Types of Traveling

Jodi and I have been traveling again, this time in Belgium and the Netherlands.  We were talking last night about the people with whom we interact while traveling.  When people idealize travel, they describe interactions with locals and learning about a place through conversations with the people who live there.  For the most part, this is not our experience.  Staying in hostels, we interact more with young travelers, the type of people who have a backpack and passport and are exploring the world.  I see our interactions as an insular experience.  We talk with like minded people, even though they are from all over the world.  The conversations, however, are very satisfying.  These conversations by themselves don’t constitute the type of experience in idealized travel.  They don’t involve learning about a place and its people.

We do, however, learn about the places we visit through our exploration of the environment in which people live.  We go beyond where just tourists visit.  We walk around neighborhoods in which people live, we shop in grocery stores, and we figure out how people get around.  A few days ago in Antwerp, for example, we walked around a Moroccan neighborhood for an hour and a half.  Our eventual goal was to find a place for dinner, but in that time, we learned more about who is a resident of Antwerp.  In Antwerp and Rotterdam, we have learned how to get around the cities.  In Antwerp, we tried a bike share program (Velo Antwerpen) for the first time.  Bicycles are everywhere in that city, and there are dedicated bike lanes on many of the roads, and traffic signals aimed specifically at bikes.  It provides a fast way around the city and a different view that is close to the street.  In Rotterdam, we navigated the public transport system of buses, trams, and metro trains.  Some of our travels were done during rush hour so that we were mingling with commuters on their way home.  We learned about the experience of a Rotterdam resident through a brief shared experience.

In addition to conversations with fellow travelers and venturing beyond tourist experiences, we learn quite a bit about the history of the places we visit through visiting the types of places tourist and visitors go.  This enables us to learn about the history and cultural heritage of a place and its people.  I also, personally, enjoy experiencing directly places that I have previously read about.  I think combining all three types of experiences produces a satisfying and worthwhile journey that I can share with others — other travelers, and friends and family back home.