Ways To Travel
What means of transport will suite you best?
How you would like to travel is of course related to where you want to go and what you want to do.
Transportation may be something you just want to consider for taking you from one place to another. It can also be where you want to put the main focus for your whole trip.
“Remember what Bilbo used to say: It’s a dangerous business Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.”
J.R.R Tolkien
Walking
Do you love walking? Would you consider some, or all, of your trip being made on foot?
We have some friends, a Swedish family, who put everything they needed (and the youngest of their five children) into a couple of bike trailers and then walked all the way from Sweden to England. Having arrived there, they continued exploring the country by foot before they went back to Sweden. We assume they never got jet lag and they will probably remember their trip for the rest of their lives.
Cycling
Some Canadian friends of ours took the whole family, six people, cycling around Europe for six months. They started out in England and then cycled to Ireland, Belgium, Holland, France and Germany. They even visited us in Sweden but as we are at the border of the polar circle and their time was limited, they actually took a plane to see a bit of this terrific country.
Our Canadian friends the Van Osch family cycling around Europe for 6 months.
Motorcycling
Motorcycling is another option which is a big dream for many people.
Motorcycling often represents the ultimate freedom, and to combine that with the freedom of long term traveling can really be a terrific adventure. And if you have been following Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman’s travels around the world on film or in books, it can really feel tempting, even for non-motorcyclists as we are.
If you want to find out more about their adventures you can have a look at their books and DVD’s:
Driving
We have traveled a lot by car ourselves, sometimes towing a trailer or with a campervan and sometimes not. Even if this doesn’t give you as much time to appreciate the landscapes as walking or cycling, it does give you the opportunity to see lots of things and the freedom to just stop wherever you want or follow that interesting road you just discovered. It also allows you to bring all those things you need for your trip that you consider absolutely necessary (but which you are surprised to find when you get back and think “why on earth did I bring that?”)
| Traveling with a campervan allowes you to choose your own perfect spots to stay. |  |
Train
To some people, train is the way to travel.
We have a friend in Germany whose whole life is about trains. He travels on them, takes pictures of and makes films about them. You don’t need to be a train lover to this extent to find the advantages with this form of transportation. We love traveling by train too. You just sit there and look at the different landscapes you’re passing. Or read a book. Or talk to fellow travelers. Or eat, sleep or maybe write. Or maybe even do some wine tasting which we did on the Empire Builder in the USA.
 |
We love traveling by train, especially for longer journeys.. No jet lag, interesting people to meet, lots of time to relax and always something new to watch from the window. |
Boat
We dream a lot about sailing and traveling the world by boat, but it’s still a
dream we haven’t turned into reality.
Many others have though. And if you are a passionate sailor, this is probably an alternative you already have considered. Apart from sailing around in the world, there are many options if you’re tempted to travel on the water.
Doing part of your trip, or all of it, by sailing, is the ultimate travel dream for many.
Or, if you’re going to Fiji, why not take Joes Water taxi to transport you around!
A friend of ours got a job cooking on a freighter ship. She was even allowed to bring all her five children and they were going to go around the world on this ship for a year but in the end, illness intervened and the trip was cancelled but we thought it really sounded like a fantastic idea!
Flying
When you talk about traveling, most people associate it with flying. To go somewhere, especially far away, you take a plane. And for long distances, it’s the most common way of course. But you don’t have to use it all the time. You can do the long distances by plane and then go around on that new continent or in that new country by some other means of transportation. Although there are problems to be solved with all the flying that we do, it is a fantastic way to have the chance to see the world and meet with its people. Use it with awareness and combine it with other great ways to get around as it suits you.
Use your imagination
Apart from these, the more popular ways to travel, there are all kinds of ways that people use to take themselves off in different directions. One family we meet now and then are for example planning to build a carriage to put behind their horses and travel through Europe in that.
We have even heard about some people who were actually swimming around the world!
So whatever way you dream of using to take yourself around the world or part of the way, there are ways to do it. There’s even a big chance someone else has done it already, someone you can learn from to make your trip even better.
However you choose to go, enjoy the journey, not just the destination and remember:
It’s not only about arriving at the destination –
It’s also about actually enjoying the process of getting there…
