Must-Know Travel Predictions for 2026 | POSTCARD #7

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Well, hello, Katie.

Well, hello Erin.

Happy New Year.

Happy New year.

How are you feeling?

I'm feeling good.

I'm feeling optimistic and I also feel like I have no idea what's ahead.

So you know, chaos as things are with the start of every new year.

Optimistic cha.

That's the start of every year that I have, I think.

Do you have any resolutions?

Are you a resolution girly?

So there's a couple books on my list that I would like to attend to at some point this year and that's the main resolution that I have.

I think that's a really good resolution.

I think we should all be reading more books.

I think so too.

Yeah.

Yeah.

What about yourself?

Yep.

My dad and I want to run a race together.

Nothing crazy, just like either a 5k or a 10k.

So we'll probably do that in the summer.

You should do a color 5k run where they throw the colorful dust at you.

I did that when I was like 21 and it was so fun.

I don't know if my dad be into that but I can pitch it.

Pitch it.

At least pitch it.

I feel like every time I open up social media it's just like carousels of people's like goals and predictions and year end wrap ups.

It's everywhere.

I want to know what yours is.

Ooh, I haven't really thought about it and to be honest, like my predictions would be shaped by everything that I've read.

Like there's predictions that I've read where I'm like yes, I think that that is probably true and we're going to talk about some of them.

So let's get into it.

So I will say so you and I are both going to bring some travel trends that we've come across the ones that I'm talking about, I pulled mainly from National Geographic's article.

I pulled them because they were the most interesting to me.

I felt like their predictions stood out compared to other ones that I read.

And I guess, yes, I do believe in these predictions, which is why I wanted to talk about them.

I pulled mine from a BBC article that also sort of curated from a variety of different places.

So I think it was like overall themes they saw.

And then I also read a really interesting substack article from Andrew Zimmerman, which had an interesting blurb in there that we'll get into.

The first prediction from National Geographic is nocturism.

So nocturism is a new term.

It is describing nighttime focused travel and tourism.

Okay.

And the trend is about shifting activities to after dark.

So like stargazing, night safaris, late opening museums, and like evening walking tours.

And National Geographic says that heat is a big driver of this trend.

With daytime temperatures climbing, like around a lot of the world, people are choosing to do more when the sun goes down because it's more comfortable.

Research cited by Booking.com found that 61% of people are choosing to do nighttime activities while they travel, simply to avoid the heat of the day.

Interesting.

And the other piece is overcrowding.

So doing things at night can sometimes ease pressure on busy places.

And like, there will just be less crowds than there would be during peak hours.

I thought that was interesting because when Luke and I were traveling in Iceland in June, the first time we went, we went in June, so there was midnight sun.

And that was totally what we did.

Like we would go places at like 9 or 10pm because there'd be like barely anyone around.

Market research specialist FMI predicts that the sector of nocturism is going to more than double in the next 10 years.

Wow.

Are we sensing like an industry shift too into like later hours and people staying open later and that kind of thing?

Yeah, I'm assuming that's what they mean.

Interesting.

Yeah.

Because I feel like I've seen this shift over the last few years of more people traveling to colder climates.

We're seeing like a lot of rise in tourism in Antarctica a lot.

I'm seeing tons of people going to like, Nor Norway and Finland in the winter.

Specifically people going to Iceland in the winter.

And I think that ties into this because it's also an answer to the heat.

Like, a lot of people are saying it's too hot to travel to sunny places, especially during peak seasons, like summer.

Yeah.

So that's the first one.

Nocturism.

Do you have any thoughts on it?

Will you be participating?

This is my question for you.

How many of these, like, little new terms did you come across in this research of yours?

Because I also came across, like, a few new ones that are very interesting.

That was the only, like, specific one where it has, like, its own term.

Okay, let me tell you one of mine that I came across called Hushpitality.

Have you heard of this before?

Hushpetality.

It's some sort of play on hospitality.

So it's Hushpitality, and it's travel that's centered around comfort and silence and finding a way to escape compounding stresses of modern life.

They're predicting a rise in people trying to travel to just, like, quieter places or just really kind of focusing on, like, wellness and just being alone and in quiet places.

Okay, we'll get into that, because I came across this as well, and I do think that's definitely a thing these days.

Yes.

Okay, so the next one is literary tourism.

I thought it was interesting because I've definitely seen this rise on social media of people going on trips to read.

Like, it's becoming a trend.

Like, I've seen group trips where people are like, we're gonna go and stay in the woods, in a cabin as a group of friends, and just read a book every day.

This is something different from what I came across, which is sort of an extension of another fun term, set jetting, where people are likely to be traveling to places where books take place.

Yes.

That is also what National Geographic was focused on.

Like, I think it's a pretty broad category.

Like, you could be traveling to read, but you could also be traveling to visit places that you read about and to, like, go to specific sites that represent those places and then read there.

Yeah.

So VRBO found a 265% increase in Pinterest searches for book club retreat ideas.

So that's more of, like, what I was just describing.

And then Skyscanner has found that 32% of travelers are interested in visiting a destination that is mentioned in a book.

Interesting.

And you know what?

I don't know if this is Really a new thing.

I feel like maybe they've just put a name to it.

But people have always traveled for those reasons, to see places that they saw in a movie or read in a book or saw on social media.

People tend to be inspired by the media that they consume, and books are a form of media, so it's not that surprising.

Think about it, like, when we were kids, like, people were excited to go to London to go to the platform nine and three quarters.

Like, it's.

It's always been a thing.

Or they watched any Mary Kate and Ashley movie and they're like, I need to travel there.

I need to be Mary Kate and Ashley.

My dad actually does the opposite, which is really cute.

Where when they book a trip, he will find books that take place in those places.

And there are a variety of fiction and nonfiction books, but when he goes to these places, then he's like, oh, this is where that story took place.

And it's the same sort of feeling.

But he does the opposite, where the books don't inform his trip, but the trip informs the books that he reads.

It's very cute.

Oh, I like that.

That is cute.

I went to Bran Castle in Romania, which is a 13th century fortress in Transylvania and it is marketed as Dracula's home because of Bram Stoker's Transylvania.

I studied English literature, and so that book is like canon.

So you read that book.

I also loved the movie, like the original movie.

So, yeah, going to the castle was pretty iconic.

I wouldn't say it's something I like do a lot.

Like, I wouldn't say that my travels are typically inspired by that.

And even in that case, it just like, was that I was in Romania.

I didn't go to Romania for that.

I was just in Romania and I was like, oh, I can go to the castle.

So.

And how do you not.

That's like an.

That's so cool.

I would want to see something like that.

It was very cool.

Highly recommend.

So the next one that I pulled from National Geographic has to do with cruising.

Oh, okay.

I thought this one was really interesting.

So cruise passengers are getting younger.

They also found that those millennials who have previously cruised, 81% of them say they plan to do it again.

This kind of relates to something that I came across in my research around travel trends.

The big sor that came up that I was look that I found was this idea of decision fatigue and how there's been a rise in travel experiences where guests just don't want to make any decisions at all.

And actually the act of not planning a trip is curating the restful holiday in and of itself.

They just don't want to do anything.

But they have seen a rise in this thing called mystery cruises where people board without even knowing where they're going.

Like, this is bananas to me because cruises are already so low lift, I feel like there's really barely any planning that goes into it.

And now people don't even really want to know where they're going.

They just want to hop on and be aboard for the ride.

But it's interesting because this decision fatigue thing seems to be the big impact here.

And I think millennials and Gen Z are particularly impacted by this because we're just sort of like in this weird sandwich gener and they're saying that like a lot of travel decisions are being made kind of because of this decision fatigue.

And I wonder if it's like a generational thing that's impacting this lean towards cruises.

It could be.

And I will say this is just based off what I'm seeing online.

But I do feel like there's been a big rise in group trips, which is a similar thing.

Right.

People want to travel, but they don't want to go through the work of like making the decisions and planning the trip.

And so they're joining group trips instead the cruise, like not knowing where it's going is kind of funny to me because maybe people might disagree with this.

Do you ever know where you're going.

When you're on a cruise?

I don't feel like a cruise really is about where you're going.

Like whenever I see people like posting about their cruise, it's never about the places they visited.

It's about like the ship and what they did on the ship.

So this I thought was interesting.

According to National Geographic, Cruise lines have been actively reshaping what a cruise looks and feels like.

They are specifically trying to tap into a younger crowd.

So they've been introducing cruises that are designed for younger crowds.

They're making adult only cruises, they're adding more parties, more entertainment, they're adding themes.

Like this mystery cruise would be one of those themes.

And the goal is to attract Gen Z and Melissa millennials.

So virgin voyages for example, now has a whole collection of adult only cruises.

The ships have wellness programs, social events, late night parties, and even an onboard tattoo parlor.

Wow.

So that you can commemorate your cruise forever.

What would you get tattooed on you from a cruise as to memorialize?

Just imagining people, like, getting anchor tattoos and stuff I have to share.

Like, this is kind of a cringy story from my backpacking days.

When I was very young backpacking around Europe, I was in Lagos, Portugal, and it was the classic story of like, checked into a hostel, made some friends, had so much fun that I just didn't leave.

Like, I was meant to stay three days.

I ended up being there like two weeks.

And this crowd of people that I became friends with, like, we all just like kept extending our stays.

And these two Aussie guys, of course they were Australian.

They, on our last day, they were like, we have to get tattoos to like commemorate this.

And so they went and they got tattooed on their feet lost in Lagos.

And I think about this all the time because it's been like over 10 years and I wonder now, like, what they think when they look at that tattoo.

Are you still in touch with them?

I could like ping them on Facebook, but so I don't know.

I'm not surprised by this, like, cruise trend.

I think that, like you were saying, young people who are really burnt out by their work lives and just want to relax when they are off are definitely going to lean towards this kind of very easy vacation.

I guess, like, my concerns are just about popularizing cruises even more than they already are.

Since they have such a large carbon footprint and generate a lot of waste, they also contribute a lot to tourism leakage.

I always find this stat really interesting to quote because it really puts it into perspective.

The nonprofit Friends of the Earth did an analysis that found that the average CO2 emissions of a passenger on a cruise around Seattle are eight times higher than those of a tourist who spends their holiday on land in Seattle.

Wow.

So something to consider.

Okay, so the last one that I wanted to chat about from National Geographic is about personalized and niche travel.

I came across this.

Yeah, I actually think this one really.

It ties into, like, a lot of the other trends we've been talking about, like literary travel, for example.

Tour companies and providers are starting to move away from one size fits all trips and towards highly specific experiences.

And they tend to be built around ideas, identity, or life stage or personal needs.

I thought this was a really cool example.

The Good Grief Project is offering retreats that combine surfing with one to one Therapy to help address past traumas and burnout.

For example, if you've experienced a loss, you might choose to go on one of their retreats to help kickstart your healing.

Other companies are offering trips that are designed to help people deal with life changing events like divorce or becoming a new parent.

National Geographic was just saying that travelers are looking for experiences that feel useful or grounding, especially after big life changes.

And so travel is being positioned as something that can help with processing something.

So it's not just about like relaxing, it's about like working through something.

I came across this as well.

This was cited in the BBC article and they also mentioned like menopause retreats that exist out there.

There was an interesting quote that I came across that was said, specialist tours have emerg to serve specific life stages because life has become an infinite scroll with fewer rituals and rites of passage.

So these trips sort of serve as an interesting way for people to mark a milestone in some capacity and move through really intense emotions.

And I think it's so interesting that we've talked about this on the show in full on episodes about how people tend to feel like they need to travel and get away to move through something important.

And I think it's interesting this dynamic of these ultra personalized trips focused around a specific milestone or specific niche interest when we also think about the dynamic of decision fatigue.

So how does this happen?

How do you curate a really specific trip to yourself while also trying to make as few decisions as possible?

And so this is where I was thinking, does this mean people are going to lean towards AI more to help them figure out their trips?

Is there going to be a rise in travel agents?

Does this just mean all inclusive resorts are going to be sort of like a, a rise in that or people are looking for these sort of retreats, these curated retreats for them already.

Yeah, Capitalism.

I know.

People are tired.

Yeah.

People are pooped.

Yeah.

So there's also been a rise in travel experiences that tap into people's hobbies.

So for example, the runcation research from Airbnb and Strava suggests that 74% of Gen Zers are seeking a rural runcation which with scenic countryside trails.

There's also now like tours built around this.

So Contiki for example, has a new running tour that you can book if you just want to go on vacation and run a lot.

I think this trend is interesting because it kind of shows how travel is marketed as something that can be done for self improvement, which I don't think is inherently A bad thing.

But it does raise questions about who these experiences are accessible to and how places and communities are affected when personal growth becomes a tourism product.

Because these retreats can be quite insular, people might not be engaging with local communities as much as they would if they'd go there specifically to travel, especially independently.

It's sort of like places become the backdrop for your own self improvement rather than a place that you're really engaging with.

Yes, I don't think it's like completely bad, but I would hope that people try to mix in engagement with local communities and just like giving back to the places that they're visiting if they choose to do this kind of travel.

This was the big theme that I came across in all of the articles that I read.

There really seemed to be like a general theme around slowness, but from like a very personal intention, not really from like a greater good sort of intention, like a responsible travel travel sort of thing.

And so I mentioned Andrew Zimmerman's substack and there's this really interesting quote that he had written.

For years we treated travel as consumption.

More passport stamps, more selfies, more velocity.

I can feel the pendulum swinging.

The forces shaping how we move through the world are not driven by novelty anymore, but by fatigue, by data, by crowd pressure, and by radical desire for control.

Over our time, luxury has become access, has become maintenance.

So it's like a huge trend around people traveling for wellness and sort of like an internalized personal sort of thing.

And this is what I thought about when I came across like hushpitality and this idea of like traveling for silence and to escape your life around decision, fatigue and burnout.

And something interesting I came across too, along with like the ultra personalized trips too, was a rise in road trips.

And 60% of Brits said that they're driving to destinations more so to save money than anything.

But interestingly, I wonder if this is like a almost accidental act of replacing trips to America for a lot of Europeans.

Because there was an interesting quote that I came across that said the nature of human car relationship in North America and Europe is very different and gives them a different attitude towards driving for leisure.

And driving in a car is an act of isolation in and of itself.

It's certainly like kind of like a special kind of ritual Driving through scenic routes and, like, listening to music, but it is very isolating.

And so it's interesting to me because we talk a lot about, like, the impact of individuality on the show and decisions that are made from it.

And for a long time, that looked like sort of like a flashy sort of selfishness, but now I think it's something a little bit more internalized.

And people want to travel, but they almost want to be numb while they're doing it.

And so it makes me wonder, do travel experiences that are on the rise almost resist community?

And like you mentioned, are people actually going to go out and explore the places that they're traveling to, or is it just sort of like an escape from their regular life?

And that's the trend that we see.

It doesn't even matter where people are traveling to to do these things.

Things.

Well, it's interesting you bring this up because I think this is a bit of a hot take.

I see this a lot in the rise of group trips in the way that I see, like, group trips being covered on social media specifically.

They're very much about creating, like, your own little moving community as you're traveling.

So the trip is really based around connecting with.

With the other people who are on the trip with you.

And a lot of the time, it's because these trips are very identity focused.

It's like solo women, or they'll have some sort of theme that is identity focused.

And so part of the point of the trip is to bring together a group of people so that they can connect.

And having been on a group trip myself, while it's like an amazing experience to do that, there's clearly lots of benefits to that, to connecting with other people in that way create this insularity.

Like, you aren't engaging with the place that you're visiting in the same way because your attention is, like, focused on this group of people.

And I have found, like, when I travel independently or I travel with Luke, we are forced to engage with other people more.

And because you're making all your own decisions, you don't have a choice, like, you do have to engage with the place that you're visiting in a more direct way.

And so I don't really know where I'm going with this other than to say, like, I do think that we are seeing a rise in that, and.

It'S a different sort of individuality than we have normally critiqued on the show, which is so interesting to me.

That's the thing.

Like, I don't want to say it's like completely bad.

I think there's a time and a place for it for sure.

And I don't think that it's impossible to be on a group trip and not balance like connecting with your fellow travelers on that trip and engaging with the place that you're visiting.

Just like with a road trip like Luke and I have done many a road trip.

And yes, you spend a lot of time in the car, just like in silence, taking in the landscapes.

But you do make stops places.

And like when we've road tripped around Iceland, one of the beautiful things about road tripping there is like you can stop in the random village and pop into a little coffee shop and chat people there.

So I think there's always nuance to it, right?

There's ways to weave a balance in.

But I think intentionality is very important for that.

What I would love to see is for things like group trips, more intentionality around weaving in downtime and stuff and encouraging people to yes, connect with the people that are on the trip with you, but also connect with the place that you're visiting.

I think it also boils down to like, who, like what kind of person you are, like what feels like relaxation to you.

Because like the funny thing is like despite being an introvert to me, I find it relaxing to like go to a city I've never been to and just wander around.

Me too.

Like for me being super isolated, I don't know if I would, that would, would fill my cup for relaxation for me, like what fills my cup is like going somewhere new and like wandering and talking to people and having new experiences.

But I think it's, it's.

Yeah, it boils down to like who you are as an individual and what, what works for you for that.

Okay, well, I mean I probably say this every year, but like I would really like people to stop showing other people's faces without consent.

Like filming without consent.

This just if you follow me on social media, you know, this really bothers me.

I just like would like content creators to be more cogn of like how they film people and how they represent places online.

And I find that trends content isn't conducive to this.

There's a lot of like rage, baity content that requires you to do sketchy things as a creator.

So I would like to see that end.

And I mean, I guess inversely, what I would like to see is creators like being more respectful of the people in the places that they're visiting and reflecting that in their content.

There's definitely a way to film places that is more rooted in respect.

So, for example, I always talk about this.

If you're in a busy place and you can't avoid filming people's faces, that's okay, but you can blur out those faces.

We have so many tools at our disposal these days.

You can still in post, go and blur a face or put an emoji over it before you publish.

And so I would like to see more of that.

Just more people like getting into the habit of blurring out faces whenever possible.

Love this.

I was thinking about, like my main takeaway from all of these trends.

And similarly, I feel like these predictions are together pointing towards a future that is shaped less by places and more by identities and niches.

Like, travel is being packaged around who we are and how we live.

And like you say, it's becoming hyper individualized.

And I don't know, it makes me think a lot about this idea of decentering yourself when you travel, which is something we talk about often on the show, and instead centering the places you visit and the people.

And so that kind of worries me.

And I don't.

I think there is a way to like strike a balance between this sort of like niche identity focused travel and like cultural engagement.

But I worry that that's not the direction things are headed.

So I don't know, it's something to think about.

The one thing I would say, maybe this is like a good takeover.

If you're looking into these sort of niche trips or wellness trips, try to find ones where the programming weaves in actually visiting the place that you're in.

I know that they exist.

There's tons to choose from.

And I think that is a nice way to like strike that balance is just like being very specific about who you choose to go with.

Look into who the operators they're working with are like, try to choose, choose trips that are not contributing to tourism leakage.

So make sure that like you can find like local tour operators who are offering this and having you stay in local accommodation, for example.

So I think like, if you weave in those practices, you can have a better impact and Then another thing I always suggest to people is if you can, like, if you have the time after you do your wellness retreat or niche check, stay an extra week, stay an extra three days if you can, to spend more time in that place and get to know it a little bit better.

And then maybe you can have an even more fun time after you've done a wellness retreat and you feel refreshed.

And then you can have an amazing trip afterwards too, if you stick around.

Yeah, don't waste all of your new wellness feelings on going back home and spending it all in capitalism again, you know.

So, Erin, it's the beginning of the year.

We have a lot of fascinating episodes queued up for the year ahead, so why don't you just tease a couple of them?

Yeah, I'm really excited for the next two episodes that we have coming at the end of this month.

We'll be chatting about why the best time to travel no longer applies.

We're going to unpack how seasons are changing, how seasonality is being affected in terms of travel.

And I think, you know, with climate change, this is something that's going to become more impactful in the travel space.

Like there may not be peak seasons in the future like there are right now.

So.

Yeah, you already touched on cold weather travel.

We get into that in that episode too.

There's way more nuance around it.

So I'm pumped for that episode to come out.

Yeah.

We're also going to chat about the Maasai vs Marriott International lawsuit that's been happening.

So even though the lawsuit might be wrapped by the time this episode comes out, I think there's still a lot to talk about what it means in terms of travel and tourism, especially in East Africa.

So, yeah, that one will be out in February, so stay tuned.

Aaron and I put a lot more content out, I think, than we anticipated, which.

So I'm very proud of us for we recapped an entire season of White Lotus.

We put out all these fun postcards that we've been really having a lot of fun doing.

So thanks for sticking with us and we hope you stick around again for another year.