She Came With a List. I Gently Disagreed.
You know the feeling. You've researched the destination, saved every Instagram reel, color-coded the spreadsheet. You are ready. And somehow, by day four, you've fallen in love with a little square in the middle of the city, found the perfect café, finally feel like you belong there. And then it's time to catch the next train.
I've been her. More than once.
True Story. Dan and I spent our 25th anniversary…
moving through Paris, Lyon, Provence, Carcassonne, St. Tropez, San Sebastián and Madrid in 14 days.
Beautiful every single day. And completely exhausting.
We came home needing a vacation from our vacation. That trip is actually where I fell in love with Paris, and I've been finding reasons to go back ever since.
Before that, Hawaii with the kids. Kayaking and snorkeling with the sea turtles, surfing lessons, and a luau for dinner where we were all falling asleep at the table by 8pm. Fully lived. Fully exhausted.
So when a client came to me with a two-week France and Spain trip and a very ambitious list, I didn't rebuild it. I just started painting a different picture. What if instead of renting cars (that tests your marriage 😉) and jumping between trains, you sat on a bench in the Palais Royal garden with a picnic lunch and a good book, just watching the world go by? What if you actually had time to linger?
She could see it. And she said yes.
Here are the rules I gave her:
Minimum three nights per hotel.
Unpacking once means you actually settle in. You learn the neighborhood. You find the café you want to return to tomorrow morning.No more than one or two activities per day.
You are not at Disney. Give each experience room to breathe and let yourself actually enjoy it.No day trip over two hours of travel time.
Anything more and you spend your vacation in transit wondering why you're tired.Slow mornings.
Non-negotiable. Coffee, no agenda, see what the day feels like. Some of the best moments happen when nothing is planned.A few really nice dinner reservations. The rest left to locals.
Ask your hotel concierge, ask the woman at the market, ask literally anyone who lives there. The best meals rarely have a website.At least one food tour or cooking class.
You don't really know a place until you've eaten your way through it. This one is non-negotiable too.
She was skeptical. She had places to see, things to do, a list that wasn't going to check itself.
But she trusted me. And she went.
From the moment she landed, the pictures started coming in.
Her and her husband, just the two of them, reconnecting in a way she said they hadn't in years. Walking through the gardens at Giverny, surrounded by Monet's water lilies, feeling like she had stepped inside one of his paintings. Stumbling onto an adorable little alley with a local market where they spent an hour just browsing and soaking it all in. And then there were the crepes. A tiny café tucked near their hotel in Mont Saint Michel that she said served the best crepes she has ever had in her life. No reservation needed. No research required. Just a happy accident that became the memory of the trip.
She came home glowing. And the first thing she said was "We never want to travel any other way."
The second thing she said? "That concierge service was clutch. The airport was packed."
And she was not exaggerating. With the new European EES security system rolling out this summer, airports across Europe have been overwhelmed. Lines stretching for hours. Travelers missing flights. That specific kind of stress that hits you right at the finish line when all you want to do is go home. Because I knew what was coming, I had arranged a meet and greet service for them before they ever left. While hundreds of travelers stood in lines that barely moved, they walked straight through. Bags handled, paperwork sorted, gate reached with time to spare.
That is the part most people don't think to ask for. Until they're stuck in a two-hour line watching their connection disappear.
The best trips aren't the ones that cover the most ground. They're the ones you're still talking about years later. The crepe in Mont Saint Michel. The bench in the garden. The moment you looked at your husband and remembered why you love to travel together.
That is what I plan for.
P.S. Dreaming about Paris? I put together a detailed Paris guide just for you.
