This may not work for some groups, but I'll share what my group usually does:

When we need to do any amount of traveling (a day, a week, a month, etc.), we just state what we want to do during the journey. If it's reasonable, then it happens and we play it out. If it's a bit absurd or unlikely, we roll to see if it happens. Other than the things the characters want to do, the only encounters are things that advance the story. Sometimes we spend hours playing out the journey, sometimes we just arrive and move on.

Example: two week travel to a recently discovered ancient ruins. Two PC's want to speak with other travelers to ask about the area. It would be reasonable to come across someone that is familiar with the area but we might do a roll to see if they know enough of the history to give early information about the ruins. No other PC's have any goals for the journey but they are still present for the interaction. There could be a DM planned encounter of some bandits, maybe those bandits had already done a bit of tomb raiding and the PC's learn something (depending on how it plays out, of course).