How To Build A Trip Itinerary For Smooth Travels

When planning our first family road trip, I quickly realised that moving around from place to place was a logistical challenge which required some form of management tool. My solution was to set up a basic spreadsheet on EXCEL to help me keep track of locations, accommodation bookings, driving distances and activities. Although not a sophisticated method, it was extremely useful and so I have continued to use a basic spreadsheet ever since to build a trip itinerary. However there are many ways to keep track of your travel plans depending on your preferences.

Pencil and Paper – tried and tested way to track travel plans

If you like a paper diary, then you might also like to make travel plans on paper, for example, using a Travel Journal.

Pros – there are some lovely travel journals available to buy, and the formatted notes in the travel journal will prompt you to consider certain aspects of your travel planning. As well as helping you set out your plans, the travel journal will make a lovely souvenir of your travels afterwards.

Cons – as you are usually given the headings, and a set number of pages per journey, then you might find the format of a physical travel journal too restrictive for planning multi-centre trips, longer trips, or more complicated trips requiring several stages. Personally, I find it harder to build a trip itinerary in the confines of a Travel Journal, although love the idea of them!

Make a travel planning document using One Note (Microsoft) or Pages (Apple Mac)

One Note or Pages are great for creating a document for each trip on your computer, providing somewhere to collect information about your trip.

Pros – you can set up a new note or page specifically for a trip that you are planning, and make different sections for different legs of a trip. Both options are then flexible enough for you to add information in different forms such as images, scans, links, or text.

Cons – whilst One Note or Pages are great options for information collecting, I find them less useful in making sense of the information when it comes to scheduling, which is why I prefer spreadsheet for the scheduling stage.

Make a planning spreadsheet on EXCEL

The reason this appeals to me when I build a trip itinerary, is that I can create an Overview page which summarises the entire trip, then using the tabs for separate sections or days of the trip, and you can basically build it exactly how you want it.

Building a working document on EXCEL

Here’s a summary of how I build my basic travel planning spreadsheet…

1. Overview page

Use the front page (or EXCEL tab) as an Overview page, creating headings that you would find useful, but for example:

• Dates down the left column – list the dates of your trip down the left-hand column of the spreadsheet, leaving some lines in between each date.
• Headers across top – create headers across the top as required, for example, date, morning, lunch, afternoon, evening/dinner, accommodation.
• Column for budgeting – dedicate a column for noting costs and budgeting at the right hand side. Use this to note the cost of accommodation and activities at the end of the relevant row. Total up expenditure at bottom of the costs column. Hide/Unhide the columns as required (e.g. if you want to print it off without the costs on).
• Use colours to code your entries, for example:
  • Blue – for flights and airport time.
  • Orange – for driving times, e.g. if on a road trip.
  • Yellow – contacted, but waiting to hear back from.
  • Green – booked.
  • Pink – scheduled but no booking required.

You can see an example of how this can look in the cover photo of this blog.

2. Make tabs for different days or places

I make tabs along the bottom relating to places we are visiting, or specific days, depending on the trip, and then make notes or copy/paste information and links about different locations or activities onto the relevant tab. This works well for text, but less well for photos, if you are wanting to include those.

Note – it could be useful to make a One Note or Pages document to collect photos and articles, and then a spreadsheet to summarise what you have actually booked.

Before travelling, I print out the Overview page of my spreadsheet, just in case I am unable to access it electronically whilst away.

3. Add overnight destinations and accommodation

On the Overview page of your spreadsheet, note your intended overnight destinations in the Accommodation column, and any comments on where you would like to stay.

After bookings have been made, update with the details of what you have booked – where and what sort of rooms, and at what cost.

4. Add transport information

Enter your flights, and periods of other travel, on the Overview page of your spreadsheet so that you can see the periods when you will be in transit, and therefore not available for sightseeing or other activities.

Where you are driving from A to B, write a note about how long the drive is in kms (or miles) and how much time you expect this to take. Also note any pitstops on the route.

5. Start scheduling activities on your trip itinerary

Consider and differences in Time Zones

Think about any time differences when scheduling your activities, for example, if you travel to the USA from the UK then, because America is behind the UK, you are more than likely going to be awake very early for the first few days. This means that you can grab an early breakfast and crack on with sightseeing straight away, aiming to have an early tea and bed for a couple of nights until you acclimatise.

Conversely, if flying east from the UK then the opposite is the case and you might be going straight to bed on arrival, aiming to get straight onto a new time zone as soon as possible.

Seek input from your fellow travellers

Ask your fellow travellers what they would like to get out of the trip and if there is anything in particular, they would like to do or see. Try to include their suggestions, where practicable, to get buy in to the itinerary from your fellow travellers.

Schedule something for everyone

When the kids hit teenage years and developed opinions about what they hoped to do on holidays, my strategy evolved to include ‘something for everyone’ in the itinerary – travel related for Dad, water-related for Mum, cycling or an adrenalin rush for one daughter, wildlife for the other and something arty for our son.

This strategy has worked well for us over the years – if one day wasn’t looking great for one person, then maybe the next day would be their choice of activity.

Include a variety of sights and activities

Aim to include a variety of activities and experiences in your schedule, to get a good overview of your destination. Try not to schedule too much of one thing and miss out on a broader experience. Elements you could consider including are a walking tour to help you acclimatise, cycling tour to cover a lot of ground sightseeing in an area, a wildlife experience, cool neighbourhood, cultural experience, something historical or sports (watching or doing).

Note – try to choose things which you can’t do or see at home, and which allow you to engage with the locals in some way, to get the most out of your experience.

Use Travel Planning Apps

There are also dedicated Travel Apps which you can use to build a trip itinerary and keep track of your holiday arrangements. These are really like a combination of options 2 and 3 – allowing you to collect information for your trip and to schedule your time and keep track of costs and bookings.

Examples of planning apps include Wanderlog, Tripit, or Roadtrippers. Most of the apps have basic levels to use for free and then advanced levels which you need to pay for.

Pros – these apps are really like a combination of options 2 and 3 (above), allowing you to collect information for your trip, and to schedule your time and keep track of costs and bookings. Then you have everything in one place.

Cons – on the apps, you are using someone else’s design which might not be quite how you want it. I haven’t found one yet that I’ve got on with, but then I like to organise information myself. It depends what you’re happy with.

Final thoughts….

Another option of course is to use a travel agent or trip planner to build a trip itinerary for you. In summary, there are several different options which can help your travel planning. The only way to find out what works for you, is to try some different options until you find the one you like best. But have fun trying in the process!

Thank you so much for reading my blog, I hope you found it useful?

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Enjoy your travels!