Travel: The Silver Lining to the Economic Cloud
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WE WON’T PRETEND that the economic climate is good. Obviously, many people have been affected by the sudden economic downtown that has been felt across the globe. Grim as the news has been, however, the cloud does indeed have a silver lining. The pound has declined by more than 25 percent against the dollar over just a few months, and travel in Britain is more reasonable that it has been for many years.
If you have wanted to travel to England, Scotland and Wales, this may well be the year to do it. Unhappily for Britain, the drags on its economy are significant. For the travel trade and retail shopper, however, the news is good. This Christmas, some 10 million foreign visitors traveled to London just to shop. Shopkeepers reported the highest level of Americans in stores since before 9/11. London, long considered among the most expensive cities on earth, is at its most affordable in 20 years or more.
Whether your dreams include joining The Gathering in Edinburgh this July, finally seeing the Chelsea Flower Show, finding your ancestral village in the coal valleys of Sout Wales or making a first panoramic tour of Britain, consider fulfilling them this year.
When I was planning my second trip to Great Britain in 1980, my old Yankee grandfather just could not understand it. After all, I had already been there. Grandpa’s attitude toward travel was simple: “Why should I travel? I’m already here.” Despite the fact that he read National Geographic religiously for decades, Grandpa just didn’t get it.
Travel to visit relatives, attend to business or to lie in the sun is purely functional, of course. Travel to travel, though, is to get out and explore the world—to have life experiences of any and every description that one would not have at home, to visit the myriad sites where history was made, to see unknown beauty in the natural world and in the gardens of civilization.
No destination on earth has such a concentration of historic locales, varied and verdant landscapes and cultural riches as Great Britain. And no transcontinental travel destination for North Americans is as accessible in its life, popular culture, social values and genuine fondness for Americans as Britain.
