Sharing the Best Short Travel Stories from My Readers!

I’ve always felt that the best souvenirs that we can bring back from our travels are not things, but rather memories and lessons.

I’m very confident that my travels across 80 countries, as well as living on a few different continents, have made me a more understanding, empathetic and loving person. Much of that, as far as I’m concerned, has been a result of moments abroad when I’ve been wowed, humbled, or otherwise pushed out of my comfort zone.

As of late, I’ve really been focusing on my travel newsletter ( which I’m amazed to say has 4 digit subscribers nowadays), and the dialogue happening there. About a month ago, I sent out a newsletter which noted that I felt privileged to have a platform to share my travel stories, but that I wanted to use my site and platform to share stories from my readers, and others who have supported me along the way.

And so, I set up a little competition of sorts.

I asked readers to send in a travel story which showcased a meaningful or memorable moment for them abroad. There were no explicit guidelines, really, I just shared the following.

“These stories can be about anything that you experienced on your travels. It could be a proud moment summiting a mountain, a unexpected destination that you connected with, a story of you confronting and overcoming your fears, or simply a story of strife or troubles on the road that you never forgot. It doesn't matter what your story is, I just want to know what you learned from it, with the idea that others might be able to learn from it, too.”

Here are the Three Best Travel Stories from my Readers!

Once I let folks know on my newsletter that the competition was open, I was blown away by the response. I had a lot more responses that I thought I was going to receive, and, in truth, it was hard to narrow down which ones I wanted to include.

The three inspiring travel stories that I chose to include here all spoke to me in some way, and I think totally encompass what I was looking for when I wrote that paragraph above.

The first story is about a traveller with a fondness for language who has a marvellous opportunity to learn a little about another culture from a Croatian baker.

The second story showcases why it’s always worth it to have a flexible itinerary when you’re travelling. You want to leave room to come across something, and chase that lead, and that’s what happened here. It’s more than just that, but that’s one lesson I’d draw.

I chose the third story included here because it’s an intense moment where things could have gone wrong but, thankfully, they didn’t. To me, it’s an example of the fact that travel isn’t all fun and games, but some of the greatest lessons come from experiences like that. I also enjoy their prose, and how descriptive they were with their writing!

Please note that the stories are not ranked in any particular order. I’m grateful to be able to draw on these three different perspectives, and feel they stand alone beautifully, but also work very well together, which is wonderful to see.

Also, I want to thank everyone who entered a short travel story. I read (and enjoyed) every single story that was sent to me, and if you weren’t selected, please don’t take any offence! I encourage you to keep responding to future opportunities like this!

Short Travel Story #1

This story was submitted by my wonderful cousin, Katrine. Like me, she’s got a deep passion and love for travel, and it’s an honour and pleasure to share her story on my site.

“We were recently in Croatia with another couple. My friend Natasha loves to stop at bakeries pretty much everywhere we go and since I need to eat gluten-free, I usually sit by and watch everyone else eat pastries. However, I had done some research ahead of time and had found a bakery named Cukarin on the island of Korcula that had some treats for me.

Well, as soon as we walked in and I said "We found it, this is 'Kukarin!”

The owner quickly said "We say DZU-karin, my dear."

This led to a wonderful conversation about how to pronounce various consonants in Croatian, with sound production being a topic of interest considering that both of the women travellers in the group are speech-language pathologists!

We then learned that Smiljana opened this bakery to serve family recipes "made with the secret ingredient: LOVE."

She had started the bakery over 20 years ago and she told us about her family, her life and she gave us free samples of many delicious creations.

She was one of our favourite people who we met on this trip and we will remember her for a long time!

She also told us where to go swim in the Adriatic and she gave us a free postcard (perfect for writing home to our children!). She could not have been nicer and she made the experience completely worthwhile!”

If you’re enjoying this post which talks about the value of travel, you’ll probably also love my ever popular post on Why Travel is Important or, if you’re looking to laugh a little, you might like this list of Funny Travel Books.

Short Travel Story #2

This story was submitted by Jeremiah from Smiles on Arrival.

“Our family’s trip to Paris was significant for several reasons.

First there’s the backstory of how we ended up going to Paris when were originally planning a road trip. We made our flight purchase just six weeks prior to departure!

This would also be our first family trip to Europe and our kids’ first ever flight. There’s so many things to look forward to when visiting Paris, so we couldn’t wait to see the city for ourselves.

There was a bit of apprehension. We would be in a country where the majority spoke French, so that could be an issue. We also heard that French people, especially Parisians, can be rude to tourists - particularly if you don’t speak French.

As we enjoyed our trip I noticed that the people we encountered were helpful, kind and nice with just a few that didn’t to seem to want to be bothered with us tourists.

Well one of the days an employee from a burger place that was across the street from our hotel noticed my Cleveland Cavaliers cap. We struck up a conversation about basketball and he encouraged me to visit his establishment. I got back to our room and checked their Instagram feed and their food looked amazing, so I was determined to try them out before we left Paris. 

The next day we stopped there and the guy that I talked to wasn’t there. Overall, there was room for about a dozen people to eat in the place. There was a small counter just to the right once you enter where you order your food and pay, and just beyond that was the cooking area where burgers were being grilled as you watched.

The guy that was taking my order spoke a little English, just enough for me to understand.

Midway through my attempt to place my order, he apologized that his English wasn’t very good. I thought for a split second and responded “et mon francais est tres mal!”

He froze for a split second and the look on his face was absolutely priceless. It was some holy combination of shock, surprise, being impressed and a little hilarity.

He shook my hand and said “okay, okay that’s good!”

What just happened was the essence of the reason for travel for so many of us.

It was a small moment, sure, but one I’ll always remember.

Just a small connection with someone on the other side of the world, someone I’ll probably never see again. But for that instant there was a cool connection between two people, both understanding that speaking other languages isn’t easy! Both appreciating each other’s effort to communicate in a way that the other person would understand, no matter how bad our attempts were (his English was far better than my French). 

The added twist to the story is that my literal translation wasn’t exactly what I intended. I didn’t find that out until much later! I was attempting to say “and my French is very bad”, what came out instead was “and my French is very wrong”. That was so much better because I just proved my point even more without knowing it. 

Perhaps the best part of the story is that the burger that I got was the best burger that I’ve ever had in my life! I still dream about that burger and laugh every time I think about going to that burger spot. 

Et mon francais est toujours tres mal!”

If you love travel stories, you probably also love travel quotes. Here’s a post on the Most Inspirational Travel Quotes, as well as Ancient Travel Quotes that Transcend Time!

Short Travel Story #3

This story was submitted by Nick & Kia from The Danish Nomads.

“We had just come back from our evening safari excursion. It was a lengthy affair, but one full of adventure. It started late in the afternoon, so we soon stopped to enjoy the sunset and a G&T. It turns out, those two go hand in hand.

As the sun dipped below the horizon, the drive continued several hours into the night, and we got to see many of the nocturnal animals that roam the savannah after dark. There are many interesting creatures you will only find during the night and today’s highlight was the stealthy chameleon and the shy, but cute little animal known as the bushbaby.

You are always a bit alert in the open jeep, especially after dark, because you know predators may lurk in the shadows just inches from the car.

It’s not until you get back from the safari, hungry and ready for dinner, that you can properly relax. The comforts of the camp make you completely forget that you are still in the middle of the African bush. It particularly helps when you start a bonfire, and the smell of a delicious home-cooked meal fills the air.

That’s exactly what happened on this evening.

We took our dinner outside under the starry sky, sitting in a half-circle around the open fire. We talked amongst ourselves, primarily about the best sights of the day as well as about each of our lives back home. Our local guide was telling stories about the wild, and everyone was intrigued about his many exciting animal encounters from the past.

Little did we know, we hadn’t ourselves had the final animal encounter of the day because just as we were gulping down our delicious, whole chicken, we got a visitor.

It was a large male hyena!

He must have been attracted by the smell of barbecued meat because he looked hungry. We barely had time to realize what happened before the helpers disappeared into the hut, locking the metal gate behind them. You could tell they were scared.

The hyena didn’t do much, it just came right up close to us and seemed to hesitate.

It was perhaps half a meter from the closest person, staring at all six of us behind the fire, each sitting with a whole barbecued chicken. A few seconds passed in silence, us staring at him and him staring right back. Surely he must have been wondering how to get away with eating all of us and our chickens too.

The moment seemed to last forever.

Suddenly he took another few steps forward… Luckily, the closest person to him was our experienced guide. He stood up and confronted the hyena.

We’re not sure how to put it politely, but this had a good shielding effect on the rest of us. Such was the density of this person. The hyena didn’t seem too threatened by his size, though, but that soon changed when he raised his voice and spoke the two simple words: “F**k off!”

That’s all it took for the little, cute fella to lurk off with his tail behind his legs. We quickly got back in a merry mood, joking about the experience. On a more serious note, we talked about how we hoped the hyena would never approach humans again.

While we were all quick to shrug off the encounter, the local helpers didn’t come back from their hiding place for the remainder of the evening - not even the guide could change their mind.

Today, days, weeks and years later, it makes us think about whether this experience was actually more dangerous than it sounds. The local helpers were really, really scared and they should know best which beasts of the savannah requires respect.

What would’ve happened if we didn’t have a professional guide by our side?

I guess you never know when you’ll be eating your last meal…”

That’s a Wrap on These Amazing Travel Stories

Another huge thank you to my readers who submitted these travel stories. If people end up enjoying reading this (and my guess is that they will), I’ll likely do a part two or what have you down the line.

In the meantime, if you’ve read this and you’re inspired to write about your own story, then feel free to shoot me an email at chris@travelingmitch.com, and I’ll see about either adding it to this post, or a new post if I feel it’s right for the site!

Travel is a wonderful thing, of that there is no question, but writing about travel can be a beautiful way of transporting yourself back to that moment, and often times gleaning more from that moment than you could have processed at that time.

Travel, it turns out, is a great teacher.