A compromise itinerary makes everybody slightly unhappy every day

The problem

One of you photographs seriously and wants to be out at five and stay with one animal for two hours. The other wants breakfast, a book, a swim, and a drive in the afternoon when it is interesting rather than when it is dark.

Booked as a general trip, both people get a diluted version: the photographer misses the light every morning and the reader is dragged out of bed at five to sit in the cold. Twelve days of small, mutual disappointment.

The solution

A private vehicle, and two schedules. One of you leaves at five with the guide; the other has a long breakfast and joins the afternoon. On a day when the reader wants a morning out, they take it; on a day when the photographer wants to sleep, they do.

It appears on a quote as one line — the vehicle supplement — and it removes the entire negotiation. It is close to the highest-value thing you can buy on a mixed-interest trip.

Where to put the camps

In a mixed party the camp matters more than it does on a single-interest trip, because one of you will be at it while the other is out.

• A pool, a good sitting area and a view — the non-obsessed traveller should be somewhere they are happy to stay.
• Land that permits what the specialist needs, because that constraint does not relax just because the party is mixed.
• Three nights rather than two, which lets each person have a morning built for them.
• A camp small enough to be flexible about meal times, since the party will be eating at different hours.
• One stop that is built for the other person — a coast, a lodge with a spa, a rest day — so the trip is not entirely one interest.

Families and three generations

The same logic at larger scale, and the answer is usually a private house rather than a vehicle supplement. Your party is the only party, the vehicles are yours, the chef cooks to your household, and the day splits however it needs to.

For six or more travelling together it is frequently both better and cheaper per head than the same people in separate tents.

Say it at the enquiry stage

"One of us is a birder and one of us is not" is a complete and enormously useful brief. So is "he photographs and I want a swimming pool".

Both change the camps, the vehicle arrangement and the length of stay. Neither is awkward to say, and saying it late is the reason most compromise itineraries exist.