I've wanted to go to New York City for years and I wanted to visit Washington DC ever since seeing Night at the Museum. On a whim I booked my flights a couple of weeks ago and I'm off at the end of the month to join some friends for 9 days visiting the Big Apple and Obama's home. I love planning holidays and I have a few things that help me along the way that you might find useful too.

Guide Books



Any excuse to buy some new books, the first thing I did after buying the tickets was run down to my local bookshop and pick up some guide books. While I really like having good old google for tips and things to see from people who have already visited wherever I'm going nothing beats having a flick through a guide book and getting all excited about your upcoming trip. DK guide books are my favourite as they are packed with pictures They're great for making a list of places you'd like to see and then if needs be doing your own research. These ones also come with a removable map so you don't have to lug the guide book with you.



One Note

I LOVE MICROSOFT ONE NOTE. It's a totally underused tool in the Microsoft Office suite. Whenever I'm planning anything, a party, a holiday, this blog, I use One Note as a place to store my thoughts and findings. It's basically a computerised notebook that you can use however you want. For my trip I've made 3 main sections, one for over all plans, one for New York and one for Washington DC. So far the city sections have links for things I'd like to do and see, suggestions from friends and my hotel details. You can see some of the things I got in the main plans section, visa, flights and lists. The tick list part is my favourite bit of One Note. It's available online and as a computer program and mobile app. Ultimately the computer version is the best but they all sync together so I'll have all my information with me on my phone and backed up on the internet.


Google Hotels


This tip was something on only discovered the other day. When you type an area into Google Maps it gives you the option to search for nearby hotels. You can then enter in your dates and it gives you prices on the map for each hotel. Obviously you can then hunt around using your own comparison websites to make sure you're getting a good price but it's a great tool to find out what the cheapest hotels are in a specific area.