Nomadic Spirit is a weekly newsletter for travelers who care as much about the why as the where.
In this issue
This week in The Dispatch, more than 90% of what people say about travel online concerns trips that have not happened yet. The planning turns out to be a larger part of the pleasure than the trip gets credit for. A Chosen Place goes to Nozawa Onsen, a Japanese village where the public baths are free, the pickles are named after the town, and the skiing is one of several reasons to be there. In The Journey, Susan Tassin wakes at five in western Mongolia, a month into living with a nomadic family in Sagsai, where most of the world’s remaining eagle hunters live. And Further Afield brings five stories worth taking with you, from Japan beyond the Golden Route to a pilgrimage trail through roadless Swedish mountains.
The Dispatch
Where Travel and Life Intersect
When Does a Trip Actually Start?
Long before you leave, according to the research, and to anyone who loves to plan.
More than 90% of online travel conversations happen before the trip.
Fewer than 10% come once travelers are home. After sharing a photo or two and retelling a favorite story, most folks are already talking about where to go next.
Much of the pleasure of travel lies in the deciding. The trip is the smaller event. The months in front of it are the larger ones.
Which makes it strange that the travel industry is now encouraging us to hand that part to AI.
What we were hired to find
Before my career in academia, I ran a Chicago-based digital and word-of-mouth marketing agency. One of the leading online travel sites came to us with a request: help them understand where, how, and why people are talking about travel online, and what would encourage them to recommend their site over competitors.
We had specialized tools that let us collect and analyze what people were saying in blogs, social media, and other digital channels about travel almost anywhere in the world.
Almost all the commentary was about trips that had not happened yet. The planning phase. Where they were thinking of going. Whether ten days was enough. What was worth seeing once they got there, and what everyone said was worth seeing but wasn't. People were pouring hours into trips that were still months away. And they clearly got great pleasure from the planning.
Then the trip happened, and the conversation stopped.
A study from 1997
Researchers found the same thing before any of us were doing much posting online.
Terence Mitchell, a management professor at the University of Washington, and three colleagues followed people through a holiday in Europe, a Thanksgiving vacation, and a three-week bicycle ride through California, asking how everyone felt beforehand, during, and afterward.
Expectation beat the experience. Memory beat the experience. The trip itself came in last, dragged down by ordinary life refusing to stop.
The trip is where the material comes from. You cannot look forward to something you have no intention of doing, or remember a place you have never been.
The part being automated
Global Rescue, which surveys experienced international travelers, found AI use for trip planning rose from 22% in January 2026 to 36% by midsummer. Most of that involves destination research and itinerary planning; however, 79% say they would be uncomfortable letting AI book flights, hotels, or activities without their approval.
This year's industry forecast is for software that books and rebooks on your behalf while you get on with your life. Expedia puts the ambition plainly in its pitch to partners: people don't dream about bookings; they dream about moments.
They are right. That is exactly what people dream about, and it is the part now being compressed into four seconds. We were once hired to get people more involved in planning their travel. The business is now figuring out how to get them to do less of it.
What to keep
It's tempting to make travel planning as quick and easy as possible. Just know that giving it away costs you one of the best parts of the trip. There is a sensible version of this, and we use it ourselves. Turn over the visa rules, the connection times, and whether the museum is shut on Mondays. Nobody looks forward to deciphering a train timetable.
Keep the reading. The book about the place written by somebody who lived there, started in October for a trip in April.
Keep talking and asking. Write to the friend who spent a week somewhere and ask what you should not miss. People love being asked, and we all love sharing our hard-earned travel insights.
Book earlier than you need to. An early booking turns a vague wish into something with a date on it, and something with a date on it can be looked forward to for months.
You probably already have a trip on your calendar, months out and mostly unplanned. Whatever you felt just now, thinking about it, is the beginning of the trip.
A Chosen Place
Destinations worth traveling to and understanding once you arrive.
Kusatsu Onsen in Gunma, a village built around water that arrives too hot to touch.
Nozawa Onsen, Japan
Japan welcomed a record 42.7 million international visitors last year, and 2026 is running ahead of that pace. The pressure is showing. Kyoto increased its lodging tax this year, with the highest rate reaching ¥10,000 per person per night, and the country’s departure tax tripled in July.
There are still places where the experience feels remarkably intact.
Nozawa Onsen is one of them.
The mountain village sits in Nagano Prefecture, a few hours from Tokyo, and is best known internationally as a ski town. Skiers and people who know Japan well have been coming here for decades.
But the reason to go isn't simply the mountain.
Nozawa is an onsen town in the most literal sense. Hot spring water runs beneath it, and thirteen public bathhouses, known as soto-yu, are scattered through the village. They are maintained by neighborhood associations and are free to use, with donations requested for their upkeep.
These aren't spa facilities built for visitors. They are small community bathhouses used by residents as they have been for generations.
The water can be startlingly hot. Each bath has its own source and character, and learning the etiquette is part of being there: wash before entering, don't bring a towel into the bath, and expect very little English signage.
Unlike many Japanese onsen, the public baths generally do not prohibit tattoos.
At the top of the village is Ogama, a steaming hot spring where the water reaches roughly 90°C. It isn't for bathing. Local residents use it to cook vegetables and eggs, and access to the hottest area is restricted to villagers.
Food is part of the rhythm here as well. The village gave its name to nozawana, the leafy green vegetable commonly pickled and served throughout the region. Small shops sell oyaki, buckwheat or wheat dumplings filled with vegetables, mushrooms or sweet bean paste.
Winter is the fullest version of the place. Storms off the Sea of Japan bury the village under several meters of snow, ten feet or more, from December into spring. The cold outside is what makes the hot water worth walking to. January and February are the heart of the season.
In the evening, the narrow streets quiet down. Steam rises from drains and bathhouses. People walk between inns and baths in yukata. There are bars and restaurants, but the village doesn't organize around nightlife.
Every January, Nozawa holds the Dosojin Fire Festival, one of Japan's best-known fire festivals. Villagers build a large wooden shrine that becomes the center of a ritual battle on the night of the 15th, involving torches, fire, and the village's men of particular ages. Access to the ceremony that night is limited to village residents and guests staying overnight in the village with tickets.
The next one is January 15, 2027.
We want to hear from you
Two ways to be in Nomadic Spirit
Susan’s piece this week (below) is a reader submission. The Journey is open to readers who want to write about a trip that mattered. Personal, specific, in your own voice. Length is flexible. We edit lightly and leave your voice intact.
Fork First: One dish, one place, one reason to go. 200 to 300 words. The test: Would you go back for this dish? Would you tell everyone heading to that city to find it? If yes, write it up.
If you are interested in sharing your story with our 21,000+ readers, please write us at [email protected], and we’ll send along submission guidelines.
We read everything that comes in.
The Journey — Voices of the Nomadic Spirit
Stories from travelers changed by where they went.
Eagle hunters near Sagsai, in Mongolia's Bayan-Ölgii province. Photograph by Susan Tassin.
My Journey with the Eagle Hunters
By Susan Tassin
My normal life is hectic. I am up by 5 am, and commute an hour into my job in education, through tight traffic. I'm tired and overstimulated when I return home, and often crash on the couch, too worn out to think about dinner.
I'm up at 5 am here, too. But the day could not be further from the life I have on the other side of the world. I am in far western Mongolia, living with a nomadic family for a month. The village we just left has no roads to it, other than a dirt path worn by Russian van tires through the Altai mountains from the nearest town, over an hour away. The village my host family resides in, Sagsai, is home to most of the world's remaining eagle hunters. Only approximately 250 remain in the world.
I have come to western Mongolia as part of a summer camp experience for the local children. English-speaking teachers are invited to live with local families as they provide instruction and support for the children who are learning English. Tourism is exploding in Mongolia, and Sagsai's residents realized that outside companies are encroaching, providing the “Mongolian Experience”. They decided they should be able to present their own story and benefit from the global interest in the beauty of their area, as well as the incredible eagle hunter culture. The hope is that, by speaking English, which is the language of tourism, their children will remain in the area and benefit from the increasing tourism industry. Currently, many children leave Sagsai after completing their education due to limited opportunities.
During the summer months, many of the village's families make the long journey to Dayan Lake, our current location. The families choose an area to place their ger (yurt) and graze their yaks, horses, camels, and cattle. We are several hard hours from the nearest dirt road. The nothingness around us is unsettling to my suburban sensibility. The distance from a hospital, from a grocery store, from other people is hard to grasp. It feels like floating in a deep part of the ocean, knowing that the water descends for an unfathomable distance below you. There is a word for that fear of the depths of the ocean: thalassophobia. But is there a similar word for what I am feeling now, as I look out the door of the ger, knowing that the steppes stretch out for miles and miles, with no people in any direction? It is not fear that I am experiencing. It is an expanding of my understanding of my own world. The knowledge that, to my hosts, this is normal. This is summer, the same way that popsicles, sprinklers, and swimming lessons meant summer to me back home.
Children here count the days until they can go to the lake. They build precious family memories, just as I did. They have foods that they only eat at the lake, just as I did when at the Jersey Shore with my family.
I step out of the ger into the sunshine and silence, and feel an emotional response in my throat and eyes. The people of Sagsai and my host family are some of the most generous, welcoming people I have met. I have been given the gift of being included in their lives for a little while. I have offered the same courtesy, should they wish to come to the States. They politely smile, but they have no interest in taking me up on my offer. As I stand in the cool breeze, watching the deep blue sky and the shadows that the passing clouds make on the steppes, I understand their deep love of their home and why leaving it is not a priority.
Susan Tassin is a school psychologist and author from south-central Pennsylvania.
Further Afield
Reading worth your time.
The trip starts before you leave
National Geographic
Planning and anticipating a trip can be as enjoyable as taking it. Researchers explain why having somewhere to look forward to matters, and how imagining the meals, places and experiences ahead lets us begin enjoying a journey months before we leave home.
Japan beyond the Golden Route
Forbes
Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka still dominate most first trips to Japan, along with the crowds that come with them. Three culture-rich cities reachable by train offer a different route and another reason to think beyond the itinerary everyone else is following.
What tourism could mean for Mongolia's nomads
Condé Nast Traveler
Mongolia is attracting more international visitors, creating both opportunity and risk for the nomadic communities travelers come to see. Can tourism help preserve traditional ways of life while allowing local families to benefit from the growing interest in them?
Five European cities without the queues
The Guardian
Parma instead of Florence. Nantes instead of Paris. Add Basel, Lübeck and Santander to a list of European cities with serious art, architecture and food but considerably less competition for them.
Europe's wildest pilgrimage route
The Guardian
The Präststigen, or Priests' Trail, runs 37 miles, about 60 kilometers, through the mountains of north-west Sweden to an 18th-century chapel deep in Sami country. There are no roads, huts, or marked trails through much of the route, just wild camping, river crossings, and some of Europe's most remote terrain. Once a year, people still make the journey to the chapel for Sunday service.
The anticipated world was often more rich than anything real.
Kim Stanley Robinson, Red Mars (1992)
