Today i thought i’d tackle a subject that seems to me to be about as important a subject as any of the subjects that affect the regular traveller.

What exactly is the right way to travel?

There isn’t a right way.

Okay, well thanks for coming and i’ll see you in another six months.

It’s very possible i’m being a little facetious there, but the point i’m making is a serious one, and one that i didn’t think needed to be made until i visited a certain travel related forum. I was asking for suggestions for a future article on this very blog about places you can go where you can visit one country from another as a day trip as part of my fascination with border towns and short, intense experiences rather than longer trips in which you spend time absorbing a country in depth. To my surprise, instead of offering suggestions, the haughty denizens of the forums instead turned their attention to my throwaway description of my preferred way of travelling.

To my assertion that i felt i could get a sense of a place in a day that was in some ways as valuable to me as the sense of a place i come away with after a month, someone replied “You must have a short attention span and an overactive imagination”. The replies kept coming in and got more and more personal until eventually i was informed that i was doing it wrong, and that i was amongst other things, shallow, stupid and “not really travelling”. As many of us now know, going on the internet for any purpose has become like trying to wash your face with a fire hose, but i was genuinely surprised by the strength of the reaction and the fact that the group reached a consensus about me and about what i was saying. The message seemed to be: “you’re doing it wrong”.

In fact, that’s explicitly what they said – with one voice, i found myself condemned by the hive mind of that particular forum (naming no names, but i’m not surprised their planet is so lonely if they’re so horrible to each other).

The idea that there is a correct way to travel is just objectively wrong, more to the point there is no bad reason to travel either – whatever your motivation, whatever your destination, the value is in the getting there, and even a trip that doesn’t go to plan or isn’t enjoyable in the moment will have value in retrospect. It’s always worth going, and it doesn’t matter where. The two places i disliked the most in the last year (Prague and Geneva) had moments i’ll always remember. For those of us who worry about going and come up with lots of rational reasons not to leave the safety of our countries and homes, it can be tempting to decide that it isn’t worth the risk of having a bad trip. The last 14 of my trips have been total steps out into the unknown and I’ve chosen the destination based on what’s the cheapest – effectively letting destiny choose for me – and I’ve not regretted a single one, even if i haven’t had the greatest time.

The best advice i can give is don’t worry about making the right choice, but concentrate more on making your choice right. As a massive worrier i must say that obviously nothing is without risk and i really encourage you to do all possible research and take all possible precautions to protect yourself from the risks that come from going out into the world. But as long as you do that, all that’s left to do is to boldly go.