Travel: The mid-life crises

It’s Sunday; you’re sitting in the local village pub, reading through the weekend papers and your mind is racing with stories of driving from Beijing to Paris or joining the Clipper Round The World race. You become Alan Whicker as you enviously read about travel correspondents checking into Fogo Island Inn, Newfoundland, Deplar Farm in Iceland or adventure companies like Quark who can whisk you off to the North Pole.

Previously, you may have been tempted, for no apparent reason, to purchase a Harley Davidson or to put a Porsche Panamera on your drive, once you realise it’s too long to fit in your garage, but after you’ve told the car insurance folks that your vehicle is parked in a locked garage overnight.

I recently enquired of a good friend ‘’what made you take up cycling?’’ Well, I could either buy a bike or find a new wife, and the bike was cheaper. Our conversation was firmly tongue in cheek, but many of my friends in their mid to late 40’s are looking at travel to fill their mid life desire to put a lot more ticks in their boxes. The greatest thing of all is that you can share these experiences with your loved one.

Today, we can track Gorillas in their natural habitat, omit the notoriously choppy Drake Passage and fly into Antarctica to meet your cruise ship, hunt (photographically) pink dolphins in the Amazon, travel by luxury train on 6 continents, explore the Kamchatka region on a luxury liner or simply join the Rio Carnival after 25 years of telling yourself ‘’next year, I’m definitely going’’

The world is so well connected these days, that to tick these incredible experiences off your list, you don’t need much time. You can leave after work on a Friday and be back a week later ready for the weekend. That’s only 1 week out of your annual holiday for the incredible experience of tracking mountain gorillas. Ok, so you probably wouldn’t want to fly to Fiji for 5 nights, but think about what you want to experience and go for it.

Unless a representative from Coutts visited you on your 18th birthday to explain a long lost uncle Albert had left you a chunk of change, your mid-life travel should be in stark contrast to the bamboo huts you frequented on isolated beaches as a teenager. That’s if you can find any; most of those spots are now sadly frequented by luxury resorts.

You can put together a trip to indulge your pas