The Roads Best Travelled

I. Love. Travel.

The freedom. The people you meet and the places you see. Those experiences and the friendships that stay with you for years following any one trip. The ones that stay with us, if we’re lucky enough, until we’re old and grey.

Whether a family trip – in youth or with age, an adventure with your closest friends, or the first time you travel far and alone. Whether travelling by land, sea or air – no trip is complete without a soundtrack.

I don’t know what it is about certain songs or albums that just seem to find themselves on repeat during our travels, but I swear it happens every time. Then! Then you hear ‘em back home and they take you right back. Nostalgia is a funny thing, and you can catch my thoughts on that here – but that’s not what this is about. This is about the soundtracks to adventure.

I know what my “travel songs” are, of course – the highlights from journeys past – but what fun is it building a playlist simply for my own reminiscing?

This list contains a few tracks of my own, but is largely a compilation of songs that my wonderful friends put forward to me, often with stories of the trips and memories that they reminded them of. Listening to it and arranging the songs has been so fun. Knowing the stories behind them, and relating them to trips of my own.

I really hope that listening to this takes you back to a land far away as well – or to the back seat of mom and dad’s van as you drove to the lake, those same 2 weeks each and every summer. To a time or a place truly special to you.

This list is built on memories of questionable rental cars covering the Scottish country side. This list is built from road trips to that lake in BC, and from drives along Australia’s Great Ocean Road. It comes from long drives with sisters; weeks of debauchery with friends, sailing the Adriatic; from bachelor parties; Spanish islands; Thai beaches; Nicaraguan beaches; Vietnamese cities; and from the United Kingdom’s many pubs. It’s stumbling through the south of France, screaming lyrics with your best friends.

This is a playlist of the roads best travelled. Grab some mates, put ‘er on and maybe swap a couple stories. Ask your friends or your parents for tales you’ve never heard. I hope, nay, I know they’ll rouse all sorts of memories and inspiration within you – and that shit, that’s the best.

Dig in. Hit the road.

Much love, and with many thanks to those who helped make this what it is – Keat, Colin, Colin, Heather, Jesse, Jess, Cait, Megan, Christine, Shelby, Tyne, Carolyn, Johnny, Andrew, and all of the amazing and wonderful friends and family that have made my, and all of our, adventures so incredible.