'The fresh out of school backpacker clutches their Bible (the ever-present Lonely Planet Guide), attempting to jump aboard a moving chicken bus.'

Holly Bruford on the backpacking experience.

In the last three weeks I have travelled from Mexico City through Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador to rest my weary feet in Nicaragua.

I rarely travel at such speed, preferring to spend time soaking in culture, history and politics in whatever community I am in, wherever I am in the world.

But having recently left a settled life in the Guatemalan highlands, and on a quest to find more work, I was ready to return to a few weeks of the backpacking experience and remind myself how it is done.

Backpacking is a funny thing: Challenging yet easygoing. Invigorating yet arduous. Thought-provoking yet frustrating. Impressive yet expected.

In today’s world we’re all doing it. If I don’t meet an 18-year-old fresh from school on the road, it’s a 50-something ex-pat who gave up the old life to find the ‘good’ life.

Categories

Different travellers, I find, fall into different categories:

1) The fresh out of school backpacker clutches their Bible (the ever-present Lonely Planet Guide), attempting to jump aboard a moving chicken bus, and see over the top of a cumbersome daypack, whilst wishing their heaving backpack was smaller. This type has a route planned, travel time accounted for, and a recommended hostel noted in The Guide at each new stop. They email home on a regular basis.

2) There is the Nomad type. On a recent introduction to the long-haired, bearded ‘Bear’ from Tasmania I enquired as to how long he’d been travelling for. After an uncomfortable pause I felt inclined to help him out.

- Well, ok then, when did you leave? (Long pause)
- Ummm, leave where?  
- Home.
- Ahhhhh. (Another long pause). Now that depends on where you call home.

Bear falls under the ‘travels without The Guide’ category.  Instead this type moves about by jumping on the next bus passing and jumping off when ‘it feels right’. When it feels right could be unfound paradise. It could also be a dirty, litter ridden beach – sadly not uncommon in less developed countries.

3) Then there is the retired ex-pat. Somewhat weary, this type contemplates more in where he is going and where he has come from, often perplexed, and usually found looking exceedingly out of place in the budget hostel’s restaurant with all the other 20-somethings trying out the local beer.

So why these days must we squeeze home into a backpack to see as many places as possible in as short a time as possible? Constantly on the move, unsettling stomachs, lumpy beds, cold showers. Unpacking. Packing up. If you’re too comfortable – you’re not ‘travelling’. If it’s too rough for even the most hardened traveller the ‘why the hell am I here?’ question cannot help but spring to mind.

Despite this wearied travellers cynicism, however, there is something to be said for crossing five boarders in as many weeks. Apart from many hours on hot buses, it’s a fascinating cross-cultural comparison to local life in a very intricate way.

Yes, we all go home with more stories to tell. But we also go home with a wealth of magical moments, eye-opening experiences and snapshots of extraordinary scenes lingering in the depths of the subconscious. They flash to the forefront of your mind, years later, in the blandest, most unexpected of moments. And you smile.

For me, that is the greatest travelling treasure of all.

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