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Travel local: How you can see your city the way travelers do
There’s nothing like travel to open your mind.
It exposes you to new people, places and experiences that can leave a lasting impression long after the trip is over.
"But a meaningful experience doesn't necessarily have to be an experience which is far away and completely new,” said Dr. Andrew Stevenson, a professor of Psychology at Manchester Metropolitan University in the United Kingdom. He literally wrote the book on “The Psychology of Travel.“
You can find enriching experiences anywhere, including your own town, if you approach it with the same attitude as you would travel. Here’s how.
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Think like a traveler
When you’re at home, it’s easy for your world to feel small with the same day-to-day routines. Part of the appeal of travel is going somewhere new or at least different.
“There's elements of discovery, and some of the sort of more everyday things become interesting or exciting and and that helps also to create memories,” said Dr. Stephen Pratt, professor and chair of the Department of Tourism, Events, Entertainment and Attractions at the University of Central Florida. He also co-runs the YouTube channel Travel Professors. “Even things like, OK, what are we going to eat for breakfast or what are we going to have for lunch? That becomes a decision, rather than sort of a non-decision or a habit that we might have.”
Because travel is limited in nature, travelers often try to make the most of their time in a destination, but that intentionality can also be applied at home.
“A lot of the things we think, OK, we'll do it later. We'll check out that restaurant later, we'll go to that attraction. We've got forever or an indefinite time period,” he said. “But you know, if we make a concerted effort to change this mindset and to plan for visiting local attractions, then we can see even see our home, our place, in a different light.”
What to do
“It's an interesting activity to actually behave like a traveler in your own city,” Stevenson said.
Here’s how to find events and experiences near you:
Check your city’s tourism bureau website for local attractions and upcoming events. These aren’t just for tourists.
Search by city on Pinterest. The company tells USA TODAY many users start with general travel ideas, seeking inspiration on destinations and activities before narrowing down itineraries.
Look your city up on Tripadvisor and filter by “Things to Do” and “Restaurants.”
Use Facebook’s Events feature to find events near you.
Search “Things to do near me” on Google or your favorite search engine.
Ask ChatGPT or your preferred AI tool about things to do in your city, but take recommendations with a grain of salt because they may not always be realistic.
“Relatively speaking, most people are quite ignorant about a lot of the things that are within 50 miles of where they live,” Stevenson said. “You can still have a sense of wonder and discovery and immersion, even when relating to places that are relatively close.”
Perhaps it’s a part of town you’ve never really spent time in or type of food you’ve never tried or a cultural festival celebrating a heritage different from your own. It doesn’t have to cost much.
“You can do your own picnics and experience some things, like if it's market day or if it's a free concert or community event. I think there are great idea, inexpensive things to do that just transport you away from the every day,” Pratt said.
What’s old is new
You could revisit places you haven’t been back to in a while.
“If you went there as a child, it's going to be a totally different experience when you go there as an adult,” Pratt said. “I'm talking about things like museums or sort of educational attractions that sometimes when you're a kid can be a bit of a chore ... but, when you make that purposeful choice, you enjoy it a lot more, and you pick up a lot of small things that you may not have remembered before.”
That can be true for anywhere. Stevenson explained the 20th century French literary travel philosophy of psychogeography posited that travelling on the same path twice never leads to the same experience because other variables are ever changing. Basically, it’s about the journey, not the destination. It encourages traveling locally, slowly, and in detail.
“The opposite of that, I suppose, is flying long haul to a place which is designed for people who are flying that far, and therefore it's almost made to look like a place that's familiar to you,” he said. “A lot of travel destinations are sort of commodified, aren't they, to make the traveler feel comfortable and almost to stop them exploring anything that's outside their comfort zone.”
What not to do
Pratt suggests stepping outside that comfort zone locally once a month or so.
"It's really unrealistic to be doing it you know every week or every weekend," he said, but it does require some commitment. “Otherwise, like I said, we get into our usual sort of stuff that we might do on the weekend, you know, sleep in and whatever. We have to do housework, of course, but you still got to plan and make time for it, so I think it's an attitudinal type of thing.”
An attitude of openness is also important as you approach these new experiences.
"We’re almost obliged to feel that we've got to rate every experience from five stars to one star,” Stevenson said. “Actually the mindful traveler is encouraged to engage with an environment, but not come to a decision about whether it's good or not because I think we all know that every place has got something interesting about it.”
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Miss travel? How to see your city in a new light
