New month, new series- WonderGraceJoy Travels
I am super excited about this series because I get to TRAVEL.
This is my first vacation in 4 years, I went to Las Vegas in 2018; this is a record for me. The last vacation before that was 7 years prior in 2011. Needless to say, I am more than excited.
For the next 2 months, every Friday along in addition to my Friday Favorites, I will be sharing more about my thoughts about traveling, how I am packing and a full recap of my vacation afterwards. If you have any questions, feel free to leave them in the comments below.
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Today’s post is all about planning. Destination, activitites, travel and what I am packing (generally speaking).
My favorite thing to do in any planning situation is to start with a list. This initital list is messy, full of ideas, ands words. From there, I like to organize the ideas and words into more organized fashion, and get a better idea of where to go. Lots of google searches later, I found some great resources for our destination. We used those as a jumping point later on for activites and places of interest.
For this trip, Kyle and I planned it through conversations and text messages. Kyle has traveled a lot (almost 1,000,000 lifetime airline miles!) so he took point with getting our flights. (I had no idea where to start or even what to look for) He was able to find us flights to our destination by using Google Flights. (Kyle will be doing a q&a about traveling prep- let me know if you have any specific questions for an avid traveler.)
Once we got our flights, we started looking for our hotels, we were traveling between two different locations so we will need 2 hotels for our trip; and an extra hotel for the first night we fly in since we have a late flight. Kyle took point on this as well since #avidtraveler.
After we got the big things booked (flights, hotels and a rental car) then I came in with the ideas of what to do. All my google searches came in handy with this. Thanks for some travel guides from some of my favorite bloggers, we made a list of things we wanted to do. We started to map out what days we were going to do what. I found this part fun also a little nervewracking. It felt like getting set up on a blind date, not sure what to expect since its a new city and you are making your decisions off of the reviews you read.
After those the activites were settled, I jumped on my packing list! This was probably my favorite part and the part where I felt most comfortable. My first thoughts were “What was I going to wear?!” I will have a whole post dedicated to specifically everything I packed AND another post after the trip about what I used and what I didn’t use and what I wished I had picked. My packing list started with me dividing up a piece of paper into the amount of days I was going to be away including travel days. I started with basic items in each section and then thought about what generally I would want to wear (shorts, tank, yoga pants etc) and I added those. I was sure to add any accessories and shoes to each box so I would have a complete list. I have been looking at this list every so often to finalize exactly what I am bringing and what I am wearing.
I also had to think about tolitrees, chargers, my medicine packing so I made a seperate list for miscellaous items. After I got the clothes list and the miscellanous items list together, I made ONE master list with every single item I am bringing. This will provide me with a great overview and it will help me when I am actually ready to pack. Now I have a few weeks until the trip so I will be looking over this list every so often to make sure I am not forgetting anything improtant.
I decided to only bring a carry on and a personal item (per United Airlines guidelines) so I need to pack extra thoughtful and carefully to make sure no precious space is wasted. This is should be fun like Wordle or Suduko, as in it might be frustrating but it feels so rewarding in the end. I am a notorious overpacker and lets just say my last vacation- I truly overpacked and it was wild. I havea photo I’ll dig out of everything I brought to Vegas for a 5 day trip. If my memory is correct, a queen size bed was COVERED in clothes. HA!
One thing Kyle and I made sure to talk about was our budget. What we were both comfortable spending and what we wanted to spend our money on. We came up with a plan that made us feel comfortable about spending. I feel this is a super important step- it should be discussed in the beginning to make sure your expectations are the same.
Well, this shall be an adventure. Check back next week when I talk about my dream destinations!
Let me know how you plan your vacations in the comments below!
[[Adventure is out there! UP!]]
