Holiday Memories: Could your favourite trips help you choose where to go next?
Stick with me on this one. It might just help you choose your next adventure. And if not, it's still quite good fun. When we think about where we'd like to travel next, we tend to look forwards. We search destinations, scroll through photographs, read recommendations and start compiling a list of places we'd like to see. But what if one of the best places to start is actually by looking backwards?
The travel experiences we remember most can reveal a surprising amount about what we really value when we travel.
The beach you can still picture. The meal you still talk about. The journey that was as memorable as the destination. The completely unexpected moment that could never have been planned. Look at enough of those memories together and patterns begin to emerge - the experiences, places and feelings we seem to seek out again and again.
So, we put it to the test and my husband and I decided to try it ourselves. We created a quick-fire list of questions in the Notes app, hit collaborate and answered them separately. No overthinking, no debating and definitely no trying to make our answers match.
Here's what we came up with:
|
Question |
Me |
Husband |
|
Most memorable beach |
Hyams Beach, NSW, Australia — white squeaky sand and barely anyone else there |
Aigua Blava, Spain — the epitomy of the Mediterranean, with sparkling waters |
|
Most amazing or memorable hotel |
Giggling Tree, Yangshuo, China — incredible food & views of the limestone pinnacles |
Laguna Lodge, Guatemala — access by boat on the stunning lake Atitlan |
|
Most memorable food |
Tuna sushi, Aitutaki, Cook Islands — huge portions, incredibly fresh, straight from the sea |
Beer snacks, Riga, Latvia — rye bread fried in oil with garlic dip. Went very well with beer. Should be sold in all pubs worldwide |
|
Favourite island |
Treasure Island, Fiji — beautiful in every way, but especially the locals and their singing |
Almost any island in Thailand — if I had to choose... I can't |
|
Most memorable journey |
Concorde, London to New York — a once-in-a-lifetime experience |
Driving the coast of Western Australia in a campervan — real freedom to go where we wanted with minimal planning |
|
Most memorable wildlife encounter |
Exmouth, Western Australia — a baby shark swimming alongside us as we walked the coast |
Tigers in India — we'd given up on seeing anything and then baby cubs appeared |
|
Most amazing skyline, sunset or stargazing |
Uluru, Northern Territory — the breathtaking moment it comes into view and the cultural significance you feel when you're there |
Wadi Rum, Jordan — endless dunes and red rock formations but when I think of stars, this was a showstopper |
|
Most unusual experience |
Mount Pacaya, Guatemala — walking up a volcano and getting close enough to the lava to feel intense heat |
Rat temple, India — a sacred place where rats are worshipped and cared for. Didn't stay too long |
|
Most memorable plane landing |
New York on Concorde — and the way it tilted to slow its speed on approach |
Aitutaki, Cook Islands — a tiny aircraft circling a small island surrounded by an amazing blue lagoon |
|
A tour you remember |
The Great Wall of China — walking the old section where the stones were still rugged, it was hard to navigate and there were far fewer people around |
Lombok to Flores, Indonesia by boat — great fun, with amazing sights I didn't expect along the way, including a stop at Komodo Island |
|
Most remote place you've been |
Mongolia — staying in a yurt where the only way to get around was on horseback |
Lake Baikal, Russia — the deepest freshwater lake in the world |
|
Most memorable country |
Australia — for so many things it's impossible to list them all! |
China — so much variety, from busy cities to incredible natural landscapes |
Once we'd finished, it was the reasons behind our choices that I found most interesting.
My memories took me from an almost-empty beach at Hyams Beach in Australia to a yurt in Mongolia; from flying Concorde into New York to feeling the heat from lava on Mount Pacaya in Guatemala.
On paper, there's very little connecting those experiences. Look a little closer, though, and there is. Space. Nature. A sense of discovery. Extraordinary landscapes. Experiences that feel particular to a place. And quite often, the journey itself being part of the adventure.
Jon's choices had their own pattern.
He remembered driving the coast of Western Australia for the freedom of going wherever we wanted with very little planning. Seeing tiger cubs in India after almost giving up on seeing anything. A boat journey through Indonesia for all the extraordinary things we came across that he hadn't expected to see.
And, importantly, fried rye bread and garlic dip in Riga because apparently it should be available in every pub in the world.
Freedom, spontaneity, surprise and the stories that came from them seemed to run through many of his choices.
Then came our final question: Where would you most like to visit next?
Without seeing each other's answer, we'd both written the same thing. Japan.
Perhaps that isn't a coincidence. They tell us something about the environments, experiences and feelings we're drawn towards — and can be a surprisingly useful starting point for imagining somewhere new. So before searching Where should I go next?, try asking yourself something different:
What have I loved most about the places I've already been - and why?
Take the questions from our table and answer them quickly. Don't think too hard about what your answer should be. Write down the first memory that comes to mind. Most importantly, add a few words about why you chose it. Then look at your answers together. Maybe you keep choosing places that gave you space. Perhaps it's food and people that stay with you. You might remember the journeys more vividly than the destinations, or find that your favourite experiences are the ones you never saw coming.
There doesn't need to be one neat answer. But you might be surprised by the pattern.
And perhaps, somewhere in those memories, you'll find a clue to where you'd love to go next.
