I’d like to believe that I am pretty experienced in the art of trip planning. I am the organized friend who always takes care of the logistical side of traveling. After planning over 15 trips in the last few years — both domestically and internationally — I feel qualified to share my experience.
Ironing Out the Details
This first step is often overlooked. Many people believe that finding lodging, transportation or activities are the most important steps to trip planning, but I’d disagree. The absolute most important part of planning a trip is setting expectations and ironing out logistics.
Before I even think about planning a location, I make sure I know who is coming, what their goal is for the trip and how much they are budgeting for the trip. If you are going with a group of four people who have budgets that are hundreds of dollars apart, there will be problems from the start.
Further, creating clear expectations about what you want out of the trip is important. Some people want to relax in a hotel and order room service while others want to explore the city and only use the hotel to sleep. Being on the same page about what you expect is so crucial.
Picking a Location
This is one of the hardest parts about planning a trip. Now that you know everyone’s budgets and goals for the trip, it is time to choose a location that fits everyone’s wants. When planning for a group of people with different expectations, finding compromises is super important.
If one person wants a tropical beach vacation and another wants a bustling city vibe, finding a happy medium can be difficult. Thinking outside the box and looking at nontraditional places could be a ton of fun.
Whenever my group and I are choosing a location, I make everyone pick two or three places that they want to go. Likely, there will be at least a little bit of overlap. If there isn’t and we cannot agree on a place, I ask everyone to make a sample itinerary and budget for their location. From there, we can have an honest conversation about what will be best and most enjoyable for everyone.
Keep an Open Mind About Lodging Accommodations
For me, I am always looking to get a great experience at the smallest price possible. That means I have had to stay in many different types of accommodations. As a college student, I cannot recommend hostels enough. Many people do not even consider looking at hostels because they do not want to share a room and bathroom with strangers, and I totally get that. However, that makes the experience all the more fun. This is a great example of why setting trip expectations is so important. Some friends are more than willing to stay in hostels to save a few bucks, whereas others would rather not.
Hostels offer a great opportunity to get to know other travelers! When I was traveling solo in South Korea, I stayed in an 8-person hostel room and made some great friends. We went out of town in the evening and had such a great time! I still speak to them to this day. If your goal while traveling is to make memories that will last forever, hostels are truly the way to go. Not to mention, they are usually significantly cheaper than hotels and can offer tourist tours for free or at discounted prices.
If hostels are really not your thing, Airbnbs are usually pretty cheap, even in big cities, if you go with a large group and split the costs. Hotels will almost always offer the least amount of benefits for the highest price, so look at those last.
Be Organized
Once I have ironed out the details, decided on a place to go and found lodging, I put everything into a spreadsheet and save it to my phone. Having all addresses, transportation information and contact information readily available is extremely important. I always share this spreadsheet with everyone going on the trip so that we can all edit it and be updated.
This spreadsheet is also where I do my itinerary planning. I usually create a master list of all of the places we want to go, things we want to see, places we want to eat and anything else we want to do. The collaborative element of the spreadsheet is super helpful in this situation.
After creating a large master list, I meet with whoever is going on the trip and discuss it in person. We talk about what we actually want to do, what we have time for and what we can afford. Finding activities that are cheap or free can really help keep costs low for trips.
Have Fun Exploring the World
I hope these tips and tricks are helpful when you are planning your next adventure! Stay safe and have so much fun exploring and traveling.
