Why Rick Steves wants Americans to travel more

BBC News

a day ago

Ironically, I've often found that it's in the moments when I need a vacation the most that it feels the least appropriate to pack a bag and take one.
Being a journalist, I've covered everything from political crises to economic turmoil – and that's just in the last few months, let alone the last few years. As I read through the panoply of headlines showing how tense the world is at this moment, I often find myself asking, "Is taking my family on a trip really the best thing to do right now?" Somehow, a holiday seems wrong, even frivolous.
But maybe that's the wrong attitude.
I recently spoke with travel writer Rick Steves, who told me that travel is actually more important than ever during moments of global tension. He sees travel as a way for people – Americans, especially – to bolster their sense of understanding of the people and the world around them.
It's a provocative thesis – and one that has already changed my outlook on what it means to be a traveller in 2025.
You can watch – or read – more of our conversation below.
Below is an excerpt from our conversation, which has been edited for length and clarity.
Katty Kay: We're living in a moment that seems particularly stressful and difficult. I imagine some people might think travel is the last thing they want to add to their plate and that it's a bit indulgent, maybe even frivolous. Why would you still encourage Americans to travel, even today?
Rick Steves: It's more important for Americans to travel right now than it ever has been. We're a frightened society and the most frightened people are the people with no passports, whose worldview is shaped by fear-mongering commercial TV news.
As a traveller, I have spent 100 days a year ever since I was a kid overseas and working on my travel writing. I know that the flip side of fear is understanding. We gain understanding when we travel. If everybody travelled before they voted, the United States would be in a much different situation right now.
KK: A lot of people are anxious about the world at the moment, whether it's about things like climate change or wars around the world. What is it specifically about travel that is so important in these moments?
RS: When we travel, we get to know the enemy. The most interesting book I ever wrote was called Travel as a Political Act. Half of that book is taken from experiences I had travelling in places my government doesn't want me to go: Palestine, Cuba, Iran.
Americans don't realize that the number-one destination in the Caribbean for German and Canadian vacationers is Cuba. Americans can't believe that the Lonely Planet guidebook to Cuba is a very good-selling book for that publisher, because we didn't think anybody goes to Cuba.
If more people travelled, we'd understand that everybody's had their challenges and we can just realise the world's filled with good people. It's filled with joy and love. There's a few bad apples and a few complicated things and there's some serious problems, but we can aspire to get to know people instead of building a wall and hiding behind it.
People are what carbonate the travel experience. My takeaways from countries like Iran, Palestine and Cuba are endearing moments with beautiful people. People are living in very difficult situations when they live without democracy and freedom. We're seeing right now in the news in all these countries that there are real people that want real freedoms and real civil liberties.
They have real economic challenges that if you didn't travel, you'd hardly be able to empathise with. Do you really want to learn about the realities of this planet? Or would you rather just stay home and go to a barbecue with your privileged friends? It's a choice you have in your life.
KK: Has travel ever made you less happy?
RS: It's burdened me with realities that maybe it would be easier not to know, as a caring citizen of this planet as well as an American. And I'm thankful for that, because I don't want to go to my grave just with a bunch of beer-commercial kind of experiences. I want to have made a difference and do the best I can to help this world live together as it should and can: peacefully.
KK: It sometimes seems to me that just as important as travelling itself is what you can bring back to your country. Is that that Pollyanna-ish of me or does that resonate?
RS: Not at all. The best souvenir you can take home is a broader perspective. A good traveller won't see culture shock as something to avoid. That's sort of the default: help me escape culture shock. Culture shock is a constructive thing. It's the growing pains of a broadening perspective and it needs to be curated. That's what I do as a tour guide and a travel writer. I curate culture shock.
I just love the thought that when we get out of our comfort zones and travel, we have a broadening perspective. That's the beautiful thing about travel – and a lot of people miss it entirely. They're just on the beach. They've changed the weather, but they haven't changed the culture. That's a vacation.
There's three kinds of travellers: tourists, travellers and pilgrims. The default is just to be a tourist and focus on little fun stuff. That's seeing the road as a playground, and that's okay. But I like to also see the road as a school – that would be the traveller. And I like to see the road as a church or a mosque or a synagogue. That would be the pilgrim.
I like to mix those three things together, and not just to be a hedonist and not just to be a monk, but to be thoughtful, to be spiritual, to be poetic, to be having fun with nature and meeting new people and drinking new drinks. That's just what really carbonates the whole experience.
KK: You mentioned fear earlier. Has there been any time that fear has stopped you from travelling somewhere?
RS: Sure! I'm afraid to go to North Korea. I'd never go there. There's smart fear: I don't want to get sick. I don't want to get mugged. I don't want to be caught in a war. I don't want to be cowering in a little corner with a bunch of people trapped in a nightmarish travel experience. I'm not that bold. I'm not a thrill-seeker in my travels.
I just want to get out of my comfort zone. A lot of people ask me what my favourite country is. And I always write about Europe, since Europe is my beat. But I surprise them when I say India. I just find India really rearranges my cultural furniture. It wallops my ethnocentricity, and it reminds me that we Westerners are not the norm. That's a very cool part of travel.
The world's not a pyramid with the United States on top and everybody else trying to figure it out.
KK: What has travel taught you about America that you might not have known if you hadn't travelled as much as you have?
RS: There's lots of things. My parents taught me the work ethic. It was presented to me as "the" work ethic. You work hard. And I've travelled around the world and I realised there are different work ethics – and that's okay. Some people have a better balance in their life. Some people take a break when they want to take a break. Some people don't work when the sun's out, even though that would be better from a productivity point of view. It's a choice you make. Those kinds of things are exciting.
KK: Rick, a conversation that wasn't around when you or I were teenagers is obviously climate change. I'm wondering whether the whole concept of climate and travelling at a time of climate change has changed at all the way you think about your own travel.
RS: Well, I'm not going to be flight shamed out of my travels, but I am going to ethically mitigate the carbon I create when I fly. I'm going to travel in a way that minimises my carbon footprint. I'm going to travel in a way, hopefully, that maximises the positive results of my travel, which is becoming a citizen of the planet.
I take 30,000 people to Europe on our tours every year and our government's never going to be this ethical, but as an ethical businessman, I need to pay for my cost of goods sold.
30,000 people contribute $30 each. That's $900,000. Round up to one million dollars. I have a self-imposed carbon tax of a million dollars a year that I invest in a portfolio of 10 non-profit organisations that help farmers in the global south do their work while contributing less to climate change.
But then the flip side of that coin is also to travel in a way that gets you out of your comfort zone so you will come home with a broader perspective. That's the beautiful souvenir that we need more than ever right now.
If our travels can save us from one needless war, that's going to do a lot to cut back on heartache and the pollution of this planet. And that's a good thing.
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