What No One Tells You About Long Trips
Some times you get sick of them.
I don't care where you are - the drag of traveling wears on you and the ambitious schedule you set for yourself while sipping your coffee in your bathrobe in the comfort of your own home starts to feel forced.
So, after many long (14+ day) trips, here are 5 tips I have for staying happy, sane and in our case, married, when all is said and done.
1. Change it up.
The best model I've found for our vacations is change it up at the halfway point. This can be a change in country, a change in hotel class, a change in itinerary, whatever. Get something to break you out of the cycle you've been in for the previous week. For us, this is usually the point where we change locations. From Ireland to Scotland, from Southern Norway to Arctic Norway, from Patagonia to the Chilean coast. There is no way that even in a year you can see everything you want in any country, so give up some time to move on and break your trip into palatable pieces.
From this...
to this.
2. Eat something amazing.
This has really been the trick for Jorge on more than one occasion and can really turn your day around. This is especially true if you've spent a couple days in a row hiking and mostly living off sandwiches and bars. It doesn't matter where you are and it doesn't have to be fancy but take the time to find something that will satiate you.
In this instance, it was a gas station hot dog.
3. Do NOTHING.
Yup. Do nothing. Or, at least have nothing planned. Truthfully, me and Jorge are just not the laze around types, but at the midway point I try not to plan anything other than transportation. That way if we want to take a midday nap, or we have some work, laundry or bills we have to take care of we can do it without stressing out.
On our way from Southern to Northern(ish) Chile, I coordinated it so we landed near a lazy beach town. We spent one whole day resting and recharging. It was one of the most relaxing days we've had and I never would have planned this stopover otherwise.
4. Have a backup plan.
I know I'm crazy with my planning, but I will ordinarily have one or two (or 3 but who's counting) backup plans especially if something is weather dependent. There are a number of reasons why I do this, but namely because I don't necessarily want to have to figure out what to do and how to do it while I am on vacation. If, for example, you want to do a tour of the Niaux caves in France, then it would be good to know that there's only one tour per day in English and you can't necessarily just show up and hope for the best - unless you speak French, I suppose.
Having a couple backup plans has worked for us if we're not feeling ambitious that day, if the weather is crap or if we get local advice that conflicts with what we originally planned. This helps turn a situation from stressful to "I'm right on top of that Rose!"
5. Take a break from your traveling partner.
Ok, eww we're like so cute and it's sickening, but I don't think me or Jorge have ever felt the need to take a break from each other on vacation. We don't see each other that often in our regular lives, so getting away together for a couple weeks every year is almost what we need to put ourselves back together. I know this is not the case for all couples, and maybe it will be different for us at some point, but either way, feel free to do things separately - especially if there is something that you know you would love to do, but your partner wouldn't. Immediately my mind wanders to the horseback riding trek in New Zealand that I refused to do because I knew Jorge's beginner self would slow me down. Next time, my precious.
I'm sure there are a ton of other tricks out there for making a long trip feel not quite so long. We've met couples who are on vacation for MONTHS (damn you Europe and your liberal leave policy!) and still manage to hold it together. The important thing is to recognize how lucky you are to be afforded the opportunity to travel and enjoy it. The rest is just icing on the cake.
I don't care where you are - the drag of traveling wears on you and the ambitious schedule you set for yourself while sipping your coffee in your bathrobe in the comfort of your own home starts to feel forced.
So, after many long (14+ day) trips, here are 5 tips I have for staying happy, sane and in our case, married, when all is said and done.
1. Change it up.
The best model I've found for our vacations is change it up at the halfway point. This can be a change in country, a change in hotel class, a change in itinerary, whatever. Get something to break you out of the cycle you've been in for the previous week. For us, this is usually the point where we change locations. From Ireland to Scotland, from Southern Norway to Arctic Norway, from Patagonia to the Chilean coast. There is no way that even in a year you can see everything you want in any country, so give up some time to move on and break your trip into palatable pieces.
2. Eat something amazing.
This has really been the trick for Jorge on more than one occasion and can really turn your day around. This is especially true if you've spent a couple days in a row hiking and mostly living off sandwiches and bars. It doesn't matter where you are and it doesn't have to be fancy but take the time to find something that will satiate you.
3. Do NOTHING.
Yup. Do nothing. Or, at least have nothing planned. Truthfully, me and Jorge are just not the laze around types, but at the midway point I try not to plan anything other than transportation. That way if we want to take a midday nap, or we have some work, laundry or bills we have to take care of we can do it without stressing out.
4. Have a backup plan.
I know I'm crazy with my planning, but I will ordinarily have one or two (or 3 but who's counting) backup plans especially if something is weather dependent. There are a number of reasons why I do this, but namely because I don't necessarily want to have to figure out what to do and how to do it while I am on vacation. If, for example, you want to do a tour of the Niaux caves in France, then it would be good to know that there's only one tour per day in English and you can't necessarily just show up and hope for the best - unless you speak French, I suppose.
Having a couple backup plans has worked for us if we're not feeling ambitious that day, if the weather is crap or if we get local advice that conflicts with what we originally planned. This helps turn a situation from stressful to "I'm right on top of that Rose!"
5. Take a break from your traveling partner.
Ok, eww we're like so cute and it's sickening, but I don't think me or Jorge have ever felt the need to take a break from each other on vacation. We don't see each other that often in our regular lives, so getting away together for a couple weeks every year is almost what we need to put ourselves back together. I know this is not the case for all couples, and maybe it will be different for us at some point, but either way, feel free to do things separately - especially if there is something that you know you would love to do, but your partner wouldn't. Immediately my mind wanders to the horseback riding trek in New Zealand that I refused to do because I knew Jorge's beginner self would slow me down. Next time, my precious.
I'm sure there are a ton of other tricks out there for making a long trip feel not quite so long. We've met couples who are on vacation for MONTHS (damn you Europe and your liberal leave policy!) and still manage to hold it together. The important thing is to recognize how lucky you are to be afforded the opportunity to travel and enjoy it. The rest is just icing on the cake.
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