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With only a few weeks left we can say we have a final itinerary. If you’ve been reading along since August you know that the first half of the trip was booked before we took our first flight and the second half was to be left open and flexible. This made our mothers a bit crazy (in a good way we hope). We managed to set some dates in advance to take into account friends limited school vacation schedules – one week in each of March and April. And in December friends suggested a meet up and vacation in South Africa. The rest was left open; well, for as long as I could tolerate it anyway.

Turns out I like certainty. I guess we, me, you (collective readers) knew that already. My planning horizon stretches weeks and I like to read up on everything so I don’t miss anything. But, for me, there is just too much information to be able to stay on top of places while also experiencing the place you are in. Did that make sense to anyone? Let me try it another way: Being in the moment doesn’t always square well with the desire to plan your next step. (I think my mom and Kirtlye have been telling me that for years. Thanks moms. I think I got it now. Maybe.)

Anyway, here we are with a few things certain: our flights, our ferries, our hotels. The great circle map (images and data below) shows where we’ve been since January and where we go next. In the list of airport codes above, we are in CPH or Copenhagen. Next week Joan and Joel will join us here and the following week, we will meet up with Mom and Doug in Scotland and travel to London. From there….we go back up to the Scandinavian countries of Sweden and Finland, take a ferry to St. Petersburg (with only a 72 hour visa) and then a flight back to our hub of Istanbul where we will have a one week vacation on the Blue Coast before heading home….on July 1st.

So that’s our flights and ferries. A quick note on hotels and AirBnB in response to a comment. If you’re not into logistics, you can move on to your next email or blogroll as this will be rather tedious and uninteresting.

Identifying where to go Edinburgh v. Glasgow is a different kind of search process but where to stay in Edinburgh itself would go like this:

I do my internet search first on Trip Advisor. This allows me to see if the different hotel aggregators are pricing similarly. Then, all being equal, I go to Booking.com. My filters are set to look at scores above 8.1 and WiFi Free Everywhere. That tells me what the room availability statistics are for the dates I’m looking at and since we are generally flexible, I can take into account heavy weekend bookings etc. I also know a little about the yield management systems that these aggregators are using so I try to look quickly and not inflate the demand, the four people looking at this room often include your last viewing. After I learn about the availability of rooms in a city I take into account how long we want to stay and whether we need to do laundry. I compare the aggregator rate to the hotel’s direct booking but generally find them comparable and I prefer all of my bookings in one place, so I open and book using the Booking.com app (my app of choice). (And then I clear the cookies from my browser if I don’t want targeted ad campaigns.)

If we are staying more than 5 days, serviced apartments (available also on booking.com) and AirBnB are our first choice. I have wish lists that I have saved on AirBnB since last winter. AirBnB has exploded and the best spots are often booked well in advance. Our bookings are for the entire home or flat so the owners go on vacation or move to a second home during our stay. We have had great experiences with the places we’ve booked and I wouldn’t be surprised, in fact I’d be delighted, if the hosts we met came to stay with us sometime. For us, we want our AirBnB flats to have two – three beds, 1.5 bathrooms and strong WiFi so the girls can submit their assignments. After that, I want to know that there is good access to city center/sights, there is a good market nearby, that there is a Dryer!, and that they either have a Nespresso or, better still, an Illy espresso system available 🙂

AirBnB tends to be nicer when you want to connect with locals and serviced apartments are nicer when you want your bed made and towels freshened each day. Our longest stays, 12-20 days, have been with AirBnB.

Had enough? Want to talk about picking cities? food and coffee searches?