How To Choose Your Next Destination

A lot of friends ask me how I can afford to keep going away. The answer will become clear nearer the end of this post, but for now I’m going to focus on the question “how do you choose where to go?”.

1. Ask friends:
2. Pinterest
3. Specific events/ activities
4. Flights scanners
5. Money

 

Asking friends:

Why not just ask your mates where they went most recently or which city they had the most fun in? Thats how I booked my latest trip to Portugal. I was eating breakfast, my mums friend walked in and I literally just said “hey Rachel, where should I go on holiday?” and she recommended Portugal. Done. Booked. Easy. If people were to ask me for my recommendation, Budapest is a big one for a really fun weekend with a group of friends, and if you want to chill I’m all about Ireland.

Pinterest:

I can honestly say I spend about 60% of my time on Pinterest looking at other blog posts about various destinations and itineraries. If you have an inkling where to go next, get on Pinterest to look at pretty pictures to get you all excited about it and for some ideas of what there is to do there.

 

Specific events or activities:

This is a great way to decide where to go. Basing your trip around an event like running the Berlin Marathon, skydiving in New Zealand or seeing a football game in Madrid automatically gets you there! I’m going to Rome in February to see a Six Nations match and for some reason going out of the UK to do such a normal thing makes it so much more exciting; all hail the mini break!.

Also, if you’re like me and have an extensive bucket list, this can be a great way to get things ticked off. I had always wanted to see the Olympic Museum in Lausanne and was lucky enough to spontaneously go when a friend was driving through there and it was the best thing I did!

Flight scanning:

So on a Sunday morning some people look at property porn, some at cake porn…. I look at cheap flights on Skyscanner! When you have an idea of where to go, do some research on Skyscanner of best ways to get there and when is best to fly. There’s a rumour that booking a flight 8weeks before you go is how to get the cheapest flights, but for me that’s a bit risky. I get pretty trigger happy and if a return flight from Bristol is roughly £50 I WILL BOOK IT NO THOUGHT ABOUT IT. Might seem stupid, but for me that’s the amount I can mentally deal with losing if it turns out I can’t go in the end. Back in July I booked a flight to Amsterdam for January for £50 and the reality is that I might be so poor at that time that I have to cancel. It would be a shame but I won’t be raging.

I’ve also recently signed up to Jack’s Flight Club. Can’t recommend this enough, I haven’t personally used his service yet because I’m being restrained, but even as a free user you get 3/4 emails a month with INCREDIBLE flight deals around the world. check it out….

Time and Money:

Lets be honest, at the end of the day this is what it all comes down to. If you’re taking time off work you need to make sure your holiday is going to be great so do your research using the points above. TOP TIP: In Europe, the farther East you go the cheaper.

The Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland have all been very kind on my bank account, but beware, with this can come language barriers if travelling out of cities which can be tricky. I could never have found my way around Poland without my Polish friend but that shouldn’t deter you!.

So please go get some spontaneity and book a break, we all deserve it from time to time.

Ciao for now

Marlo x