Why do I bother travelling?

It's a question I have been asking myself the last few days and it isn't the first time. And it always arises when I am tired of the travelling, weary of the constant moving and drained by the constant stream of new impressions. The only difference is that normally I am able to travel for much longer before getting this feeling. I have only been away for three month and I am ready to go back to Europe, which to my luck I will also be doing very shortly. But why have I tired so quickly? Perhaps this is a more profound question. Is it my age? Or is it something else?

I have concluded it is partly because I have been travelling faster than usual, not only on this trip but on the last two trips and thus I am more weary at the end of them. Another reason I think has been the fact that I am travelling alone for prolonged periods of time, which nice as it can be at times also can drain you. It is nice to meet people and travel with them for a while, because it makes things easier. You have somebody to talk to, complain to and to take the load of always doing the bargaining and everything else that comes with the travelling. When you are with two or more you can take turns and it helps.

As for why I bother travelling? I do ask myself this question and than I think about it and I know the answer. Firstly while I am very ready to go home now and all I can think about is going home, at the same time as I think about how nice it will be to go home I am already making plans for my next trip. I haven't even finished this one and I am thinking about what to do next and how to do it!! And not just that, I look further forward, as far as five years ahead. And this I do so often it drives me crazy at times. It's a strange duality, at the moment I am loathing the travelling, but I am still thinking about my next trip. It's like with going on and off the beaten track. When I am of it, all I can think about is getting back on it and meeting the travelers, when I am on it, all I can think about is getting of it and losing those same travelers!! I often wonder if I am the only one who feels like this. I can't imagine a world in which I wouldn't or couldn't travel, and yet after just a few months on the road I just want to go home and do nothing. Where were the days that I could manage for a year without having this feeling? I guess, it is because of the location. There are few hostels here and so there is not as much chance or ease to meet fellow travelers as in Europe or Australia or S. America. Here you spend your nights in your own hotel room and to meet others you need to go to a popular restaurant or bar and put an effort into it. With my budget constraints I have not been doing much of going to traveler haunts, or bars, and so I am meeting fewer travelers and this seems to be taking its toll in the length of my travels.

So last night as I was contemplating this question and all the pros and cons, I looked at what I did since my last blog and I knew again why I loved the travelling so much. In the last ten or so days I have managed to finally get to see a one horned rhino, getting an adrenaline rush in the process; as after I took my photo I noticed that both my guides and Andy and Halley (with whom I was doing the jungle walk) were making a run for it. At that moment I remembered our guides words to us before we started off: "don't take a photo of the rhino if we come to close to it, just run!" And we were close! And I took a photo instead of running!! But run I did after that snap... And I survived it, because the rhino didn't charge.
I enjoyed the carnavalesque experience of the elephant safari, with about twenty other elephants, each with four tourists on it encircling the rhino's so we could get a good shot. It was more like being in a zoo!
I remembered the silence of Daman, a village from which to soak in views of the Himalayas. I didn't see them, but the village itself was so peaceful it was incredible. On a side note, my parents did manage to see the Himalayas from Daman back in 1969... It must be true what they say about everything being better in the past... Even the views!
I recalled the funky guesthouse I stayed at in Dhulikhel and the lovely walk I had in the surrounding hills.
I thought about the morning breakfasts on one of Bhaktipur's squares and seeing the locals perform their puja at the different idols scattered around the square, not skipping even the measliest, tiniest shrine, often no more than a corner stone or a slight inundation in a road with a small bell and something that is supposed to resemble one or another of the gods.
The jokes and fun I had with the street kids in Bhaktapur after they understood I wasn't going to give them sweets/bonbons/chocolates/schoolpens/schoolbooks/shampoo or rupees, came back to me. And how the initial crowd of them protected me against the further onslaught of more street kids, telling them to back off, even thought they were also just curious who this strange blond haired freak was who was having such fun with the others. And I remembered the other travelers I met and travelled with, even if it was short, and the locals I talked with and who invited me for dinner or a tea.
Finally the beauty of Patan and its Durbar square came back to me, the exquisite temples and the fine carvings.
I thought about it all and how this all happened in such a short period of time, how it would have been impossible for me to experience all this if I didn't do what I did. And this is one of the reasons I love travelling.

So I have concluded that I travel because I love going home, it has made me appreciate home and my loved ones more. I travel because I love the excitement of leaving home again, the trepidation of a new adventure waiting to happen, meeting new people, experiencing a new culture and just heading into the unknown. I travel because I love meeting other travelers and locals and exchanging experiences or stories. I travel because I love being alone, having an empty beach, an ancient ruin or a mountain vista all to myself. I fear I have become like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. It must be the clinical trials! My next one should definitely be for Schizophrenia!

But it actually all boils down to this. I travel because it makes me immensely happy. I am living my dream, not many people can say the same. And so I plod on and right now I am at the stage of loving and longing to go home, if only for a short while. It is just another part of travelling.

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Part of trip: The great journey east!

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