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positivity of the World Cup. The luxury of it being like when you come here, your hotels you're going to get, you're going to have plenty of space. The cars you rent, you're going to have plenty of space. And the thing is that positive news is ever. I think it's been a really fantastic thing cuz we had the 250th of the US on July 4th. Also, I think that brings us all closer together, which is really nice. Hey, THE FELLOW TRAVELERS, WE'RE BACK WITH the honest travel podcast. Myself, Mark, and chevs. Hello. How are you all? And we're back. And it's been a while because she's been to about 117 countries. I've only been about 55 countries since last time, but it has been such a fun summer so far with the
World Cup things going on. US travel, international travel, so many great things. So, chefs, tell me, what have you been up to since last time? Oh, Mark, it's been a whirlwind. It's been, yeah, as you said, a couple of months, and we really appreciate you guys sticking with us and commenting still on our videos. It's been really good. I've been to a few places. So, I went to Lithuania, then I went to Cyprus, then I went to Armenia. I just came back from Armenia. A lot of people don't even know where Armenia is. It's near Georgia. So, that was fantastic. And I also went to Switzerland as well. So, there's been a few places.
Yeah, it's been very busy. The last couple of months, it's been like four different destinations and spent a good amount of time there as well. But, it is a topic that we'll discuss actually because you've been to so many yourself. We thought we'll cover Europe in another episode because I think it's it's wise because one of the things we talk about being the honest travel podcast is we get to travel ourselves and then give you the honest opinions about these destinations and we can do this in the next episode. But yeah, you've been to quite a few yourself, haven't you? Yeah, we are in Spain and Portugal and Dora, France, Monaco, Italy. Then we travel around the US quite a bit and
that's what today's topic is about. US travel and the positivity of the World Cup. Because let's be honest, we did do a podcast a few months ago talking about the World Cup and the $150 price for the train tickets and the thousand tickets to get in and there were some things that got adjusted. But the thing was there was that trepidation and the trepidation you had before Qatar, what they had before Brazil, what you had before Germany and it all turned out and it's been a fantastic experience for all kinds of people. But Chevs, tell me like what's it been like for you when you're like you're you're not in the US and you're seeing things about the World Cup. What are you seeing about the US
when you're uh when you're over there? Yeah, it's been really positive. Not just in the UK by the way. I've been on the road so Switzerland, Armenia, all those countries that I just mentioned. All it is positivity. I was watching the England game the other day and it was in a bar and it was fantastic. People were cheering, people were getting together. It was really friendly atmosphere. It's been real positivity coming out of it which has been fantastic to see because the US tourism I think we may have talked about it in one of the episodes had a bit of a hit this year but I think it's right back up there now and it's really helped and you're the resident of
the US Mark and you've been traveling quite a bit. So you'll be able to tell us a little bit about what you've seen yourself firsthand and obviously your family as well. You travel with your family what you've both what you've seen as a family as well. Well, there's a lot of people that are worried about the World Cup going in because this is one thing we all know. News loves to give like bad news. Like that's what sells, you know? So, the scare, the fear, the bad, those kind of things that got people to be kind of worried about it. But once people got here, like that's one thing, like I always say, when you go to the US, Americans really are overly friendly. And you see, that's why
people think, oh, it's so fake. That's not how. No, we really are that friendly. We want to know like you have an accent. Where YOU FROM? HEY, WHAT are you doing here? Oh, I mean you saw the stories of the Scottish uh football team in Boston how they drank the entire you know the bars out of beer like and the thing is that positive news is ever yes I think it's been a really fantastic thing is we had the 250th of the US on July 4th and like you go around the US no joke I mean whether it's a bottle of ranch dressing a Coca-Cola heck they've coming out with all kinds of like special stuff just for the 250th in the US just to celebrate it's been a fantastic experience for the tourist company but I think for the US.
It's been fantastic really showing off the US and the US people and it's nice getting positive news out there about the US. It's been I mean it's been an excellent experience for me when we were abroad watching cuz we were watching some of the early games when we were in Europe and people were talking to us about things. They kind of got a little bit more excited cuz their friends were in the US sending back stories about like the people and the food sizes and the portions and everything. I mean it's just been a really posit just really a positive vibe that I think everybody really is enjoying. When I've traveled to the US, those are the things that I've seen when I traveled to the US. I've had an
amazing time going back 15 years ago when I first came to the US. And one of the dreams was going to New York. But everyone's everyone that I've seen and the feedback that I've had from colleagues as well. I've know a few people in the media, they've said it's been fantastic. The organization's been second to none as well. The you feel safe as well. There's no worries about okay, this is what's going to happen. Do I need to worry about this? Do I need to worry about that? None of that as well. So that's been really positive as well which is great to hear. And obviously a lot of the matches are from the west coast to the mid midwest to the east. So if you're traveling if you're a fan and you've been traveling to all these games.
Yeah. Actually leave us a comment and say tell us what you've seen what you've heard because one of the topics that we covered was the price ex of the food and the transportation from what you've seen and you've traveled a little bit. Has it spiked up or has it remained the same or was it just scaremongering from the from our media outlets to sort of give it a bit of a negative vibe to it? There was some of that beginning like those high prices the hotels and stuff were saying it was kind of a non entity about the bump that they'd get in the World Cup because they'd scared enough people off with the high price and stuff. So those actually came
down somewhat. We've been traveling around the US the last couple weeks and honestly we've been like by like Kansas City and things and the prices were a little bit higher but not like triple like it was. So I think the prices got more regulated cuz they saw people were like I'm not going to spend that. I'll go stay someplace else. I think that's made it a lot more affordable. And there's been other things like there's so much blowback from example from that the train ticket prices and stuff that those kind of came back as well. So, there was the fear-mongering, but the price it's been a little bit easier and the getting tickets still the thousand tickets are still out there, but at
least there were for some games you get tickets for a few hundred bucks, so it was at least doable versus like what we were looking at before when they had those insane prices. But, uh, yeah, know it was definitely overblown. Um, but seeing it now, people are going and enjoy it and like the fan zones and stuff, but not just the fan zone, like the official ones. Like I've gone to watch parties to watch US games, Mexico games, Portugal games. So it is kind of cool because where I live there's a lot of different nationalities. So I can go oh where the Mexican fans go, where the Portuguese fan go, the Brazilian fans go. So that's been kind of a fun thing to do. And that's one thing in the
US you can find those all over. And it's gotten people really excited. And you know football, soccer isn't the biggest sport here. Though a lot of people play well when they're little kids that's like the default little kid game. like every weekend you drive around in the fall and the summer, you'll see like little soccer leagues going around. Um, but just like when kids get to high school, they kind of flow away from it. The women still play, but the boys tended to go out to basketball or football or whatever. But, uh, everyone's played it. It's like it's not more like explaining people what is soccer. Well, the funny thing is we've always heard it on TV or on movies,
the soccer mom as in yeah, you do this stuff the soccer mom and you do it when you when the kids are young, but then the kids don't necessarily follow up as some obviously do become professionals and stuff, but not many people do. But it's good to see actually because one of the things I've seen from it is there's been a really good vibe and we mentioned that you always hear the stories about oh if you go to the stage this is going to happen. I've never had that experience. So for people who have gone there now and to experience it during this boom period and there's there's a lot of good spirit there, what would you think they're going to take away from it when they come back? And just maybe give us a few examples of what maybe perhaps what
they may have done and might do when they go back. I think one of the biggest things is what I've heard I've had people tell me this, they've emailed me about this, DM'd us about it, but also like you'll see it in the news like people are so surprised about like Americans really are incredibly friendly. like when the soccer teams are coming to town and when the fans are there like the locals like welcome them in. It's like oh your country is based in our city, we're going to take you and so we're going to cheer for your team. And that's one of the really great things is people like they kind of like you go abroad people make fun of Americans cuz oh they always say hi and they're always like talking
and stuff so loud. I'm like yeah but that's just who we are. And when abroad a lot of people think it's fake, you know? They're like oh you just you know it's like oh that American service is over you just want money for the tips. like well yes but also we're really friendly people and now that they see it in like in situ like in the US they realize wow these people really are really nice people and I think the ramifications for this the positive effect of tourism in the US how it's kind it was go very much down this in the first part of this year and last year I can see the US getting a boom in tourism from Europe Asia other places international travel coming back because people saw wow that was really a fun
place like people went and had a good time and they want to try that ranch dressing they saw about on TV and stuff, you know. So, I think that's going to be a really good positive thing. I've actually found really interesting is the social media posts have been mostly about the US and the travelers to the US versus the travelers went to Canada, the travelers went to Mexico because people were like, "Oh, Canadians, they're nice and that's kind of Mexico's a fun place." So, everyone, it kind of fit with the thing. Hey, we had a good time, nice people. But there's such a different version of what people see and hear about the US abroad and then they're here and like whoa I had to share this like I got to let you know
it's a different place. And I think that's one of those really nice things and also I think that brings us all closer together which is really nice. So that's a couple things I think u I've really seen over the course of the World Cup. the infrastructure. I remember you sort of jokingly sort of used the air quotes. Yeah, they've done this, they've done that, they've altered the transportation and stuff because sometimes they say this and they don't. But h would it have a lasting effect in the in the tourism when it comes to because one of the things when I noticed when I came to the states your train system wasn't wasn't the best, but I assume now they've they've they've done stuff to that and the transportation for people to travel
along. It's made it a lot more easier. Would that be the case? Well, I think one of the things a lot of times they have World Cups like in Brazil, in Qatar, like they had to build stadiums. They had to build the infrastructure. You know, in the US, we already have stadiums that hold 80,000 people just for the local football team. Like, that's true. I live in a college university town and we have a stadium that holds 60,000 people and we're just like a normal university. We're not like a bigname thing. So, like those huge stadiums, we already have them. We're not building anything. Like I we had to do stuff to make it le hold less people in some of the stadiums, right? And so therefore that infrastructure is already
there. But also when you look at things like we have our Super Bowl and have the Super Bowl or the Final Four for basketball, these big tournaments, the towns that host it have to have certain number of hotel rooms. These kind of things which are exactly what you would need for the World Cup. So you're going to Houston, Miami, you know, Los Angeles, New York, we already have all the hotels. It's already there. So what they do with it is the money that they have to spend isn't as much on building the stadiums. It's more it's just more of the let's spruce up the stuff. Let's help out the infrastructure. Let's make the train lines a little bit better. Go a few more stops. There's a few things with it. So,
it wasn't as revolutionary like when you see the white elephant projects like in Greece with the Olympics a few years ago, how there's just things that are just empty and just grass grown over. None of that stuff's here cuz we've already have it there. So, that people saw the wait, you already have this kind of infrastructure. Oh, yeah. It's it's a normal thing. And I think that's been a really kind of eye opening experience for a lot of people. Now, the long-term impact for Americans for this is one, hey, it's like how I talk about the 94 World Cup. Like, that was kind of cool. Like, we learned about soccer, we saw these things. This time it's more of a, hey, it's another event
we're enjoying together. Um, but it's not like, oh, there's a new stadium. Oh, there's a new train line. Like that kind of stuff. We didn't have as much of that. Cuz when I travel to the US, I have been outside of the big cities like LA, New York, obviously, because I like to travel. But for people who have never been to the US and they've been to obviously the New York and LAS and stuff, what's been really great is see highlighting those destinations where people might not ever think about going to. So holding those matches there. Now what do you think will happen in terms of the people traveling to those destinations instead of just going to New York or just LA?
Yeah, I think you're right. Good point. I think that's one of those things. It's like people have had a great time in Kansas City, Houston. I mean, these are cities that people are never really tough. Even in the US, people won't talk about going to Kansas City, but I've been there and it was a fantastic. They have one of the best art museums in the world. Not just in the US, in the world. The Atkins Museum that's there, but also the food that's there, the jazz, the music scene, the jazz scene, and it's so cool. But most people think, oh, it's in the middle of the US. Nobody cares.
There's nothing there. But all of a sudden, people see, wait, that's kind of cool. Let's do that adventure in the middle of the US. Let's go to the, you know, the Northwest. You know, Seattle, the stadium there was great. What if we go to the Northwest? And I think what's it's what's nice is it gets people to open their eyes about all the different stuff the US has because that's another thing people have said. It's like I understand why Americans aren't going anywhere because if you want the beaches, you got Florida, California, right? You might Maine, anywhere you want to go there. Oh, you want mountains? Yeah. What kind of mountains you want? You want the really highs like the Rockies? You want to do hikings like
in the Smoky Mountains kind of stuff? And people like, wait, you really have a lot of those options already here. And it I think it's been very help. The World Cup has been very helpful with all these tourists coming here to understand the American mentality when you're like, you know, if you, you know, if you live in the UK, it's like, yeah, it's a 30, you know, it's an hour long flight, you know, I'm in France or I'm in wherever. In the US, I have an hourong flight. I'm still in Illinois, you know, it's like south of going to Chicago, Dad. I mean, and that's the thing. It's like people start to understand just the entire distance of the US, right? And you know, and the jokes they had about the US, like,
oh, you guys can't park. and then they come here and they realize, oh yeah, you don't know how to parallel park because you don't parallel park in the US because we have big huge parking lots and we have big huge cars and we have big huge roads. So that's why you start it really I think it's been really good for a cultural understanding for a lot of Europeans and not just Europeans but that's the one you see on social media line and it seems like oh I'm starting to understand the American way of life a little bit better and ah I see with these portion sides why so many Americans look like Mark right and so there are those things out there but it's it's it's just been a really great
thing and I think it is going to open up more places around the US cuz like for those you don't know like Barcelona was not Barcelona before the olymp they had the Olympics in '92 after the Olympics put Barcelona on the map for tourism. Okay. And a lot of people like no everyone would go to a beach town like Barcelona. Well, Barcelona wasn't a beach town. They built those beaches for the Olympics and then they made the whole like the city kind of like rode that wave. And that's like one of the best examples of using a big event really promote your city. And now Barcelona is one of the most visited cities in the world. And so by having this kind of stuff, hey, we've done this. It gets people interested. It's
planting that seed that maybe they don't go this year because they saw the World Cup. They think, hey, maybe next year, the year after we do something like this and we explore more than just New York City because for a lot of people, you know, I go I went to New York, I went to the US, I'm done. It's like I went to London, I saw England, I'm done. No, there's more there people, right? And so I think this is nice that they've kind of shown that. So you hit a point there. It's really vast the US and some people even have the passports and you can see why. So people who have never been to the US and they can understand now why because there's so much to explore throughout the US. I think in a lifetime I know I
know lot people say oh I've been to all 50 states and stuff but you haven't been to everywhere in that 50 states because it would probably take you a lifime to do so. Yeah it's impossible. So I think this is really positive because I absolutely love the US. So whenever I go, everyone's always friendly to me, the hi's and how are you? And I always generally feel like they there's care there. And sometimes you don't get that in Europe cuz when I went to Switzerland, when I went to Armino, when I yes, they're very friendly, but they wouldn't necessarily go out their way to say, "Hi, how are you?" That is very and that's one thing when I see when I go to the US, I
love because and your hospitality as well, by the way. Hopefully people listening tell us if you've been to the restaurants, what's the hospitality like? Because Mark, you know, when I've been the hospitality has been out this every time I'm I'm eating every 10 minutes. Is everything okay? Do you not need anything else? You don't really get 10 minutes. That's a long time. It should be like 3 to four minutes. I stop by top up that Coke. What's more free ice water? Hey, you want free refill? How's everything? No, but that is one thing that I noticed when I first went to the US. I thought, wow, actually it is genuine. It's not just what you see on television or in the movie. You really do get that. So hopefully people again let us know if
you have had those experiences. So I think that's that's one of the things people will probably go away thinking wow it is actually generally one of the nicest places in the world to travel to. It is and that's one thing that's really nice is that when you come to the US you can fly around you can drive around. There is limited train and bus stuff you can do that but like you can get around and if you're in the Northwest, the Southeast, the Midwest, anywhere people are friendly. That's one thing. It's like the food will kind of change in different places. Our accents might be a little bit different, but that friendly Americanism is one of those things that is truly across the
US. And I think that's one things that people can really take and enjoy when they come here. It's like, wow, everywhere I went, people are really nice. Yeah. That's one of the things that all our differences in the US, it's one thing that says the same. What other areas do you think people can capital the cities that can capitalize and give it a bit more of a boom to the to their area? What do you think is the are the best places to prosper from this World Cup? I don't think one place I think is going to prosper the most isn't actually in the US. I think one place Scotland is going to get a huge boost cuz that is one thing the entire all the I mean it was like a daily news thing about
Scottish fans in Boston. So I can see those flights from Boston to Edinburgh selling out next year like that going. Um, awesome. By the way, Kate Birdie or is it we about to say Kate Verdie, right? Okay, I was about to say K. Like that's another one people cuz people I mean even on the like when they're doing the FIFA stuff like you guys don't have Cabo Verde in the right place like you're it's not in South America guys it's an island over coast of Africa and it's just so like and sometimes that's the same people just don't know and that's what's great about it because you know they always have I mean I when I was in Portugal no joke it was one of the late
night games and I was like clicking through the TV and there was literally I think 14 channels were talking about the World Cup and only one had the game on. But the thing is, they're all talking about the other things in the US. Oh yeah, I'm here in Kansas City and I went to the Jazz Museum. I went to the, you know, Negro Leads Baseball Hall of Fame and like I went to this they're talking about it's like it's if people don't know these places exist, it never crossed their mind, but now they see it. It's like, hey, why don't we go there? And I think that's one of those things it's it's definitely going to open up more of the US, you know, cuz like Seattle, people knew Seattle back in the
90s because of, you know, oh, it's it was Microsoft and then Amazon was from there, right? So it's like it's the tech city, right? But now they saw the stadium like oh my god like how loud that stadium gets how much they cheer for the people that be kind of a cool place to go. And I think that's what you're going to see is the like Texas I could see getting a big boom cuz they had you know the Texas stadium in Dallas or the Dallas stadium which is in Arlington and the Houston stadium and like people are having a good time there. I could see like an inflow there. But I think it's just going to open up a lot more of the US to travelers and people be putting the US back on their
travel itinerary cuz for a long time the US is one of the biggest place people like to go and then you know kind of got uh like pushed to the side for a bit made fun of. I'm not going there and now people like hey they've had a great time and now like hey you know what why don't we go? So I could see a boom I wouldn't say an insane boom but I could see a boomlet of travelers coming back to the US next year. And a lot of these things it's like a couple years. You get a couple years of like the glow and then that kind of goes, "Hey, did we build enough goodwill that they want to come back in later?" Because one thing I'll see when I meet people that come to the US as a travel, they're like, I come all the time.
Like they go, you know what? I've gone to California four times. I've been to Texas. I mean, they don't go once. They go multiple times. and if they have that if we've gotten people back to thinking about that. You also hit a really good point about those other destination other nations as well because it might actually help tourism in general worldwide because it's had a bit of a hit obviously with what's happened over the last year or so with people not traveling and stuff. It's had a lean period obviously with the pandemic. So the World Cup is actually side of things, financial side of things. And it might actually help cuz when I saw the Japanese and we had an episode on Japan
where actually Carmon Roberts spoke about the Japanese will clean up after themselves. We actually saw it in the World Cup where they were actually cleaning up after the when the stadiums when the matches were they were cleaning out and they were showing and it was all over the news and it was funny because we covered that during one of our episodes. So it's actually great to see because it will actually help people. I think people again there's always a misconception about okay if you go to America they don't know about different cultures. actually they do and it would have also would have helped people who have come from parts of this world to actually understand them even
better say wow actually these are fantastic people and we want to come to your country invite me I would love to go and I think that's that's the real positivity about it I think anyway in general about this world cup and we haven't even finished the world cup yet either that's one thing I like is if you look at some of these places like the European cup like six or eight years a I guess six years ago or 10 years ago when Iceland did really good and everyone did the one clap and it really helped Iceland tours because people really start talking about even more. But the thing is now people like, "Hey, what is Cabo Verde?" And they open up their phones and then you get that array
of beautiful picture like, "Wow, look at those beaches. Wow, look at that food." Like, "Yeah, the Cabo I say Cabo Verde because they speak Portuguese. I speak Portuguese so you um but it's like Yeah. Yeah, that helps. But also the other way like if your team I mean you can lose, but if you like you play with Spirit, like it's like the Curisowl like I could see people going to Curissowl especially Germans like yeah they beat them but they were so friendly. It was a good game. I could see a number of tourists going to Kurissau, you know, in the Caribbean seeing that. But also vice versa, like when Paraguay went out, you know, and how like versus
France and how there's a lot of really cheap shots and like chipping and stuff that kind of like left a bad taste in people's mouth. So I could see people say, you know what, I don't want to go to Paraguay because I didn't like what their players did. And that's one of the things the players sometimes don't realize is like I mean they do know like you represent your country but the thing is like Mbappe with his smile kind of stuff like ah I like France a little bit more cuz he like he seemed like a nice guy like they're not nice guys but it comes off that way and that's where it's like hey you know like Cabo Vera is going to get a bump. Coral is going to get a bump. US is going to get a bump.
Paraguay is going to take a hit and not allow tours to go to Paraguay anyway. It could have been, hey, if it was a good game, even if you lost, hey, lost with respect, maybe it could be planted a seed, you know, like, hey, Argentina trip and I go to the false guazu, which is where, you know, Brazil and Argentina come together and Paraguay is right there. Maybe people do go over to Sil the last day and go pop into Paraguay for a little bit. I actually did that when I went to that Gaza Fool, you could take a bus into literally you could take a bus from the Brazilian I think it's Brazilian side all the way up to Paraguay and Oh, you can go for Yeah.
Oh, you could do it by boat. Yeah, you could do my boat. Yeah, the Cuz I've done it a few times. One, we just walked over. Another one I took the bus into Brazil and then over into Paraguay. So, I've done I know exactly what you're talking about. You've also hit it hit the nail on the head that yeah, those countries and obviously places like Paraguay, if they if they've seen their team behave quite badly, they might I might not want to go there. But, however, in general, from what we've seen, it's been a really positive impact. Not just obviously for the US, Canada, and Mexico as well. they'll they'll they'll read the rewards of this World Cup. And it actually falls very nicely, Mark, to because we want to just go we always
finish off with viewers question because yeah, one of the comments we got on the last episode was our advice on second, third, fourth cities. And this is what Citizen Tal said. Your advice on go on going to second, third, and fourth tier cities is spot on, Mark. Everyone crowds the bucket list, but I visited Tulus, Travisio, Western Belgium, and Osaka, Coobe, and I barely heard any English and I saw everyone there immerse themselves into local culture and daily living. There you go. That's what Citizen Tower said. And that's what hopefully people get out of the states. And I'll tell you like on this last trip we went, we were in two cities that had that exact same. Zaragoa. It's exactly right in between Barcelona, Madrid, and
most people just take the train, don't even think about it, and they pass right over it. Fantastic Spanish experience. I mean, I was speaking Spanish the whole time. Like English, they had some English here, but it was like, hey, I really got felt like I was in Spain, you know. I wasn't like just a tourist city, you know? And then we're in exump by kind of by N Marseilles down in the south. Again, it's not a beach town, but it's in the south of France. And all the French we had, the markets and everything is going to those secondary tertiary cities. You get to see the culture, the people, and honestly when it came to tourists, I think we saw like four.
Well, lots of people commented about the slow travel. One thing I would say is because of the fact that the World Cup's been going on for about 6 weeks, you actually if you are going to be there for 6 weeks, slow travel is a thing. So, and we've had people say, "Yep." And we will hopefully get to an episode very soon about slow travel. So, again, with slow travel, this is where you've done slow travel a lot. I've done slow travel, Mark. This will hopefully help people understand a country a bit better. I think this is what we just we've obviously gone through it a little bit, but hopefully people now can say actually if you travel through the US, not just go hit the hot spots and slow
travel throughout the country, you get to feel more of the destination, would you not say? And the people and the culture. For sure. Because if you're going like it's the other if you're doing a city every 3 days, right? It's like your first day you get there, you're tired, you've been traveling, you're unpacking, let's grab a bite to eat. Second day we're going to see the sites. Third day trying to see all the sites we didn't see already. And then I got to pack when I get back. So we leave the next morning. It never gives you that chance to like sit back and go, hey, like let me enjoy the city cuz I'm trying to get all the sites. It's like that checklist kind of thing to hit everything. Did I
eat Did I eat everything I needed to eat? Did I see all the sites I needed to see? Versus let it kind of play through where you can instead of making three things in a day, you can spread out over three days. And I think that's where if you spend like and it doesn't have to be you sp you know slow travel doesn't mean just spending like six weeks in one place. It can mean you know what we're going to spend one week in this town and it can be I'm going to spend one week. It can be I'm going to speak one week in Paris cuz you know what you get all the main sites in a weekend but all of a sudden you got four extra days. Then you start to see the other stuff. Then you're going to the grocery store. Then
you're sitting the cafe. Then you're going to that same cafe, that same petissicisserie in the morning, three days in a row, and they recognize you and you're like, "Hey, I'm feeling like more of a part of something here." And that's where slow travel can be very nice. And that's why, you know, we have friends that like they'll rent a cabin and like I'm in Michigan, you know, and we don't talk about nature travel in the US and slow. You get that cabin up there, you're chilling during the day, you go to the local like mom and pop diner at dinner kind of stuff. You really kind of understand the local people a bit better. It's it's a fantastic thing. There's one we should really finish off on and it is a
beautiful one that Aaron El Tali has put down here. It's definitely a luxury here in the United States. What would you say to that Mark? The luxury of it being like look when you come here you're hotels you're going to get you're going to have plenty of space. The cars you rent you're going to have plenty of space. People I mean people are not going to crowd you. We do not crowd. We like our personal bubble. So you have that space. And so it is a luxury because you get to go around and you need anything. Guess what? You can go shop any time of the day.
It'll be right there for you, you know, and you can go and you don't have to spend a lot. I mean, I'll have friends, no joke, I have a friend of mine came from Brazil. They bought literally I think everything they saw like when they went back, they had eight suitcases and they had a driver and the driver had one of those big American cars, you know, they filled up the trunk, they filled up the back seat, his girlfriend was in the back and she had a suitcase on her lap. suitcases on this side. He had a suitcase in his lap sitting in the front seat and they're like it was just too good to shop. I couldn't stop shopping and it was just like such a thing and they had so much fun. They went I mean
they went from Florida to Illinois and they did a nice thing cuz they did the tourism stuff. They did, you know, Disney and things, but then they came to central Illinois and because he was an exchange student our with our family years ago and they did like the small town Route 66 stuff, you know, and it was just so fun. And for a tourist, it has anything you want. You want to bring your family, there's always family stuff there, young and old. You want to do outdoor stuff, that's all. You need co like museums, we've got that, too. And that's what's so nice about you can do all these different adventures when you're in the US. So yeah, you are it is very much a luxury coming to the US to
uh to travel cuz just you can just do so much. The weather is has been warm but that's is it is a summer of course there's no by the way we've had a heat wave here in the UK and not just the UK but all over Europe it's been hit the temperatures I know in Celsius is around about 354 degrees CC but it's like 100 F. Oh yeah it's over 100. It's actually probably warmer here in Europe than it is actually in the States. But and we have air conditioning everywhere. So you're like, "Ah, it's so funny. You guys do the funny thing is here in the UK, we don't have any air conditioning and we've we've had American people come over and said it's actually feels more hotter here because we just don't have the we just don't have the infrastructure for because it's
never usually this hot. So we're going to have to start building these infrastructures for the hot weather." Yeah. And I think another thing, it's not just the no AC, it's the no air movement. You know, like we have friends in this in the south US that like, hey, they don't have air conditioning because it can get very expensive. They wait to turn it on. But they had the ceiling fans going, you know, like in our house, like all of our bedrooms have a fan in it. Like on the ceiling, so you turn your light on, there's a fan there that gets the air moving. So even if it's hot, at least the air moves. So that sometimes makes it feel a little bit cooler. Whereas you have no air movement, you're just like,
uh, I'm just sitting to my own sweat. Well, I really appreciate everyone listening and watching this episode. If you got any comments, please do let us know if you've been, what matches you've been to, what everything that we've discussed, have you interacted with people throughout I've come over all over the world. What sort of impressions have you had from it? And yeah, let us know in the comments. We love to hear from you and keep the conversation flowing. And yeah, Mark, any more before we leave? There are lovely people here.
Want to say thank you for all your comments. Uh, keep on traveling, having fun doing it, whether you're coming to the US or you're going all around the world. But I will say the World Cup has been a fantastic very it's been a very uh like wonderful experience for the US itself because this summer has been fantastic. People all over the world coming to the US telling how much they've enjoyed their time in the US. Us celebrating 250 years of the US. Sorry, chevs. That's and one of the topics that we will discuss during our Europe European discussion is I just mentioned it the heat wave. People are traveling across to places where it's a bit more cooler and it's become a the word coolation
has all of a sudden been invented. So I think that's a topic that we can cover in the near future. But yeah, let us know in the comments what you if you're going anywhere. But yeah, Mark, I leave it to you to sign us off. All right. Well, thank you everybody and hope you'll be with us on our next honest travel podcast. Like Ship says, you have ideas for new content or ideas for new topics you want us to talk about, please put it down in the comments below. And also let us know how your team did in the World Cup. Bye from the library.
