I’ve not traveled much by any stretch of the imagination. I have friends (like Mike Connolly) that have traveled around the world and experienced many cultures. My trips have been limited to the US, India, and parts of Europe. Yet it seems that I have more travel experience that most people. Why is it that people fail to travel anywhere except to pre-packaged resort all inclusive packages? Whatever happened to going on a road trip with only a compass and the only guides being the sun and the occasional advice from a stranger? Perhaps people are too busy to know better or want to package as much as possible into as little time as possible.

I try to take a distinctly opposing view by seeing things again and again. I like visiting some of the same places many times over and expanding the circle each time. That’s not to say that I don’t go to a new place but it’s impossible to see a whole town in one day. A town or city isn’t just historical sites; it’s the sidewalks, it’s the people or lack thereof in a park on any given day. Perhaps I take traveling too seriously.

Over the last few years my travel luggage has expanded from a single bag to four bags and now down to two. Experience teaches one that equipment can always be minimized. There are some things that just won’t be needed. In case of an emergency there’s very few things you worry about. For instance, last year when I went to Italy I crammed two camera bags full of equipment and necessities. This year I’m taking less than one camera bag and it has space for non-camera related items. It’s partially the experience of knowing what to shoot with and also deciding that I don’t really need 500 GB of RAID 1 backup on the go.

Do other people learn? Or perhaps other people are looking to see and not experience.