If you travel for work- what do you love/ hate about it?

[Stressedgiraffe]

I'm 6 months into a new job. It's has min 1 week travel a month. At the moment I'm enjoying it. I'm averaging around 8 nights away a month can be less can be more. I did 3 one week travels in a row and that was too much. I'm currently in Scotland for a week in a lovely hotel.
Luckily DCs are late teenagers and dh doesn't work so everything goes on a home ok.
This is my last trip till mid January though.
So I'll go first - i like staying in lots of different places.
Dislike hotel menus get boring

I like the chance to watch newly released movies on flights. I also like having peace and quiet during the journey to either work on something without interruption by phone or email or just to chill out and read a book. Also hotels with gyms are great at the end of the working day.

Hmmm I love seeing new places. I'm not a huge fan of museums etc (and get loads of those when I travel with DS!) and my favourite part of travel is wandering around a new city with a nice hot drink in hand, which works very well with jet lagged mornings and evenings after work!

I enjoy saving all the points to go towards personal travel - saves a chunk off family holidays!

Love eating at different restaurants I wouldn't normally, and expensing.

Adore curling up in a luxe hotel bed with international snacks and room service and a movie!

Have yet to find a part I dislike 😂 Though I think that's because DS is so young, so it's genuinely a little holiday even with work. Colleagues with no/older kids don't seem to enjoy it so much! I also think if I were travelling to less desirable destinations/middle of nowhere, I'd get bored.

I like breaking up the monotony of working from home, seeing colleagues in person. I like the journey home (especially if it’s cold and dark) - it has very cosy ‘coming home for Christmas’ vibes.

I don’t like catching other people’s colds and viruses. I don’t like constantly doubling checking I’ve got all my stuff on me.

The evenings away are all mine to enjoy and anything done is for my own pleasure and wellbeing.

The only time I travelled for work was when something really bad had happened and they needed me (worked in quality assurance) to be sent out for the customer to chew on until they felt better.

I don't miss that at all.

I did like seeing stuff I would otherwise never see in my life, such as going onto the flight lines at Boeing, McDonnell Douglas and Bombardier - this was before 9/11 when security was a lot looser. I made a fool of myself at Bombardier as I asked if it was possible for a diver to be taken up by the super scooper fire fighting plane (urban myth). The engineer showing me around looked totally disgusted and pointed out the water inlets were 4 inches in diameter so a diver wouldn't fit through them.

I still wonder if the plane would squish the diver though.

I also got to see test engines for the space shuttle being fired up in the Utah desert.

London trips - I go to the theatre a lot

Overseas trips I stay on for a few days or longer and sightsee.

Both I like collecting loyalty points on flights and hotels to use for future holidays

DH also travels so we have to do a lot of diary coordination and occasionally rely on GPs for help with kids if we clash.

I travelled to New York a lot and that was great - I'd often stay for the weekend. Now a mix of physical health + mental health + a small child makes it very hard.

LOVE:
The adventure! Seeing places I would never ordinarily see.
Traveling alone, getting away from my desk at home, away from the monotony of home life.
Flying! I bloody love flying!

HATE:
Train/flight delays or cancellations & delays
late night returns
The fucking general public with their loud speaker conversations, shite music on full blast or reels … on full flicking volume.
The general fucking public and mess. Dumping their rubbish everywhere and leaving train seats and tables filthy.
Pre packed sandwiches/meal deals. Bloody crap.

I don't travel for work anymore (I changed jobs and new employer is too tight to pay for any travel) and I really miss it.

I love exploring new places and meeting new people. I also enjoy the downtime on flights when I can relax/read/sleep/watch a film without feeling guilty that I should be doing chores/something less self-indulgent. Obviously it's less enjoyable if I have to work while I'm in transit. I still remember a particularly miserable Eurostar back from Paris one Thurs evening when I was surrounded by women on a hen party drinking and having a lovely time whilst I was buried in my laptop working on an urgent bid for a client. The only break I got was when I had no phone reception under the Channel (hurray for no reception!!!)

It's a great way of checking out new places / hotels / restaurants without it costing me any/much money and figuring out if I'd want to go back at a later date when I'm actually paying. And it's lovely to have someone making my bed and my breakfast (I LOVE a room service breakfast!) and just generally being looked after.

But it can also be super-stressful and very long days. I used to go to Colorado quite frequently with work but still had to attend other timezone meetings too. So quite often I would be up at 4am on a call in my hotel room, then in the office by 6.30am and with clients/co-workers all day and straight to dinner and drinks with them so may not be back in my hotel room until midnight. And then start the whole rigmarole all over again 4 hours later. It made for very long weeks.

I'm travelling again this week, to the other end of the country, but its only once per quarter generally.

I enjoy seeing colleagues F2F as most of them are based in the office I'm visiting. I'll be out for a dinner and plan to do some city centre Christmas shopping while I'm there too.

The main drag is train cancellations, but seems to be a bit better now the main strikes are off. I've been stranded once before, so touch wood I can just get there and back easily!

Love: Being somewhere different - change of scenery, something new to see, even if not much free time there is always time for a walk around. Also having "time" whether it's a flight or a train, being able to read or watch a film with that dedicated time to do nothing.

Hate: Sometimes needing to rely on packaged food, sandwiches or gooey pasta in plastic tubs when needing to eat on the go.