll be able to determine how long you’ll stay in each place. Possibly you might want to adapt your itinerary accordingly.

The same way I determine the route crossing a country I sketch strolls through cities and neighborhoods, i. e. I check where the points of interest are, and what’s a good time to be there (it doesn’t make sense to plan to go to a museum that opens only at 11 a. m. at the beginning of your day)

Booking

My early booking – and early packing for that matter – are legendary. All my friends make me look like a fool laughing at me for booking flights and accommodations and sometimes bus and train tickets months ahead. And in the end, they are all jealous when I get the best seats for the best prices.

The same goes for accommodations. Whereby, I actually do prefer those where I can cancel the booking free of charge up to let’s say a week before arrival. Although I seldom change the route and dates, it does happen that I still stumble over an even better deal. Therefore, it’s good to be able to alter or cancel. If the deal is too good and cannot be changed, I bite the bullet.

An often-heard argument against my way of booking so much ahead is that it makes me inflexible. Yes, that’s true, but think about it: If I have three weeks, which equals 21 days, obviously, and I want to see let’s say six to eight places – how flexible can I be, anyway?

I will have only two to four days for each destination. Hence, checking beforehand usually gives me a pretty good idea of where I can happily leave after 36 hours. Respectively, where I should stay for a couple of days. A limited amount of time for a road trip doesn’t leave too many options to be ‘flexible’. So why not book ahead and save time and money?!

I probably don’t need to list all the portals where you can find flights at reasonable to cheap prices. However, you’ll find some of them in my World’s Most Complete Travel Information.
Unfortunately, there is no such thing as the best site. However, blogs that claim to have the best deals might be right: The best deals for them for advertising.

So if you want the best deal, there is no way around checking all the different sites plus the airline’s pages.

The same goes for accommodations. I already wrote in an earlier post that there is definitely no website comparing all other pages and showing you the best price. This can be an orientation, but you might always find a better deal on another site. However, most of the time, I find the best deals on booking.com*.

Another thing is that booking in advance might be more costly in certain regions. Some Asian countries, Peru, Mexico – these are places where you can easily negotiate a good bargain on the spot. So here you have to do a little research, too.

Although Airbnb conquered the lodging market about ten years ago, I’ve never ever stayed with them. Simply because I enjoy having someone cooking me breakfast and making my room while I’m gone – I love hotels.

But if you are travelling by yourself and do want company from time to time, why not give it a try?! Nonetheless, quite honestly – I’ve never heard from any of my friends that stayed somewhere through Airbnb that they made Pizza with their host or all the great stuff the company promises in their commercials. My friends often found the key behind an old flower pot or had to pick it up at the dry cleaners next door. To this date, they don’t even have a clue what their host looks like; there was no Pizza involved.

Another thing you should consider when booking accommodation is a convenient location. Otherwise, you will end up in one of the places I described earlier.

So this is another thing I check beforehand on google maps and print out.

If you intend to use public transport, just search the city and key in public transport and you’ll be surprised. This way I’ve found online bus schedules for the posh beach destination Naples in Florida. Even local people were convinced they had no public buses.

I love the Internet and every wonder that comes with it – I’m writing a Blog, after all!

Still, there are things I want on paper. I’m hauling big books around the world, and I like my plans and information and confirmations and tickets on paper. So I’m printing everything out – for instance, also those map excerpts I’m showing above. It came in handy more than once being able to show the cab driver quickly a piece of paper with the hotel address instead of desperately waiting for an internet connection while smiling at him apologetically. Sometimes, it even has a small photograph on it.

Plus I like how from stop to stop the folder holding all the printed info gets lighter and lighter.

Solo Travel with a Safety Net

Maybe it’s your first trip by yourself and you feel a teeny bit insecure. Or you want to make sure to get in touch with other travellers. Or you are simply a bit lazy and want to leave the planning to others. Well, you still don’t need to go on an All Inclusive hotel vacation. There are agencies organizing either the entire route or a part of it for you. It works like the Hop On Hop Off system you know from cities. You buy a pass and you can join the tour on certain days at certain stops. Sometimes there are even some day trips and tours included.

The biggest one covering every continent is the Bamba experience. In Asia, you have Stray Travel, and GreenToadBus drives you through South America. You can travel in Europe by www.busabout.com, Australia by www.greyhound.com.au, and in the United States, www.amtrak.com offers travel passes.

Although it’s convenient and fun, you should compare the prices to individual bookings and reconsider. Especially the tours in Asia and South America are really pricey compared to what you would pay if you organize your trip by yourself.

But it is definitely an option.

Pinnable Pictures

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Note: I’m completing, editing, and updating his post regularly – last in August 2023.

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