When Travel Stops Being Fun: The Burnout, the Break, and the Balance

[0:00] Hey everyone, and welcome back to another episode of Put the Guidebook Down, a Kultura Travel podcast with me, Kiara, the creator, as your host. And as you can see, we're kind of on brand and theme today, sporting one of my favorite flag sweatshirts that I have since we're going into the fall season.

But today's topic is going to be a little bit more of a serious topic, and maybe one that we don't necessarily talk about all the time, but one that we need to start bringing more attention to. Have you ever been traveling, and either for a short period of time or maybe a long period of time, really took a moment to be like, why am I not feeling as excited as I normally would to go on to the next destination or place? Have you ever been in your destination and been like, I'm kind of losing the magic of being in this moment? You're not alone.

This is what is called travel burnout, and what we're going to be talking about today. And it usually comes with those who are usually digital nomads constantly on the move, but it's really related to what we're passionate about and trying to draw attention to here at Kultura Travel, where you need to take a moment to slow down, reconnect to the purpose of why you're visiting, what you're doing, and to really immerse into the daily life of the location you're in. And that's back to the idea of cultural immersion and slow travel.

And this is why I started off by saying it's a topic that we need to draw more attention to, because we live in a very fast paced society these days where we're always chasing the next thing, the next destination, and maybe get hit with the call-out that, wow, you're tired, you're not enjoying where you are, in the sense that maybe you're spoiled or not grateful for the experience you're having. And that's not right to say, because everyone can experience burnout, and it's okay to recognize that you're experiencing burnout. It doesn't mean you're not being grateful for the destination that you're in, the experience that you're having. It's just your body telling you that you've reached your limits.

Today I want to talk about what happens when travel stops being fun, how to recognize it, why it happens, and how to get back to enjoying what you love and being present in the moment.

For those of you who have never heard about travel burnout, you may be wondering, what does that mean? What does it look like? Have I ever experienced it? There's a couple of key — I don't want to say symptoms, but general feelings that come with it. It's where you start losing excitement over maybe the place that you're currently in, or going on to the next thing. This is common when those are doing the whirlwind tour — maybe they're going to 10 countries in 20 days, and they're already on country three and dreading the next. That's just starting to feel a bit of the burnout.

Another feeling is when you're starting to feel detached, or just on autopilot. So you're like, I'm here, I paid the money, I did all the work to get here, so I must — must is the emphasis — start going to this key destination, this landmark, take the photo, oh, I probably should eat something. That's the autopilot that we can kind of fall into with burnout, just because we feel like that's what we're supposed to be doing, or have to be doing, with the travel.

The other one is that you begin skipping things, or opportunities for cultural engagement, or talking to locals or other people, just because it's starting to feel like work. Those are just some general feelings.

I will take this opportunity to share one of my moments, just because I was living abroad, I had the opportunity to travel to other countries from Moldova. There was one point where I was doing that kind of whirlwind tour, because I had X amount of time for a break in between teaching, and I wanted to go to all these destinations, and I figured, oh, might as well just do it all together, because it's cheap by bus to get to them, and I only have an X amount of time to do all of this. When's the next time I'm going to be able to do this opportunity? One of the things I started to notice is that this was a lot of fun, but A, I'm not really seeing or experiencing the places that I'm in, and B, it's kind of falling into a routine where you just wake up really early, get on the bus, sit on the bus for several hours, get into the next destination, have one quick walking tour, take photos, photos, photos, photos, and then you're back on the bus getting to the next destination. It felt very repetitive, and I felt at the very surface level like I wasn't actually visiting the places we were spending all this time to get to.

And I think one of the major moments for me that really sparked this idea of trying to explore more of the slow travel side is when I was actually in Spain with my colleague Mike a couple years ago, and he had come to Moldova. We did a whirlwind of Moldova for him, just because he had only a couple days there and I wanted to show him where I was doing my Fulbright, and the culture that I was really loving to be living amongst, and the people. But we did that, and then we went to Spain, and we did, again, a similar whirlwind, trying to do all the landmarks, try to experience as much as we could since we had a limited amount of time. We went from Barcelona to Valencia and then ended up in Madrid. And during that time, I was having a lot of fun — we were chatting with a bunch of people, trying to take those cultural moments. And then by the time we got to Madrid, I was tired to the point where I didn't want to associate with anyone in my hostel. Now, if you're not familiar with the hostel setup, it's usually very popular for backpackers, and the point of them is that you genuinely, A, want to meet people and fellow travelers, and B, it's also a cheaper accommodation alternative. But again, the main point is to meet people. Now, if you're feeling travel burnout, the last thing you want to do is walk into a hostel room where you're sharing with 10 to 15 other people, and everyone's going to start the typical hostel questions of, who are you, where are you from, how are you here, what have you done, blah blah blah. And you just want to sleep, just want to sit in silence.

And this indication started going for me to recognize that sometimes I just want to chill in the area that I'm visiting. So go to the cafe — as Mike had mentioned during his episode in Morocco, about just chilling in a cafe, sipping my coffee, people watching, and just being present in the moment and really taking it in, rather than going from one conversation to the next, one destination to the next.

And that's where I started to understand for me what travel burnout is, and what my travel limitations are, and why here we are with cultural travel, slow travel is very much more attractive to me as a traveler now. We see this a lot with travel influencers, content creators — they're always moving on to the next destination, going quick, very intense, filled moments, whether it's for their job, that's just how they like to travel. But there's a lot done in a short amount of time, and we tend to romanticize this idea of being able to reach X amount of countries in X amount of time. But exploration is still worth emotionally, physically, and mentally. That's why it's important to be aware that burnout is possible, to recognize it, and to start exploring this idea of what slow travel is and why it is necessary to incorporate into your travel itinerary.

My favorite thing is, if you've ever — and I'm sure you have — come back from a vacation and said, wow, I need a vacation for my vacation, really should start considering slow travel as an option, because you come back feeling refreshed and more deeply engaged with the place you visited.

So I started going into this a little bit, but you may be wondering, why does this exactly happen, what is the source, so then maybe I can avoid it, or be aware and in tune with my external factors and internal factors going on to create this burnout so I can avoid it. There are a couple different things to be aware of. So there are external pressures. What does this mean? We have social media, which is great in a lot of ways, but it also has a lot of cons to it, and I'm sure many people have had this debate around the impact of social media on emotional, mental health, and this idea of this external image that we create. And with social media, we feel this — for no reason, or maybe just the societal picture — just to feel perfect and create this perfect image of our lives. But that's where one of the external pressures comes from, to keep doing this content creation, pushing more content, keep moving from one destination into the next. It's this idea of creating a quote-unquote perfect social media profile and image for yourself, that you're living the best life possible, the most ideal life. And it's that keep-moving mentality, and it eventually does catch up with us. But that is one of the major external factors, especially with the rise of travel influencers that we're seeing.

Now the other problem is something that's a little bit more — you can manage the social media when you can, but it does take a lot of reflection in terms of how you want to portray yourself on social media, what social media means to you, etc. I'm going to leave the deep philosophical thoughts and reflections to you — we're not going to go into it on this episode.

But the other one is really overscheduling and lack of rest days. Yes, you are on vacation — then why do we feel the need to jam-pack our vacation schedules to do the most, when really we opted to go on vacation, take time off from work, to rest? The overscheduling is something we can work towards in order to find a more balanced scheduling, incorporate that slow travel aspect, and then really go deeper into the place that you're visiting.

Now, internal factors — there's the possibility of disconnection from your purpose. Why am I doing this again? I had that own moment personally where I was going through another journey, two, three weeks of travel back to back, and I was actually staying relatively in the same area. One of them was two and a half weeks in Romania — I didn't even leave the country, but I was going from a couple different cities to see some friends and try to reach destinations in Romania that I hadn't been able to in the past, because if you didn't know, Romania is actually a really big country. But I found myself on the train going from one side of Romania to the next, and I was thinking, why am I doing this again? Why am I sitting on the train for another nine hours to go to a city that I'm only going to spend two days in? Does the time and cost justify what I'm about to experience? Sometimes it does pay off, but sometimes the fatigue it creates takes away the joy from being at that end destination.

Another one is the loss of creativity, or creative fatigue. Now, this can, again, sometimes come from the external factors — I feel like this one's really related to the social media one — but if you're not feeling curious about what you're doing, where you are, what's going to happen in the place you're visiting, then you start to lose that curiosity and kind of go in on yourself. Then you're feeling the exhaustion more, or maybe even creating the exhaustion that wasn't there, just because you're creating in your mind the work of being in the moment or in that destination.

What does this mean, right? Tying it back to my conversation with Mike in the past two episodes, this idea of authentic travel and that flip side of it coming with the slow travel side — it all requires energy. Cultural travel isn't the easiest, it is the most meaningful and the most rewarding, but it does require that energy. This is why, with cultural travel, we're focused on the cultural travel element, but also this idea of slow tourism and immersing into the place, culture, and language that you're in. I find that slow travel and cultural travel are very much intertwined and really do go hand in hand.

Rather than focusing from the cultural travel side and trying to do all these different cultural elements, think about taking a breath and genuinely adding time for relaxation and rest to the vacation you took off to do, within your itinerary. There'll still be plenty of time to see, to experience, maybe to taste different elements of the places you're visiting. It's this idea of the intentional pause, right? So by slowing down, you're creating space to actually reflect, be present, and truly experience the place you're in. This is, I like to call, an intentional pause. Sometimes the most transformative trip isn't to another country. It's staying still in one place long enough to remember what ends up moving you in the end.

With slow travel, a lot of people tend to stay in one city or one town for the entire duration of their trip. Maybe they'll venture out because they feel moved to try a different dish that's known to that area, or they want to see the mountains, but that's because of the internal drive and what fulfills their cup with their travel, not the external influences that say, oh, I need to travel to the mountains because this travel influencer said so, or, if I don't go to the mountains, did I even visit the place I'm in? Those are external factors and influences that make us feel we have to travel in a certain way, but then we really don't need to. No one's telling us we have to travel this certain way — why are we creating that pressure and force on ourselves? Remember, you need to rest.

Now, say you're already traveling, you're watching this, you're like, oh my gosh, this is exactly what I'm feeling, it's called travel burnout, how do I reset from this? You can stay in one place for a little bit longer than you anticipated. I've met people who are feeling the travel burnout and they literally cancelled their train ticket just to stay an extra two or three days in the place they're in. Now, I'm not saying it has to be days — it could even be just a couple more hours, but just taking a moment to breathe and think about what you need. So think about soaking up the daily life of the place you're visiting rather than just sightseeing. And if this doesn't ring a bell to what I've said in my previous episodes about cultural travel, go back and take a look at what cultural travel means, but tied together.

Another way is to reconnect with the locals and community. Step outside your hostel or expat bubble. Go talk to your barista in the local cafe, talk to the waiter or waitress, just stop someone passing by you to ask a recommendation. Just those smaller conversations, to seek understanding and just give some kind of grounding to where you are, will go a long way.

The next one is really difficult — I'm going to say it, but consider spending time without your phone or camera. Now, this is really difficult, but again, it goes back to social media and how we have to take videos and photos of everything we do, everywhere we are. Again, why? We won't go down that — that's another deep conversation, maybe we can address it in another episode. But take a moment to put down the external factors. By having your phone, you're bringing those external factors and pressures to you in your trip. Take a moment to put it away, really sit, look around your surroundings, and be present in the moment. By putting the camera down, you're forcing yourself to not be that tourist, and to again take in the sights with your own eyes.

And the last one is something I always do as a traveler, and it's old fashioned, but it's journaling. Everyone likes this idea of travel journaling — people bring them, they don't start them. Take the time to actually sit down, open up the journal, and then reflect a little bit, or even revisit your previous travel notes. Just really think about what it means for you to be in this location, what you're doing, what you've accomplished — not in the sense of the checklist, oh I went here, X, Y, to Z, in this amount of time. Think about what you have accomplished. Who have you talked to? What have you learned? What reflections and connections are you drawing from this experience? Have you changed perspectives on anything at all? This is the deeper level of travel journaling — really reflect. And by taking the time to write in your journal, you're also putting the phone and camera away. This helps with resetting, clearing the mind, and giving more purpose and intention to what you're doing.

With all of this, right, how do you move forward now? I mentioned it at the beginning — there's a balance to everything. Cultural travel is not a checklist travel, it's not a cookie-cutter travel, it's not just slow travel — it's kind of an encompassment of all of this, in that you're really, at the end of the day, noticing the little things and enjoying where you are in the moment you're in. Again, immersing into the local environment and the destination. You're maybe going to notice a local's kindness, the smell from the cafe, maybe the laughter coming from the table next to you in the restaurant. It's just how you tune in to the present moment. How do you feel what you need and still accomplish what you came there to do on the travel, and leave refreshed and with a new perspective.

Slow travel can be one type of travel, in that you do go to a destination and only stay in one location — that is a part of slow travel, but it's not the only definition of slow travel. You need to figure out what it is that you're seeking in your travel, what you want to accomplish, what you want to feel, and then consider looking at the travel itinerary that you put together again and seeing maybe what you truly are excited for because you genuinely have interest in it. What's something that you know you're going to learn from during your visit? And then what are the items that you feel you have to put on your list because of external influences and forces? You don't have to see it all. You just have to be there for the part that makes you feel alive, that makes you feel that you truly engaged with the place you were in.

This is what I want to talk about. I started off by saying that I think we need to draw more attention to this: 110%, travel burnout is a thing. It is not being privileged. It's not being ungrateful for your experiences. It's just the fact that we are human. We do have limits. And we need to understand what our limits are by going back to our core values and trying to remove the external factors that sway how we perform, the decisions we make, how we want to experience something. Slow travel gives you the opportunity to do more of that reflection, and to be in a travel experience that's more geared to you, and all of what I just said.

Don't be afraid to acknowledge that you have experienced travel fatigue, maybe that you are experiencing it. The most important thing is to take a step back, try one of those resetting tasks or strategies I mentioned earlier, and recenter, refocus. Once you have that clarity, I'm going to suggest, how can you travel more deeply and more meaningfully with that? What aspects of cultural travel can you bring into that slow travel itinerary, or into your existing itinerary? Just breathe, be present, be centered.

Now, what I would like to know is, have you ever hit a point where you just needed a break from your travel? If you have, maybe if you haven't, how would you fall back in love again with traveling? Have you ever said that you need a vacation for your vacation? I would love to know, because this is something I have personally experienced, I know other travelers have experienced, and this is part of bringing clarity and light to this conversation, that people are not alone in this.

Now, as always, I want to thank you for joining us on another episode of Put the Guidebook Down. Be sure to check out our website for Kultura Travel and our channels. We have some really exciting new itineraries coming out — we are partnering with a couple other local travel agencies and companies who are also focused on eco travel, slow travel, and cultural travel. These are going to be very unique, specific experiences to help you travel more deeply, more meaningfully, and leave, again, refreshed, with a new perspective and a deeper understanding of yourself and the place you are in. Thank you so much, everyone. Bye.