Missing Travel – 5 Alternative Ways To Travel From Home

Due to the pandemic crisis, global lockdown has restricted and disrupted many plans, forcing many to be cooped up at home or in their home country. While the global situation seems to be improving, online the future of travelling still seems unpredictable, at least for the rest of the year.

Here is a list of some of the ways you can still “travel” vicariously within the confinement and comfort of your house during this tough time.

Miss travelling? Here’s some ways to live vicariously from home

1. Virtual Travelling

Technological advancement has seen unprecedented improvements to meet the hustle and bustle of our daily lives. Thankfully, with the rapidly improving way online content can be consumed now, one can “travel” to other countries without even setting foot out of their house.

Online museum tours

For lovers of the arts, Google Arts and culture has partnered with over 2000+ museums from all over the globe to showcase their vast collection.
The British Museum has come up with a very interesting interface and experience for viewers by creating a page for viewers to travel through the years and view the various artifacts. The world’s most famous museum, The Louvre, also has an online tour, so travelers need not voyage all the way to Paris to catch a glimpse of their collections.

VR tour

VR tours from Google maps street view is also utilized for viewers to have an actual “on the ground” experience. Informative videos are also uploaded with the VR views so that viewers can have a immersive 360^o view of the environment in the video.

Tourism boards from around the world are also offering various ways for travelers to have unique experiences through VR videos or live cams, to give them an idea or inspiration of the countries attractions.

2. Food Wanderlust

Food is the way to the soul, but is also a way to understand more about another culture. It shows values and the way of life from certain cultures and brings out the uniqueness of the dish. You can try out new meals with the help of delivery services. From classic to vegan to paleo food delivery, choose the best one for your diet.

Home cooking

Home cooking has been on the rise during the Covid-19 outbreak, and many have use this period as an opportunity to experiment with recipes and harness the inner chef in themselves, or also learn and pass on unique family traditions and cooking skills.

People are learning that home cooking has many benefits, like low costs, healthier dieting and therapeutic effects.

The Dalgona coffee is a beverage that is simple to do, entertaining and also delicious. Its spike in popularity is due to it featuring on social media platforms like TikTok and Youtube, before spreading to Facebook and Instagram too. Social media users have then contributed with its rise by sharing and posting their own takes and attempts of the drink.

The burnt cheesecake is also gaining popularity as many people are also exploring baking in their home. Its unique look and flavor have garnered much attention and like the Dalgona coffee, it is also making its way around the various social media platforms and gaining popularity. This spike in popularity has increase awareness that there are many different types of cheesecakes based on different recipes from around the world.

Takeaway deliveries

When one is tired and worn out from cooking, restaurant and food delivery providers provide a myriad of food options to choose from and delivered to your doorstep. Customers that are adventurous and want to explore food apart from local cuisines are actually spoilt for choice and can choose from a wide variety of cuisines from other countries, ranging from American, Japanese, Indonesian, Indian and Italian to name a few.

3. Online Performances

Many venues and bars are not available during this lockdown. Lovers of music and concert-goers fret not, for there are still ways to view your favorite artists performances.

Online live concerts

Many artists have reacted to this lockdown by coming forward and providing fan service such as live streaming performances or providing other multi segment production on the various social media platforms. Popular Dutch DJ Martin Garrix has hosted live performances on his Youtube channel, with fans tuning in from around the world to dance and have a lively time.

Popular K-Pop band, BTS intially had to cancel their concert due to the lockdown measures but quickly reassured fans by letting them know that they were moving their concert to an online platform.

American rapper Travis Scott linked up with popular video game Fortnite and held his concert online in the video game itself, and had 12 million players in the game participating in the concert. The concert was a unique experience as gamers were not only be able to view his concert from home, they were also able acquire in-game merchandise, and experience a fully immersive performance set utilizing in-game features to participate in the rapper’s performance.

Another American rapper, Machine Gun Kelly, showed fans that it was still possible to have fun and collaborate with other artists like Yungblud and Travis Barker, while still maintaining social distancing. He also uploaded many performances and music to his Instagram stories and Youtube channel, and live sessions to provide entertainment to his fans and send messages of support to his fans in this difficult time.

Online Performing arts

Online Performance Art is a platform for artist to stream their live performances. It showcases artists from all over the globe, and their different arts ranging from expressionist dance, singing and poetry, to musical drawings.

Eventbrite is also platform that hosts various performance and festivals online, allowing users to stay interconnected with live experiences events from various brands and performers around the world.

4. Learning A New Language

With more free time spent from home, travelers can take the time to learn a new language. If you already have a future destination in mind, now is the perfect time to learn the language of the destination and brush up on it.

Useful Applications to learn

There are many applications and sites that offers lessons to help people learn a new language, such as installing a voice recognition system that allows users to practice and match their speech to the recordings provided.

Duolingo has a unique gamified interface that piques the users into an addictive learning experience. On the other hand, while Babbel does not offer as many languages as Duolingo, its provides more comprehensive lessons. That being said, Babbel and Duolingo are some of the many applications that are available to download for free.

Of course there are also paid applications which will offer better lessons. Italki offers a unique service of personalized lessons with native speakers all over the world. Rocket Languages is another tool that provides very comprehensive materials, especially in its conversational transcripts.

Earworms Musical Brain Trainer is another free to download application that offers in app purchases. It utilizes rhythmic repetition and music to help infuse the new language with great ease to the learner.

5. Online Video Games

Traveling can also take place in the world of games, where one can roam freely, not bound by rules of society and only limited by his/her creativity. There are various genres like Open World or Walking Simulator that gives gamers the freewill to move freely in the game and explore the area.

Open world games

Games like the Grand Theft Auto (GTA) series and the Assassin Creed series are examples of games that allows gamers to explore real world locations that are rendered with meticulous details, while completing various tasks from the storyline of the games.

No Man’s Sky is an interesting game that focuses on exploration. It is a space exploration simulator that allows users to explore galaxies almost infinitely. The game employs a procedurally generated deterministic open world universe, which generates 18 quintillion unique planets, and would take players 585 billion years to see every single planet. At the same time, it ensures that other players will see the same elements as another player by travelling to the same location in the galaxy.

Leisure games

Missing your friends during this lockdown? Worry not as there are also a wide assortment of casual games that allow multiplayer. Plato is an app that allow users to choose a wide variety of games in the app and to host the game or join friends. Players are also able to chat together in real-time.

Cards Against Humanity is also another fun game to play with your friends. Players have to choose various answers to fill in the blanks to the question posted to them. The various answer cards range from risque, socially sensitive or dark humour, pop culture and politically incorrect statements. It is a hilarious game free to play online and laughter is a guaranteed component.

Skribbl is a game that requires players to choose various words and draw them out. The other players have to guess them correctly to earn points. Laughter is also a guaranteed component when playing as this is when you try to guess the abstract art your friends have drawn and identify the Picassos and Van Goghs in your group of friends.

That’s it from this list. Comment below if you any thoughts on the list above, or have more alternative inspiring ways to travel virtually from the comfort of your home.