凯文·凯利分享了50年的旅行经验，总结出不同的旅行模式（放松 vs 探索），强调围绕个人兴趣规划旅行，提供了一些实用的旅行技巧，例如乘坐司机家的车辆，参加婚礼，减少行李等。
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50 年旅行小贴士
我已经旅行了 50 多年，收获颇丰。
我独自旅行过，也曾带领着一个由40名朋友组成的旅行团。我睡在宿舍里，也和管家一起住在总统套房里。几个月来，我身无分文地搭便车，乘坐私人飞机。我和兄弟姐妹以及完全陌生的人一起旅行了几个月。我曾两次乘坐慢车，骑自行车穿越美国。我参加过地球上最大的人类聚会，并独自长途跋涉到地球上最偏远的地区。我支付了豪华旅行费用，并且进行了自己的自助旅行。我经常出差，有一次我去夏威夷还获得了门奖。我只用了48小时就环游了地球，而且我的旅行时间长达9个月。我坐过头等舱和三等舱，有时是在同一趟旅行中。
到目前为止，我已经走遍了世界上的一半国家，每次旅行都会尽量远离首都。下面是我对旅行的见解。
有两种旅行方式：退避或参与。人们常常旅行是为了摆脱日常工作的束缚，为了充电、放松、恢复活力和补充精力——休息与娱乐。在这种模式下，你旅行是为了摆脱日常生活的束缚，或者享受平时得不到的宠爱和关注，最好是做一些有趣的活动而不是工作。因此，你会选择去容易到达的地方旅行。这种旅行被称为度假，或休息与娱乐。
另一种模式是参与和体验，简称 E&E。在这种模式下，你出行是为了探索新鲜事物，体验新感受，投身于结果未知的冒险，去感受异域风情。通过遭遇在家乡无法遇到的快乐与挑战，你将找到自我。这种旅行方式是一种学习，在这两种模式中，我更倾向于在以下建议中推荐这种旅行方式。
围绕个人兴趣而非目的地来规划旅行。探索那些鲜为人知的奶酪、海军历史、恐龙遗址或爵士乐场所的行程，将比游览知名景点带来更多冒险和难忘的经历。这不必局限于自己的兴趣，也可以是朋友、家人或你所了解的。重点是打破常规，追求意想不到的体验。
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如果你雇佣司机或打车，不妨提出付钱请司机带你去拜访他的母亲。他们通常都会乐意接受。这样既尽了孝道，你也能轻松进入当地人家中，还有机会品尝到地道的家常菜。母亲、司机和你都会满意而归。这个方法几乎百试不爽。
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不要对某事是否开放做出假设。还有其他规范在发挥作用。如果可能的话，请最后时刻再确认，否则，请准备好备用方案。
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闯入婚礼。你不是讨厌鬼;你是名人嘉宾！最简单的方法是找到当地按计划举行婚礼的婚礼大厅，并邀请参加婚礼。他们通常会感到荣幸。如果您愿意，您可以向新婚夫妇赠送一份现金小礼物。你必须跳舞。给他们拍照;他们会给你拍照。它将让您和他们的一天都过得愉快。（我去过的大多数国家都参加过婚礼。）
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不要因为博物馆或演出的门票价格昂贵而犹豫。这仅是您旅行总成本的一小部分，您已经投入了太多，也走了很远的路，不能让这些相对较小的费用阻止您看到您此行想要看到的一切。
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Google 地图能为您提供详尽可靠的公共交通路线信息，包括在各大城市中的换乘点。
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第一次去外国城市旅游，不妨参加一次街头美食之旅。根据所在地区，行程可能包括食物车、食物卡车、美食广场或小型餐馆。这样的行程通常需要几个小时，而且费用已包含食物。您将有机会品尝到当地最地道的美味，主办方还会带领您深入了解当地文化。搜索“城市 X 街头美食之旅”即可。
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选择旅行伴侣时最重要的标准是：他们是否会抱怨，即便抱怨有理。不要抱怨！旅行结束后再进行总结。
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就像任何艺术形式一样，限制能够激发创造力。给你的旅行设定一些创意性的限制：比如骑自行车旅行，或者只带一个背包，或者低于预算标准，或者只在夜行火车上过夜。让旅行变得多样化。即使是流浪生活也可能变成一种固定的模式。
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今天租车比以往任何时候都方便，即使在发展中国家也不例外。如果你要去很多城市以外的目的地，租车无疑是最佳选择。尤其是 2 到 3 人同行时，这是一个值得考虑的选择。然而，仍有许多地方道路混乱、法律意识淡薄、责任不利，你并不想开车。在这些地方，为多日旅行聘请司机和车辆往往是一个意外的划算选择——尤其是有 2 到 3 人分担费用时。总费用可能比乘坐火车和出租车还要低，还能享受上门接送服务，通常还有一位熟悉当地道路、节日和美食的导游。 他们至少是租车费用的两倍，但在某些旅行类型中可能好两倍。如果你是个随性旅行的爱好者，雇佣司机无疑是最佳选择，让你能根据心情、天气或幸运时机立即调整行程。我通常会在旅行论坛上寻找推荐来寻找司机。我主要根据他们的沟通技巧来评估候选人。
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如果你足够幸运，送朋友与你同行的旅行费用，无疑是分享财富的一个美妙方式。你们将共同享受愉快的时光。
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去墓地转转，寻找那些神圣的地方。那里的生活很真实。别只逛市场，还要去小作坊、五金店和药店看看——这些地方能让你更容易接触到当地的风俗。你会发现，虽然有所不同，但也有很多相似之处。
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FlightAware 是一款查看航班状态的最佳免费手机应用。它经常会在航空公司之前数小时就通知您航班延误。小贴士：用 FlightAware 检查您的飞机是否已经抵达您的出发机场。
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旅行计划不靠谱，去些不靠谱的地方也无妨。不妨冒险一把。如果事情出了岔子，你的假期就变成了冒险之旅。完美只属于手表。旅行本就应该不完美。如果没有出现任何意外，那就没有故事可以讲述了。
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旅行中的乐趣与行李重量成反比。令人意想不到的是，旅行时间越长，你应携带的物品越少。在为期 6 周的旅行中依然快乐的旅行者只需携带随身行李。这样做可以最大化你的灵活性，让你在没有电梯的情况下也能轻松搬运行李上楼，或与他人合乘嘟嘟车，高效地打包和拆包，避免物品丢失。而且，当你轻装出行时，你故意减少携带的物品，以增强你的生活体验。如今，你几乎可以在旅途中买到你所需的所有东西。
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获得内部参观是旅行中的极致享受。比如工厂参观、访问阿米什家庭，或是歌剧后台，这些地方都值得一去。出差旅行时，我有时会要求参观一些不常见的场所，而不是仅仅收取演讲费。你追求的是金钱无法买到的独特体验，这需要提前做好规划。
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夜晚比您想象中更冷，尤其是在热带。不管怎样，都要多带一件衣服。
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Planning your itinerary: You want to see it all and you are likely to never return, so the temptation is to pile it on, maximize your visit. Since we are in X, and Y and Z are so close, we might as well see Y and Z….. Paradoxically when you are traveling you should minimize the amount of time you spend in transit—once you arrive. The hard-to-accept truth is that it is far better to spend more time in a few places than a little time in a bunch of places.
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在您所在国家之外的世界任何地方预订火车，您首先应该访问《座位 61 号的人》网站，这个网站可以帮助您轻松预订您心仪的火车。
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在 53 年的旅行生涯中，我发现吃的地方和是否有肠道问题之间并没有任何关联，因此为了更好地享受当地美食，我建议去那些看起来健康的当地人常去的地方用餐。
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最受人们向往的旅游城市都有一个显著特点——它们都重视步行。这些城市鼓励人们步行。像 Booking.com 这样的在线酒店预订网站拥有地图界面，让您可以根据位置选择酒店。只要条件允许，我都会预订靠近最佳步行地点的酒店，这样我就可以轻松出门漫步了。
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真正难忘的旅行，不妨不带预订，随心所欲地旅行。若你喜欢某个地方，不妨多待一天；若不满意，就提前一天离开。火车满了就坐公交车。这种自由自在的感觉，能让人感到无比轻松。
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Google Translate 手机应用非常棒，完全免费。它能翻译 250 种语言的语音、文本或脚本。可用于解读菜单、标志，与店员交谈等，经常能救命。
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大规模豪华邮轮对我来说毫无吸引力，但小型邮轮却是一种完全不同的体验，是一个值得考虑的可行选择。邮轮的好处在于您的住宿会随您移动，因此您只需打包一次行李。这对小型团体来说尤其方便，因为它避免了永无止境的吃饭地点协商。（您总是在船上用餐。）小型邮轮相较于大型邮轮的优势在于，您可以快速、频繁地登陆，这些地方比大型邮轮能到达的更小、更私密。活动选择也更加丰富多样，不仅仅是购物：如浮潜、划独木舟、骑自行车、徒步旅行、探访当地家庭和社区。总的来说，您在船上的时间远少于在岸上活动的时间。 我把载客 40 人以下的小船称为小型船只。每天的费用很高，但几乎每一分钟都是美好的时光，与连续乘坐公交车相比。我特别喜爱的小船旅行目的地包括：加勒比海地区、阿拉斯加内陆航道、湄公河、土耳其海岸以及印度的喀拉拉邦。
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你的前进速度并非取决于你走路、骑自行车或驾驶的速度，而是取决于你的休息时间。请减速，多休息。最难忘的时刻——与奇妙陌生人的对话、受邀进入家中、发现隐藏的艺术品——往往发生在你停止移动的时候。
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我通常觉得“专业”的导游很无趣，过于刻板。他们大多只是重复导游书上的内容。因此，我很少请他们。我更倾向于让朋友或当地熟人带我去看他们感兴趣的地方，以即兴的方式，无需脚本。提前告知朋友们你要来他们所在地区。
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几片洗衣片装在迷你密封袋里几乎不重，不会漏，非常适合在洗手盆或淋浴间进行应急洗衣，使用起来非常方便。
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这些天，保持网络连接是必须的。你需要覆盖蜂窝网络和 Wi-Fi。为了导航、使用翻译应用、叫车和支付，你需要稳定的移动网络。最好的办法是使用提供“免费”国际计划的运营商（比如 T-Mobile 或 Google Fi），这样你就不需要做任何事情。其次，你可以为访问的国家购买一张 SIM 卡或 e-SIM 卡。E-SIM 应用（如 Airalo）可以自行下载。大多数国际机场在出境时都出售 SIM 卡和 e-SIM 卡，它们都是可靠的。一个小贴士，在使用 SIM 卡时，请关闭照片和视频的云备份，以减少数据消耗。
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People in other places are not saints. You might get cheated, swindled, or taken advantage of. Paradoxically, the best way to avoid that is to give strangers your trust and treat them well. Being good to them brings out their good. If you are on your best behavior, they will be on their best behavior. And vice versa. To stay safe, smile. Be humble and minimize your ego. I don’t know why that works everywhere in the world—even places with “bad” reputations—but it does.
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您只需步行至少五个街区远离中心区域，就能在著名旅游景点附近找到既经济实惠又地道美味的餐食。
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手机上的数字钱包正在许多地方取代现金。比如，我在最近的英国和中国旅行中就没有使用过现金。即使某些地方现金尚未完全消失，您也可以通过移动支付将现金需求减半。出行前请先设置好 Apple Pay、Google Pay 或支付宝。您无需在机场等地方兑换货币。您可以在遍布各地的 ATM 上取到所需的现金，并使用不收取或退还外国手续费的卡片。
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如果你发现有人向一个方向移动的人数略多于另一个方向，就跟随他们。持续跟随这种“人流梯度”，你最终会发现一些有趣的事物——比如市场、游行、生日派对、户外舞会或节日。
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购买最新版本的旅游指南绝对物有所值。这比一顿午餐贵不了多少，却能让你获得最新、最有用、最可靠的信息。我还会参考在线旅游论坛上的建议来补充指南书的研究内容。指南书内容详实，论坛信息更新迅速，即使是一周前的信息也能派上用场。
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如果你初涉旅行，对世界了解有限，不妨前往旅行成本较低的地区，这样你的旅行时间可以翻倍。选择经济型住宿，你甚至可以用一半的价格旅行更长的时间。不妨看看《最便宜目的地博客》。据我观察，这些不为人知的旅行地往往值得一游。
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现在，全球许多地区，摩托车已经取代了汽车的角色。你可以乘坐摩托车出租车，坐在后座，或者通过类似 Uber 的应用程序叫车，也可以跟随导游驾驶摩托车进行旅游。在摩托车普及的地区，它们的效率远超汽车，是后者的十倍。
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把经济实惠的 Apple AirTags 装进您的包里，一旦它们不在您视线范围内，您就能追踪它们。越来越多的航空公司正在将 AirTags 纳入他们的系统，以协助找回走失的行李。这些标签适用于存放在酒店储物柜的行李、藏在公交车下的物品，或需要转寄的物件。
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为了获得最佳的旅行体验，你需要要么有很多钱，要么有很多时间。在这两者之间，拥有更多的时间比拥有更多的钱更为重要。尽管金钱可以尝试，但它无法买到时间所能带来的东西。你有足够的时间去参加那些罕见的节日，学习新词汇，理解真正的价值所在，等待天气转晴，或者开车前往那个需要一周时间才能抵达的目的地。时间是你可以赋予自己的唯一资源，因此如果你年轻且没有足够的财富，就要好好利用这一点。
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纪念品不能仅仅因为美丽、制作精良或价格低廉。它必须承载着旅行的意义。购买纪念品时，不妨自问：我回家后，它将置于何处？
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旅行中最珍贵的回忆是那些旅行记忆，因此找到方法来纪念它们吧；记日记、向朋友分享更新、携带速写本、记录观察、制作相册都是不错的选择。
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向别人询问餐厅推荐时，别问他们哪里是吃饭的好地方，而是问他们自己常去哪里吃饭。他们上次外出吃饭是在哪里？
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简而言之，这是我优化两周假期的方法：抵达新国家后，立即前往旅行中计划到达的最远、最偏远的地方。若有小村庄、偏远的水疗中心、朋友农场或计划游览的野地，应立即前往。切勿在机场附近停留，也勿在抵达城市过夜，更不要停下来适应。如果可能，直接乘坐飞机、巴士、吉普车或汽车直达目的地，中途不停歇。如果需要，可以安排通宵旅行。到达最远点后，放下行李，开始探索，然后缓缓返回国际出发机场所在的大城市。
也就是说，你直接冲向终点，然后再绕道返回。先直冲，再绕道。这种做法与许多人的直觉相反，他们倾向于在抵达城市后立即适应当地文化，然后再前往偏远地区。他们的想法是：先了解情况，储备物资，评估环境。然后逐步向更具挑战性和偏远的地方前进。这听起来合理，但并非最佳策略，因为全球大多数大城市之间其实更相似。如今，所有的大城市在初来乍到时都给人一种似曾相识的感觉。而在激光往返旅行中，你将立刻置身于截然不同的异域风情之中，这是你在这趟旅行中能感受到的最大差异。 你从家中出发，很快就能体验到极端的差异，这几乎就像幻灯片中的溶解效果。砰！你的眼睛瞪得大大的，你精神抖擞，全神贯注，耳朵竖起。而在路的尽头（同时也是你的起点），你不可避免的错误通常代价更低，更容易恢复，也更加有趣。无论身处何国，你都会放慢脚步。随后，你以自己的节奏利用这段时间返回机场城市。然而，在经历了一周左右的陌生之旅后，也许没有你习惯的许多奢华，你突然会以周围人的视角看待这座城市。 在不那么豪华的住所度过了八天后，明亮的灯光、宽敞的购物街道和深夜的餐馆让你眼花缭乱，你带着热情和渴望拥抱这个城市。一切都显得如此……文明而巧妙。真是太棒了！喧嚣和忙碌不再那么令人烦恼，甚至几乎让人感到欢迎。你注意到的景点是当地人珍视的细节。你仿佛成了一个本地人，而非一个在类似城市购物中心中疲惫的游客。你带着对城市各个角落的喜爱离开，无论是偏远还是邻近，古老还是新颖，缓慢还是快速。
我们还了解到，如果目标是在家外度过 12 天，这种强度效果最佳。这意味着在国内体验 10 天，加上每端各一天的旅行时间。通过多次实践，我们发现，无论旅行者的年龄和兴趣如何，14 天的地面时间似乎都有些过长。大约在 10 天的高强度动态旅行后，人们开始有些分心。因此，我们选择在那时结束，利用剩余的时间来缓和过渡。另一方面，8 天的时间感觉势头被过早地截断了。因此，我们追求的是 10 天的高强度体验和 12 天的国家停留时间。虽然激光回程旅行并非总是可靠，也并非总能实现，但平均来看，它比我所尝试的其他方式效果更佳。
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如果你喜欢边旅行边工作，或者选择远程办公，那么你可能会喜欢我们的 Nomadico 简报。这份每周一页的简报提供了四个实用的旅行小贴士。而且，这份简报是免费的。
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感谢早期读者克雷格·莫德、德里克·西弗斯、克里斯·米歇尔和威尔·米恩。
50 Years of Travel Tips
I’ve been seriously traveling for more than 50 years, and I’ve learned a lot.
I’ve traveled solo, and I’ve led a tour group of 40 friends. I’ve slept in dormitories and I’ve stayed in presidential suites with a butler. I’ve hitchhiked penniless for months, and I’ve flown by private jet. I’ve traveled months with siblings, and with total strangers. I’ve gone by slow boat and I’ve ridden my bicycle across America, twice. I’ve been to the largest gathering of humans on the planet, and trekked into remotest areas on the planet on my own. I’ve paid for luxury tours, and I’ve done my own self-guided tours. I regularly travel for business, and once I went to Hawaii on a door-prize award. I’ve circumnavigated the globe in only 48 hours, and I traveled uninterrupted for 9 months. I’ve gone first class and third class, sometimes on the same trip. So far I’ve visited half the world’s countries, and usually manage to get far from the capital city when I do. Here is what I know about how to travel.
There are two modes of travel; retreat or engage. People often travel to escape the routines of work, to recharge, relax, reinvigorate, and replenish themselves— R&R. In this mode you travel to remove yourself from your routines, or to get the pampering and attention you don’t ordinarily get, and ideally to do fun things instead of work things. So you travel to where it is easy. This is called a vacation, or R&R.
The other mode is engagement and experience, or E&E. In this mode you travel to discover new things, to have new experiences, to lean into an adventure whose outcome is not certain, to meet otherness. You move to find yourself by encountering pleasures and challenges you don’t encounter at home. This kind of travel is a type of learning, and of the two modes, it is the one I favor in these tips.
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Organize your travel around passions instead of destinations. An itinerary based on obscure cheeses, or naval history, or dinosaur digs, or jazz joints will lead to far more adventures, and memorable times than a grand tour of famous places. It doesn’t even have to be your passions; it could be a friend’s, family member’s, or even one you’ve read about. The point is to get away from the expected into the unexpected.
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If you hire a driver, or use a taxi, offer to pay the driver to take you to visit their mother. They will ordinarily jump at the chance. They fulfill their filial duty and you will get easy entry into a local’s home, and a very high chance to taste some home cooking. Mother, driver, and you leave happy. This trick rarely fails.
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Make no assumptions about whether something will be open. There are other norms at work. If possible check at the last minute, if not, have a plan B.
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Crash a wedding. You are not a nuisance; you are the celebrity guest! The easiest way to do this is to find the local wedding hall where weddings happen on schedule and approach a wedding party with a request to attend. They will usually feel honored. You can offer the newlyweds a small token gift of cash if you want. You will be obliged to dance. Take photos of them; they will take photos of you. It will make your day and theirs. (I’ve crashed a wedding in most of the countries I have visited.)
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Don’t balk at the spendy price of admission for a museum or performance. It will be a tiny fraction of your trip’s total cost and you invested too much and have come too far to let those relative minor fees stop you from seeing what you came to see.
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Google maps will give you very detailed and reliable directions for taking public transit, including where to make transfers in most cities.
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When visiting a foreign city for the first time, take a street food tour. Depending on the region, the tour will include food carts, food trucks, food courts, or smaller eateries. It will last a few hours, and the cost will include the food. You’ll get some of the best food available, and usually the host will also deliver a great introduction to the culture. Google “street food tour for city X.”
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The most significant criteria to use when selecting travel companions is: do they complain or not, even when complaints are justified? No complaining! Complaints are for the debriefing afterwards when travel is over.
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As in any art, constraints breed creativity. Give your travel creative constraints: Try traveling by bicycle, or with only a day bag for luggage, or below the minimum budget, or sleep only on overnight trains. Mix it up. Even vagabonding can become a rut.
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Renting a car is easier than ever today, even in developing countries, and oftentimes the best bet for getting around if you are headed for many places outside of cities. It is an option worth considering, especially if you are 2 to 3 people traveling. On the other hand, there are still plenty of places where you don’t want to drive because of chaotic roads, lawless attitudes, and unfavorable liabilities. In those places hiring a driver plus car for a multi-day trip is often a surprisingly appealing bargain—especially if you have 2 to 3 people to split the costs. The total could be less than taking trains and taxis, and you get door to door service, and often a built-in guide who knows the local roads and also local festivities and best places to eat. They will be at least 2x the cost of renting a car, but for some kinds of travel 2x as good. If you are a spontaneous traveler, a hired driver is by far the best option allowing you to change your itinerary immediately as mood, weather, or lucky timing dictate. I usually find drivers by searching travel forums for recommendations. I score candidates primarily by their communication skills.
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If you are fortunate, a fantastic way to share your fortune is to gift a friend the cost of travel with you. You both will have a great time.
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Go to a cemetery. Look for sacred places. People live authentically there. Don’t just visit the markets, but also go to small workshops, hardware stores and pharmacies – places with easy access to local practices. See how it’s different and the same all at once.
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FlightAware is the best free phone app for the status of your flight. It will often tell you about delays hours before the airline will. Tip: use FlightAware to check whether your plane has even arrived at your departure airport.
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Sketchy travel plans and travel to sketchy places are ok. Take a chance. If things fall apart, your vacation has just turned into an adventure. Perfection is for watches. Trips should be imperfect. There are no stories if nothing goes amiss.
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Your enjoyment of a trip will be inversely related to the weight of your luggage. Counterintuitively, the longer your trip, the less stuff you should haul. Travelers still happy on a 6-week trip will only have carry-on luggage. That maximizes your flexibility, enabling you to lug luggage up stairs when there is no elevator, or to share a tuk-tuk, to pack and unpack efficiently, and to not lose stuff. Furthermore, when you go light you intentionally reduce what you take in order to increase your experience of living. And the reality of today is that you can almost certainly buy whatever you are missing on the road.
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Getting an inside tour is the ultimate travel treat. How about a factory tour, a visit to an Amish home, or backstage at an opera? When I travel for business I will sometimes ask for inside access to an uncommon place in lieu of a speaking fee. You are aiming for experiences that simple money can’t buy. Good ones will take planning ahead.
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It is always colder at night than you think it should be, especially in the tropics. Pack a layer no matter what.
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Planning your itinerary: You want to see it all and you are likely to never return, so the temptation is to pile it on, maximize your visit. Since we are in X, and Y and Z are so close, we might as well see Y and Z….. Paradoxically when you are traveling you should minimize the amount of time you spend in transit—once you arrive. The hard-to-accept truth is that it is far better to spend more time in a few places than a little time in a bunch of places.
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To book a train anywhere in the world outside your home country, your first stop should be The Man in Seat 61, a sprawling website which will conveniently help you book the train you want.
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In 53 years of travelling with all kinds of people, I’ve seen absolutely no correlation between where you eat and whether you have intestinal problems, so to maximize the enjoyment of local foods, my rule of thumb is to eat wherever healthy-looking locals eat.
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The list of most coveted cities to visit have one striking thing in common—they are pedestrian centric. They reward walking.Better online hotel sites like Booking.com have map interfaces which allow you to select hotels by their location. Whenever possible I book my hotel near to where it is best to walk, so I can stroll out the door and begin to wander.
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For a truly memorable trip, go without reservations, just winging it along the way. If you like somewhere, stay a day longer, or if you don’t, split a day earlier. If the train is full, take a bus. That freedom can be liberating.
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The Google Translate app for your phone is seriously good, and free. It will translate voice, text, or script to and from 250 languages. Use for deciphering menus, signs, talking with clerks, etc. It is often a lifesaver.
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Large-scale luxury cruises have no appeal to me, yet a small boat cruise is an entirely different species and a valid option worth considering. The advantage of a cruise is that your hotel travels with you, so you unpack only once. It is especially useful for small groups because it eliminates the eternal negotiation of deciding where to eat. (You always eat on the boat.) The advantages of a small boat cruise over a huge boat are several: you disembark very quickly, very often, at smaller more intimate places than large boats can do. And the options for activities are more active than just shopping: such as snorkeling, kayaking, bicycling, hiking, visiting local families and communities. Overall you spend far more time doing things off the boat than on. I define a small boat as 40 passengers or fewer. The per day cost is high, but almost every minute of it is quality time, unlike a series of bus rides. Examples of places I’ve loved a small boat cruise; The Galapagos, Alaska inland passageway, Mekong River, Coast of Turkey, and Kerala, India.
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The rate you go is not determined by how fast you walk, bike or drive, but by how long your breaks are. Slow down. Take lots of breaks. The most memorable moments—conversations with amazing strangers, an invite inside, a hidden artwork—will usually happen when you are not moving.
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I generally find “professional” tour guides uninteresting, and too scripted. They are mostly repeating what can be found in guide books. So I rarely hire them. I much prefer to have a friend or local acquaintance show me what interests them in an ad hoc way, with no script. Let friends know you are coming to their area.
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A few laundry detergent sheets in a tiny ziplock bag weigh nothing and won’t spill and are perfect for emergency laundry washing in the sink or shower.
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These days it is mandatory that you are connected. You need cell coverage as well as wifi. You’ll want robust mobile coverage for navigation, translation apps, ride shares and a digital wallet for payments. Best option is to use a carrier with “free” international plans (such as T-Mobile or Google Fi) so you need to do nothing. Second best is to get either a sim card or e-sim for your phone for your visiting country. E-sim apps (such Airalo) can be loaded by yourself virtually. Sims and e-sims are also sold at most international airports when you exit. Most are reputable. One tip, turn off your photo and video cloud backup while on the sim to reduce data usage.
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People in other places are not saints. You might get cheated, swindled, or taken advantage of. Paradoxically, the best way to avoid that is to give strangers your trust and treat them well. Being good to them brings out their good. If you are on your best behavior, they will be on their best behavior. And vice versa. To stay safe, smile. Be humble and minimize your ego. I don’t know why that works everywhere in the world—even places with “bad” reputations—but it does.
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You can get an inexpensive and authentic meal near a famous tourist spot simply by walking at least five blocks away from the epicenter.
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Digital wallets on your phone are displacing local currencies in many places. For instance I did not use any cash on my last trips to the UK and China. And in places where it has not completely eliminated cash you can reduce your cash needs by half with mobile payments. Set up your Apple pay, Google Pay or Alipay before you leave. There is no need to exchange money anywhere, especially at airports. Get any cash you need at local ATMs, which are now everywhere. Use a card that does not charge, or reimburses, a foreign fee.
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If you detect slightly more people moving in one direction over another, follow them. If you keep following this “gradient” of human movement, you will eventually land on something interesting—a market, a parade, a birthday party, an outdoor dance, a festival.
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Splurge in getting the most recent version of a guidebook to your destination. It is worth the price of a lunch to get the latest, most helpful, reliable information. I supplement the latest guidebook research with recommendations suggested in travel forums online. Guidebooks have depth and breadth, while forums offer speed—results from a week ago.
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If you are starting out and have seen little of the world, you can double the time you spend traveling by heading to the places it is cheapest to travel. If you stay at the budget end, you can travel twice as long for half price. Check out The Cheapest Destination Blog. In my experience, these off-beat destinations are usually worth visiting.
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In many parts of the world today motorcycles play the role of cars. That means you can hire a moto-taxi to take you on the back seat, or to summon a moto-taxi with an uber-like app, or to take a motorcycle tour with a guide doing the driving. In areas where motorcycles dominate they will be ten times more efficient than slowly going by car.
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Put inexpensive Apple AirTags into your bags, so you can track them when they are out of your sight. More and more airlines are integrating AirTags into their system to help find wayward bags. The tags work for luggage left in hotel storage, or stashed beneath the bus, or pieces you need to forward.
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For the best travel experiences you need either a lot of money, or a lot of time. Of the two modes, it is far better to have more time than money. Although it tries, money cannot buy what time delivers. You have enough time to attend the rare festival, to learn some new words, to understand what the real prices are, to wait out the weather, or to get to that place that takes a week in a jeep. Time is the one resource you can give yourself, so take advantage of this if you are young without money.
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Being beautiful, or well crafted, or cheap is not enough for a souvenir. It should have some meaning from the trip. A good question you may want to ask yourself when buying a souvenir is where will this live when I get home?
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The best souvenirs from a trip are your memories of the trip so find a way to memorialize them; keep a journal, send updates to a friend, take a sketchbook, post some observations, make a photo book.
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When asking someone for a restaurant recommendation, don’t ask them where is a good place you should eat; ask them where they eat. Where did they eat the last time they ate out?
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Here in brief is the method I’ve honed to optimize a two-week vacation: When you arrive in a new country, immediately proceed to the farthest, most remote, most distant place you intend to reach during the trip. If there is a small village, remote spa, a friend’s farm, or a wild place you plan on seeing on the trip, go there immediately. Do not stop near the airport. Do not rest overnight in the arrival city. Do not pause to acclimate. If at all possible proceed by plane, bus, jeep, car directly to the furthest point without interruption. Make it an overnight journey if you have to. Then once you reach your furthest point, unpack, explore, and work your way slowly back to the big city, wherever your international departure airport is.
In other words you make a laser-straight rush for the end, and then meander back. Laser out, meander back. This method is somewhat contrary to many people’s first instincts, which are to immediately get acclimated to the culture in the landing city before proceeding to the hinterlands. The thinking is: get a sense of what’s going on, stock up, size up the joint. Then slowly work up to the more challenging, more remote areas. That’s reasonable, but not optimal because most big cities around the world are more similar than different. All big cities these days feel same-same on first arrival. In Laser-Back travel what happens is that you are immediately thrown into Very Different Otherness, the maximum difference that you will get on this trip. You go from your home to extreme differences so fast it is almost like the dissolve effect in a slide show. Bam! Your eyes are wide open. You are on your toes. All ears. And there at the end of the road (but your beginning), your inevitable mistakes are usually cheaper, easier to recover from, and more fun. You take it slower, no matter what country you are in. Then you use the allotted time to head back to the airport city, at whatever pace is your pace. But, when you arrive in the city after a week or so traveling in this strangeness, and maybe without many of the luxuries you are used to, you suddenly see the city the same way the other folks around you do. After eight days in less fancy digs, the bright lights, and smooth shopping streets, and late-night eateries dazzle you, and you embrace the city with warmth and eagerness. It all seems so … civilized and ingenious. It’s brilliant! The hustle and bustle are less annoying and almost welcomed. And the attractions you notice are the small details that natives appreciate. You see the city more like a native and less like a jaded tourist in a look-alike urban mall. You leave having enjoyed both the remote and the adjacent, the old and new, the slow and the fast, the small and the big.
We’ve also learned that this intensity works best if we aim for 12 days away from home. That means 10 days for in-country experience, plus a travel day (or two) on each end. We’ve found from doing this many times, with many travelers of all ages and interests, 14 days on the ground is two days too many. There seems to be a natural lull at about 10 days of intense kinetic travel. People start to tune out a bit. So we cut it there and use the other days to come and go and soften the transitions. On the other hand 8 days feels like the momentum is cut short. So 10 days of intensity, and 12 days in a country is what we aim for. Laser-back travel is not foolproof, nor always possible, but on average it tends to work better than the other ways I’ve tried.
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If you work while you travel, or work remotely, you may enjoy our newsletter Nomadico, which is a weekly one-pager with four brief travel tips. It’s free.
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(Thanks to early readers, Craig Mod, Derek Sivers, Chris Michel and Will Milne.)
凯文·凯利的旅行秘籍：50年浪迹天涯，我总结了这些绝招！
嘿，朋友们！今天给大家分享一篇超有料的文章，是凯文·凯利总结的旅行经验。这哥们儿可不是一般人，50多年旅行经历，啥稀奇事儿没干过？搭过便车，睡过地下室，也坐过私人飞机，住过总统套房，还带着40个人的旅行团到处溜达。他去过世界上一半的国家，那叫一个溜达得远！今天，咱就来唠唠他总结的那些旅行秘籍，保证让你眼前一亮！
旅行，到底是去“躲清闲”还是去“找刺激”？
凯文说，旅行有两种模式：一种是“躲清闲”，就是大家常说的度假，去个地方放松放松，享受享受，啥也不想，就图个轻松。另一种是“找刺激”，就是要去探索新鲜事儿，体验不一样的生活，甚至去那些从来没去过的地方，感受一下当地的风土人情。凯文自己更喜欢第二种，毕竟，旅行嘛，就是要有点冒险精神，不然跟在家有啥区别？
规划旅行，别只盯着景点！
凯文有个绝招：别只盯着那些热门景点，多围绕自己的兴趣来规划。比如你喜欢奶酪，那就去那些小众的奶酪产地；要是对海军历史感兴趣，那就去那些有海军遗迹的地方。这样不仅能避开人山人海，还能收获意想不到的惊喜。就像吃菜一样，别总去那些人人排队的地方，说不定那些犄角旮旯的小馆子，藏着人间美味呢！
旅行小技巧，全是干货！
凯文还分享了一大堆旅行小技巧，我挑几个有意思的说说。
旅行中的“意外惊喜”
凯文还特别强调，旅行中遇到点意外很正常，千万别怕。要是计划被打乱了，说不定还能收获一场意外的冒险。就像市场里的猫，你永远不知道它下一秒会干啥，但正是这种不确定性，才让旅行变得有意思，不是吗？
旅行伴侣，别挑爱抱怨的！
选旅行伴侣，凯文说最重要的就是看对方爱不爱抱怨。要是遇到那种事儿多、爱抱怨的，那旅行肯定不开心。旅行嘛，就是要开开心心的，等回来再总结经验教训也不迟。
旅行时间，越长越好？
凯文还分享了一个特别有意思的观点：旅行时间越长，你越能发现不一样的东西。比如，他建议大家去那些偏远的地方，先一头扎进去，然后再慢慢往回走。为啥？因为大城市都差不多，没啥新鲜的。反而是那些偏远的地方，能让你感受到最真实的风土人情。
旅行的“性价比”
要是你手头紧，凯文也有妙招。去那些旅行成本低的地方，不仅能省不少钱，还能延长旅行时间。毕竟，旅行不是看花了多少钱，而是看收获了多少回忆。
旅行的“终极目标”
凯文最后说，旅行的终极目标是给自己留下难忘的回忆。所以，别光想着买纪念品，多记录一下旅行中的点点滴滴，这才是最珍贵的。
总结
凯文·凯利的这些旅行经验，简直就是一本活生生的“旅行宝典”。他用自己的经历告诉我们，旅行不是简单的“出去走走”，而是一场充满冒险和惊喜的旅程。别怕麻烦，别怕意外，大胆地去探索，去体验，去感受不一样的生活。毕竟，人生不就是一场说走就走的旅行吗？
好啦，今天的分享就到这里啦！要是你也有啥旅行经验，欢迎在评论区留言，大家一起交流交流。下次旅行，不妨试试凯文的这些招数，说不定能收获不一样的惊喜呢！