I just read a line about a travel resolution in the AFAR newsletter by senior editor Aislyn Greene. It’s actually a quote of another travel writer for the Guardian, Shahnaz Habib, but I think the lineage is important because it shows how this is resonating with a lot of travel-lovers.
Habib originally wrote: “The truth, frightening and liberating, is that nothing in the world is a must-do.”
There you have it. Bucket lists are out. Sorry, Jack and Morgan, but if I died tomorrow, I really wouldn’t be devastated that I’d never skydived, seen the Pyramids or embarked on an African Safari. That all sounds pretty generic to me, actually, and pretty small-minded, as though all African countries and Safaris are equal.
Not that I had this figured out years ago, but Habib has made my travel mentality a little easier to explain. Here’s my effort:
But when I spent three months in Lima, Peru, years ago, I never went to Machu Picchu. And I get a lotof funny looks and questions about that when I mention it to fellow travellers. I even stayed in a youth hostel for most of that time, and most of those visitors were going to the ancient Incan citadel.
Did I not want to feel the “energy” there that everyone talked about? Did I not want to challenge myself by walking to the less-than-accessible destination? Sure, I guess. But I really didn’t need to. There was so much else to explore in Lima.
Like Las Viñas (photo above), where I ended up hiking through avocado and cherimoya orchards on my way up a sandy sun-drenched mountain. And I did go to Huaraz, a less popular mountain area than Cusco, to rock climb.
So what if I missed out on some spiritual moment of jibing with rays of light in the Temple of the Sun? I met the coolest trekking guides in Huaraz. We made vegetarian ceviche with beans and choclo together at their scenic home and climbed super hard routes (well, they did) in an area that none of my Montreal climbing friends have been to because it’s not Red River Gorge, USA, Leonidio, Greece, or Potrero Chico, Mexico or Viñales, Cuba.
I bathed in some really gross hot springs that are really only for locals, in the traditional way of public baths rather than a tourist destination. I ate super rubbery guinea pig soup in a mountain-side restaurant. I saved a ton of money. I tried to not promote over-tourism and an increased ecological impact. Admittedly, I flew to Peru, which is far and took a lot of carbon to get there and back, and being green wasn’t my focus, but I wanted to do things a little differently.
I ate as much sustainable ceviche and sushi in Lima as I could. I danced salsa with musicians and walked home from Barranco late at night, watching the shadows for anyone who’d rob a single girl on her way home (very common). I got horrible food poisoning and ended up in the spare room of a former tango-singing Peruaña who wasn’t exactly looking out for me, so I limped over to a fancy hotel where the Newfoundlander mother of a former roommate was staying in Miraflores. I had nothing in my stomach except a scoop of ice cream, because nothing else had stayed down for two feverish days and I fell into her arms so thankfully.
I spent nights at my favourite local juice bar and climbing at the local rock climbing gym with people who didn’t speak English (my Spanish was mediocre at best, but we all knew how to keep each other safe on ropes), making lentils and rice with medical researcher expats, teaching Peruvian percussionists to shape Bach on the marimba, telling them about the history of John Cage and Nexus, recording a CD of Peruvian and Newfoundland folksongs with an exceptional local performer, writing articles about lúcuma and beef heart anticuchos, peeling mangoes in the open-air kitchen of my hostel, doing yoga in the morning with an Australian engineer and surfer who wanted to design playgrounds.
I still don’t regret not seeing Machu Picchu, because it would have meant not doing some of those other things.
Travel Goals for 2021
So my goal this year will be to have those adventures here in Montreal and the Laurentians where I’ve started opening climbing routes, places I foolishly think I know already. I’ll do what I’ve already done tons of times before, but with different people, or have new conversations with people I already know.
I’ll miss travelling as much and as broadly, meeting people from different backgrounds in the places they grew up, being out of my element, but there are plenty of people from other places here, plenty of ways to feel out of my element and open my mind.
Actually, I feel pretty much at a loss most of the time these days, which isn’t quite the same thing, but I hope can lead to similar self-development. I admit, the difference is I haven’t chosen to be lost this, which is much more implied when you take off on a travel adventure.
But if I accept the feeling of discomfort and incompetence, wander aimlessly down a few unknown alleys, roads or digital parties, maybe I’ll get a bit more out of my own place and head.
And who knows where that will take me.
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