Getting into a routine while travelling is hard.

I like travelling.

Be it to visit family and friends in Germany for a couple of weeks or drive up the coast in our bus for a few months to avoid the Sydney winter.

A fellow traveller recently told me about his struggle to exercise on the road.

I can relate. One day you drive 200kms in the morning, the next you go shopping at lunchtime, some sightseeing in the afternoon. When your schedule isn’t fixed, it’s tough to get into a rhythm and get work done.

Managing vs. Creating

Easy is the managerial stuff. Answering emails and discord, scheduling tweets and articles or hopping on a meeting. They don’t usually need a lot of focus and can be fit in between.

But when I need to get creative, it’s much harder. Time is always on my mind. How much do I have left before the next commitment? How do I find a quiet spot where I can focus?

The most important part is getting into the headspace of where you stopped. What exactly was the problem that you were debugging two days ago? Did you figure out why the error occurred? It’s good once you have your mind set on the problem again and ideally then, you have an hour or two to solve it.

This might not be such a big problem if you’re travelling on your own. I travel with a family, and a three-year-old can be great at tearing you out of that focus zone.

At home, you close the office door, head to your local library or favourite cafe, when travelling this might not always be that easy.

I might not even get into the headspace because I anticipate getting interrupted again.

It’s not just working that takes time to get used to when on the road. Exercising regularly can be an issue when you don’t have your gym close by.

How about having a healthy dinner at the same time every day? A non-negotiable for us.

What helps

Getting up before the family and starting with a habit (get up, shower, make a coffee, check the emails or start coding straight away). This sometimes gives me an hour of focused work and over time builds a routing.

Block out times for creative stuff. Set aside two hours and try not to let anything disturb you. I head to the camp kitchen or put on noise-cancelling headphones.

Find a nice location such as a cafe or your father-in-law’s office to get into the zone during that time.

Trick your mind with short stuff. Want to exercise or go for a run? I don’t aim for a daunting 1-hour session (unless I’m surfing of course). Try 20-min. Do that 4 or 5 times and you will easily scale up to more if you enjoyed it.

The same works for writing. Sit down for just 10min and write a few words. Often I find that I do more than I set out to do.

Reading something motivational on the side. I’m currently reading the minimalist Entrepreneur by Sahil Lavignia and enjoy it. It fits roughly with what I’m doing and gives me lots of little things to think about and work on.

I’m not sure how to find this kind of book. Most important is probably that it has to do with what you are currently doing.

Good food. It doesn’t need to be expensive, but just make sure you eat stuff that doesn’t make you tired. It’s tempting as travelling can be stressful and it might be tempting to just go for a quick bite at Maccas. Don’t.

Slow down. What helps us is slowing down. We don’t go to a new place every night. Ideally, we book into a place in some town for a week or two and then move on. When moving on we try to only drive for a little bit before settling down again.

What works for you?

I’m keen to learn what you have seen working for you.