With the world at your fingertips like never before, you can be sure to achieve your vacation goals—as long as you set those goals carefully. That requires some reflection and choices even before you start lining up specific plans.
Are you looking for a getaway from the routine? A chance to experience exotic cities or natural beauty? An enriching historical or cultural experience for your kids? A way to create treasured family memories? Ask not just where you want to go but why you want to go there. Once you’ve considered these questions, be sure to write down the answers—or, better yet, tell a friend about them. TheCompassIsCalling.com says that people who write down their goals are 42 percent more likely to achieve them while those who tell others are 78 percent more likely.
Gather Ideas
Once vacation goals are established, consider the best strategy for achieving them. Would one trip of two or three weeks be more appropriate or several long weekends throughout the year? What are the places where you are most likely to have the experience you want? A fast-growing tool for this kind of research is Instagram—carefully filtered to avoid marketers and to define your choices precisely, it can show you the real experiences that other ordinary people have had on their vacations in those places. Jenni Fink in a Newsweek article provides a guide.
Plan Ahead & Save Money
Once you’ve matched a location to your vacation goals, planning the trip will become an exciting, targeted activity, according to the blogger Ramit Sethi. You will be able to investigate the most effective uses of time and money in that particular place, and you may discover that the destination can be enjoyed more economically than you expected. Also, your pre-planning gives you an opportunity to find discounts, choose affordable seasons, and even set aside money in a savings account regularly to cover costs. The less you put on the credit card while you’re on vacation, the more you’ll enjoy the trip—and the return.
Enjoy your Vacation
You can’t manage what you can’t measure. When you take the time to set shared strategic goals and carry out a plan to achieve them, you’ll have the pleasure of a successful preparation as well as a successful trip.
For a Colorado vacation that checks the boxes for family-friendly, affordable, thrills and new experiences, make plans to visit Glenwood Caverns Adventure Park.
May your 2020 journeys and destinations be rewarding!
