Photo from http://www.yellowmaps.com

I’m one of those odd birds who wants to travel the world and see everything there is, and also never be away from home for two weeks. All my travel crazed friends cringe when I say I want to stay in my home state for good.

“But what about the world?”

“I thought you wanted see other cultures?”

I do want to see the world, I do want to witness other cultures, but I want to have my own too. I just don’t think I could travel the world without knowing exactly where or what I’m going home too. The word home embodies what I’ve been craving since birth. I need the stability. I need the comfort. I need the familiar.

So how do you balance these two?

Short vacations are a clear answer for this, I mean, you leave for a week or two and come back to a mostly unchanged home. It’s beautiful, you get to see the world, and not be gone long enough for the world to shift under your feet. Anyways, it’s how most of the world travels happen anyways. It’s easier on your wallet and your homebody heart.

But it goes past that, one of the biggest parts of wanderlust in the need to explore, and we’ve become convinced that can’t find anything new at home. That’s the danger with anything familiar, it becomes so familiar that it no longer excites us. This is what I feel like most people my age are scared off. But in reality, we know very little about our home state, our bordering towns. We don’t think to take the three hours drive to the mountains to hike because after all, if we head back that day that’s a whole six hours in the car. In reality though, the six hours in the car can make for one of the best Saturdays and travel fixes we need. Day trips are so important to a homebody with wanderlust. It keeps us sane. So why don’t you do this every few weekends? I’m guilty of this too, I feel like I don’t have enough time, but it’s funny, because every time I do it, I never feel more alive.

Here are some day trip ideas:

• Hiking: Up to the mountains down to the woods, somewhere in the wild away from the everyday to dos. Anyways, fresh air can do some amazing things to people, spiritually, mentally, and physically.
• Art Galleries: These guys are everywhere and we so rarely look for them. We tend to only go to the big ones (like the metropolitan and such). It’s normally a big part of someone traveling to far away cities, some kind of art, culture, and museum. This can happen right outside of your front door also, you just have to look out for them (an maybe follow them on social media).
• The town over: This is an easy to understand one. I remember when my mom took me down to Asheville for a weekend when I was a senior in high school. We explored and hunted for good stores, restaurants, and coffee shops. It’s a nice change with a lot of exploring to fix your craving.
• The Switch: Okay, we as humans tend to live in two different areas, the city or the country. Go to the other for just a day, whether it’s a picnic or a shopping trip, just switch it up for a few hours. It’ll be enough of a change to help.
• Horseback/canoeing/strawberry picking: Very similar to hiking, just going outside, getting the fresh air. Just going.

Have fun, go day-tripping.