The best thing you can bring home from your travels is memories that will last a lifetime. Souvenirs are a fun way to commemorate a big trip — but there’s nothing material that can compare to the experiences themselves. One of the best ways to remember your trip and relive each special detail is to keep a travel journal. Rick Steves, renowned travel expert, always writes in a journal during his adventures abroad. Over the course of his long life, his journals have become one of his most cherished keepsakes.
During summer 1969, when Steves was just 14 years old, he traveled to Europe for the first time with his parents. That trip ended up shaping the course of his entire life, because it was then that he first fell in love with travel. Around the same time, his love for journaling was born. “On my first trip to Europe … I collected and logged my experiences in a file of a hundred postcards, each numbered and packed with my notes,” he wrote in a blog post entitled, “The Zen of Travel Journaling” which is posted on his website.
After that first trip, he never stopped writing about his travels. For Steves, chronicling his adventures blossomed into a lucrative career. He’s published around 100 guidebooks, and many of them are bestsellers. You don’t have to be an aspiring travel writer in order to benefit from keeping a journal during your trips abroad. Even if you haven’t written more than a email or grocery list since your school days, journaling will allow you to keep your travel memories close long after your trip comes to an end.
A travel journal makes the perfect souvenir
Studies show that keeping a journal can be wonderful for mental health, but when it comes to travel journaling, the real magic happens months and years after your pen leaves the page. When you return to your journal to re-read what you’ve written, it can feel as though you have been transported back in time.
Suddenly, you can almost taste that bowl of pesto spaghetti you enjoyed in Italy. You can once again smell the scent of tropical flowers that lingered in the thick humid air on your trip to Costa Rica, or hear the sounds of the busy streets of London. There’s no better souvenir than one that allows you to relive your trip again and again. Plus, a travel journal is an excellent budget-friendly souvenir.
As Steves so eloquently wrote, “Without capturing your thoughts on paper (or on your laptop or tablet), the lessons of travel are like shooting stars you just missed … and butterflies you thought you saw.” He’s right. Science suggests journaling can actually help improve long-term memory, even without re-reading what you’ve written. If you want to remember a particular experience in vivid detail, write it down. “Collecting intimate details on the road, and then distilling them into your journal, sharpens your ability to observe and creates a keepsake you’ll always cherish,” Steves wrote. Journaling is something he does on every trip.
Tips for creating a journal that will serve as a keepsake and an heirloom
