Travel
Discover facts about travel. Small discoveries that change the way you see familiar things.
Travel
Three explorers crossed Antarctic winter to bring back penguin eggs
In 1911, Edward Wilson, Henry Bowers and Apsley Cherry-Garrard sought emperor penguin embryos for research on bird development. They collected five eggs after…
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Orient Express passengers were told to pack revolvers
The train crossed the bandit-infested Balkans, so its founder, Georges Nagelmackers, advised wealthy passengers on the 1883 inaugural trip to bring revolvers.
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A double-decker bus carried travelers from London to Kathmandu
Topdeck's company history records a bus called Grunt making that overland journey in 1975. The vehicle turned a familiar piece of British public transport…
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A medieval monk thought unfinished things had more life
In Essays in Idleness, the Japanese monk Kenkō praised worn objects and incomplete collections. Leaving something unfinished, he suggested, gives it room to…
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A giant eye advertised a fair about the human body
Franz von Stuck's striking eye poster promoted Dresden's 1911 International Hygiene Exhibition. The event drew more than five million visitors to displays on…
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Butter royalty sold colonialism at Wembley
The 1924 Wembley Exhibition featured a life-size butter statue of the Prince of Wales as part of an imperial-themed spectacle that drew millions of visitors.
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The first Disneyland Hotel was not owned by Disney
Jack Wrather developed the hotel in 1955 under an agreement to use the Disneyland name. Disney acquired it in 1988 as part of its purchase of the Wrather…
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Folding scooters were around a century before rental apps
The early Autoped had a motor and a steering column that folded down for storage. A surviving 1918 example shows the compact-transport idea in recognizable…
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Japan's “Youth 18” pass has no age limit
Despite its name, the Seishun 18 pass has no age limit. It offers cheap travel on slow local trains, making it appealing to older travelers with time to spare.
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Why Europeans once couldn't buy Eurail passes
Launched in 1959, the Eurail pass was designed for visitors from outside Europe; European residents couldn't buy it.
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Couchsurfing began with a student database hack
In 1999, after finding a cheap flight to Iceland, founder Casey Fenton hacked into the University of Iceland’s student database and emailed 1,500 students…
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Pilgrims carry a passport that records the journey itself
On the Camino de Santiago, travelers collect stamps in a credential at stops along the route. The stamped record helps demonstrate the journey completed when…
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How Japan's rail pass subsidized foreign tourists
The pass let tourists ride expensive bullet trains for far less than regular fares. Japan Railways raised its price by as much as 70% in 2023.
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Spain preserves a road network built for migrating livestock
The country's traditional livestock routes extend roughly 125,000 kilometers. Their history includes the Mesta, the powerful sheep owners' association that…
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Why ancient Maya threw offerings into sinkholes
The ancient Maya saw cenotes as portals to Xibalba, the underworld, and as stops on pilgrimage routes. During droughts, offerings to the gods included jade,…
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Why flying to India once meant crossing the desert
Imperial Airways’ Cairo-to-Karachi route took several days in unpressurized planes, with freezing, noisy flights and emergency stops at desert forts when…
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Yellowstone visitors once cooked fish without taking them off the hook
At Fishing Cone, anglers caught fish in the cold lake and lowered them into a nearby hot spring to cook. The novelty became a tourist ritual. The practice is…
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London's first commemorative plaque outlived neither the house nor itself
The Society of Arts put up a plaque at Lord Byron's birthplace in 1867, but the building was demolished in 1889. A plaque to Napoleon III from the same…
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The singer who disguised herself to enter Tibet
In 1924, 55-year-old French explorer Alexandra David-Néel disguised herself as a Tibetan pilgrim, smearing her face with soot and wearing a necklace of human…
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Sybille Bedford wrote about wine, roads and chaos
In the ration-starved years after World War II, Bedford traveled through Mexico and Southern Europe, writing about wine, three-hour lunches, terrible roads…
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Travelers were publishing their itineraries long before travel blogs
William Bray's 1778 tour of Derbyshire and Yorkshire turned a journey through English counties into a book others could read. Such accounts let readers…
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South Africa's Blue Train puts a bathtub on rails
Luxury suites on the Blue Train include a private bath, letting guests soak while the landscape moves past. Fitting a hotel bathroom into a carriage means…
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The festival railway built to lift Britain's spirits
The 1951 Festival of Britain used temporary railways to move visitors around its London pleasure gardens, part of a bid to lift spirits in a country still…
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Monetizing damp wilderness via strict hiking schedules
When the Milford Track opened, guided walking routes turned rugged wilderness into a managed tourism itinerary, with hikers reaching a dry bed by sunset.
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