A big purpose of small travel photography
Would anything other than the desire to take a photograph push me through ankle-deep mud on an Irish island that can only be reached by a wobbly cable car, gliding dozens of meters above the surface of the ocean?
Would anything else force me to leave a warm lounge and stand for a good hour - or even longer - on the slippery deck of a ship, in an ultra-freezing wind, somewhere beyond the Norwegian Arctic Circle, in the middle of the polar night?
Or to get out of the car in the middle of a downpour, in a place on one of the Scottish islands, where I wouldn’t have even suspected it was worth going?
Would I, for any other reason, want to leave hotel or my mini-camper bed long before dawn, and instead of catching up on sleep while traveling, wander through forests, mountains, cities, towns, and villages just to reach pins marked on a google map, to make sure I reach them before sunrise?
Would I ever choose holiday destinations based on their aesthetic potential (or at least on how well they align with my sense of aesthetics)?
Would I even want to travel this often (it’s no secret that by nature I’m rather a boring homebody) alone (after all, I have a wonderful partner with whom I could share this time, every time)?
Fuck yeah!
Before I became interested in photography, I already liked, from time to time, going on solo trips to fairly non-obvious places.
Searching for cheap flights, sorting out budget accommodation, getting up before dawn to beat potential crowds, eating instant food to save money for the next trip.
Photography didn’t change that.
It only seriously affected the frequency of those trips.
And gave me a good purpose.
To this day, I regret that I didn’t have a camera when I crossed the Little Sahara in Morocco on a quad, the moon-alike Timna Park in Israel on a bicycle, or when I was roadtripping through the Alps on a motorbike.
Those memories are stored on the hard drive of my brain, but over time they fade. Photographs would have preserved them forever.
But it’s easy to forget that I return home from my travels with something more.
I sadly live in a world where it seems like everyone casually travels around the globe from time to time, and if not, at least can afford several small trips a year, and where responsibilities don’t stop anyone from spontaneously booking tickets for weekly getaways.
In other words: the world of social media.
In the real world, it turns out - surprise! - that this isn’t actually the case.
A few days ago, I was talking with my friend Helen about my quick trip to Portugal.
When I honestly don’t give my casual travel photos any special meaning - beyond my aesthetic or documentary ambitions - it turned out others may perceive them as a gateway to a world they have never seen yet, or may never see.
Unfortunately, subconsciously, I’ve been infected by the social-media virus and somehow, and I didn’t expect that in 2025 someone would still look at it like that.
Silly me.
That’s enough motivation to share them online.
And also a good reminder to not remove it from the list of things I am deeply grateful for. Thank you, Helen.
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