Archive

Quotes

Those who travel heedlessly from place to place, observing only their distance from each other and attending only to their accommodation at the inn at night, set out fools, and will certainly return so.

—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 1747

The traveler was active; he went strenuously in search of people, of adventure, of experience. The tourist is passive; he expects interesting things to happen to him. He goes “sightseeing.”

—Daniel Boorstin, 1961

More and more I like to take a train. I understand why the French prefer it to automobiling—it is so much more sociable, and of course these days so much more of an adventure, and the irregularity of its regularity is fascinating.

—Gertrude Stein, 1943

All traveling becomes dull in exact proportion to its rapidity.

—John Ruskin, 1856

Our nature lies in movement; complete calm is death.

—Blaise Pascal, c. 1640

Traveling is the ruin of all happiness! There’s no looking at a building here after seeing Italy.

—Fanny Burney, 1782

There ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.

—Mark Twain, 1894

Thanks to the interstate highway system, it is now possible to travel from coast to coast without seeing anything.

—Charles Kuralt, c. 1980

I think that to get under the surface and really appreciate the beauty of any country, one has to go there poor.

—Grace Moore, 1944

People commonly travel the world over to see rivers and mountains, new stars, garish birds, freak fish, grotesque breeds of human; they fall into an animal stupor that gapes at existence, and they think they have seen something.

—Søren Kierkegaard, 1843

In the Middle Ages people were tourists because of their religion, whereas now they are tourists because tourism is their religion.

—Robert Runcie, 1988

Travel is like adultery: one is always tempted to be unfaithful to one’s own country. To have imagination is inevitably to be dissatisfied with where you live.

—Anatole Broyard, 1989

I am leaving the town to the invaders: increasingly numerous, mediocre, dirty, badly behaved, shameless tourists.

—Brigitte Bardot, 1989