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TRAVEL SLEUTH
Paper Routes
How the humble travel journal is making a comeback among mindful explorers
By Sylvia Dekker
Perched on a rock, Anastasiia Morozova glances up from the journal balanced on her knee and pencils in a loose outline of the Ta Prohm temple in Cambodia. Other tourists mill around, lifting phones and snapping quick photos as they walk.
She peeks again, twirls a wet paintbrush on the tiny palette balanced on the other knee and begins filling in the sketch, slowly building a memory with paper and watercolours. A breeze blows the last brushstroke dry, and she lifts a spread of the day’s journey.
Despite having thousands of pictures always backed up at her fingertips, Morozova rarely scrolls back through old travel photos. Instead, she finds herself constantly reliving her trips by flipping through the pages of her colourful travel journals, which she says are the key to deeper, more meaningful travel experiences.
“They bring me back not just to what I saw, but to what I felt, what I was thinking, the sounds, the air temperature,” she says. “The pages have layers of memory built into every line and stain.”
Analogue Revival
By carrying a half-full book of travel memories down a sidewalk in Vietnam, flipping to a blank page on the Galapagos coast and pencilling in the date on a boat to Lao, Morozova is practising what travellers have done throughout the ages: kept detailed logs of their adventures.
Ancient merchants to mountain explorers scratched ink on paper, using words and drawings to interpret and chronicle experiences.
These days, digital pixels turn a moment into instant still life, a perfect visual replica of reality.
But studies from Cornell University released in April entitled Crafting a Personal Journaling Practice, and another titled Finding Meaning Through Travel Journaling from ResearchGate support the notion that mapping experiences onto paper can also help us crystallize meaningful moments, instill self-reflection, and trigger self-development.
Between slow travel trends and our increasing desire for deeper connections with place and time, the analogue travel journal is making a timely comeback.
Small companies are taking notice, offering products to aid and enhance the journey. KMM & Co. offers handmade leather-bound journals, and Travel Journal Company makes personalized notebooks with guiding pages. For those who wish to add colour, Art Toolkit and Pinkoi carry compact portable watercolour palettes, like the one Morozova travels with.
Sense of Place
Depicting travel experiences in a journal is about slowing down, soaking in your surroundings, and connecting. Unlike lifting a camera and snapping a photo, journaling takes time and forces presence and deep observation.
The magic begins, Morozova says, when you capture what moves you, whether with words or watercolours, map collages or pressed leaves.
Ultimately, the look and feel of a travel journal is very personal and as unique as the journey itself. The key is using real paper. “It’s as if the paper itself remembers,” she says. “Physical space holds imperfections—texture, atmosphere, accidents—and journaling in that space means absorbing it with all your senses.” It also means becoming vulnerable to the curiosity of others, something Morozova says is worth embracing for the interesting conversations and interactions sparked with observers.
Let your journal have a dialogue with a place—interacting with the street, the light, the people—and Morozova says you will end up not merely capturing a place, but truly meeting it.
5 Tips for Starting a Travel Journal
- Gather a few basic supplies. You don’t need much to get started. A simple sketchbook and either a pencil or a micron pen will do.
- Bring some colour. If you want to add some colour to your journal, consider packing a portable watercolour set and a couple of brushes.
- Write and draw wherever you are. Don’t wait for the perfect moment. Put your pen or paintbrush to paper while on a crowded bus, in a café, or wherever you find yourself.
- Record what catches your attention. Focus on the details that your eyes are drawn to, and also include your thoughts and feelings about the experience.
- Embrace imperfection. The goal is for your pages to feel “alive,” not to be perfect. Don’t worry about making mistakes; simply capture the moment as it happens.
Travel Planner
Learn how to travel sketch at anastasiiamorozova.com
