Olá, amigos! Yesterday, I recapped our trip last February to Lisbon, Portugal and Barcelona, Spain. The post ended up being pretty long since we stayed a whole week and I had so many recommendations! Instead of sharing some things I learned about traveling overseas, particularly to that area of Europe, I decided to split it up into separate posts. So here’s part 2: travel tips from my trip to Lisbon and Barcelona!
Disclaimer: I’m not a travel blogger. I’m also not going to go through the obvious tips when traveling to another country like having an extra copy of your passport. This was my first time packing for a week in only a carry-on, so I’m clearly not a packing expert. But I promise these ideas will be useful if you’re looking to explore abroad. These are specific travel tips I found helpful as an American tourist planning and enjoying a trip overseas.
Five Tips For Planning a Trip Abroad: What I Learned Traveling to Lisbon & Barcelona
This was the first time I planned a trip myself. I had really only booked flights and AirBnBs for weekend trips. I’m a bigger planner than Hugh, but my mom and sister always took the lead for family vacations. We also were spending significantly more than we would on a weekend away. So planning this trip was a little intimidating! You can read about how we chose our destination and travel agent in my Lisbon & Barcelona Travel Guide. Here are five tips I have for you as I reflect back on what made our travels enjoyable!
1. Do Your Research
Even if you’re not a big researcher (a concept I’m not very familiar with), learning about your destination is important when planning a trip! Travel blogs and other resources write about all aspects of the culture, list out tourist must-sees, and give endless recommendations.
Doing a little research beforehand allows you to be in the moment and enjoy the trip while you’re on it. I don’t necessarily mean have a rigid itinerary the whole time, but arming yourself with knowledge about the area makes traveling less stressful.
As I mentioned in my recap, Ali from Gimme Some Oven’s Barcelona Travel Guide was incredibly helpful. She shared a lot of tips about the culture, like expectations for paying with cash, the different meal schedule there, and how to get around via public transportation. I went into the week having an understanding of how to make our way and enjoy these two great cities. The trip was a lot less stressful because of the research I did before we left.
2. Travel on the off-season
Crowds can seriously dampen travel experiences. Masses of people mixed with peak rates on reservations and transportation can be (mostly) avoided when traveling on the off-season. We went to Europe in February. Though the cities were still bustling urban environments, there were clearly fewer tourists crowding the monuments and hot spots. Both group tours we scheduled ended up being just the two of us! Private for the group rate! Skip the touristy crowds and enjoy the local, everyday life by selecting a less popular time of year to visit.
3. Prioritize the experiences/activities that matter to you
And to your travel mates. The purpose of this trip was to eat and drink and walk our way around the cities, observing other cultures and relaxing. We focused on finding good restaurants and trying the local cuisine, and skipped a lot of the touristy spots because they weren’t as important to us. We were even intentional in the way we experienced the sites we did hit.
I share more in my Travel Guide, but on our first morning in Barcelona, we took a private car tour all around the city. Our guide gave us the lay of the land, shared some history, and drove us to (or by) a lot of the landmarks. We were so happy to have seen the iconic architecture of Gaudí and the Olympic village, but we condensed it into a few hours.
We also knew we would regret skipping La Sagrada Familia, but only wanted to spend an hour or so exploring it. I got creative and bought our tickets for an hour before closing, making them only 9 euros each!
Another activity that mattered to us was sleep. Though we immersed ourselves in the Lisbon and Spanish/Catalan culture during the day, we did not change our meal and sleep routine to the local norm. We were usually in bed before most people were done with dinner! The nightlife just wasn’t important enough to us to miss out on rest. We prioritized the experiences we wanted out of the week and cared less about what we “should” do.
4. Make an effort with the local people
It was really important to us to not stick out as “those Americans.” We really didn’t want to be jerk tourists or nuisances. I recognized that we were visitors to their home!
A simple way to be a friendly person when visiting another country is to learn a few basic words in the native language. We learned words and phrases like please, thank you, and hello in Portuguese and Catalan (which people often speak rather than Spanish in Barcelona). People really seemed to appreciate the gesture!
Though tipping is not customary in many European countries, rounding up to the nearest euro or adding one or two to the bill was another way to show appreciation for dealing with our language challenges. Ali from Gimme Some Oven shares more tips like this in her post about ways to be a nice person in Barcelona. Most of them carried over to Lisbon, too.
5. Don’t over-plan or over-think
I have to tell myself this on a daily basis, but it’s especially important when planning something major like a trip overseas. The anticipation and lead-up is half the fun of a major event, but remember not to stress about it! If you forget something, you’ll figure it out. You can get more recommendations from tour guides or other people you meet and adjust. Set up a few tours or reservations, but leave some free time to explore and immerse yourself in this other culture! To really get the most out of your travels, you need to stay in the moment and take it all in.
I hope you find these travel tips helpful for the next time you plan a trip! I wish you the best of luck and safe travels!
What are your travel tips?
Do you have any tips for planning a vacation abroad? What destinations have been your favorite and what did you do that made it enjoyable and less stressful? I’d love to hear in the comments!
