Two tools. That's the whole system: a Google Maps saved list built before you leave, and a notes app used on the ground. Everything else is overhead.

The Pre-Trip Maps List

Before you travel, create a Google Maps list called the city name and add everything you're considering: restaurants, neighbourhoods, specific sights, viewpoints, markets. This takes twenty to thirty minutes at home and produces a visual map of the trip that's infinitely more useful than a written list.

On the ground, you open the map and see what's nearby and what's in the direction you're already walking. You can make in-the-moment decisions based on proximity rather than routing yourself across the city for a reservation you made at home with no idea where it was.

The Shared List as the Couple or Group Document

Share the list with your travel partner or group before you leave. Everyone adds their suggestions. You arrive with a collective map of what everyone wants to see, visible to all. No WhatsApp thread of restaurant suggestions. No forwarded articles. One shared map.

This also removes the "where should we go?" conversation from the trip itself. You open the map, see what's near you, pick something. Done.

The Notes App as the Offline Itinerary

Copy the key details into your notes app: accommodation address, confirmation number, the name and address of the restaurant you've booked, the opening hours of anything you've pre-planned. These things are now accessible offline, without signal, without opening a booking app.

This is not about distrust of technology. It's about the airport at 11pm when you can't load the booking app and you need to tell the taxi driver where you're staying.

What Not to Over-Engineer

Don't create a notes document with a colour-coded schedule, a spreadsheet of opening hours, and a ranked list of every restaurant in the city. This is not trip planning. It's anxiety management dressed as preparation, and it produces the kind of trip where you're managing documents rather than actually being in the city.

The maps list and the key details in notes. Everything else can be looked up when you need it.