Hallmark bullshit

I enjoy the process of travelling rather than the destination.

Ali calls it my hallmark (cheesy movie channel) bullshit. I stick by it.

I want to see beautiful places, experience new things, and meet interesting people but I don't have a tick-list of destinations I want to visit. I've found that often the best experiences happen on the spur of the moment in unheralded places.

Ali on the other hand would prefer a daily plan, which is likely to include, lunch spots, things to see and activities. As a result in our travels and in life too, Ali tends to drive the destination/activity, and I (assuming I like or don't mind it) will go along and enjoy the ride.

So far so good, in fact it's the relationship I've had with many friends as well. Why is this coming up as an issue between us now?

Well we're in freezing Northern Europe at the moment and our list of four key destinations (Bruges, Ghent, Amsterdam and xmas markets) have been done except the latter which don't start for another couple of weeks. So where to next?

Our roles in our relationship are also changing or at least, we're being more conscious of our roles, figuring which bits we like and don't like. Ali it seems has had enough of coming up with all the plans and would like greater input/direction from yours truly and whisper it: might want to just sit back and enjoy the ride once in a while.

This has come up between us before, and one of my digital solutions has been using the app Trover. It's a photogropher heavy recommendations app which allows users to recommend useful/tasty/pretty places that they come across in their travels. Yesterday with it's help we ended up in Monschau which was absolutely stunning:

After some research on Trover I've got a list of places that look interesting in the area so the plan as it stands is to potter our way through them over the coming days/weeks...

Hopefully a more balanced approach between us will allow us to both enjoy the ride.