Bon Voyage



Tomorrow, I embark with my family on a trip overseas to Davos, Switzerland. For many years, we have made this same journey, and it has become, in effect, the backbone for my travel experiences. Visiting foreign destinations has become a passion of mine for the sole reason that it was forced upon me by two sets of extremely generous grandparents. However, I could not be more grateful for the opportunities that I have been given to broaden my horizons and become more cultured and globally aware than I ever could have had I never left our borders. I have seen things that have changed how I view the world and that is a precious experience in and of itself.

Travel is a gift that never gets old or loses its novelty. No matter what happens, the memories created by travel will likely be burned into your memory for the rest of your days on earth. There's something about the conquering of new intellectual frontiers that brings people together, although I find myself at a loss for descriptive phrases and adjectives that can accurately describe what I am talking about. However, that is besides the point. No matter what kind of travel you do, whether it be repeated visits to a constant location (a summer home or a special resort) or possibly a fresh, once-in-a-lifetime experience (a trip to Africa, Asia, or South America), the memories will be etched into your brain as if you were born with them already there.

Although travel has many qualities that are uniformly the same for all people, each person approaches travel in a slightly different manner. Some cannot wait to go home, thinking of the things that they are missing, although somehow these types of travelers always seem to miss it when its gone. There are others for whom travel (especially the trials and tribulations of airports and airplanes) is an intensely stressful experience, which puts an inhuman amount of pressure on their nerves, willing them with every second that they wait in that check-in line to crack. I am personally a different type of traveler. I tend to attach myself to wherever we are at the time, and invest myself into the local activities and passions. If we are at a lake, I fish, and if we are in the mountains, I ski. I tend to make travel an interactive experience, and therefore attach myself devoutly to the location that we are visiting. This results in two things: sad and painful goodbyes and brilliantly vivid memories, both of which make the experience that much more memorable.

In the end, travel is like many things in life because it is what you make of it. Travel can be an enjoyable experience, or you can turn it into an exercise in keeping your nerves from cracking. Either way, every second that you vacation in some distant land creates memories. It creates memories of people an places that would otherwise be lost on you. No matter how you approach travel, the end result is always the same, and I can think of nothing else in the world that exhibits those qualities. Bon voyage...

Where I am visiting: Davos, Switzerland (Blog Article)