We travel a lot. We travel for months, not weeks. We travel all over the world. We travel in a way that makes our friends’ eyes glaze over. We travel by “winging it”.
Here is a typical conversation I might have with a friend prior to one of our trips to Europe:
Friend: So, you’re off to Europe again?
Me: Yep.Friend: How long are you going for?
Me: Two months.Friend: Two months??????
Me: Well, we’re retired right; what better time to take long, interesting trips?Friend: I guess! That must require a lot of planning?
Me: No, not really.Friend: But, you’ve got to book your flights over and back, plan all of your stops, book your hotels, book your connecting internal flights … or do you rent a car and drive around? You’ve got to do lots of online research about the places you’ll visit, plan what museums, art galleries and historical sites to see and buy entry tickets, check out what restaurants are close to your hotels and read reviews, figure out what clothes to take … you’ll need at least two suitcases each won’t you? Arrange a phone plan with your service provider, get travellers’ cheques, etc., etc., etc.
Me: Yeah, no. We’ll pick where we’ll fly in and out of. I’ll book a return flight, and I’ll book a hotel in the city that we are flying into. We’ll discuss where we’ll probably go, and I’ll order a EurailPass. That’s pretty much it.Friend: What???? You’re going to go over there with nothing set up????
Me: Yep, we’ll just go over and wing it.Friend: (this is where the “eye-glazing-over” typically takes place)
Although we do trips like this all the time, and many of our friends and acquaintances know how we travel, we really haven’t convinced anyone to try doing it our way yet. I do have to admit that it does seem a little daunting, and a little bit scary for sure, but it really isn’t all that difficult.
This is the typical conversation I will try to have with folks who I have just explained our travel “non-methodology” to:
Me: If you were going to go on a two-month driving trip across Canada, or even the United States, would you plan and book everything in advance?
Friend: No, of course not.Me: Why not?
Friend: Well, there are lots of motels and hotels, so we can always find a place to stay on short notice, so that’s not really a concern. We can grab some of our food from grocery stores, and there are lots of restaurants to choose from. More importantly, we might get to a spot where we’ve never been before, really like it, and want to stay there longer than what we had expected. Or, one of the places we thought we’d like could turn out to be crappy, so we’d want to spend less time there than what we had planned.Me: Exactly. So, why would you think travelling around Europe would be any different?
Friend: I suppose.
Obviously, you’ll want to the know a bit more about how we approach doing all the logistical issues and decisions that need to be addressed as you travel around Europe for a couple of months. When I state that we wing it, I don’t mean to make you think that we do everything without any pre-planning or thought … alright, I did try and make you think that … literary license and all that. But, most of our pre-planning is relatively short term and takes place during the trip, not beforehand. We really don’t just show up in a city or town, and then start looking for a place to stay … most of the time anyway.
In the final article in this series I will discuss in some detail how we approach all the specific considerations and tasks that come into play when travelling around in a loosely planned fashion. That said, I should probably talk about the one specific that really is essential to making our freewheeling approach work right away. You need to be flexible.
Be Flexible
Occasionally things will pop up that will throw even your short-term scheduling for a loop. So, it’s important to not get too married to what you plan on doing, and be ready to do something else.
Here’s a good example. In the fall of 2015 almost a full month of our two months in Europe was spent in Spain. We were in San Sebastian on the north coast … lovely … and had planned on heading to Madrid next. However, when we started looking for places to stay, most hotels were fully booked, and the ones that weren’t were tremendously expensive. We had missed the fact that an important national holiday was taking place, and that most of the principal events were taking place in Madrid. So, we bypassed Madrid and headed down to Seville. Be ready to change your plans; be flexible.
By the way, we were so impressed with Spain I am writing this article in Marbella on the Costa del Sol where we are currently wintering. I will fill you in on my thoughts on this area as a potential winter getaway alternative to the usual suspects, Florida, Arizona, Mexico, etc., in a future article.
Next Up – The final article in this series, How We Do Europe – The Specifics
