A trip passes if most of your waking hours are spent where you chose to be. Subtract the hours lost to travel, check-in and sleep from the total, and look at what is left. This page gives you the sum and a pass mark you can use for any destination.
It belongs to the itinerary styles topic. The same logic sits behind our usable holiday days calculator, which you can use alongside this guide.
What do we subtract?
Start with the hours between leaving home and arriving back. Then remove four things.
- Travel to the airport and the wait before the flight.
- The flight and the journey from the airport to the hotel.
- Check-in, check-out and packing.
- Sleep, and the meals you would have anyway.
What is left is the time you can truly spend as a couple.
What does a worked example look like?
The hours below are illustrative, to show the method. Your own will differ.
| Step | Hours |
|---|---|
| Time from leaving home to returning | 72 |
| Remove travel to airport, waiting and flight, both ways | 12 |
| Remove airport to hotel, both ways | 3 |
| Remove check-in, check-out and packing | 3 |
| Remove sleep for two nights | 16 |
| Left as usable awake time | 38 |
That is about a day and a half of free time inside a three-day window. Not bad, but not a lot either.
What is a fair pass mark?
Compare usable hours with the total hours. A trip where more than half of the time is free feels like a holiday. If most of it goes on travel, it feels like a journey.
You may set your own mark. What matters is using the same one for every option you compare.
Which levers add hours?
You can change four things.
- Fly earlier on the way there, so you arrive before lunch.
- Return later, ideally in the evening.
- Choose a closer airport or a shorter transfer.
- Stay one extra night, which adds a full day.
See matching flight times to resort check-in for how timing changes the first and last days.
How does a tired couple adjust the sum?
Reduce the usable hours you expect. If you are drained from the wedding, you will want longer sleep and slower mornings. Subtract an extra few hours and see if the plan still works.
What should we do next?
- Write your departure and return times.
- Subtract using the table above.
- Compare two destinations with the same method.
- Message us with the results. We will check the real door-to-door times and show a total for two.