101 Inspiring Travel Quotes to Spark Wanderlust

I have always had a love of quotes, especially inspiring travel quotes. Quotes just have a way of saying things you are thinking but better. Over the course of my incessant pinning on Pinterest and browsing the inter-webs, I have come across tons of great travel quotes so I thought I would compile them all for you here! I hope these quotes inspire you as much as they inspire me. 

This is a long list so I made it a little easier and broke them down into sections to make it easier to read. 

Travel Quotes to Spark Wanderlust

“The most beautiful in the world is, of course, the world itself.”

Wallace Stevens

“I’m in love with cities I’ve never been to and people I’ve never met.”

John Green

This quote really sums it up well. I often say I am homesick for places that are not my home, this is in that same vein. I spend time daydreaming of places I have never been, imagining myself there. The curiosity consumes me and I do believe it plays a large role in my wanderlust.

“Above all, try something.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt

”Veni, Vini, Amavi. We came, we saw, we loved.”

“Quit your job, buy a ticket, get a tan, fall in love, never return.”

“A ship in a harbor is safe, but it not what ships are build for.”

John A. Shedd

Travel and Life Quotes

“To Travel is to Live”

Hans Christian Andersen

“Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all.”

Helen Keller

“In the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.”

Abraham Lincoln

“Don’t live the same year 75 times and call it life”

Robin Sharma

“Life is a journey, not a destination.”

”I’ll look back on this and smile because it was life and I decided to live it” 

“The goal is to die with memories not dreams”

This inspiring travel quote is something I try to remember in all aspects of my life. It is so easy to let the day-to-day take you, time flies by and years start blurring together. You begin to think of the things you wish you would have done. I realized I was tired of that. I spent too long dreaming of places I wanted to see and I decided it was time to make them memories instead of daydreams.

“Life is a journey. Make the best of it.”

“Live your life by a compass, not a clock.”

Stephen Covey

“Live life with no excuses, travel with no regret”

Oscar Wilde

“Life is short and the world is wide“

“Dare to live the life you’ve always wanted.”

“The life you have led doesn’t need to be the only life you have.”

Anna Quindlen

“Be fearless in the pursuit of what sets your soul on fire.”

Jennifer Lee

Adventure Quotes

“And now…let us step out into the night and pursue that flighty temptress, adventure.”

Albus Dumbledore

“Our battered suitcases were piled on the sidewalk again; we had longer ways to go. But no matter, the road is life.”

Jack Kerouac

“Oh! the places you’ll go! There is fun to be done!”

Dr. Seuss

A list of quotes wouldn’t be complete without at least one by Dr. Seuss. I have always loved the doc. The amount of imagination he had was something I always strived to have and keep. If you have read our about page, you know that the name of this blog is actually a play on a Seuss book title. This quote, and really the whole book it is from is an inspiration. It inspires travel, taking risks, and living life to the fullest. It reminds you that things might not always be great or perfect, sometimes you will feel stuck, but you will persevere. I love to read this book when I am feeling stuck. It always reignites the fire and reminds me to see live, and to travel, to make it happen.

“Wherever you go, go with all your heart!”

Confucius

“There was nowhere to go but everywhere, so just keep on rolling under the stars.”

Jack Kerouac

“We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm, and adventure. There is no end to the adventures we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open.”

Jawaharial Nehru

”Adventure may hurt you but monotony will kill you.”

“Adventure is a path. Real adventure – self-determined, self-motivated, often risky – forces you to have firsthand encounters with the world. The world the way it is, not the way you imagine it… This will change you. Nothing will ever again be black-and-white.”

Mark Jenkins

“I was completely intimidated, and I was absolutely at peace. I was at the beginning of an adventure.”

“The biggest adventure you can ever take is to live the life of your dreams.”

The Journey

“All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware.”

Martin Buber

“Little by little, one travels far.”

I love this quote. It really says so much with so little. It reminds me that near or far there is a world to explore. Travel doesn’t have to be an exotic place halfway around the world. It could be a part of town you have seen, a short drive to a trail, or a city you have not been to before. It can be close or far. Every place, even ones that may seem boring or familiar, allows you to experience something totally new.

“The best journeys answer questions that in the beginning, you didn’t even think to ask.”

Jeff Johnson

“It is not down in any map; true places never are.”

Herman Melville

“A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving.”

Lao Tzu

“Two roads diverged in a wood and I – I took the one less traveled by.”

Robert Frost

“Not all those who wander are lost.”

J.R.R. Tolkien

“Take only memories, leave only footprints.”

Chief Seattle

“Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter.”

Izaak Walton

Changed by Travel Quotes

“Conventional wisdom tells us… we take our baggage with us. I’m not so sure. Travel, at its best, transforms us in ways that aren’t always apparent until we’re back home. Sometimes we do leave our baggage behind, or, even better, it’s misrouted to Cleveland and is never heard from again.”

Eric Weiner

“I am not the same, having seen the moon shine on the other side of the world.”

Mary Anne Radmacher

“It was only when I truly started immersing myself in people’s way of life did I understand what it really meant to travel. Traveling isn’t sitting in a resort lounging by the pool. It is experiencing new food, immersing yourself in their way of life, and really taking the time to reflect on this.”

Adventure in you

“At its best, travel should challenge our preconceptions and most cherished views, cause us to rethink our assumptions, shake us a bit, make us broader minded and more understanding.”

Arthur Frommer

When I first started traveling I wanted to travel to well, travel. I wanted to see cool places that I saw in photos and be able to say “hey! I have been there”. It wasn’t till I went on a trip that wasn’t at a resort or hotel and really got out and saw a place that I really understood the power of travel. My first taste of this was visiting family in Germany but it was really solidified when I went to Iceland, you can read about that trip here. I came home from that trip with a new understanding of a place and a culture in a way I had never done before. I had an understanding of something other than myself and culture, and I would forever be changed by this.

“It seems that the more places I see and experience, the bigger I realize the world to be. The more I become aware of, the more I realize how relatively little I know of it, how many places I still have to go, the more there is to learn. Maybe that’s enlightenment enough; to know that there is no final resting place of the mind; no smug clarity. Perhaps wisdom…is realizing how small I am, and unwise, and how far I have yet to go.”

Anthony Bourdain

“Why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colours. And the people there see you differently too. Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.”

Terry Pratchett

“You will never be completely at home again because part of your heart always will be elsewhere. That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people in more than one place.”

Miriam Adeney

“A mind stretched by new experiences can never go back to old dimensions.”

“Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world.”

Gustav Flaubert

“No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow.”

Lin Yutang

“To my mind, the greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time, to be in a position in which almost nothing is so familiar it is taken for granted.”

Bill Bryson

“You can shake the sand from your shoes, but it will never leave your soul.”

“Travel far enough, you meet yourself”

David Mitchell

“Wherever you go becomes a part of you somehow.”

Anita Desai

Travel Lessons

“Then I realized adventures are the best way to learn.”

“To travel is to discover that everyone is wrong about other countries.”

Aldous Huxley

“A great way to learn about your country is to leave it.”

Henry Rollins

This is another thing I learned from travel that I didn’t expect. Seeing my country and city from the outside and hearing how others see it, and how they live. It taught me so much about my home. Things worth loving and things worth changing. It is easy to think that the way you know is the right way or the best way. Traveling, and seeing the world from a different point of view really shows you that there is so much you don’t know if you never leave your own backyard.

“Traveling – it leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller.”

Ibn Battuta

“Better to see something once than hear about it a thousand times”

“Like all great travelers, I have seen more than I remember, and remember more than I have seen.”

Benjamin Disraeli

“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.”

Agustine of Hippo

“Once in a while it really hits people that they don’t have to experience the world in the way they have been told to.”

-Alan Keightley

“I have found out that there ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.”

Mark Twain

“I love the feeling of being anonymous in a city I’ve never been before.”

“What you’ve done becomes the judge of what you’re going to do – especially in other people’s minds. When you’re traveling, you are what you are right there and then. People don’t have your past to hold against you. No yesterdays on the road.”

William Least Heat Moon

Don’t Wait to Travel Quotes

“Travel when you are young and don’t wait until it is a “right” time.”

“Travel while you’re young and able. Don’t worry about the cost; just make it happen!”

 “Take every chance you get in life, because some things only happen once.”

Karen Gibbs

“The world is not in your maps and books. It’s out there.”

The Hobbit

“Cover the earth before it covers you.”

“Because in the end, you won’t remember the time you spent working in the office or mowing your lawn. Climb that goddamn mountain.”

Jack Kerouac

“And then there is the most dangerous risk of all — the risk of spending your life not doing what you want on the bet you can buy yourself the freedom to do it later.”

Randy Komisar

In 2016, when we decided we were going to fulfill my boyfriend’s dream of going to Iceland I had spoken with my grandfather. He loves to travel too, now that he is retired he and his wife are seeing the world and are happy to do it. When we spoke he said to me “go now, don’t wait. I love the travel we are doing but I wish I could have seen these places when I was younger and could see even more” It really hit me. This inspiring travel quote really supports what my grandfather said. You can wait to travel or to do what you want in life in hopes that you will have more money, more time, more whatever, later. Later is not guaranteed so you have to just make it happen, make the time, and take the chances. Don’t wait till it’s too late.

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”

Mark Twain

“If you’re twenty-two, physically fit, hungry to learn and be better, I urge you to travel – as far and as widely as possible. Sleep on floors if you have to. Find out how other people live and eat and cook. Learn from them – wherever you go.”

Anthony Bourdain

Happiness and Travel Quotes

“Remember that happiness is a way of travel – not a destination.”

Roy M. Goodman

“The gladdest moment in human life is a departure into unknown lands.”

Sir Richard Burton

“Happiness is letting go of what you think your life is supposed to look like and celebrate it for everything that it is.”

Mandy Hale

This quote isn’t totally travel-related but I still think it fits on the list. It is easy to fall into a routine, looking for the path you think you are supposed to be on. To look at your life and think you are missing something or you are not where you are supposed to be. I love that this quote reminds you to take a step back and look at what you have and where you are and realize it’s perfectly ok.

“Our happiest moments as tourists always seem to come when we stumble upon one thing while in pursuit of something else.”

Lawrence Block

A Traveling Mindset

“All you need to know is that it’s possible.”

Wolf, an Appalachian Trail Hiker

“Every man can transform the world from one of monotony and drabness to one of excitement and adventure.”

Irving Wallace

“Everything you do is based on the choices you make”

Wayne Dyer

This is another quote that is not technically travel related but it so very much applies. This blog was almost called Decide to Travel because traveling is, in fact, a choice. When it comes down to it, it is easy to make excuses of why you can’t do something or can’t have something. If you think about it though, when there is something you really and truly want, you find a way to get it. Be it a house, car, new tech, even that cup joe you drink in the morning. Travel is no different, if you really want to travel then you much CHOOSE to travel and make it a priority in your life. This was the thing that made all of the difference for me. I chose to prioritize travel in my life and it wasn’t long before I was traveling more.

“With the right mindset and spirit, only the sky is the limit”

“Don’t call it a dream…call it a plan”

“One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.”

Henry Miller

“Travel and change of place impart new vigor to the mind.”

Seneca

“He who would travel happily must travel light.”

Antoine de St. Exupery

“Blessed are the curious for they will have adventures.”

Traveler vs Tourist Quotes

“The traveler sees what he sees. The tourist sees what he has come to see.”

G.K. Chesterton

“Tourists don’t know where they’ve been, travelers don’t know where they’re going.”

Paul Theroux

“If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion and avoid the people, you might better stay home.”

James Michener

This quote here is really food for thought. I have always said I am not a tourist. Like the other quote above says I don’t just go to SEE. I don’t just go to take a tour and grab a selfie with a famous landmark. I mean, sometimes I do those things, but that is not why I go, I travel to see and to do. To learn. To see how other people live and live like them, even if just for a few days. I think that you should do more than see when you travel. Eat the food, see how they live, ask questions. Experience it all, don’t just look. This quote here is saying that if you can’t push yourself out of your comfort zone just a little then maybe travel isn’t for you.

“I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake.”

Robert Louis Stevenson

“I travel not to cross countries off a list, but to ignite passionate affairs with destinations.”

 Nyssa P. Chopra

Travel and Wealth

“Travel is never a matter of money but of courage.”

Paolo Coelho

“You don’t have to be rich to travel well.”

Eugene Fodor

There is a lot you can take from this inspiring travel quote. For me, it means the obvious, you don’t need to have a bunch of money to travel. You can choose affordable places, you can choose to stay closer to home and just explore, and you can take advantage of small opportunities that open more travel. It means skipping the pricy tours and resorts and getting lost in a city you haven’t been to before or a hike to a new place. Make some sacrifices to put traveling first and be flexible with how you travel and where.

“You can always make more money but you can’t always make more memories.”

“Travel is the only thing you buy that makes you richer”

Got Wanderlust Yet?

So there you have it. There are hundreds more great quotes out there, and maybe I’ll keep adding to this list as time goes on but for now, these ones should have inspired you to get out there and TRAVEL. See the world, don’t make excuses about why you can’t, make it a priority in your life. Traveling is fully attainable for anyone if they just decide they are going to do it.

What do you think of these quotes? Did I miss a really good one? Let’s chat in the comments.