Photo by Lorenzo & Ylenia in Lake Como for Flytographer
So you're planning the most lavish trip of your life. How do you make it amazing?
You can find a million resources on planning a wedding, but tips and tricks for planning a honeymoon seem few and far between. After tastings and fittings and registry-making, is everyone just too exhausted to care? Take heart, we’ll help you design an emotionally-satisfying trip in eight easy steps.
1. Talk to your partner
Before you book that ticket to Bali, let’s hit pause. Have you and your spouse talked about your honeymoon goals together? It’s important to get on the same page about potential destinations, budget, and ways you’d like to spend your time. Spoiler alert: this may require compromise — which is a great skill to start honing before you’re married!
2. Focus on what, not where
The first question most people ask is “where do we want to go?” But Katy Rebrovich, a luxury travel consultant with CIRE Travel, says it’s better to ask what you want to do. “I regularly have clients that are following someone else’s dream. They [think they] want to go to the Maldives to stay in an overwater bungalow, but they’re active people who like to be out and about, exploring restaurants and local culture. We have to have that conversation that spending two weeks on one island might not be the right trip.” (Guilty as charged? For an overwater bungalow destination rich on activity, Rebrovich’s favorite recommendation is Cambodia.)
3. Hire an expert
Just like you wouldn’t ask your Aunt Elva to snap some photos of your big day just because she has a nice camera, it’s savvy to entrust your $10,000+ trip to an expert. “I think the biggest mistake couples make is spending their energy trying to decipher the internet, sifting through review sites and other people’s opinions,” Rebrovich says. The reality is that the honeymoon is the most expensive thing you buy that you don’t taste test or test drive or try on first.” A travel agent can help filter options based on their experience and even more importantly, serve as the all-hours phone call when plans go awry. “That’s what you’re paying for,” Rebrovich says, “the security of having someone to help you if it’s not right.”
4. Choose the right time to go
Do you need a minute or a year to recoup from the wedding mania? Fabulous. Take your time. “More and more couples are doing minimoons right after their wedding and then saving the bucket list trip for later,” says Sarah Kline, president of Time for Travel. If delaying your honeymoon will result in a superior honeymoon, it might be worth considering. And there’s the weather factor: not to be captain obvious, but you’ll want to ensure wherever you’re going is a nice place to be, when you plan to be there.
5. Start planning early
The early bird gets the worm, and the early travel planner gets the booking. There are finite seats and rooms and spots in restaurants, so if you procrastinate with your planning, you might not get everything you want or it may come at a premium. According to Rebrovich, the sweet spot is 10 months. Much before that, it’s harder to get accurate pricing.
6. Buy travel insurance
It’s not a scam. Yes, you need to buy travel insurance because if you don’t have it, you will hate you and your lost baggage and the safari that indirectly twisted your ankle. Insure your trip, just like you insured those rings — ideally before you purchase your flight. Some credit cards, like Chase Sapphire Preferred and Amex Platinum, offer complimentary travel insurance benefits; check the fine print to understand your coverage before you buy a separate policy.
7. Prioritize photos
Considering most honeymoons last 5 to 14 days and a wedding lasts 1, it seems absurd that we expend a fortune to document one and not the other. Every good trip needs photos (and a coffee table book to make your friends and neighbors wistful.) If you’re feeling fancy, level up and hire an onsite pro. To simplify your search process, Flytographer connects couples with local photographers in 350+ cities across the globe.
8. Build an itinerary
If you go rogue and decide to do all the trip planning yourself, build an itinerary you can print out and refer to on the ground. This can be as elaborate as an hour-by-hour breakdown of what you aim to do, from restaurant reservations to scheduled attractions, or as simple as a list of ideas organized by location. Just don’t forget to include vital info like hotel bookings and car rentals. Once you’ve created your itinerary, review it with your spouse. Is there anything you haven’t included that you would be disappointed to miss? Speak now or forever hold your peace; marriages prosper when there are limited honeymoon regrets.
Eight Cities in Eight Weeks
Maryland couple Jenna Ring and Torrey Leonard managed to take a two-month honeymoon through Europe and the Middle East by combining PTO with remote work. Sound incredible? This is how they pulled it off.
Itinerary: Flying from Washington, D.C., to Rome, visiting Israel, Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, Positano, Ravello, and finally London. “We left in the afternoon the day after our wedding and it was a true whirlwind in the very best way,” Ring says. “One of the highlights we both agree, was the first night in Rome; we stayed in the St. Regis and laughed, cried, ate good food and even better dessert, and just let it all sink in.”
Packing: I’ve never been a light packer, but for this trip, I managed with one carry-on and I was so glad. I never had to deal with lost luggage as mine was always with me and I never had to be one of the girls in Capri that carried their 65 lb suitcase up 20 flights of stairs!
Pacing: We stayed one week minimum in each place. This gave us time to unpack and unwind instead of living out of a suitcase for weeks on end.
Prepared: Bring some of your favorite snacks from home. They’re so nice to have when you’re craving a little bit of your “norm.”
