Inspirational Travel Quotes, Busted!

Stokepedia

We’ve all got those people in our lives, those who go on a holiday once and become the Dalai Lama of travel wisdom, burdening their social media feed with all manner of appropriated and often misquoted travel quotes. Heck, we’re all guilty of being that person, at some point in our lives. 

It’s great! They’re great! Travelling’s great! We’re great! But some of these quotes aren’t exactly accurate, are they, and really we think there’s more value in making up our own quotes that apply specifically to us, because:

There are as many types of travllers as there are people in the world.

See, we just made that up, and isn’t it nice. Anyway, here are some other travel quotes that we consistently come across that we just can’t help but make a little fun of…

All those who wander aren’t lost

That’s right, it’s true, it would be a folly to assume that everybody wandering around was lost. Some people are just ineffective walkers and others perhaps enjoy dawdling, or have tired legs, or perhaps are a little drunk and just seem to be meandering when they’re really sort of stumbling. BUT, if somebody is walking around aimlessly it’s a better indication that they’re lost than if they’re striding with purpose. Lost people are never moving quickly and effectively because what’s the point in making good time when you don’t know where you’re going?

Travel is the only thing you buy that makes you richer

That’s a really nice thought, but it absolutely disregards all the other things you can buy that make you richer, like stocks, property, drugs for resale, old stamps, football cards, work boots, fake tits and Bitcoins. It actually does seem that many of the people who once told us that travel is the only purchasable commodity that increases our wealth are now telling us that Bitcoin is the best way to get rich quick. You really can’t take these people seriously.

The world is a book and those who don’t travel read only one page

This one is particularly bullshitty. The world is nothing like a book, not in shape nor in the way content is delivered. It’s more like a round television, with sights and sounds and stories that are being constantly updated. But ok, ok, it’s a metaphor. So the world is a book, therefore it’s a story with a beginning, middle and end. Great! Now which page do the non-travellers read? The cover? Every person who doesn’t travel has read the cover? I would postulate that even those who don’t go on extended holidays and other movement based adventures can be completely familiar with the beginning and most of the middle of the book, because nobody’s claiming that travel makes you a historian, or a physicist, or an evolutionary biologist, right? Are travellers saying that they are readers of the whole book, and thus able to see the future? Ridiculous.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step

This one is tough to argue against, although it does leave out people in wheelchairs and rollerbladers, but what this travel quote fails to mention is that after that first step the journey of a thousand miles then contains another, approximately, 1,999,999 steps, each one more difficult than that first step we’re all making such a song and dance about. How about we give each and every of those other steps some respect, like, The journey of a thousand miles is made possible by the all too difficult 587,006th step? Why does the first step get all the kudos, it’s likely the easiest to do. Literally pick up your rucksack and take a step. I would say that the step immediately after that first one would be more difficult and perhaps more worthy of praise.

Something about the journey being more important than the destination

Absolutely horseshit and abviously spread by somebody who’s never stayed with Stoke Travel. The journey is a bus ride, a long check in queue at the airport, a speeding fine, blisters on the top of both your little toes. The journey is lugging your gear, getting a sore arse, committing your mortality to the irrational acceleration of a meth-addled Thai bus driver. The destination, however, is when you take your shoes off and jump on the bed, crack open a cold beer, have a shower, meet your new friends, have a dance on the dancefloor, make out with some never-before-known hottie – basically everything yuo do at the destination kicks the journeys arse. Fuck the journey, make it as painless as possible without putting you into debt, and lap up the delights at the destination.

Which travel quotes grind your gears? Share them with us. Also, if you want to have some good, honest, old fashioned, quote-free travelling fun, why not grab yourself a Stoke Travel Passport. 12 nights of all-inclusive across 20+ destinations and all for €550. Get in there!