This question came in response to a comment I made on Sharon Astyk’s page, saying I travel by train 16 hours each way to see my family once a year. I commented:
“Air travel is so utterly miserable. I don’t understand how so many people put up with it. I’m happy to sit on Amtrak for 16 hours once a year to go visit my siblings. OK, it’s 16 hours each way, but I’m still fine with it.”
Which prompted someone to ask me:
“Is that the only time/place you travel?”
My reply to the person’s question:
Nowadays yes. I mean, I go on some occasional short trips within my state and region, but the annual trip to see family is my only super long distance one.
For a variety of reasons.
I have been very fortunate in my life. I got to travel when I was younger, and because the experiences were so rich (such as getting to travel around England, Scotland, and Wales for 5 weeks in the 1980s; and getting to live in Japan for 5 years in the 1990s), they went a long way and I am satisfied.
Before that, as a child, I grew up in the military family so we moved every couple of years. My parents took the opportunity to take us camping in many national parks and state parks all over the country when we would be moving from one assignment to the next.
As a climate activist, I am keenly conscious of the footprint of my past travel. And so I feel it’s my duty to leave it to the younger people, and to other people who have never had a chance to travel.
Fortunately I really love my adopted home place.
And I added another comment later on the same thread:
If I liked the area where my family lives, I would probably move there to live closer to them. And I may do that someday. [Note, the cost of living there is really high though.]
But I really love the place where I have made a home. There’s a really beautiful community here.
I did used to live twice as far away from my family, but I decided to at least move to the same coast of the USA as them. Did that 14 years ago and here I am.
If there were a really good network of walking paths and cycling paths, I would probably be very happy to take a very very long time on my trips to see them. Maybe nine days each way by bicycle, or 40 days each way on foot. My work is portable. But right now the safe network of paths does not exist.
(The original post on Sharon’s page was sharing a post by a person who says they’re happy to sit on a train for many hours, even though it takes so much longer than air travel. That they enjoy watching scenery and being able to get up and walk around, etc.)
PS. Although my assertions of finding air travel miserable are 100% true, there is an additional reason why I assert my dislike. I’m trying to emphasize the cramped drudgery of air travel to see if I can nudge more people to rethink hopping on airplanes. A little behavioral-economics experiment.
As I’ve said before on this blog and in various public forums, it’s not just about wanting to avoid the ecological impact. It’s about wanting to minimize my contribution to the destruction of other cultures, communities.