Comments on: How to Choose the Right Destination

By: Erica Johansson

Erica Johansson — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 21:35:06 +0000

@Mark, Good tip for first time travelers! Whether they follow that advice or not might depend on how adventurous they are. I know one girl who had barely been outside Sweden who picked India as her first time abroad experience. But Norway, the UK, Denmark and other nearby countries are obviously way more popular among, at least, young Swedish travelers. And yes, attempting to see too much in a short time is not a good bet. During my first stay in Paris I tried to cover all the major sights in one day. Since then I’ve learnt that faster doesn’t equal better.

@C K and @Nomadic Matt, Same here! The travel sections in Borders, Barnes & Noble and Waterstone’s are all great ‘first steps’ before booking any trip. I won’t even mention how much time I’ve spent there researching trips and new destinations over the years.

@Charlotte, Budgeting can certainly be easy to put off, but it is a necessity – unless you want to wake up one morning and realize you only have $90 left in your account and 3 more days to spend at your destination before your booked flight departs (happened to me when I was 19 in NYC and didn’t know how to budget!) Suffice to say, I’m glad I finally learnt that working out a budget is well worth it in the end.

By: Charlotte

Charlotte — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 16:09:56 +0000

Hi Matt,

Good post (and well written Erica). Some really sound advice for travellers and especially for first time travellers. I think one thing a lot of people forget to do, is work out their budget and they just assume they’ll have enough money without actually knowing how much. Although budgeting can be scary, it really is a must.

Charlotte

OH Barcelona

By: NomadicMatt

NomadicMatt — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 15:02:04 +0000

@CK: Don’t worry! I’ve sat in barnes and nobles getting info from travel guides too

By: TravelPhilippines

TravelPhilippines — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 17:11:29 +0000

a very nice list. would be very helpful for first time traveler.

By: C K

C K — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 15:14:04 +0000

Thanks Erica (and Matt too) for the great post.

For us, we rely a lot on guide books. Call us cheapskate but we do browse quite a bit in the travel section in Borders before deciding on the destination (and which book to get of course!).

Safety is one primary factor for us. It would be pretty hard to to persuade us to go to a place if security is a concern. Like you mentioned, language is not so much as a problem – I rely quite a bit on hand gestures during a trip to the Italian countryside.

By: lakshmi

lakshmi — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 08:59:32 +0000

very helpful list…its imp to get the priorities right as they say

By: Mark H

Mark H — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 22:32:27 +0000

Nice summary. I think for first time travellers, they should select a more comfortable country – maybe one that speaks their language, maybe one that is culturally a little more similar and maybe one which has less challenges in terms of food quality and water. That let’s people get the hang of travelling before embarking on something more ambitious. One more point, trying to cover too much first time means frustrations at rushing and not seeing places properly.