What does ‘well-traveled’ mean, anyway?

I’ve always considered myself a traveler. Though I’d only visited one other country by the time I graduated high school (Canada — an easy visit), I had been to 46 different states. Since coming to college, I’ve added nine more countries to my list — and seven of those have been in just the last month. From Luxembourg to Liechtenstein, I continued to add names to an ever-growing list on my Notes app, titled “Countries I’ve Been to (In Order).”

As I traveled with my family ahead of my study abroad program, we encountered a few fellow Americans. What I remember most vividly is a conversation I briefly overheard while walking through Heidelberg, Germany. One young woman, apparently from Florida, discussed with her group how few people from her home state travel beyond its boundaries.

This is far from the first time I’ve heard a stereotype about Americans being ill-traveled. The often-repeated cliche that Americans are bad at geography serves as one example. However, I often perceived those sentiments as coming from people outside the U.S., typically in Europe. Having heard this stereotype from a fellow American got me thinking about what it even means to be “well-traveled,” and why the concept is flawed to begin with.

It’s not necessarily true that Americans don’t travel, both within the United States or abroad. Almost nine out of every 10 Americans have left their home state — clearly, the Floridian I encountered in Heidelberg was hyperbolic in her assessment. When it comes to international travel, the U.S. consistently ranks as having one of the highest numbers of outbound departures in the world, with that figure growing each year.

There is, however, a distinction to be made in just how many Americans travel internationally. Though most Americans have been abroad, income plays a large role in deciding who’s in that majority. Nearly half of Americans with salaries of $30,000 or less have never left the country, compared to only 10% of Americans with salaries of $80,000 or more.

Education, race and gender also play a role in determining who gets to travel. Only 7% of college graduates have never left the country, compared to 37% of those with some or no college education. Just more than half of Black Americans have never traveled abroad, compared to a quarter of white and Hispanic Americans —though white Americans are more likely than both Black and Hispanic Americans to have traveled to more than five countries. Additionally, women are more likely than men to have never left the U.S.

Couple all these demographics with the fact that many Americans don’t have as many vacation days as Europeans, and it becomes clearer why Americans prefer to cross state lines rather than international borders. It tends to be simpler and less expensive. The lack of a language barrier or different road signs, for example, makes domestic travel a more comfortable option. And when travel isn’t a priority, not traveling at all is almost always the cheaper option.

Still, traveling  — especially abroad — is one of the best ways to become a more globally informed individual. Being in a foreign country allows travelers to encounter new languages, cuisines and cultures that aren’t always accessible at home. The hands-on experience offered in such situations can thus create a more sophisticated individual.

People like the Floridian I encountered in Heidelberg may be right that trips outside the U.S. produce more worldly travelers — and they aren’t entirely wrong. Nations like Germany, for one, tend to have more extensively documented histories than the relatively young United States. The linguistic diversity spanning across the continent can also challenge visitors to learn and speak foreign languages.

But while they may be right in some respects, the assumption that Americans aren’t well-traveled doesn’t capture the full picture. Those who choose to travel domestically might have to travel further to find a place unlike their hometown, but the country is large enough to house diverse cultures and histories in every one of its corners.

The U.S. has national parks and historic landmarks across the states that educate Americans and tourists alike. With such an expansive landmass, it’s almost like we’re a collection of smaller nations similar to Europe. Though a trip from one region to another may not entail a change in language or units of measurement, the cultural differences are sometimes enough that it can equate to, for example, a trip from Germany to Austria.

Back in Ann Arbor, I could get to Detroit or Lansing in an hour by car — a change for sure, but nothing very drastic. In Freiburg, Germany, where I’m studying abroad, I can get across the French or Swiss border by train in an hour. This is thanks to not only the more robust rail system here but also because these countries are comparatively small. Europeans can easily travel to another nearby nation and return home within a weekend, but that’s not something most Americans can afford to do, in terms of both time and money.

What truly matters, at the end of the day, is not how frequently we travel or how far we go, but our attitude toward the pastime. I hope that I can add more countries to my Notes app list or that I might one day visit my 50th state, but those achievements will be little more than conversation starters. Travel is just one of many ways to stay informed and adventurous. Having a curious mind and kind heart — not a passport —is what makes for a good global citizen, no matter where you are in the world.

Instead of quantifying travel by focusing on how many places a person has been or how far from home they’ve traveled, we ought to qualify travel by focusing on the experiences a person has had, both at home and abroad. When we ask ourselves or others what we learned, whom we met or what we valued most from our travels, any excursion, no matter how far, becomes an adventure rather than an item on a list. 

Audra Woehle is an Opinion Columnist currently studying abroad in Freiburg, Germany. In her column, “Audra Abroad,” she writes about culture, identity and travel. She can be reached at awoehle@umich.edu.

Related articles