Why I Can’t Tell You My Favorite Place in the World

A letter from Lindsay, first sent to the Sundays from Somewhere list. Want it in your inbox each week? Sign up below.

I have spent a good portion of my life traveling the world, and I still can’t answer one of the most common questions people ask me. “What’s your favorite place you’ve ever been?” You’d think I’d have an answer by now. I don’t. Not even close.

I was talking about this recently with Hanna, our fantastic web designer at Ignited 180 (shameless plug, but she’s wonderful), when she tried a different question. “Okay, what place surprised you the most?”

I thought about it for a solid minute. Still couldn’t answer. Then she asked where I’d most like to go next. Surely I could answer that one?

Nope.

Our conversation got me thinking about why these seemingly simple questions are so difficult for me. And I think it comes down to something I’ve realized after years of traveling: the experience of a place has as much to do with who we are when we visit as where we actually go.Keep going with the story. Add more paragraphs by pressing Enter at the end of this one.

It Depends on What I’m Craving

Every trip I’ve taken has been shaped by my circumstances. How old I was, who I was traveling with, how much money I had, what was happening in my life, even the weather. And perhaps most importantly, what I wanted out of travel at that particular moment.

Because sometimes I want to go somewhere that completely rocks my brain. I want to be somewhere where I don’t speak the language, where I don’t recognize half the things on the menu, and where I have no idea what’s going on around me.

I want to have to go back to my room and count out the local currency in private so I don’t look disoriented trying to buy street food. I want to be confused, surprised, and forced to figure things out. I want that feeling of realizing just how much of the world I don’t understand!

When I’m craving that kind of experience, Japan is at the top of my list.

Sometimes, I want the exact opposite. I want to be in nature, wake up to birds instead of an alarm, and spend hours outside without feeling like I need to be anywhere else. I want the noise of everyday life to get a little quieter.

Right now, that makes me think of an incredible rainforest lodge we found in Costa Rica. I can picture myself sitting outside with a cup of coffee, listening to the rainforest wake up, with absolutely no desire to check my phone or figure out what we’re doing next.

It’s a completely different experience from wandering the streets of Osaka, trying to figure out what I’m eating. I want both. Just not necessarily at the same time.

The Right Trip at the Right Time

Years ago, I was dealing with a debilitating back injury. I was in so much pain that I couldn’t sit down. I could stand, or I could lie flat on my back. Those were pretty much my options.

Around that time, I went to Vieques, a small island off Puerto Rico, for a week with a friend. She wanted to spend the entire vacation resting and reading. She had absolutely no interest in filling her days with activities. Under normal circumstances, we probably wouldn’t have been ideal travel companions.

I remember watching people kiteboarding and saying, Oh my gosh, I want to do that. And she looked at them and said, “I don’t ever want to do that.”

We laughed because we both knew that if I’d been feeling like my usual self, we would have wanted completely different vacations. But at that particular moment, she was exactly the right person for me to travel with!

I couldn’t do most of the things I would normally have wanted to do, and she was perfectly happy spending the week doing very little. We both got the vacation we needed.

I still think about that trip. A year earlier or a year later, the same destination with the same friend might have been an entirely different experience. But right then, it was exactly right.

We’re Allowed to Change the Way We Travel

It’s not just our circumstances that change. Our interests do, too.

Take reading retreats, for example. If you’d asked me 10 or 12 years ago whether I wanted to go on a trip built around reading books, I probably would have looked at you like you were crazy. I could read at home! Why would I travel somewhere just to sit around reading?

Back then, I wanted to spend my time talking to people, exploring, and finding unexpected adventures. And to be fair, there’s still a big part of me that loves traveling that way.

But now, the thought of having uninterrupted time to read somewhere beautiful, followed by long conversations with people who get just as excited about books as I do? That sounds wonderful.

Sometimes the luxury is simply having the time and space to enjoy something I already love. I haven’t become less adventurous. What feels exciting to me has expanded.

A trip doesn’t have to challenge me in the same way it did when I was 35 to be worthwhile. Maybe I want to learn something, try something new, or laugh until my stomach hurts with people I’ve only just met. Or maybe I want someone to hand me a cup of coffee and tell me I don’t have to be anywhere for the next three hours. Both sound pretty good to me.

I think we sometimes get so attached to the idea of being a certain kind of traveler that we forget we’re allowed to change. You can love hiking through mountains and still want a week at the beach. You can be fiercely independent and still appreciate having someone else make the arrangements. You can love adventure and still want a vacation that asks absolutely nothing of you! And you don’t have to justify any of it.

So, What’s My Favorite Place?

I still can’t tell you. Even in my 20s, I tried breaking it into categories: my favorite place for mountains, my favorite beach, my favorite place for culture. As though enough categories would eventually produce an answer.

But I’ve accepted that I’ll probably never have a favorite place. The places we love have as much to do with who we are when we visit as where we actually go.

The trip that would have bored me at 32 might be exactly what I’m craving today. And the trip I loved at 22 might still be my first choice now, in my 40s. Neither version of me is a better traveler. I’m just not always looking for the same thing.

So ask me where I want to go next, and I might still struggle to answer. But ask me what kind of experience I’m craving?

Now that’s a conversation we can have for hours!

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Until next Sunday,
Lindsay