End your vacation on a high note

Make a vacation more memorable by making the last day great

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is to end your vacation on a high note.
We tend to remember an experience based on the most

(00:24):
intense moment of it and the end of it, So
engineering a really great end to a vacation means you
and your fellow travelers will likely think of the entire
vacation as having been wonderful. Today's tip comes from an
episode of Laurie Santos's Happiness Lab podcast, during which she

(00:46):
had a conversation with Tim Hartford, a Financial Times columnist.
That conversation drew on the late Daniel Conneman's research about
the peak end effect, that is, the tendency to remember
an experience based on the end of it and the
most intense moment of it. Because of this effect, Harford

(01:09):
and Santos suggest making sure your vacation ends on a
high note so that you remember the vacation as great.
As you are planning a summer vacation, perhaps this could
be a very practical tip to keep in mind if
you are hoping to go out for an amazing tasting

(01:30):
menu dinner maybe you can do that on the last
night of your trip. You might save Big Thunder Mountain
Railway to be your last ride at disney World. You
could have a slide show and campfire the last night
of a family reunion. Or you might go out for
lobster rolls in blueberry soda for your last luncheon main

(01:53):
before you hit the road to drive home. Even the
journey home could be fun. Get to the airport in
enough time that you can have a nice breakfast at
a cute cafe, or if it's midday, go to that
quirky restaurant that serves sushi from a conveyor belt. On
a recent trip to Spain with my older boys, when

(02:16):
we were flying home on a public holiday that was
likely going to feature zero actual business travelers, I got
a very reasonable offer to upgrade to business class, so
I took it. My kids definitely remember that as a
great end to the trip. You could adopt this strategy

(02:37):
even during a staycation or a time when your kids
are off from school. For instance, you could book a
massage for the last day of a staycation, or plan
a family outing to a favorite restaurant for your last
summer break dinner, of course, even with the best planning,

(02:58):
travel can sometimes be a night If you have a
terrible journey home from a vacation. To avoid having the
whole vacation seems spoiled, Santos and Harford suggest reframing your
experience as a great vacation followed by an awful trip home.
In other words, the trip home wasn't part of the vacation.

(03:21):
They were two totally separate things. The vacation itself still
ended well, So as you are thinking about making great
memories on your next vacation, give a little extra attention
to making the end especially wonderful. If you do, you
can help everyone remember the entire vacation as being really great.

(03:47):
In the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and
here's to making the most of our time. Thanks for
listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback,

(04:08):
you can reach me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com.
Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts
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