Welcome to 2022 – we couldn’t let it go by without a little something from our team at Out Travel the System, even as we continue planning Season Four! On this mini-episode, we’re hoping to help you set your travel intentions for the year by giving you the inside scoop on 2022’s hottest destinations. Host Nisreene Atassi also details what the Expedia search data is showing in terms of trends for the 12 months ahead, including slower, more immersive travel, travel as a key priority of self-care, and yes, even a bit of thrill-seeking too. Supply and demand is always in effect for travel, so use our insider knowledge and best travel hacks to make sure you have the jump on keeping your travel budget right where you want it.

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Nisreene Atassi: Hey everyone, new year, new me, new you, new travel inspiration and new information about travel trends. So let’s go. I’m Nisreene Atassi, and this is Out Travel The System.

As we continue planning out season four of the show, we thought we’d drop in with a mini episode to help guide your travel inspirations. I wanted to share not only what we’re seeing in terms of what destinations are shaping up to be the hottest spots for 2022, but a little bit about how I’m personally thinking about my travel plans in the year ahead. I think I’ve mentioned this before, but I am a bit of a checklist person, I’m a little bit impromptu in planning my trips at the last minute. But when I do start planning a trip, I really go all in. I usually know exactly the things I’m going to do, the places I’m going to eat, how I’m going to get from point A to point B. It’s pretty planned out, which I’m impressed by, especially because I do things typically so last minute.

But as I sort of reflect on how I’m going to travel in the new year, I realize that I think my travel habits are going to change a little bit. And that’s not only because I haven’t traveled a ton in the past two years, but a lot has really changed for me. Pre- pandemic and post- pandemic, it’s a pretty different Nissy. I have really come a long way. I think I’ve done a lot of self- reflection as I think a lot of you have during this time, but I’ve also had a child and I’ve got a family now that I need to really I think about. And one of the things that I’m going to try and be really cognizant of is slowing down a little bit while I’m traveling, and not really staying super focused on trying to cram in every single monument, or every single museum, or every single hot tourist spot. But more so building in time to allow myself a chance to wander, a chance to maybe get lost, a chance to maybe spend an hour or two at a cafe, just people watching.

Because at the end of the day, when I reflect on some of my favorite trips to places like London, Paris, Maui, all of which are going to be some of the hottest destinations for 2022, I realized that my most favorite memories are of when I did get a chance to really slow down, when I was being a little bit more spontaneous, when maybe I sort of did get lost in the streets. Expedia did some really great research. A lot of you are thinking about doing the same. A lot of people noted that they wanted to be more present and truly experience a destination instead of trying to do things that they felt like they had to do, or things that they felt like they wanted to do, because it was going to look good on Instagram. So in the new year, I hope you all really get the opportunity to go with the flow, explore a little bit more of the unknown and really sort of dial into the type of travel that really brings you joy.

One of the topics that came up in season three repeatedly was people realizing how much travel actually means to them, and how it was an integral part of their mental wellbeing. It’s funny because oftentimes we don’t know how important something is to us until we don’t have it. It started to really sink in for a lot of people, myself included, that travel is actually a form of self care, and that it’s really important to prioritize it, whether it means making sure that you’re using all of your vacation days or making sure that you sort of plan out that budget. I know I’m certainly going to a little bit more thought into planning out the places I want to go and experiences that I want to have.

I’ve actually redone my bucket list in terms of travel, not only for 2022, but for the rest of my life. I look at bucket lists a little bit differently now. Instead of really sort of holding out for these really, really big, massive trips. So Australia and Bali and an African safari were all places that were on my bucket list before. And maybe they’re still there now. But I’ve added some more tangible places to my list as well, because now I’m thinking about what are the experiences I want to witness my daughter experiencing for the first time.

Orlando is on the list for one of the hottest destinations again for 2022. And I was thinking about the Disney episode that we recorded with Color Me Courtney, and how Disney was never a thing that would’ve been on my bucket list before. But it kind of is now because I think about how amazing it can be to watch my daughter enjoy it. But also thanks to the episode with Courtney, now it seems like something that I’m going to really get benefit out of and that I can really have a great time as well. So I’m just sort of thinking about things a little bit differently, and it’s how I’m prioritizing some destinations now for my 2022 bucket list, but also my sort of travel for the rest of my life bucket list. I hope all of the circumstances really align for you to really get where you want to go this year as well.

I want to dig in a little bit more about some of the trending destinations that I’ve mentioned, because this is a lot of the great data that has really been in coming through that we wanted to take a look at. The reason why I like to talk about these trending destinations is because with supply and demand, the destinations that are going to be the hottest for 2022 are probably the ones that are going to be a little bit more expensive. So those are the ones that are really worth planning out a little bit in advance.
So when we looked at things overall, I mentioned Orlando, Maui, and Paris and London. But in addition to that, we’re seeing places like Destin, Florida, Gatlinburg, Panama City, Florida, Riviera Maya, Playa Del Carmen, Tulum, Rome, Bali, all shaping up to be some of the hottest destinations for US travelers in the coming year. If we’re looking at major cities, Phoenix, Miami, Los Angeles, Charleston, Atlanta are all rising to the top as well.

We also took a look at some of the hottest beach destinations for travelers in 2022. I mentioned a couple of places in Florida, but right after that, we’re looking at Myrtle Beach in South Carolina, St. Petersburg, Gulf Shores, Alabama. If those places as are on your wishlist, you might want to start researching them now. We’ll put a link to the most recent travel hacks episode that I mentioned so that you can have all of those tips and tricks right at your fingertips.

During the course of the show, I think it’s come up before that I’m not the most outdoorsy or adventurous person. I think I want to change that a bit this year within my travels too, whether it’s going on that zip line or trying to do a longer or more challenging hike. Those moments of adrenaline and sheer joy or peacefulness sort of looking at how truly beautiful the world is, well they’re priceless. And I hope you get as many of them as you can fit in this year. Especially in the new year, we’re constantly bombarded with things like new year’s resolutions and people don’t often reflect on what that actually means for them and what they actually want to get out of the year.

We almost always default to some of the more standard ones that everybody in the world also uses. But it’s really important to just start to really reflect, look a little bit more inwards. A five mile hike may be absolutely nothing for the person standing next to you. But if you’re a person who only does a half a mile hike or a one mile hike, putting a five mile hike on your bucket list is absolutely something that can be important and something that I want to encourage everybody to just be a little bit more in tune with as they think about their travels for the next year.

Now there’s no replacement for truly being somewhere and being immersed in other cultures and other ways of living and thinking. It’s truly a way to get away from the every day. I hope that we’ve been able to provide you with lots of inspiration that you’ll keep tuning in as we keep researching new places to go, the best way to get there and how to get the most out of your travel.

I am wishing you all the best for this year in travel, and we will see you soon in season four. Until then, happy travels.

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