Travel Research

In a previous post, I described my ideal trip … or rather, my lack of desire to go somewhere specific. To think of how I might prepare myself before the trip to God only knows where is hard for me. 1) Leaving on a whim doesn’t give me much preparation time and 2) I don’t think that I would want to know anything. It’s not because I’m lazy, it’s because I find being unaware to be interesting. It leads to experiences that I wouldn’t have had if I had planned everything ahead of time. Now, in order to fulfill requirements for future assignments (travelogue) and this post I have to choose a specific place and talk about what kind of research I would do before I packed my bags. For these reasons alone, I have chosen to focus on my family’s vacation to Cozumel, Isla Rotan, Cayman Islands, and Belize.

            I find, like I said before, that I wouldn’t want to plan everything out. Thus, my researching wouldn’t not consist of traveling guides. I am going to focus only on Belize because that’s really the only place I’m super excited about visiting. Take a moment and think about Belize with me … what do we already know? It’s in Central America; it was once inhabited by the Mayan culture and has hundreds of Mayan ruins, and it has a rich history of pre-colonization, colonization, and independence. The researching can now start.

            I would first get a map of Belize and plot out the ruins that I want to see or find most fascinating. Yes, this is time consuming but as I plot I am reading information about the different sites and history behind them. I’m not a Central American historian and I don’t plan to be in the future, but my fantastic Walsh education has brought me up to speed with most general information about the area. I probably wouldn’t spend much time researching that. I would however, burry my head in a book on the Mayan Civilization. For me, one of the most interesting things is ancient civilizations and this would be the perfect opportunity to learn more about it. I might brush up on my Spanish skills a little, but Belize’s official language is English, so I should alright in that department.

            Most people, I feel, will choose to look through travel guides, maps, maybe even talk to people they know that have been there before. I understand why they do this, to prepare themselves and to gain a better understanding of where they are going. For me, it’s not like that. I feel like I just keep saying the same thing over and over, but it’s true; I don’t like planning! Planning makes for a boring and predictable trip. I myself am an unpredictable person, you never know what I’m going to say or do next … it only fits that I would want my travels to be just as spontaneous as my personality.