Are people afraid to travel?

[JohnK]

Europe is a trouble spot, John .

Parts of Europe are trouble spots John. Can't bring myself to transit via BRU, IST to name a few. Wait and see.

Oh and if travelling with wife and daughter need to be extremely cautious.

 

[RooFlyer]

Absolutely no changes to travel plans. Turkey earlier this year was cheaper and much less crowded due to the nervous nellies (but yes, family considerations cause a different perspective to personal ones) and the welcome I got for being 'brave' was an added bonus.

Fiji was a great place post coup(s).

Iran coming up next year.

 

[TheRealTMA]

No changes here. Much more perilous driving in Brisbane or going to the Valley for dinner after 9pm. More than a million people are in the air at any given minute. Chance of you being involved in incidents is much lower than crossing the road.

 

[JohnM]

Iran coming up next year.

Ooer, that sounds really dangerous. Would I go there? Oh..., that's right - it was my idea .

The dangerous part may very well be Rooflyer and JohnM being dry for two weeks :shock::mrgreen:.

 

[TheRealTMA]

Ooer, that sounds really dangerous. Would I go there? Oh..., that's right - it was my idea .

The dangerous part may very well be Rooflyer and JohnM being dry for two weeks :shock::mrgreen:.

I have some friends who are planning Iran next year, driving around. Sounds fabulous to me. Jealous!

Hadn't considered the 'dry' problem! That would indeed be perilous.

 

[drron]

Absolutely no changes to travel plans. Turkey earlier this year was cheaper and much less crowded due to the nervous nellies (but yes, family considerations cause a different perspective to personal ones) and the welcome I got for being 'brave' was an added bonus.

Fiji was a great place post coup(s).

Iran coming up next year.

I didn't see you in Fiji post coups.Only missed the last one.Did meet the Colonel and Mr.Qarase though.

 

[RooFlyer]

Ooer, that sounds really dangerous. Would I go there? Oh..., that's right - it was my idea .

The dangerous part may very well be Rooflyer and JohnM being dry for two weeks :shock::mrgreen:.

Dry?



........

 

[bPeteb]

Interesting question. Once upon a time I would have said when it's your time it's your time but but the last couple of years have made us cautious and I'm sad about that.

Next year we're off to Brazil for a couple of weeks basing ourselves in Sao Paulo. My partner is now spending way too long trawling the interweb reading about taxi jackings and carrying a spare wallet with a cancelled card and $100 dollars in it. His worry is worrying me. I think our guide in BA this year constantly reminding us to keep our bags in front of us has him a bit paranoid but it's something we've always done subconsciously in any case.

Turkey was on our list for next year but it's now off, more for concern about what's happening next door than in Turkey itself.

I hope we get our travel confidence back because we're finally in a position that we can start to travel much more regularly.

 

[JohnM]

Dry?



........

No alcohol in Iran...

 

[Jmrocky]

Are we among the majority, or minority? Has anyone on here made the decision to NOT go somewhere as a result of recent events?

I would say we (AFF posters) are in the minority, and yes people are more cautious about travelling. Was watching "Walking the Nile" the other week, where Levison Wood treks along the Nile from Rwanda to Egypt by foot (and boat and plane when too unsafe). Pretty sobering part when he is in Egypt, around Aswan from memory, dining in this grand restaurant for lunch and he is the only person there. Almost every ship and watercraft used for tourism was docked. Interestingly, the Brits have Egypt as the same terror threat level as Australia.

I know Egypt has had its recent problems, but I think nowhere is it more obvious than Egypt that there is a heightened fear of travel in places where we previously wouldn't have thought twice about.

 

[harvyk]

Whilst I can only really answer anecdotally, no none of my friends are traveling more or less than at any other time.

I would say yes there are some people whom are more fearful now than before, but that's not limited just to travel, that's just a result of our current saturation media environment. It's not enough that we need to be told of every disaster which has happened, we now need to have "special event" programs dedicated to it, we have a week of analysis on what went wrong, rehashing the event from every different angle (although surprisingly still in a biased way) we basically have the media feeding us fear since fear sells ad space.

So are people "afraid"? Yes. Does that stop people from travelling? I'm going to say no.

Interestingly enough, terrorist attacks against airlines and in western destinations is very rare these days compared to the 80's. I remember as a kid hearing of a bombing in the UK was not exactly unusual, and having terrorists hijacking planes was a somewhat frequent occurrence, however the difference there was it was a 2 minute story on the 6pm news, and they would then move onto the next story.

 

[TheRealTMA]

Whilst I can only really answer anecdotally, no none of my friends are traveling more or less than at any other time.

I would say yes there are some people whom are more fearful now than before, but that's not limited just to travel, that's just a result of our current saturation media environment. It's not enough that we need to be told of every disaster which has happened, we now need to have "special event" programs dedicated to it, we have a week of analysis on what went wrong, rehashing the event from every different angle (although surprisingly still in a biased way) we basically have the media feeding us fear since fear sells ad space.

So are people "afraid"? Yes. Does that stop people from travelling? I'm going to say no.

Interestingly enough, terrorist attacks against airlines and in western destinations is very rare these days compared to the 80's. I remember as a kid hearing of a bombing in the UK was not exactly unusual, and having terrorists hijacking planes was a somewhat frequent occurrence, however the difference there was it was a 2 minute story on the 6pm news, and they would then move onto the next story.

I well remember flying into LHR during the IRA years. The day I landed was the only day of three where the IRA had not fired home-made missiles into the airport from a truck on the boundary road.

 

[Jeffrey O'Neill]

i've not changed my travel habits that much. had been wanting to go back to turkey and was thinking to go next year but have scratched that plan after what's happened there.

still going to paris though.

i hate to let the terrorists win, but at the same time i'm in no rush to my grave so take terror attacks into my calculations.