There was a time when the purpose of travel writing, and later of broadcast travel coverage, was not to tell us how to follow in the writer's or broadcaster's footsteps, but to tell us about something we would never do for ourselves. It seems fairly certain that in the foreseeable future, for reasons of vanishing non-renewable resources and the protection of the environment, long-distance travel will once again become unaffordable for all but the few. The link above is to an interview with a British television icon who started broadcasting about far-away places back before package holiday travel had been invented, and when most of us stayed where we were, other than making a trip to the seaside, or a channel crossing to France.
Anyone remember when travel was actually glamorous?
Who will be the Alan Whicker for the slower-moving, shorter-distance society when it returns?
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