Why we build every trip around one useless day

It is the hardest thing to sell and the easiest thing to justify. Somewhere in the middle of every route there is a day where the itinerary says almost nothing. No transfer, no activity, no meeting point.

The instinct — ours too, at the start — is to fill it. A cooking class, a viewpoint, something. We tried that on the first two groups. Both times the day people talked about afterwards was the one we had left half-empty by accident.

So we made it deliberate. The rule is that the co-host does not organise anything. If the group wants to do nothing, they do nothing. If somebody's new friend from the guesthouse invites everyone to a family lunch, there is space to say yes.

You cannot schedule serendipity. You can only refuse to schedule over it.