There’s a particular kind of traveler who arrives with a spreadsheet: every meal booked, every museum timed, every hour accounted for. I used to be that traveler. I’m not anymore.
The over-planned trip
A fully scheduled itinerary optimizes for seeing the most things. It rarely optimizes for actually enjoying them. Rushing between reservations leaves little room for the unplanned café, the wrong turn that leads somewhere better, or simply sitting still for an hour.
What changed
On a trip a few years ago, a missed train left an entire afternoon empty in a city I knew nothing about. That accidental afternoon — wandering with no destination — is still the part of the trip I remember most clearly. Everything I had actually planned has mostly blurred together.
A looser way to plan
This doesn’t mean showing up with nothing:
- Book the flights and the first night’s stay — that’s it for hard commitments.
- Pick two or three things per city you genuinely don’t want to miss.
- Leave every afternoon open.
- Ask a local for one recommendation and actually follow it.
The tradeoff, honestly
You will occasionally miss something you meant to see. You will occasionally have a slow, uneventful day. That’s the point — a trip with room to breathe ends up more memorable than one crammed with things to check off.
Loose plans aren’t lazy plans. They’re just plans that leave space for the trip to happen to you, instead of the other way around.