10 Advantages Of Overnights And Other Short Trips
The pressures of our daily lives can make us feel we don't have a moment to ourselves, let alone time for vacation. I've discovered that sometimes the best vacations are the really short ones, which require little preparation, or -- better yet -- are completely spontaneous.
Such small adventures —lasting anywhere anywhere from a few hours on a weekday morning, to a full day, or even a quick overnight— can leave you feeling recharged and energized, yet those around you barely even notice you're gone. Such trips have many advantages:
Inexpensive. If you bring your own food, go on your own power, and camp, you can easily have an overnight vacation for under a hundred bucks. However, if you don’t quite feel like roughing it, and trade you camping equipment for a night or two at an inn or Airbnb, a local exploration weekend is much more budget-friendly than any packaged 3-day/2-night getaway.
Don’t need time off. In true microadventure style, you could be gone between 5pm on Tuesday and 9am on Wednesday, an no one would be the wiser. But you can just as easily fit in a local weekend, or Sunday/Monday excursion, with minimal —if any— time off.
Require very little planning. If you plan to camp overnight, you will need to do some route planning and lay out your gear, but that’s about it. For a single night, your gear does not need to be supremely technical, and you can cut some corners. If you’re OK with a motel stay, you can even pick a completely spontaneous route, and dispense with any gear except your phone or map, bike, flat repair kit and wallet.
You get to know your region. In the last five years I’ve discovered so many unsung natural treasures easily accessible within a few hours drive of Chicago, including caves, canyons, quaking bogs, carnivorous plants, massive bird migrations, natural arches, springs and primeval forest. You discover train lines, country roads, forgotten towns and rivers you didn’t know existed. Or pelicans. Did you know there are pelicans in Illinois??
You speak the language, but you can still feel like a foreigner. Have you even noticed how a small town in Michigan has a completely different vibe than a seemingly identical town in Wisconsin? A warm “Hello!” breaks a lot of barriers, though the response you get in Wisconsin may be quite a bit more hearty than the one you get in Michigan. If you’re open to cultural nuances (and stay away from chain restaurants), you can learn a lot about regions that may seem similar on the surface, but have their own indigenous and irreplaceable character, complete with food, beverages, architecture and vocal inflections.
Cook whatever you want. If you’re only going overnight, there’s virtually nothing that will spoil, even in the heat of summer. In many cases, even for two self-supported days on the road you can mostly bring pre-cooked tasty food you would normally consume, instead of relying on prepackaged freeze dried meals or pasty energy bars.
You can shower at home. Sure, if you’re riding your bike in sweltering summer heat, you’ll want to rinse off after just an hour or two. But if you’re on an overnight trip, you will not die from lack of hygiene. You may be able to cool off in a nearby body of water, skip suspicious looking public showers, and take a proper one when you return home.
Spontaneity. You can decide to go almost on the spur of the moment, or quickly adjust plans in case of inclement weather or other unforeseen circumstances.
Easier to do alone. Of course it’s fun to travel with your partner, friend or even in a groups. But rather than waiting for everyone’s schedule to align, overnight trips are a fantastic opportunity for solo adventures, giving you a chance to disconnect, clear or head, and maybe a way to push yourself to become more self-reliant.
You can repeat as often as you like. Because of minimal planning, expense and time commitment, local overnights or weekend trips can be done a couple times a month or even weekly. Keep your travel gear clean and organized after each use, and you’ll be shocked how little time it takes to get ready.
Imagine knowing you don't need to save thousands of dollars and wait months for your next getaway, and instead looking forward to taking your next adventure literally tomorrow, or grinning at your co-workers, because you just got back from one.