Written by: Veerle Beelen, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Whether it’s for business, family visits, or to have some time off from our busy lives, we all travel for different reasons.
When the pandemic hit and the borders shut down, our realization of the important role travel plays in our lives grew since we couldn’t have it anymore. It is expected that once we can all travel the world again, people will be looking for more authentic travel experiences that will have a positive impact on both their own lives and the places they travel to. This will not only affect where we travel to, but mostly why and how we want to travel in the first place. Innovation, preferences for more sustainable travel options, and support from travel experts, like travel coaches, will shape these travel trends.
10 Travel Trends That Will Change The Way We Travel
1. Slow Travel
No more dealing with FOMO or “travel burnout.” This type of travel is all about slowing down and being more in the present moment. Instead of ticking off a bucket list and trying to see as many places as possible, you immerse yourself in one place for a longer time to connect with its culture, food, music, and local community—the focus shifts from quantity to quality. Further, Slow travel provides more opportunities to support and connect with the local travel industry, which the lack of tourists has severely impacted.
2. Transformative Travel
Transformative travel focuses on traveling with purpose and creating experiences that align with your goals, lifestyle, and personality. Travelers don’t want to travel just as an escape from their daily lives and be a tourist. Travel becomes a tool for self-reflection, personal growth, and fulfillment. Transformative travel experiences have a long-lasting effect on your life in ways that you perhaps couldn’t even have imagined before going on the trip. It’s about becoming more open-minded to new experiences that can change you on a deeper level.
3. Wellness Travel
Wellness Travel is all about personal wellbeing during your travels. It can help reduce any negative effects that travel can have on your health, like jetlag or ‘travel fatigue,’ and as a tool for relaxation, rejuvenation, self-healing, fitness, or maintaining a healthy lifestyle while traveling. Not only are spa retreats part of Wellness travel, but you could also think about culinary experiences, cultural traditions and ceremonies, exercise outdoors, and natural resources, like hot springs and mud baths. The focus on personal wellbeing can be integrated with every part of your trip. From the type of transportation you choose, to finding specific wellness-centered accommodations or spending more time in nature.
4. Domestic Travel
When borders closed down, people were still looking for ways to escape their daily life and explore. People started to appreciate their local surroundings more, and were finding new ways to enjoy the things that often feel so familiar and might often be forgotten in our daily lives. A part of domestic travel is connecting with local people and enriching your understanding of local life. Post-COVID, some travelers may prefer visiting one place and staying in this small bubble over spending time in many different or faraway places due to health and safety measures.
5. Sustainable Travel
This type of travel focuses on protecting our planet, using eco-friendly ways of transportation, and reducing the footprint we leave behind in the places we visit. It’s also about finding ways for tourism to cause the least possible harm to nature and culture and, instead of causing negative effects, trying to bring benefits to the environment and natural resources. When the world shut down, we saw nature recovering due to the lack of pollution caused by daily commutes and travel. However, it’s not only about the choices we make in terms of transportation. It also concerns how we spend our time at our travel destination. For example, choosing more environmentally conscious options in terms of accommodation and activities and being mindful of how we can support the local communities.
6. Technology & Travel
New technologies in the travel industry can help improve travelers' customer experience, satisfaction, and confidence, find ways to make travel more sustainable, and connect consumers to their surroundings. Think about virtual reality (VR) to connect you to a destination before visiting or new applications and devices that make traveling more efficient and comfortable. Innovations can also help travel more responsibly in terms of health and safety and personalize travel experiences even more.
7. Remote Work & Travel
The rise of the digital nomad already started before the pandemic. However, when everyone started to work remotely in 2020, the trend of working from anywhere became more mainstream. People will be looking for more opportunities to combine their work with their travels and have more flexibility on where and when they want to work. Remote work is not limited to backpackers with a laptop lifestyle who want to explore the world. More passionate travelers and professionals will want to combine their vacations with working remotely to spend more time at their travel destination instead of spending 5 days per week in the office or working from home.
8. Staycation
Related to domestic travel, but even closer to home. Staycations have become more popular when we couldn’t go anywhere else. People who have been missing traveling have been finding creative solutions to have a vacation feeling in their own backyard. This also comes with appreciating the little things in life and the simple pleasures, like nature and relaxation. It’s a realization that you don’t have to go far to spark your wanderlust.
9. Family/Group Travel
When the borders closed, families and partners living in different countries got separated for a long time. Even within the same country, people could not always visit their families and friends anymore due to restrictions. People who have been in one of these situations will first of all use travel to visit their loved ones and reunite again after a long time. Besides that, people want to organize group trips with their friends or family, not only to stay in their familiar bubbles but mostly to bond with each other and spend some well-needed quality time together.
10. Travel Coaches
More travelers are looking for the ‘why’ of travel first instead of the ‘where.’ When you want to have more personalized experiences that are not just about a destination but have a deeper purpose, a Travel Coach can support you. Travel coaching offers travelers tools to include more self-reflection, personal development, fulfillment, and meaning to their travel experiences. However, Travel coaches are not the same as Travel agents. Instead of focusing on the more practical parts of your trip, they will guide you on creating travel experiences that align with your personal life goals. A Travel Coach keeps you accountable before, during, and after the trip and offers tools to personalize your travel experiences. Travel can have a life-changing impact while creating more purposeful, meaningful, and authentic travel experiences.
Veerle Beelen, Executive Contributor, Brainz Magazine
Veerle Beelen is an Internationally recognized Certified Travel Coach. As a Travel Coach she empowers travelers to have transformative travel experiences and to focus on their “Travel Mindset”. Her goal is to help expats and other travelers transform their personal lives and careers through their travel experiences, guide them through the preparation process of moving abroad and coach them through the transition process of living in a new country. Besides that, Veerle inspires people to use travel as a tool for personal growth, self-awareness, reflection and to boost their overall wellbeing. She has been featured in various online media publications and guides her clients during their journey through her eBook, blog, online videos, articles and personalized coaching sessions.
