The Wanderlust guide to the best of learning trips
Don’t just come back with a memory, come back with a skill! Your guide to learning while you travel
Adding a ‘study’ element to a trip can add to your travel experience. As you scour the city looking for unusual photographic angles, as you spend hours at your easel perfecting your African watercolour, or as you linger in a street café mulling how you’d write the scene, you are truly absorbing your surroundings.
Knowing you are there to learn or to create something – article, photo, painting – forces you to look deeper, focus on the detail, and ultimately get more out of your destination. A food or wine tasting course is a great example of this, learning how to create dishes from your favourite cuisine that you can then repeat when back home.
They say that travel broadens your mind. Here’s how it can also broaden your skill set too.
Female student during Spanish class (Shutterstock)
Looking for inspiration?
Whether you want to learn a new skill or take your current skill set to the next level, there is a suitably exotic place where an expert is waiting to teach you. The tricky part is deciding where to start.
Of course, sometime the decision is self-evident. If you want to become a master of Vietnamese cooking, well, Vietnam is the place to go. It’s not always so self-evident so the Wanderlust team have put together a list of 9 trips to take to learn a new skill, as well as 5 incredible learning trips guaranteed to polish your skills. From learning wildlife photography with a BBC cameraman in Peru to creating authentic dishes in Istanbul, we’ve got your interests covered.
Or check out these testimonials from travellers who picked up new skills – and it some cases, new careers – on their travels. From African bush craft and Indian cooking to new language and photographic skills, these people went on learning adventures that changed their lives.
More information
9 trips to take to learn a new skill – Wanderlust team
5 incredible learning trips – Wanderlust team
The complete guide to learning holidays – Various contributors
Trying to communicate (Shutterstock.com)
Learn the lingo
There’s no better way to learn a language than by immersing yourself in a place where it’s the mother tongue. You’ll be surprised how quickly you’ll learn a language when you are immersed in the country and the culture, and are forced to speak to the locals.
Even more so when you go to a local language school. You’ll find them all over the world – just choose a language and a country that speaks it. Just make sure they offer complete immersion, says Ulrike Reinke in her guide to learning a language. Oh, and try to stay with a local family too.
Gwenllian Jones did a four-week Italian course in Tuscany and reveals the 5 things she wish she’d known about learning a language overseas.
More information
How to learn a language – Ulrike Reinke
5 things I wish I’d known about learning a language overseas – Gwenllian Jones
