Slow Travel and the Value of the Journey

 “These days, people talk too much

Can't say no, get caught up in the come and go

Untether from that restless soul, and take it slow.”

 

The Satellite Station, Slow

 

Why We Chose Slow Travel

 

As a student in the 1990s, I watched many of my classmates approach schoolwork with a singular set of goals in mind: getting the grade, meeting the requirement, and excelling in our courses. Cliff Notes and study guides were passed around like cheat sheets - shortcuts to essays, summaries of classic novels, and bullet-pointed histories that stripped away the struggle in favour of speed so we could go out to the movies with our friends or on a date with someone we liked.

 

I’ll admit, I used them too. But not until after I had read the novel.  I wrestled with Shakespeare’s unfamiliar turns of phrase or puzzled my way through Roman timelines. For me, those condensed notes weren’t a replacement for the journey - they were a compass to help orient me after I’d already gotten a little lost in the material. I wasn’t trying to skip the experience. I was trying to understand it more fully – and, admittedly, get an A grade.

 

Fast forward a few decades, and the world has changed dramatically. Cliff Notes and SparkNotes have been replaced by a suite of digital tools – Wikipedia, Google summaries, YouTube videos, TikTok micro-lectures, and now, AI websites like ChatGPT. The technology is different, but the impulse remains the same: What’s the fastest way to get what I need to know without doing most of the work?

 

The Age of Instant Answers

 

As bloggers, we see the same phenomenon play out in a different arena. Nearly every time we post a new blog series - whether it’s a pilgrimage across Spain, a railway journey through Canada, a sailing voyage across the Atlantic, or a multi-year trek along the Trans Canada Trail - the analytics tell the same story.

 

Two blog entries are read far more than any others:

1. “About the Journey” – our overview or our notes on planning
2. “Reflections on the Journey” – our conclusion, reviewing the experience

These entries are, in a sense, the Cliff Notes of the adventure. They’re quick windows into the essence of the experience. They let readers know what to pack, how long it takes, what it costs, and what we think we “got out of it.” Sometimes people read these and take the dive to read more of our travels. 

Most of the time, they don’t.

 

And while these entries are useful - and we’re grateful that people find them helpful - they’re also a reflection of a broader shift in our culture and in ourselves.

 

Skimming the Surface of Experience

 

We live in a time of unprecedented access to information, but it often feels like we’re trading depth for convenience. We’re becoming consumers of experience rather than participants in life.

 

More and more, it seems that people watch the documentary instead of walking the path. They scroll through travel instagram posting rather than sitting with their feet in a cold mountain stream. They want the summary, the listicle, the “Top 10 Must-See” spots - not the sore legs, missed trail markers, or moments of awe that come unplanned and unscheduled.

 

This isn’t just true in education or travel. It’s across everything in our lives and society. And it's seeping into how we think about time, meaning, and growth.  Marshall McLuhan once observed, “we shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us.”  Very true.

 

We’ve built lives around schedules and efficiencies - work hours, meal prep windows, push notifications, and algorithmic “you might also like” suggestions. We are conditioned to seek what’s relevant, ranked, and recommended. But what happens to the irrelevant, the unexpected, the things we only notice when we’re willing to be still?

 

The Immeasurable Value of the Experience

 

Long-distance journeys teach you something that the instant-solution world often forgets: struggle has value. Getting lost has value. Not knowing, sitting with questions, fumbling through a foreign language, learning by doing - these things shape us.  And they all have value.

 

Put another way, lived experiences, whether good or bad, teach us and have value.

 

In the same way that reading Macbeth in full teaches more than memorizing key quotes, walking the Via de la Plata or hiking the Bruce Trail from end to end or crossing a continent on the Trans Canada Trail offers something that a guidebook or travel summary cannot. You come to understand the landscape not just as a backdrop, but as a force that shapes both the journey and the traveller.

 

Choosing to slow travel is to actively engage in the process of taking your time and taking in the experience.  It asks you to be present for more than just the Instagrammable moments and selfies. It calls you to notice the birdsong at sunrise, the blister forming under your heel after a day of hiking, and the taste of cold water after a hard climb.

 

It asks you to show up, not just pass through.

 

From Cliff Notes to Compass Bearings

 

We don’t share these reflections to judge those who prefer to skim. We understand the impulse - we’ve all been students racing a deadline, or travellers with only five vacation days. But we also feel compelled to speak for the value of not rushing through it. To reaffirm the importance of reading the whole book, of walking the full trail, of taking the long slow way there.

 

Because in the end, it’s not just about “getting the answer”, or knowing the top lessons learned, or about getting the Compostela in Santiago.  It’s about the transformation that happens on the way to finding it.

 

So whether you’re reading this from the comfort of your couch or scrolling through blogs to plan your next adventure, we invite you to consider the journey as more than a checklist.

 

Because sometimes, the lessons we truly need to learn can’t be summarized - they can only be lived once you have walked out the door.

 

And that is why we have hiked across entire countries, entire continents, and why this year we are sailing….oh yes, sailing…across the Atlantic Ocean.  Because the experience of slow travel matters.

 

“...there will be hardships along the way, and we are not guaranteed to succeed...”

Abby Barnes, WILD