I arrived on Friday evening with a bag, a notebook and no list of places to see. For once, the plan was to have no plan.
What I found instead
A bakery that only opens at dawn. A bookshop with no sign. An old man who explained the town’s history in twenty minutes and three cups of tea, and who refused to let me pay for any of them.
Without an itinerary, every corner was a choice instead of a checkpoint. I stayed where I was happy and left where I was not. I sat on a harbour wall for an hour because the light on the water was too good to leave.
None of it would have made a guidebook. All of it made the trip.
How to travel without a plan
- Book the bed, nothing else.
- Ask locals where they eat, not where tourists should go.
- Say yes to the first unexpected invitation.
The fear of missing out
The hardest part was the first evening, when I realised I had no idea what the town was “known for”. I almost looked it up. I almost made a list. What stopped me was the thought that a list would turn the weekend into a test I could fail.
Instead I walked until I was hungry and ate where the lights looked warm. It was the best meal of the trip, in a restaurant that had no website and nine tables. Later I learned that the famous sight everyone visits was ten minutes away. I never saw it, and I have never regretted it for a moment.
I came home rested in a way that no carefully planned holiday has ever managed.
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