How long do you stay in any one place

On our 12 month round the world trip we rarely stayed in any one spot for more than 5 days days. The excitement of moving on to the next location and seeing all the sites became addictive although it could be tiring at times.
How do other members manage their trips.
Jean

It all depends on the location. Sometimes a destination is only worth a day or two (or less). For us, spending 3-5 days in one location has been a pretty good pace on past trips.

On our upcoming trip we plan on slowing down a bit and will probably spend 1-2 weeks in several places.

I think if you're travelling for a year, you will want to stay in some places longer just to catch your breath. It also depends how far away these places are from each other though. If you spend 2 days on trains and busses to get somewhere, you won't want to move on the next day. If it was just half an hour from your previous destination, that's completely different.

On the longest trip I've been on (5 months), I stayed in Berlin (staying with friends) and Ulaan Bataar for a week, and in Novosibirsk for one month (studying Russian), the rest was shorter. I went to 7 countries in total (if you don't count passing through the Czech Rep. by train), spending just a few hours (Finland) to 2 months (Russia). That was about the right pace for me, but of course that's different for everyone.

We did a 12mth RTW and probably averaged 3-5 days as well. In retrospect, the time in each locale was about right but we wish we had stopped in some places long enough to work to earn room/board or $$ so we could have continued our travels for longer. There were a couple of spots where we spent 1 week and it was a nice break before the thrill of the road called again.

Our standard stay was 4 days. Every 3 or 4 stops we'd find somewhere we'd only want to spend 3 days, very rarely did was stay only a single night some place. A couple of spots we stayed longer, I think the longest was a week. But mostly 4 days.

If I had it to do over again, every 6 weeks there would be a multi-week halt, possibly as long as a month somewhere. Our trip only went 5 months, and I'd budgeted for six, so I think it would have been valuable to have holed up for 2-3 weeks in a couple of spots to build up our energy again.

I realized at a point that my average was 4 days/ 3 nights at one point so I'd book the hostels accordingly. Though of course sometimes I'd stay in a place longer (Bangkok, Florence, London...) and some I got out of pretty quickly when I realized they held no interest.

2wanderers wrote:If I had it to do over again, every 6 weeks there would be a multi-week halt, possibly as long as a month somewhere. Our trip only went 5 months, and I'd budgeted for six, so I think it would have been valuable to have holed up for 2-3 weeks in a couple of spots to build up our energy again.

That's how Kathryn and I intend to take our RTW — which should last a year — travel at whatever pace our energy warrants until we get tired or find a place where we'd like to hole up for two or three weeks. Enough time to recharge and get to know the area!

I think it very much depends on the location.. Some place is worth staying longer then others

Only 3-4 days in a place must get really tiring! We are planning our RTW trip with staying in places for a month at a time. We figure it will save us money and allow us to travel longer.

For us, it totally depends on the location. Sometimes we'll move on daily, if we're not that enthralled by the place, or if we are on a tight schedule (3 weeks each in Taiwan and the Philippines is not long enough, but that was all our visas allowed for). On the other hand, we've spent 3 weeks or more in Bangkok in one stint. We are travelling a bit differently to most backpackers, by motorcycle, so it is easy for us to pack up and go whenever we want. At the moment we are in China without the bike, and are finding booking transportation very frustrating!

Tried to make it at least 3 nights in a place when possible however some were just one night others a week. Then came Bangkok with a 2 month break for a TEFL course!

Our goal was to get a taste of lots of different environments. We ended up sleeping in 158 different places (includes overnight busses, trains etc) over the course of 15 months. Some of those places we went to more than once, and even though our longest stop was three weeks, and frequently stayed a week or more, we rarely stayed only one night. For five months we were in motorhomes and so could move somewhere different every day if we wanted to, but then there was the tradeoff with us having to do the driving as opposed to sitting on a train.

Its best to stay for a week in every destination, in order for you to enjoy more and appreciate the beauty of the place. And to prevent the stress from moving one place to another.

The longest I've spent was 4 nights in a city. I average 2 nights per city. It all depends on when I arrive (arrive late at night takes up a night but doesn't really count, what time of the day I leave (if I leave on a night train, then it's like having an extra day in that city).