Navigating friendships with people who have zero interest in travel

Aside from food and travel what else is there to talk about?

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Sports

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I love sports and always will. I would have unabashedly agreed with you years ago, but in today’s day and age, people find a way to inject politics into sports these days and makes it unfortunately a harder topic to discuss than in the past.

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No problem. We talk about other subjects.

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I don't get why this is so tough for people. It's like people who are very political, people just don't want to deal with you anymore if all you do is talk about a subject other people have no interest in. Figure out other things to talk about.

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I’m not saying it’s easy or tough for people to do, but what I was getting at is for those who love to travel as in something they look forward to everyday and their main hobby.

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What made you friends in the first place?

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How do you deal with friends who have no desire to travel and look at you crazy when you mention going somewhere, especially internationally or off the beaten path?

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I just go on my own. COVID taught me to go do the things I want to do, not only the things others want to do

When I get back if they ask about the trip, great. If they don't, we can talk about other things

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What made you friends in the first place?
A history with them. A lot are childhood friends and friends made in college.

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With old friends we talk about family and how everyone is doing. Talk about restaurants and new recipies someone has tried, other hobbies and activities or projects going on at the house.

We’re older and have grown, married kids and our friends do too. Everyone has at least one son-in-law or daughter-in-law that does what the parents think is stupid stuff - that’s always good for a few laughs.

Sister in law and her husband don’t travel long distances he’s terrified of flying

She grew up going on ski trips to Colorado and visiting family in Montana every summer, hasn’t made a single trip in the 10 years they’ve been married, she’s fricking fricking miserable but just deals with it because she is a stay at home life and he makes a lot of money.

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It’s not even about money, it’s a lack of curiosity....Yet if SWA doesn’t fly there, the family isn’t going. They’ll go to Mexico, 30A, Disney, etc.,

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This is a big piece. A lot of people do not have an open or curious mind. I have a list of some wild places I want to go but I know plenty of guys that just want to take their family to the beach and chill.

I get that Montauk is 2.5 hours from JFK, but if these are local folks you're talking about it gets pretty egregious. Your flights to Western Europe are barely longer than what it takes me to get to SEA or LAX, and I have to spend 10 hours to FRA from IAH.

But, New England is kind of weird. I was in mid-Atlantic (VA) as a kid for a few years, and believe me we hit every civil war site or point of interest from Kentucky into PA, and down through VA, so I sort of get it. In Rhode Island, everyone (including military families) was basically focused on Boston, antiquing, find "the special syrup place," or whatever. It was social media preening and posturing before the smart phone was invented.

I got a bit lucky in Houston, because there are so many people in the oil industry that have lived/worked/visited odd places. You can always find a couple of 'em almost anywhere. There were people in my hood from all over the world. One category is the foreigner that wakes up to load the car for 30A at 0100 to avoid traffic, and that's what's excites them. The other category has stories that start, "so I was on my way to Singapore, and got stuck in Ulan Bataar." I run with haste to the latter for engagement, and leave the 30A crowd to let the wives start sh1t on social media. A decent tactic is to seek out EPL fans in the states. At least here, it is a good filter to find someone that will do dumb shite like fly to the world cup in Qatar like an eeeeeediot.