So, Where Should I Go?
Hank Schrader, USMA '71, Europe Destination & Europe River Cruise Expert
Anne Schrader, Certified Travel Counselor & Certified Luxury Cruise Specialist
One of the biggest problems Anne & I face in making our personal travel decisions is “Where Should We Go?” You might think this is an easy problem for destination specialists like us, but in reality, the more you travel to one area of the world, like Europe, the more difficult it becomes.
Why? It seems so simple at first but there are just too many options—do you revisit places you have been, look for new places, combine the two, emphasize cities, or peaceful stays in the countryside?
There are so many choices—what should I do? And when all choices are great options, it becomes even harder.
The inspiration for this blog comes from our struggles to decide where to go in April for Anne’s 70th birthday—we will let you know when we finally decide but here is the process we will use to make the right decision.
Regular readers of this blog, will probably guess Anne wants to go to Brugge sometime during the trip—here is the view from our favorite canal side room in Brugge when we visit
So, let’s explore this dilemma together and see if we can come up with a logical process that will make your decision-making easier and, more importantly, provide you a way to maximize your travel time.
Travel Decision Making
In my opinion, there are 5 steps in the travel decision-making process. They are:
First, you want to go on a vacation somewhere.
Second, you begin a search process, looking for some type of inspiration.
Next come comparisons—what will I do or see while on my vacation?
Now comes the suppliers and vendors–will their product or service that I select provide me the vacation I desire?
Last, you evaluate the decision—did I make the right choices?
Vacation Time—I want to Go Somewhere
The first step in this process is a decision to go somewhere.
During this phase, you should try to decide how long you can go, develop some type of budget and select a general destination.
Perhaps, most important, you should ask yourself–why am I going?
Once you know the why, the rest of the decisions become easier. They always have for us. A word of advice here—the why has to be as well defined as possible. The reason we are struggling with Anne’s birthday milestone trip is just celebrating isn’t enough—it has to be the right celebration and we have not really defined exactly what we want to see or do (we are stuck on step 3 in the decision making process as I wrote about above in this blog).
The Search Process–Inspiration and Destination Knowledge
There are lots of ways you can begin your destination search. Usually it is a cool picture, maybe a book description, maybe a TV show or Movie or Video posted on the internet—it doesn’t really matter how it starts.
You begin to see yourself experiencing something new, or perhaps returning to a familiar place where you can relax or be stimulated. Or maybe you just don’t know enough but want to try something new or different.
Maybe you went to our website and researched some of the pages to learn about trip ideas or went to our Pinterest site and looked at the over 5000 photos we have taken during our travels or requested one of our 50 Europe City Guides or 51 Europe River Cruise Port Guides.
For Anne’s 60th we attended a cooking school in Wales—maybe a new cooking adventure for the 70th?
Now that you have been inspired, you next need to learn about where you want to go. Destination knowledge is the combination of 3 types of knowledge–objective knowledge (facts), subjective knowledge (how does it make you feel?) and experience knowledge (what do I gain from doing this?).
We use all three when planning your trips and, even if you don’t realize it, you do the same when thinking about (or better yet dreaming about) your upcoming trip.
Travel Planning 101—Comparing What is Available for Your Travel Decisions
I think there are 3 main ways to make travel decisions. They are:
advantages and disadvantages method (most common)
simple prioritization (best opportunity) method
acquiesce to an expert method (us).
In the military, during our formal decision-making process, we used to call this phase evaluating the course of actions. We would decide on what to do and decide on the advantages and disadvantages of each course of action.
While this was a more formalized process than is necessary for planning travel, it is essentially the same process you should use to plan your trips. Each traveler makes a series of choices (courses of actions in military terminology) and then compares the advantages and disadvantages of each part of the trip to each destination.
Already this is sounding overwhelming, but we have a good solution for you!
Here is a chart I developed, addressing 7 common travel problems and our solutions to help you.
| Problem | What is the Benefit to You | Our Solution |
|---|---|---|
| Will I get the best value for my Money? | Spend your money wisely | We match the right vendor(s) to provide a trip that will exceed your expectations |
| Will I find the right trip? | A Better Vacation | We Learn your dreams and turn them into reality |
| Will I make wise choices? | A better vacation and no fear of missing out on great experiences | Our 25 years of experience in the travel industry coupled with our first-hand destination knowledge and numerous professional certifications will help us provide you with the best options possible |
| Will I remember all the details? | No unforgotten trip details | We check all the details so you do not have any missteps or forgotten arrangements |
| Will I spend too much time researching my trip? | Saves you time & eliminates hassles | Once we know what you want, we do research to get you the highest quality, expertly planned trip |
| How can I best protect my vacation? | Peace of mind | We can help lead you to the right people to answer your questions about insurance options |
| How do I know I can trust my advisor to do the best for me? | Someone thinking and acting in your best interests | We are members of several professional organizations and we have earned the trust of dozens of clients. We encourage you to read their comments about our services |
Trade Offs—What Can I Afford and What Will I Get?
I always tell folks we travel to Europe as many times as we can during a year until we run out of money—most all of us have constraints of some sort—time, travel costs, work demands, family situations—all can affect the desired outcome of your vacation.
Here is simple advice–pick the level of products and services that will provide you the best value. Don’t let money drive the decision–every time we cut a corner on a vacation to save a couple of bucks, we regretted it. It always led to poor experiences.
There almost always is the “sweet spot”–great value but not too expensive to bust the budget. Let us help you find it.
So, Where Do I Go?
The real answer is that there are usually no perfect choices. I do think it becomes easier if we help you, as you can see by the 7 problems we can solve for you in planning and taking your vacation.
Our Final Thoughts
When we decide on Anne’s trip, we will write about the adventure.
As you can see, making wise travel choices, is more complex than you may have thought. Trip planning is not easy. Making sound decisions are critical to the travel planning process. Time and money issues are complex—we all want the best at the least possible price. We help you solve those complex issues, saving you hassles, time and worry.
We are travel experts, ocean and river cruise specialists, and Europe destination experts. We have first-hand knowledge of almost anywhere you want to visit in Europe. We know our products and the vendors who sell them to you. We have designed special tours for dozens of clients, led several and will continue to find just the right vacation that will exceed your expectations.
When you are spending your hard-earned money for a vacation, you want an advisor who can match you with the right trip. You want someone who will understand your expectations and fuel your anticipation (or excitement) to get you the best possible trip experience. And, you want someone who can help you with the decision making process. We think we have all these qualities.
Whatever your Dream Destinations are, we are here to help you get the best possible vacation based on what is important to you! We will provide you high quality, expertly planned travel. Please give me a call 713-397-0188 (Hank) or email me at hschrader@dreamdestinations.com. We want to help you: Savor life…make memories…Visit Dream Destinations! Your journey begins here!
ANNE has earned a degree from the University of Houston in Hotel and Restaurant Management. Serving as the President of Visit Dream Destinations, LLC, since 2016, she is uniquely experienced professional travel advisor with over 26 years’ experience in the travel industry. Among her numerous certifications, she is a Certified Travel Counselor (CTC) by the Travel Institute, considered the gold standard in travel agent certification and she is also an Accredited Cruise Counselor (ACC) by the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), as well Luxury Cruise Specialist also from CLIA. Having traveled often to Europe since 1989, she has expanded on her certification as a Destination Specialist in Western Europe (DS) with extensive first-hand experience in luxury vacations. She holds numerous other specialty designations from individual vendors. An expert photographer, she delights in capturing the true essence of destinations to share with all.
HANK is a certified Western European Destination Specialist (DS) who has been traveling to Europe for 50 years. He is also an Accredited Cruise Counselor (ACC), conferred by the Cruise Line International Association (CLIA). This recognized expert in cruise and leisure travel is a retired Army Officer, and taught World Geography for 8 years. He is a `71 graduate of West Point and has earned 2 master’s degrees. His other Certifications:
AmaWaterways River Cruise Specialist
Viking River Cruise Specialist
Scenic River Cruise Specialist
Emerald Waterways Specialist
Avalon Waterways Specialist
Brit Agent
