“For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move.” – Robert Louis Stevenson


Why do we travel? Do we travel to to see new places, experience different cultures, taste new food or just to be? I guess there is no one answer which can exhaustively answer this seemingly innocuous question. All I know is I travel to because there is no experience like it. In fact, it is not something I choose to do, it is almost like a second skin, a reflex action, a necessity, a state of being if you will.

For me the best part about any trip (apart from the traveling that is) are the days leading up to it. The planning, preparing, reading. The excitement of it all is overwhelming. The impending (imaginary) kick to life in the city for some days of bliss. Of reading in quaint different cafés for hours at a stretch. Of trying out local delicacies which have an uncanny habit of surprising you. Of striking up (and sometimes getting drawn in) random conversations with eclectic strangers. Of trekking through unknown passes and crevasses not knowing where it leads (or if it even matters). Of ordering the last drink and watching the town getting lost in the night. I may paint it with an idyllic and messy brush, but you get the picture.

There exists a quiet unexplained aura behind traveling. More than a journey in the strict physical sense, it is journey of self-exploration (however cheesy that might sound!). In all sincerity I believe that you cannot truly know yourself unless you travel. And by 'travel', I do not refer to our desi-style of traveling as a big, bustling and boisterous group creating a ruckus everywhere with no space for introspection or self-discovery. Backpack. Take bare essentials. Pick a random destination. And just go. There is no better way.

What brings these seemingly random thoughts to my head today you might wonder? I am going to the Valley of Flowers this week. It has been there for long on my burgeoning travel list. The list is what keeps me going. The more I travel, I realize how much more lies out there. Because there is always another journey waiting in the wings to sweep you away.