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You are here: Home / Adventures / [Video Post] Structure vs. Specifics [London Edition]

[Video Post] Structure vs. Specifics [London Edition]

September 14, 2010 By Joel Runyon 19 Comments

This is official the first international post at BIT. You may or may not know, but traveling is a HUGE part of my life. I’ve written for some other sites about it, but I love traveling and am working on structuring my life to include a lot more of it.

Since I’m out of the country, I figured I’d do another video post since you guys didn’t seem to mind the last one so I gave it another shot. Also, I have a little something for those of you that comment early [Be sure to watch all the way through the video].

[If you’re reading this in email, click here to watch the video.]

Here are some of the highlights:

  • 0:08 – Twitter shoutouts
  • 0:37 – How I plan my trips
  • 1:02 – My London Schedule
  • 1:54 – Why I avoid planning specifics
  • 2:10 – I forget how to talk
  • 2: 19 – What’s your strategy for planning trips?
  • 2:35 – A video offer for those of you that read this & comment ASAP*

People Mentioned

  • @lachlancotter [Actual suggester of Trafalgar Square]
  • @samedelstein [I went to London Bridge, Tower Bridge, & walked by the London Eye before the video, sorry].

People I Should Have Been Mentioned

  • @codymckibb [Got your tweet after the video was made, but I’m definitely heading down to East End Brick Lane tonight].
  • @mattkoenigphoto aka @1yearsabbatical [For telling me to do another video post]

Question #1: How do you plan out your travels?

Question #2: London Experts: Any other places in London I should hit up before I come on back?

**If you’d like to take me up on the video offer, please comment before 10am BST [5pm EST] tonight. I’m heading out around noon on Wednesday, so I do have time restrictions.

Some of My Panoramic Photos of London [Check ’em out]

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Filed Under: Adventures Tagged With: England, International Trips, London, Trafalgar Square, Trip Planning

About Joel Runyon

I started IMPOSSIBLE to push myself to try to live a life worth writing about by pushing my limits, living an adventure & telling a great story by doing the impossible. You can get free updates in your inbox via your new favorite newsletter, free fitness training tutorials, and see all my businesses at Impossible X and our philanthropic efforts at Impossible.org

Comments

  1. Sam says

    September 14, 2010 at 7:51 am

    Nice update! Happy you made it to Tower of London Bridge!

    I’m in the midst of planning a 6-week, 5 country trip coming up in about a month with my girlfriend.

    Planning has been interesting because we have slightly different approaches to planning. I’m a little bit more like you in I’d be happy just going with the flow, she likes to plan a tiny bit more. Her argument is that since we are on a budget, knowing our costs up front lets us enjoy the trip more later. We also aren’t forced to buy a last minute room or ticket which could cost more. So in that sort of case, if you know that you have multiple places to visit, it is a good point.

    I enjoy getting lost in a city and just looking around, hopefully bumping into all the tourist sites on the way. That’s what I did when I was in London last year (I’ll be back on this trip, too!) Also asking friends for recommendations is an easy way to go about it.

    It’s definitely a balance, but being laid back about the whole journey I think is key.

    Reply
    • Joel Runyon says

      September 14, 2010 at 5:01 pm

      I’ve found that while there are a few things its good to be extreme in, a balance is usually more useful for most activities.

      Reply
  2. Josh Crocker says

    September 14, 2010 at 8:36 am

    Shout out first! – I’d love to have some type of a shout-out from a London-based tea company or tea shop. I know Twinings is located in London, but not sure where. That’d be cool.

    Now on to the strategy:
    I’m a lot like you Joel. I used to be a raging melancholy-choleric when it came to vacations (plan it all out, then beat my family to death to make sure we arrived at every planned location at exactly the right time or the s### would hit the fan!). After the 3rd day on my honeymoon, my wife set me straight. Traveling that way causes nothing but frustration and headache, and you don’t really end up enjoying the moment, because you’re always worrying about getting to the next location as quickly as possible.

    So now…We’ll plan 1 or 2 major “stops” that we’d like to see, and then let the rest fill in the blanks. Here’s an example: We’re flying to NYC tomorrow to meet with Tim Morris (@rustytim) and David Crandall and their wives. My wife and I have been to NYC a dozen times, Tim and his wife have been there dozens more. The Crandalls have never been. One place I would like to see that I haven’t yet, is the 5th avenue Apple store. I think the design is cool, and it’s relatively close to a lot of the action (Times Square, Central Park, places like that). That would be my 1 place I’d want to go. Anybody that’s been to New York before knows that you’re BOUND to discover a world of adventure along the way going from say…the 42nd street subway stop to the 5th avenue Apple store. So I’m really looking forward to the “randomness” of this trip.

    As a matter of fact, I’m going to bring my video camera and give some BIT-inspired video posts.

    Holler!

    Thanks Joel 🙂

    – JC

    Reply
    • Joel Runyon says

      September 14, 2010 at 5:02 pm

      I can’t wait to see them! I’m gonna comment right now.

      Btw. searching everywhere for Twinnings…its proving quite elusive 🙂

      Reply
  3. Lach says

    September 14, 2010 at 9:28 am

    Jeeze, if I had remembered that fountain was there I would have suggested Victoria Station so we could hear you better 🙂 Thanks for the shout out!

    Reply
    • Joel Runyon says

      September 14, 2010 at 5:03 pm

      I’m sorry! I didn’t realize it was that loud until I uploaded it. It’s one of those white noises that you don’t really notice while shooting and shows up massively loud when you hear the recording.

      Reply
  4. Matt says

    September 14, 2010 at 12:30 pm

    Nice Joel! I like the way you roll. Glad you did a video post like this so we can catch a glimpse of London (and you of course). I used to be the kind of person that scheduled all my trips out. I created a plan with a lot of detail and specifics. But then I had kids and all of that went into the diaper. Now we are much like you in that we have some general ideas on the things we want to see and places we want to go but we don’t over think it to death. With kids you have to take things as they come and adapt to the situation. Nothing ruins an experience quicker than hungry, tired, cranky, upset kids (I guess that goes for adults as well). I’m sure we will learn a lot of valuable travel lessons when we embark on our 1 year sabbatical in June. Thanks for the shout! Look forward to catching up when you get back.

    Reply
    • Joel Runyon says

      September 14, 2010 at 5:04 pm

      Maybe that’s part of it for me. I get upset when I have a plan and it’s not followed, so when I Don’t have a plan, I’m much much happier 🙂

      Reply
  5. Danielle Severance says

    September 14, 2010 at 6:40 pm

    Joel! You should buy me something and then feature it in your next video!
    🙂

    I hope London is treating you well! It’s way better then where I am [home on crutches/getting surgery].

    My trip planning goes along these lines: If I know I am going somewhere then I like to research some cool places to stop. I’ll make a list of the places that I definitely want to stop at. Then just go. If I make them all then I make them, if I don’t, then I don’t.

    Reply
    • Joel Runyon says

      September 15, 2010 at 10:31 pm

      you are all about the $$$ haha

      Reply
  6. Andrea says

    September 15, 2010 at 10:09 am

    Yeah, I want one of those. Also i would be happy to look through the thousands of pictures i am sure you will have upon your return.

    Reply
    • Joel Runyon says

      September 15, 2010 at 10:36 pm

      I’m back already 🙁 sorry. How bout one from Indy?

      Reply
  7. Timothy Morris says

    September 16, 2010 at 1:07 pm

    Joel, I love this man. You are awesome. I love the idea and am glad Josh Crocker saw this before our trip to NYC with Crandall. We did some shout-outs too.

    You are awesome.

    Reply
    • Joel Runyon says

      September 16, 2010 at 9:10 pm

      can’t wait to see them!

      Reply
  8. Todd Caraway says

    September 16, 2010 at 6:26 pm

    Congrats on the awesome trip to London. I’m super jealous. I basically try to do the same thing as you said, just leave it opened to the day. Like Danielle said above, I usually have a list of places I’d like to hit up and maybe break it down to what I would like to see each day and just go. That way I can spend hours in one place and maybe 30 mins at something else that didn’t keep my attention.
    I did that on an Washington DC trip. My friend wanted it a little more structured, but convinced him to just have a list of places and let’s relax and take it all it. It was a great trip!
    Welcome back to the states and I can’t wait to see who got the personalized video and from where.
    Later.

    Reply
    • Joel Runyon says

      September 16, 2010 at 9:14 pm

      Very cool Todd. I like leaving things open to the possibility of whatever and getting “surprised” by a city. Sometimes the best adventures come from that :).

      Video postcards are coming soon 🙂

      Reply

Trackbacks

  1. You never know… | JoshCrocker.com says:
    September 14, 2010 at 2:05 pm

    […] of fact, if you comment below and tell us what you want to see, we’ll give you a shout out (Joel Runyon style) on our video postcard from […]

    Reply
  2. Idaho Shout Out Challenge « Intentional Influence says:
    October 4, 2010 at 7:01 am

    […] two of my good friends who did this and I loved the idea. Joel Runyon pulled this off in London (check it out here) and Josh Crocker made it happen in NYC when he and I had a meet up with David Crandall. (check it […]

    Reply
  3. Announcing The 2011 BIT Border to Border Road Trip | Blog Of Impossible Things says:
    January 6, 2011 at 9:32 pm

    […] the chance to travel so I like to include other people in my trips as much as possible. Back in September when I went to London, I did a video postcard project where I shot a personal video postcard for readers who commented […]

    Reply

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