Why Travel?

[Ronstar]

That's a good point. We often "invite" others to tag along with us (so far no one has joined us) but figure it would be a bust since most folks seem stuck in the rush rush rush 1 week gottadoitall "vacation" mentality. I'm okay missing a few things if I only have a week somewhere.

We always plan on plenty of "do nothing" days where we tend to sit around, prop our feet up (maybe on the balcony with a view), read a book, or take an afternoon siesta. Maybe we go out for a bite or to do some shopping, but we don't go out sightseeing on our do nothing days.

I understand how our lack of intensity and focus could be seen as a failure by others.

We're traveling with another couple on our next trip. They texted me a few days ago, asking me for my list of must see's and must do's. They are making their list. The plan is to meet to discuss the merger of our lists and come up with an itinerary. This is going to be brutal.

 

[Sunset]

I do, too, but not nearly as many as I used to. I have boxes of slides and prints and terabits of digital photos that I will never look at.

For the digital ones, you could get one of those electronic picture frames, put a few thousand photos on a memory card and hang it in your house, the picture will change every so often and everyday you pass it repeatedly you will see and recall some nice trip.

Then change the photos on the memory card in a few months and repeat.

 

[Sunset]

I save my digital photos on a file server, grouped into folders listed by the date they were taken. I do not classify them by travel, family Christmas parties, or anything such. Needless to say, looking up something was tough.

Recently, I went through and made a text index file to list the folder contents. It's a simple one liner per day, such as "12/25/2005 - Xmas at Brother's", or "6/24/2016 - Grape tomato vines". That alone simplifies the search......

I save mine in the following format, a directory of the year, then a subdirectory of each "trip/event" with the date in YMD format (it makes it sort correctly) and the name of the "trip/event".

I eliminate spaces in the naming by using underscore, not really needed but makes it easier if I use command line actions on the files

- 2016_Pictures
- 2016_07_13_Lizzadro_Museum_Lapidary_Art
- 2016_07_05_Chicago_Botanical_Garden
- 2016_04_13_Trip_to_Florida

Sometimes I have found, I wondered when did we go to FL in 2005 , so I look at my photos and the date is right there.

 

[explanade]

For the digital ones, you could get one of those electronic picture frames, put a few thousand photos on a memory card and hang it in your house, the picture will change every so often and everyday you pass it repeatedly you will see and recall some nice trip.

Then change the photos on the memory card in a few months and repeat.

My whole library cycles on my iMac as screensaver. Wary of those picture frames, which have been known to spy. Why you have to connect them to the Internet I'll never know.

If the next Apple TV supports 4K TVs then they may be a great way to run slide shows or screen savers of your library.

Otherwise I'll probably get the 5k iMac eventually.

 

[DrRoy]

We're traveling with another couple on our next trip. They texted me a few days ago, asking me for my list of must see's and must do's. They are making their list. The plan is to meet to discuss the merger of our lists and come up with an itinerary. This is going to be brutal.

For the most part, I do not want to travel with other couples. I am pretty particular about what I want to see and do, which DW and I find easy agreement on, including when to rest. Throwing others into the mix just does not work for me. We went on a cruise with her siblings for the first time this year. I just went off to do my own thing and they did theirs.

 

[braumeister]

My whole library cycles on my iMac as screensaver. Wary of those picture frames, which have been known to spy. Why you have to connect them to the Internet I'll never know.

I have one of those picture frames in the family room with a couple thousand travel photos on it. I love seeing memories every time I walk by.

No internet connection. I just download the photos to an SD card and stick it in the frame.

This is the one I use:
https://www.amazon.com/NIX-Advance-Digital-Motion-Sensor/dp/B00FWQ7M2G/ref=sr_1_2?s=photo&ie=UTF8&qid=1468586370&sr=1-2&keywords=digital+photo+frame&refinements=p_n_size_browse-bin%3A9647492011

 

[explanade]

I want high dpi and big screen.

There's definitely a difference between my iMac and Retina MacBook Pro when cycling through the same pics in the Ken Burns screensaver, which slightly zooms in or crops so you really want maximal sharpness.

 

[Chuckanut]

Wary of those picture frames, which have been known to spy. Why you have to connect them to the Internet I'll never know.

I agree that one should be very wary of the IOT - Internet of Things. Often security on the 'things' is poor if it is present at all. They can open huge holes in an otherwise secure system at home or at work.

That said, there are good reasons for having them connected to the Internet. One person I knew would take photos of the grandkids and then upload them to the picture frame for grandma and grandpa who lived many thousands of miles away. The grandparents were always excited when new photos popped up.

 

[Chuckanut]

One reason people (American people that is) do rush about on vacation is the very small amount of vacation time we get. Remember that jerk in the Cadillac commercial who had a big house, nice car and probably traveled the world at company expense? Alas, to many of us work for people like him.

 

[Ronstar]

One reason people (American people that is) do rush about on vacation is the very small amount of vacation time we get. Remember that jerk in the Cadillac commercial who had a big house, nice car and probably traveled the world at company expense? Alas, to many of us work for people like him.

Good point. It does seem like most of the people I know try to do more things on vacation than they do at home.

 

[audreyh1]

I understand when someone is working with limited vacation time, why they would want to squeeze every last thing into an overseas trip.

But once you've retired.............

Good point. It does seem like most of the people I know try to do more things on vacation than they do at home.

Actually, I do way more things in a day when traveling, then I do at home. But that doesn't mean I don't take plenty of down time when traveling. Just a lot less than at home.

 

[Danmar]

but I first started wanting to go to Europe when I was a kid and Dad went on business. It killed me that a group of my HS classmates went on a camping trip to Europe one summer and I couldn't go; I was babysitting but couldn't make enough to pay for it, and my parents were saving to put the 5 of us through college so a special trip for one kid wasn't in their budget, either. I joke that I've spent the rest of my life making up for it!

Funny story. We sent our daughter to Europe for High School credit courses. French in Nice and History in UK. She loved it. Sorry we didn't send her to Switzerland for her senior year at Neuschatel ( sp?). She still talks about these trips 15 years later. She really grew up on those trips.

 

[braumeister]

We sent our daughter to Europe for High School credit courses.

Kudos to you! Best thing you could have done, paying dividends forever!

 

[travelover]

For the digital ones, you could get one of those electronic picture frames...........

Thanks. I actually have received two of those digital picture frames as gifts, but don't like using them. They just seem kind of creepy - endlessly displaying pictures that have a lot of emotion associated with them. I guess I need to be in the mood to look at old pictures.

 

[NW-Bound]

OK, so what really makes people travel?

People who dislike travel can add the following to the list in the OP

1) They are bored at home

2) They do not know what else to spend their money on

3) They want to escape the miserable weather at home, whether too hot, too cold, too humid, or too dry

4) They are masochistic, and want to punish themselves with the hassle of going through the airport security and the tedium of air travel

5) They are thrill seekers, and want to go to other places in the world where they can get robbed, possibly assaulted and hurt

Is there anything I miss?

 

[Meadbh]

OK, so what really makes people travel?

People who dislike travel can add the following to the list in the OP

1) They are bored at home

2) They do not know what else to spend their money on

3) They want to escape the miserable weather at home, whether too hot, too cold, too humid, or too dry

4) They are masochistic, and want to punish themselves with the hassle of going through the airport security and the tedium of air travel

5) They are thrill seekers, and want to go to other places in the world where they can get robbed, possibly assaulted and hurt

Is there anything I miss?

6) They want to visit family

7) They want to visit interesting places they have read about, or seen in movies or on the news

8) They are pursuing a special interest, e.g. skiing, Italian cooking, seeing wild animals, archaeology, volunteering, etc.

 

[braumeister]

7) They want to visit interesting places they have read about.

This sums it up for me.

 

[daylatedollarshort]

OK, so what really makes people travel?

People who dislike travel can add the following to the list in the OP

1) They are bored at home

2) They do not know what else to spend their money on

3) They want to escape the miserable weather at home, whether too hot, too cold, too humid, or too dry

4) They are masochistic, and want to punish themselves with the hassle of going through the airport security and the tedium of air travel

5) They are thrill seekers, and want to go to other places in the world where they can get robbed, possibly assaulted and hurt

Is there anything I miss?

Friends offer you free timeshare stays.

 

[Ronstar]

7) They want to visit interesting places they have read about, or seen in movies or on the news

8) They are pursuing a special interest, e.g. skiing, Italian cooking, seeing wild animals, archaeology, volunteering, etc.

Definitely want to visit places I've read about, mainly to satisfy hiking, sightseeing, and photography interests.

I've run out interesting places around here to hike and take photos, so I have to travel to find new ones.

 

[audreyh1]

4) They are masochistic, and want to punish themselves with the hassle of going through the airport security and the tedium of air travel

We've countered this by amassing various perks that reduce the hassles of flying dramatically - things like TSA Pre-check and Global Entry, economy plus and/or cheap upgrades when available, club access for layovers in comfort, premium lines and premium baggage handling for reducing waiting significantly.

I don't mind the hours in a plane considering the benefits when we arrive. The magic of iPad - a great plane companion.

 

[audreyh1]

6) They want to visit family

7) They want to visit interesting places they have read about, or seen in movies or on the news

8) They are pursuing a special interest, e.g. skiing, Italian cooking, seeing wild animals, archaeology, volunteering, etc.

These are excellent additions - and really the only ones that count for us.

We really enjoy being in a different culture for a while. We enjoy the European culture and all the little day to day details of different types of meals, different transportation, different things to see. I'll be curious whether South and Central American culture will be the same.

We even enjoy dealing in another language. I speak pretty good Castillian Spanish, good for most of Latin America and Spain. I've really been working on my French - I'm already well past where I was last year with my tourist polite French arsenal that was quite well received wherever we traveled in France.

So maybe:

9) immerse in a different environment/culture for a while.

 

[RunningBum]

8) They are pursuing a special interest, e.g. skiing, Italian cooking, seeing wild animals, archaeology, volunteering, etc.

Add running to that. I try to do a destination race every year.

 

[Pbkmaine]

I spent much of my professional life running through airports, and have seen all of the lower 48, and much of eastern Canada and western Europe. I would be happy to never leave Florida again. Nowadays I travel to see people, not sights.

 

[brett]

Why stay home looking a four walls?

Travelled for business, now we travel for pleasure. As often as possible. Lots to see and experience.

 

[Gumby]

I spent much of my professional life running through airports, and have seen all of the lower 48, and much of eastern Canada and western Europe. I would be happy to never leave Florida again. Nowadays I travel to see people, not sights.

Business travel is not really travel. I did a substantial amount of it. In the end, I felt that every airport, every cab to and from the city, every hotel, every law firm conference room and every courthouse looked the same. It was just a source of annoyance rather than a chance to have new experiences. I did my work in the least amount of time I could and went back home as soon as possible. When I travel for pleasure, the experience is totally different.