How does Gen Y travel?
At this exact moment I’m sitting in the passenger seat with my sister at the wheel. We just passed Richmond on our way from Raleigh, NC to New York City.
A week ago we weren’t sure if we were even going to make the trip. Even now we only have a few solid plans. The entire idea sprouted out of my sister’s lack of desire to sit around the house again for the entirety of her Spring Break from senior year of college. Knowing that she needed a vacation, but also being the Gen Y overachievers that we are, we decided to take a Kerouac-like trip. We would enjoy the journey itself and leave ourselves as flexible and open as possible to new experiences and new people.
Speak of the devil. A song called “iGeneration” just came on my iPod at random. Good song by the way.
If anything has shaped the way that the “iGeneration” or Gen Y travels, technology has no doubt.
Think about how GPS navigation and cell phones have changed the way you travel from place to place. For our trip we didn’t print out any maps and definitely don’t have any paper maps from 10 years ago with us. We didn’t need to call our friends from our home land-line phone to confirm our arrival time or where they would pick us up. We simply packed our bags, hopped in the car with our gadgets and some snacks, and set the course.
What about how smart phones and laptop (i.e. mobile) computers have changed the way we do business and vacation in other cities. Business and vacation blend together almost all too well. Here I am writing an article in a moving car on my laptop, after all. We didn’t pack guide books, but have LonelyPlanet.com bookmarked on my laptop and my iPhone in case we can’t find wireless internet access.
Even social media has changed the way some really connected Gen Y-ers travel. For this trip we’re crashing on a college friend’s couch (the budget traveler’s alternative to a hostel) and meeting up with another college friend coming in from out of town, too. For the most part nobody we know IRL knows a whole lot about our destination. So we reached out to the Twitter community to find fellow tweeps who live in the area, get suggestions for places to go and things to see, and even plan meetups to bring the internet relationships to real life.
Well this traveler has to sign off now. We made it past DC and it’s my turn at the wheel. Let the adventure begin…
Image: Indy138
I took a spontaneous, surprise trip to Pittsburgh last weekend for the same reason — didn't want to be stuck at home, basically. I made fun of my boyfriend for printing out Mapquest directions, because we had the GPS on my BlackBerry. When we weren't sure where we were going in the city, where we could get gas during the drive, when the restaurant we wanted to go to opened, etc., we used my phone to get directions and information, too.
How travel agents stay in business, I don't know. The only reason I could see using one would be for a trip into a different country.
I used to use travel agents to book tickets to other countries but that time is over. It is much easier and cheaper to do everything online at a time that is convenient for me (read the middle of the night when no travel agent is working or a few days before the flight). The Internet has made everything so much easier from booking tickets to checking in for the flight before you even get to the airport, to finding restaurants in any place, and I love it. Most adults in my life are really suspicious about it though.
I love just getting up and going without a real plan. It make me nervous (not having a plan, being such a planner), but I think it's important to also learn how to be flexible. Sometimes it works out for the better (“Sure I'll go to an event in 20 minutes with someone I just met”) but other times flexibility means you end up not doing what you really wanted to.
And it's funny about the map thing, because even a few years ago I would always print out Google map directions and bring them with me, but this time it didn't even cross my mind because I have the iPhone. But then my iPhone led me astray and we got lost multiple times taking back roads when we should have just used our brain and followed the I-95 signs.
I love that you and your sis just jumped in the car and got to rollin'. My impromptu trip to Colorado after getting laid off was just what I needed. Money wasn't really ever the issue in keeping me from taking off, it was just the sense that I was obligated to be working all the time. Once I got over that idea post-employment, my willingness to get up and just GO increased dramatically. Never really had the ability to do that and I hope to carry this attitude into my next job… we can be good and productive employees and still live spontaneously. I believe this!
I don't know how people managed to survive 20 years ago. When I spent a semester in Europe, we coordinated all of our train tickets, hostel bookings, day scheduling online… always no more than a few weeks before we traveled halfway across the continent. Somehow we all managed to survive without cell phones (this was 2006… very few of us had phones that worked internationally), but trust me – we developed a keen eye for Internet cafes.
the ambiance calls for a good night sleep…