Oui Oui, Wee Wee
Now for some brutal honesty…
I am clearly obsessed with planning, as can be illustrated simply by the existence of this blog. But I don’t think anyone really knows how far the obsession goes. Full disclosure–I’m planning on making my own travel book.
I already have several pages of notes for every part of this trip, and I’ve started a table in one of the documents (all organized in my Travel Plans folder on my Mac) that lists all of the places we want to go, as well as important information such as when that attractions is open, how much it costs and if it is covered by any day passes, with notes about other places that would be convenient to visit on the same day. It is an OCD masterpiece work-in-progress. In addition to this, I’m also including maps I’ve found to be helpful–maps of different neighborhoods that I will cut and paste from the internet, or literally cut and paste from my guidebooks, all to be included in the Master Vacation Planning Guide (I’m sure I’ll devote an entire blog post or two to said Guide, once it is completed.) I plan to have the guide copied–one for me and one for my husband–and spiral bound at my local Staples. I’m thinking about adding pages for notes, so that I can have an all-in-one travel guide and journal. Ok, who am I kidding? I am going to do that. And I’m super excited about it.
Currently I’ve been looking up what I consider to be the hands-down most practical information for any traveler–and if you are reading this as someone who knows me, you certainly can guess what this information is. I’ll give you a second to think about it. Got it? Good. If you guessed ‘where the restrooms are’, you are absolutely correct!
I’ve found so many great online resources for Paris, but most are in list form and I don’t really feel like weeding through them right now–or adding another column to my crazy Paris Attractions Table of Fun. But without a doubt the best resource I’ve found so far is this map, the London Tube Toilets Map, part of which is pictured below, and is available to save as a PDF file. You can bet this is going in my DIY travel book.
I love that this map exists, and only wish that I could find one for Paris–though I did find a similar version, but it was an eBook that cost 2.5 Euros, and this website, put out by the mayor’s office (why can’t NYC be this pee-friendly?). But I did happen upon something even more amazing–something called The National Public Toilet Map, a website (and iPhone app) created by the (I’m not kidding here) Government of Austrailia. It lists every single public restroom in Australia. I think I know where we’re going on our next vacation.
Just kidding. But only kind of.
A travel book? How great is that!! I can’t wait to read more about your OCD travel stuff. I am a nut planner too. Good luck!
I’m right there with you fellow OCD planner. Atleast I’m not alone. Since we are spending the most time in Italy on our 7 country, 13 city trip I haven’t gotten to extensively researching our London and Paris legs. Can I take a peek at yours?Oh, so we got our kelty backpacks over The weekend. We love them! They have more space than I thought. Also we put about 17 lbs of books in them and toted them around. They do a great job of distributing the weight around. I’m excited to use them and I hope they work out as well as I think they will.
Oh don’t worry, I’ll post all of my travel plans on here. And if you’d like me to email them to you privately–the really REALLY OCD ones that I won’t even post–let me know! We did not get our bag sampler yet–the one (that I don’t want but my husband insisted upon) is back ordered. Fortunately we have until July to figure out the whole baggage thing. But wow–17 lbs of books–I hadn’t thought of that as a way of testing it out. My husband is insisting we pack the test bag full and then go and try to fit it in the carry on example box at the airport. I’m super jealous of your 7 country trip! That’s what we started out with, and it has been downgraded CONSIDERABLY since then. Ahhh..some day!
Well I’m jealous of your “you” Grand Tour of Britain. While I love our tasting of Europe we’re about to experience, I would equally love extended time in one place. I imagine really getting to know the country, the people, the culture, and most importantly, the food.
This trip is probably the longest trip we will ever take (we’re both going to be inbetween jobs AND moving right when we get back so we chose to go all out). I figure it will be easy to take week long trips in the future because we’ll have places to go back to!
For your Las Vegas leg, my absolute favorite restaurant in America, (I know I’m going to have favorites in Europe come May!) is Firefly. It’s a tapas bar that is off the strip but oh so good. I dream about their empanadas, aioli dressing, and stuffed dates. I hate recommending restaurants because everyone’s taste is so different but I love this one too much to not share. I hear the sangria is fabulous so if the food isn’t what I raved it to be, the sangria will help you out with that.
Oh yea, bring on the OCD-laced notes please.
Thanks for the restaurant recommendation. We will be sure to check it out. I love recommendations like that–and, to be fair, I’d go JUST for sangria, thank you very much! So if the food is good, that’s a bonus! I would love to hear about your trip–if you plan to blog about it at all, please do share. And I would also love to share my OCD notes. Email me–elbodans@yahoo.com–and I’ll send you what I have so far, though it is not much, as our trip isn’t until July…or email me in a few weeks–there will be more by then! Though I don’t know when your trip is, so that might not work.