Girls Trip Ideas: Destinations, Itinerary and Costs for Your Girls' Weekend

Friday, 17:40, on the platform. One of you has brought bubbly, one has the playlist, and one is asking for the third time whether anyone remembered the address of the holiday flat. That’s how a good girls’ weekend begins, and to make sure it ends well too, you need less planning than you think, but the right kind. Here you’ll find girls trip ideas: cities worth the journey, an itinerary that keeps shopping fans and late sleepers equally happy, an honest cost range and a few tricks against drama in the group chat.

For an occasion or just because?

Some trips have a reason: a milestone birthday, a farewell before a year abroad, a hen do. Others start with a sentence that comes out over the third glass of wine: “We really should go away together again.”

The occasion changes the planning. If there’s a guest of honour, a core group plans in the background and surprises her. Without an occasion you decide together, and that’s harder than it sounds. For the hen do case, ideas, games and a plan are in our guide to the bachelorette party, and if you’re taking on the planning as maid of honour, our article on the maid of honour’s duties covers the role around it. This article takes care of all the other trips.

Where should your girls’ trip go?

The best city is one you can reach by train in under four hours. That leaves more time for the weekend itself and less for changing trains and waiting. A few directions, depending on your mood:

Every city guide shows bars, restaurants and activities on a map, and you can click your programme together right there and share it by link. For nature instead of a city, take a look at our weekend trip guide, which also covers cabins and islands. If you want to cross a border, compare Kraków, Budapest and co. in our destinations abroad.

An itinerary that works for everyone

The most common mistake: too much programme. A weekend with three booked activities a day feels like a school trip. Better to plan one fixed anchor per day and leave the rest open.

1. Friday evening: arrive, check in, go out for dinner together. Book ahead here, because a group of six rarely finds a table on the spot at 20:00 on a Friday.
2. Saturday morning: a lie-in is part of the programme. Early risers go for a run or fetch fresh bread rolls.
3. Saturday lunchtime: the fixed anchor. A workshop, a boat tour, a city tour with tastings, an afternoon at the thermal baths.
4. Saturday afternoon: free time in small groups. Shopping here, a museum there, a nap somewhere else.
5. Saturday evening: get dressed up, an aperitif at the accommodation, then a bar or club.
6. Sunday: brunch, a walk, the journey home behind sunglasses.

If you don’t fancy hunting for activities yourselves, let the itinerary generator build a plan for your city, group size and budget, then adjust it. More than a hundred activities to filter, from a cocktail class to an escape room, are in our bachelor party activities. They work without a bride, too.

What does a girls’ weekend cost?

The big items are accommodation and travel, followed by food, drinks and one activity. We’ve broken down what these blocks look like for groups, and how to split them fairly, with a worked example in our guide to bachelorette party costs. The same logic applies to a girls’ trip.

Three levers make the biggest difference:

• A holiday flat instead of a hotel. For four to eight people, a flat is usually cheaper per head, and you get a kitchen for breakfast and pre-drinks. What to look out for when booking is in our article on bachelor party accommodation.
• Book early. Advance train tickets tied to a specific train and accommodation on popular weekends get pricier every week.
• One highlight instead of five. Better one really good boat tour than five mediocre activities.

Agree the amount per person beforehand and collect it. A shared kitty in a bill-splitting app saves you doing sums on the train on Sunday.

Planning without group chat drama

A chat with ten people and the question “When works for you?” produces 140 messages and no date. Better:

• One plans, everyone decides. One person gathers suggestions and puts two or three options to a vote.
• Set the date by poll, not by discussion. Anyone who doesn’t vote gets the date the others choose.
• A deposit as a commitment. Only once money changes hands is someone really in. That sounds strict, but it saves the booking.
• Talk about budget openly. Not everyone earns the same. A range everyone can live with matters more than the perfect bar.

And let’s be honest: not everyone will love every activity. That’s fine, as long as on Sunday everyone says they’ll come again.

Little extras that make a big difference

The moments you remember later rarely cost much. A few ideas:

• A shared playlist for the train journey, with everyone adding five songs. Our list of party hits is good for inspiration.
• A games night at the accommodation. Truth or Dare and Two Truths and a Lie run straight on your phone.
• Photo challenges on the go, so you come home with more than just a hundred selfies from the same angle. You’ll find templates in our photo challenges.
• A quiet counterweight, in case the group has mixed energy levels. You’ll find inspiration in our low-key bachelor party ideas and the spa weekend.

What nobody needs: T-shirts with names and slogans if it isn’t a hen do. Unless you want them. Then do it properly.

Cities for your trip

Start with a city guide and build your programme right on the map:

• Girls’ weekend in Hamburg: the harbour, the Schanze quarter, brunch by the Elbe.
• Girls’ weekend in Vienna: a coffee house in the morning, a Heuriger wine tavern in the evening.
• Girls’ weekend in Amsterdam: canals, markets, terraces.

You’ll find all cities in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and beyond in our city overview.