[Amrita Das a travel blogger and a freelance travel writer.
She quit
her corporate job to travel and explore the world. She moves to any place that
allows her to travel and explore the off-beat path, volunteers to understand
the various ways of sustainable living, and loves outdoor adventure. She
travels solo to meet strangers as friends.
She has travelled
across twenty states in India and has briefly explored Nepal, Switzerland,
Italy and Paris. She aims to "get as many stamps on my passport because life is
too short and there are too many stories to hear!"
Hear what she has to
say about the many vectors of search a traveler has to face, and how finding
the right search engine is as important as enjoying your vacation itself!]
Planning the next travel is a big decision.
Even a bigger one than ‘do you want to mortgage a house?’ Well, at least for
me.
Once I have booked my transport to and from
the place, my next step is usually to select an accommodation. Depending on
what I will be doing in the destination, I prioritise my accommodation. For
instance travelling to Coorg was synonymous to staying in a rainforest and here
my place of stay had become a crucial part of my search. However, when looking
at something Goa, I am more open to options. My search, hence, depends more on my
focus on the activity.
And even though search engines like Google
are great in showing up the best results, I suppose I have to be quite specific
with my keywords. If I am looking at ‘restaurants in Panjim’, I must type
those. As a traveller, it may work better for me if my search engine shows up customised
searches by itself. With a variety of essential and basic keywords to choose
from, planning and researching over a destination becomes more focussed and
easier.
Take for example my recent visit to
Darjeeling where I was solely researching on the Sandakphu Trek. I intended to
do the trek all by myself and spent unnecessary hours examining through
millions of words on cyberspace to check if this could be possible. Finding
information such as ‘solo friendly’ or ‘travel alone’ should be viable options
in today’s day and age. After all, travelling solo is a quick trend that’s
catching up the travel industry already. Nonetheless, specific keywords like
adventure, trek or geographic locations like Darjeeling, NorthEast India; only
help minimise time and effort while putting together a good suitable travel
plan.
As explorers, we’d rather be lost on unknown
turns of physical space than feel hapless amidst unknown words of cyberspace.