So, I got a haircut last week (…this is going somewhere travel-related, I promise).
It was my first time in this salon, so the stylist and I did the usual small talk song and dance: where are you from originally, how long have you lived here, what do you do for work, are you married, etc.
I filled her in on our move to California from Texas a few years back, and how it took place just one month after our wedding, with our honeymoon in the middle.
“Oh, where did you go on your honeymoon?” she asked. I told her about our amazing two weeks in Croatia, and how that trip remains one of my absolute favorites to this day.
“Wow, two weeks for just Croatia?” she asked, sounding surprised. “I feel like you could see a lot of other countries in that time.”
This certainly isn’t the first time I’ve heard this sentiment, but I still never really know how to respond to it. Sure, in theory you could probably squeeze visits to Bosnia, Montenegro, and perhaps even Slovenia into a two-week trip to Croatia…but should you?
I remember planning that trip, and stressing about how two weeks in Croatia wasn’t nearly enough.
There were so many places I wanted to see, and no possible way to fit them all in. I was so excited to stumble across lesser-known places like Motovun and the Peljesac Peninsula, and then crushed when I realized that choosing those places would mean cutting out others, like Hvar and Plitvice Lakes.
And how could I even think about taking a day trip outside of Dubrovnik when I only had three nights there in the first place?!
In the end, I was super happy with the trip I planned. It wasn’t the itinerary you would find in a Lonely Planet guidebook (then copied and pasted into a million blog posts and TripAdvisor forums), but it was perfect for me and Derek.
Do I regret spending so much time in quieter, “less exciting” places like Ston, rather than squeezing in single-night trips to Bosnia and Montenegro (thereby adding more points to my list of countries visited)? Absolutely not!
In fact, I think part of what I loved most about that trip was the fact that we traveled very intentionally.
It wasn’t a race to cram in as many destinations as possible and “see it all,” but an opportunity to actually relax and get to know the country we were exploring.
Does a town like Motovun, with a population of 500 people, really need three nights to be properly experienced? Probably not!
But it gave us plenty of time to really settle into the town—to visit every shop, sip every cappuccino, and revisit our favorite restaurant (with the most AMAZING views) multiple times.
We had time to drive aimlessly around the Istrian countryside, chat with our Airbnb hosts, and stumble across some really cool lesser known towns in the region.
In fact, I can’t think of a single instance where I regretted my decision to “travel deep,” i.e. dedicate a significant amount of time to get to know a single destination.
…No, not even that time I planned a three-month trip to Central America and only ended up visiting three countries, rather than the seven I had originally planned to explore.
But hey, I fell in love with the places I visited, and I’m glad I got to experience them on such an intimate level.
What exactly does it mean to “travel deep?”
To start, I don’t think there’s an upper limit. You could spend an infinite amount of time getting to know a foreign destination—just ask the travelers who end up settling down for months or years in a city they fell in love with along the way.
But for the average traveler, I think “traveling deep” can be loosely defined as focusing on quality over quantity when it comes to crafting an itinerary. For me, that looks like visiting just one country if my trip is 10 days or less…which they almost always are.
Additionally, I like to spend 3-4 full days in larger cities (think Paris, Barcelona, etc.) and around 2 days in smaller cities or towns with less to see and do. More importantly, I almost NEVER book single-night stays.
The one exception to this “rule” is when I’m traveling locally—I’m happy to spend one night away from home here in California. But when traveling abroad? I try to avoid this at all costs.
Here’s how I look at it: would I rather spend my day checking out of one hotel, traveling to the next destination via bus/plane/train, checking into the new hotel, and then having just a few hours to see that destination before going to bed and leaving the next morning; OR would I rather just enjoy a full extra day and night right where I’m at?
Aside from very rare exceptions, I’d almost always choose the latter. Like I said: quality over quantity.
Ultimately, what this boils down to is that I like to have a bit of free time in every single destination I visit—especially at the very start or end of my stay. This unscheduled time is often when I stumble across the best art galleries, cafes, street art, or historic architecture that wasn’t originally in my itinerary.
All that said, I do get what people are trying to accomplish when they plan a whirlwind trip.
Most Americans don’t get a whole lot of vacation time compared to people from other countries. Two weeks is standard; some people have more time than that, but many others don’t even get those two weeks. And often, you’re not able to take all of that time off at once.
So when you get the chance to use your limited vacation days, you want to see as much as possible. There’s so much to see, and you don’t know when you’ll ever get the chance to go back.
But why does seeing as much as possible have to mean cramming in as many destinations as possible?
The classic Euro-trip itinerary often includes a lot of bouncing around between different capital cities. And while the big cities do tend to have an abundance of history, architecture, food and nightlife, they often lack qualities like charm and natural scenery.
For me, seeing as much as possible means seeing as much variety as possible—not just one capital city after another. It also means getting to see as much as possible in those select destinations I’ve chosen.
Yes, I want to see the big city hotspots with the all the museums and historic sights…but after that, I want to see what a small town looks like in that country…and then a mid-sized coastal city…and then the rural countryside…
Plus, two weeks is two weeks, no matter how you spin it.
I know, there’s this misconception going around that the more countries a person has visited, the more experienced they are when it comes to travel. This mindset is how you end up with people visiting every country in the world in a span of year, or some other crazy timeline.
Spending one day in a country just so you can cross it off your list isn’t experience, it’s insanity.
It doesn’t matter if you visit one country or ten during a two-week span; you’re gaining two weeks of travel experience (adventures, foreign cuisine, culture, history, and memorable experiences) in either case.
But ultimately, your vacation is YOUR vacation—and in that sense, my opinion on this doesn’t matter.
I am 100% an advocate of people doing their own thing when they travel. Following the same cookie-cutter itineraries as every other traveler and taking the word of travel guides and bloggers (like myself) as gospel is b-o-r-i-n-g. Where’s the adventure in that?
We’re talking about your hard-earned money and vacation days here, and if “traveling wide” is what makes you want to jump in the air and scream “HECK YES” then you should do exactly that.
Still, I would encourage every traveler try “traveling deep” at least once in their lifetime, to see if it’s a philosophy they can get behind. You never know—you just may discover that spending one or two weeks in “just one” country isn’t quite as boring as you thought 😉
Do you prefer to travel deep, or travel wide? What’s the shortest amount of time you’ve ever spent in a country? What’s the longest? (For me, my shortest was a day trip from to Austria from Germany, and my longest was two months in Honduras.)
Hey Kelly!
Absolutely agree with your sentiment on travelling deep rather than wide. I do think it’s a bit of an American ‘thing’ to do the checklist, capitals-only approach to to travel. Some of the itineraries I see on Reddit make me want to curl up into a ball and weep. In Denmark, we are strongly encouraged to take three weeks off in one go between May-September every year so we fully relax and get plenty of time to enjoy our trip; it’s such a shame the US holiday culture is so bad for many people.
I try to spend a minimum of 7-10 days per country, and my aim in the years ahead is to work on going for three weeks at a time.
Some of my favourite destinations have been the smaller, less on the radar places that you would absolutely skip over, too.
In Israel that was Akko, which ended up having this fascinating Knight’s Templar museum and the kindest people I met in the country. I didn’t see it on a single itinerary online. In Mexico, it was Izamal, the cutest yellow town I’ve ever seen. In the US, it was getting off the track and checking out heaps of little towns and bourbon distilleries on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail, rather than just hitting up LA, New York and San Fran (see, Europeans do it to the US too!). In Germany it was Bamberg and Bremen, which felt far more ‘German’ than Berlin or Frankfurt could, In Bulgaria it meant I went to a nothing town called Kazanlak, but I managed to see the annual Rose Festival, which was utterly bizarre yet incredible – along with catching minibuses to random little monasteries with just handfuls of tourists. And by focusing on central Tunisia, I managed to trip out to Dougga, which has some of the world’s best preserved Roman ruins, and a colosseum that’s second in size to only the one in Rome, but with next to no people and a measly 2 Euro entry fee. I could go on, but I think I’ve got my point across!
I honestly don’t think capital cities necessarily showcase the best or even the most accurate picture of a country, but generally when I suggest people spend more time in a place, they get FOMO about missing out on Madrid, Rome, Berlin, Amsterdam and Prague in one week, including travel days – rather than spending it in one place. But hey, different strokes for different folks I guess?
Totally agree with everything you said here, Georgia! Americans are definitely fans of the whirlwind capital city Euro-trip, which has never really appealed to me personally.
Sure, I get that many European countries have a lot of shared history, and they’re quite close together. But the culture/food/architecture between Germany, France, Spain and Italy is SO different, to the point where I want to experience them separately. If I’m visiting Spain, I want to be ALL about Spain…I don’t need Rome and Paris mixed in there too, you know?
Some of those travel experiences you mentioned sound SO COOL. Thank you for mentioning Izamal because I’m always looking for more places to explore in Mexico, and that’s one I’ve never even heard of! Also I would love to follow the Kentucky Bourbon Trail…funnily enough, I was actually born in Kentucky, but my parents moved away when I was a few months old and I’ve never been back. So, I don’t even count it as a place I’ve been to hahaha.
You’re right though, different strokes for different folks! Sometimes I do have to keep my mouth shut on r/travel though 😉
Love this post! I have to say I sway between the two travel styles a lot – when I owned a business I could often only get a day or two away from it at a time, so I tried to cram as much as possible in. And I got really good at it!! But equally I spent a month in Thailand, over a year in Australia, six months in Canada… I LOVE getting to actually know places! Another thing about fast travel is I find it’s great for finding places you want to go back to. The problem is, that happens to me SO often hahaha. Whereas perhaps if I’d given myself enough time there in the first place, I wouldn’t. Not that that’s *really* a problem, but you know what I mean. 🙂
Clazz – An Orcadian Abroad recently posted…2019: My Year In Review
Definitely agree that fast travel can be useful for identifying the places you want to see more of in the future. But like you, I think I’d probably just want to revisit EVERY place hahah. Such a struggle!
Side note, I’m going to New Zealand in February and am currently reading through all your posts! I SO want to visit Mount Sunday, but we’re driving from Mt. Cook to Christchurch (which is already long enough on its own) the day before flying to the North Island, so tacking it onto that drive would be our only opportunity to do it. Probably too out of the way for us, but it looks so gorgeous!!
Travel deep is definetely our way to approach a vacation. Okay, we live in Germany, so we have tons of off time more than an average American has, which makes that approach a lot easier.
We did a round trip in the Southwest last year, Sedona, Santa Fe, Page, Grand Canyon and always stayed for two nights. March will see us in Denmark for one week at the same place. There are so many things there to explore that we won’t be able to do them all. We have been to San Diego many times on family visits and still have not seen everything we want to see.
There is nothing better than sitting in an Italian bar in any city, close to the water and watch people on their evening strolls and get in contact with locals.
One more thing, we always plan to do one thing or place a day not more and that fits us more than well.
Can a woman ever go shopping on a tight time schedule? We doubt it. You want to see polar lights? You have to go North and be patient and maybe come back another time.
Deep is our way to go and we are glad that other people see it the same way.
Many greets, Claudia and Dirk
Thanks for your comment Claudia and Dirk! I really wish U.S. employers would get onboard with the European way of granting time off. When you consider the fact that most people want to take time off for holidays like Christmas, so many Americans really only end up with a week for actually traveling!
But I still think Americans can make the most of that week by traveling deep, if they just give it a chance.
Your last paragraphs totally sum up why I love to travel deep. Sitting in a bar drinking a coffee or glass of wine and just soaking it all in is one of my favorite things to do when I’m abroad. Happy travels!