If you are like me, you didn’t quit your 9-to-5 to pursue a life of constant traveling and adventures. Maybe you don’t want to, or maybe you just can’t. While it increasingly seems like everyone on social media has all the time in the world to explore every inch of our beautiful planet for months on end, truth is, that for most of us, we have to make do with the number of days we are allowed to at work. Or with the financial restrictions that we have.
The good news is that you can also enjoy a short trip and make the most of it. But how can you navigate the feeling of overwhelm you get when you see articles listing the top 50 things to see in a city that you are only in for 48 hours? Or the 15 towns to see in a region that you will only be visiting for 3 days?
This little guide will help you with just that, taking you from deciding where to go on your short vacation all the way to making it the most enjoyable without feeling stressed by the time.
My best tips to make the most of a short vacation
Find your destination: stay “local”
If you only have a couple of days, or a long week-end at most, I would suggest to avoid flying there, not only for environmental reasons, but also to avoid all the hassle of flying, where you usually waste more time than you actually gain in the end. Maybe it is best to save the faraway destinations for a time when you will have more days to enjoy them.
Sometimes it is difficult to realise just how many amazing things there are around us, so to decide exactly where to go – if you don’t already know – here’s what you can do:
- Open Maps and check out all the cities or towns at a reasonable distance from your home and look at some pictures: maybe there is one you haven’t visited or that seems promising
- Check out social media accounts or blogs that create content specifically for your area and see what inspired you
- Ask around to your friends and colleagues if there are some places they would recommend
- Look up online if there are buses or trains (even overnight ones) that could take you a bit further away
Obviously what you find will depend on where you live, but these tips definitely help you to see that you have plenty of options to make your short holidays memorable. The time you gain by staying “local” will also allow you to truly make the most of your short vacation.
Find the right accommodation
After deciding your destination, the second thing to do is to find your accommodation. This will depend on your budget of course, but for short trips, it is always best to stay somewhere close to the main tourist attractions – if that’s what you want to see – so that you will be closer to everything and can make optimal use of your time.
If you are on a budget, in many European cities you’ll find cheap hostels right in the city centre, though you might have to compromise a bit of comfort.
If you want to save money by staying a bit further away from the centre, make sure it is still within a walking distance you feel comfortable with or that the area has buses or metros that can quickly take you to the centre. If you are traveling with your car, you might want to check the parking options first too!
To find the perfect accommodation I always check on Booking.com because of the great discounts they sometimes have. You’ll also be able to see both hotels, hostels and private rentals. Airbnb is also a good option, though I do feel like it has gotten very expensive in bigger and more touristic cities.
Set your priorities
Wether you usually like to plan your holidays in a lot of details or you are more of a going-with-the-flow kind of person, I would say that if you want to make the most of a place, especially if you are only staying there for a few days, it is always best to set your priorities on what you want to see and do. This will allow you to optimise your time once you are there and really make the most of it.
To help you in this task, you can follow these steps:
- Decide what you really want to do: what kind of trip is it going to be like? are you most interested in food, museums, walking around, meeting locals?
- Check websites about the best things to do in your destination, focusing on the main tourist attractions (like my “Brussels Essentials” article) or articles specifically linked to what you are interested in.
- Write down and select what you want to see or do the most. In this process, try to see if there are 2 to 3 things that you absolutely want to see, eat or do.
- Check the time needed to do each thing: for example, visiting a museum will usually take you a few hours and some famous landmarks might have a long queue. On the other side, you might just want to check out quickly some things or grab food or drinks on-the-go!
- Combine things together: organise your days or hours to see all the things that are in a same area together. Maybe some things can be combined, like checking out a beautiful fountain and trying ice-cream from a famous place.
- Finally, see if your plans align more or less with the length of your trip and, if not, take some things out or write them down so you can check them if you have the time.
In my opinion, it is not necessary to have a detailed schedule and I personally prefer to have more of a flexible plan, but knowing more or less what are your personal must-dos is really essential to enjoy your trip to the fullest and avoid any regret in the end.
Plan ahead
Once you have a rough itinerary in mind, it is time to plan ahead to avoid “losing” time at your destination. Depending on what you decided to do, this will obviously vary, but here are some things to look out for, that may help you save some time during your short vacation:
- buy museum tickets in advance, and maybe check if there are tickets to skip the queue
- book your experiences beforehand – this will also help you to plan your schedule
- download any app that you may need (Uber-like apps, translation apps, public transport apps, etc.)
- if you will rely on public transport, buy your tickets in advance if possible and keep a map somewhere + the bus schedules
- if you need to change currency, try doing it before you leave whenever possible
- have a list of restaurants or foods you want to try
All of these things will help you to make the most of your trip by avoid spending time doing things that are not as enjoyable and that could be avoided, so if you can, it might be worth doing!
Don’t overpack your schedule
When you are going on a short trip, it is very tempting to try to fit as many things as possible into the few days you have to explore a destination. While this will certainly allow you to see more things in general, you might miss out on some other things by being stressed out about the time.
Keeping a light or loose schedule will not only help you navigate all the unexpected things that inevitably happen when you travel, but it will also allow you to spend more time in a place that you have enjoyed and to really take in all the beautiful things you are experiencing.
I know it can seem counterintuitive, but overpacking your schedule will not help you to make the most of a short trip, it will probably make it feel even shorter.
Take advantage of walking or bus tours
Whenever I travel, be it for a short or a long vacation, one thing that I have almost consistently incorporated to my schedule are walking tours. These are especially great if you are visiting a city and even more when you only have a short amount of time there.
The guides will usually take you to the most famous spots and provide lots of details and fun facts about the history of a place, and sometimes even give you recommendations. This will help you to have a better idea of the area you are visiting, and maybe decide whether doing this or that will be worth it or not.
Walking tours usually last 2 or 3 hours, but they definitely help to see a lot of things in a short amount of time, while learning a lot at the same time. They are also usually free, though it is best to tip the guide at the end of the tour. If you are not so comfortable with walking or are in a very big city, you can also take bus or boat tours.
To find walking tours, just type in “free walking tour + the name of the place” on your browser and see what you find! I also always check Airbnb experiences and GetYourGuide for more specific or original experiences!
Allow for some downtime
Just like having a light and loose schedule might feel counterintuitive when you want to make the most of a short trip, allowing for some downtime can feel a bit useless. However, in my experience, it is also one of the things that make your experience the most memorable.
Having downtime allows you to slow down and not look at your schedule, to roam around freely in the city you have just explored, stop for a pastry at a café and watch people go on about their lives, discover new off-the-radar spots and truly take in the atmosphere of a place.
By having some downtime, even during your short vacation, you’ll be able to relax a bit more instead of feeling exhausted at the end of your trip because you went from one sight to another without a break.
Also, this free time will definitely stretch your time a bit and you will feel like you have more time in the end. It doesn’t need to be a whole morning, just one hour or two are more than enough!
Build anticipation
Anticipating something and being excited for it in advance plays a huge role in how much we enjoy the things on the moment, and it makes the whole experience more memorable. If you start to anticipate your trip in advance, the time you spend there will also somehow feel longer, and you will enjoy it much more.
Building anticipation can take many forms: reading a book about or set in the place you will be visiting in the months or weeks before your trip, watching documentaries, browsing through guidebooks or images online, learning about the history of the place or famous people from there, trying to cook a specialty from that place or even watching a movie or series linked to it.
Having a bit of knowledge about the place you’ll visit and feeling more and more excited to go there as the days go by is going to make your trip feel even more special, and you will absolutely contribute to making the most of it.
Staying for a short amount of time in a place obviously mean that you have to miss out on some things, but it doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy it. These tips have personally helped me to make the absolute most of some trips and to feel like I still had a good grasp of them, even though I didn’t stay there for long.
