27 of the best exploration quotes to help you get going on your journey!
These quotes are here to inspire you, to assist you in your next trip. These words may enrich your journey’s happiest moments.
When the travel bug bites, that’s when things are about to get exciting!
Here are some more Travel Quote Themes to check out:
- +99 inspirational Travel Quotes
- Getaway Quotes
- Safe Reaffirming Travel Quotes
- Funny Road Trip Travel Quotes
- Homesick Travel Quotes
- Adventure and Love Travel Quotes
- Family Travel Quotes
- Romantic Travel Quotes
Table of Contents
1. Life is a traveling to the edge of knowledge, then a leap taken.
Quote by D. H. Lawrence
We prepare for our trip, but nothing can ever prepare us for how it’s going to be in this new unknown place.
Mr Lawrence is telling us exactly this and much more!
The quote also means, that we get to know about a place, that’s the “traveling to the edge of knowledge”, and when we visit the place, it’s a “leap taken”.
Rekindle your curiosity, move away from safe harbor, discover new oceans, allow your compass to transport you across the world! You get the message.
2. Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not.
Quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson
Every so often we travel to get out of our lives, to see the world, to live again. Essentially, that’s how travel works and that’show we find inspiration.
Yet, nothing is that simple. The energy that we bring into our travels will make or break our journeys. This is the beautiful in us, which Emerson is referring to here.
Imagine you travel without a smile on your face, vs traveling and smiling back at people. The latter will be more fulfilling.
3. Who ranks higher than an emperor? The traveler, when he has completed his journey.
Zen Quote
Traveling is a very fulfilling task. You go to new places, get to know people, new cultures, the good, and the bad.
You gain on experience on your soul-searching journey and this is the right path to become more in life.
The one who’s bold and goes with courage sits higher than an emperor because of his unique knowledge and richer experience, which he or she has acquired on his or her travels.
4. Life is what we make of it. Travel is the traveler. What we see isn’t what we see but what we are.
Quote by Fernando Pessoa
Yes, life is what we make of it, but that’s not everything this Portuguese writer tried to tell us in his quote. Travel and the traveler are one.
We see others and perhaps judge them one way or the other, but that’s not just what we see, we are that person.
Understanding this, and much more before the end of my life, is something that I strive to do!
5. Down to Gehenna or up to the Throne, he travels the fastest who travels Alone.
Quote by Rudyard Kipling
Gehenna is a valley in Israel. Rudyard Kipling is trying to tell us in this quote that, no matter if we are going up or down, when we travel alone we are faster because there is none to wait for. Not just physically faster, but perhaps also in another way.
Just think of it. When we travel alone, we tend to meet more people. Because we are alone, we are more accessible, compared to traveling as a couple or with family and friends. The essence of the human spirit comes to light!
This form of exploration can help you make new meaningful connections, and you are automatically more open to new knowledge. So, you will travel faster, gaining more than anyone else, faster.
6. A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving.
Quote by Lao Tzu
You know how they say the journey is important, not the destination? This quote from Lao Tsu is exactly trying to say that.
You will want to take in everything on your way to an end destination. Your trip might be by foot, cycle, bike, car, bus, train, flight, or boat. All have one thing in common, a pleasurable, exciting soul-searching journey!
7. The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.
Quote by Unknown
This quote has been wrongfully attributed to Augustine of Hippo. Nonetheless, I think it contains a lot of wisdom.
Imagine you read only a page from a novel, or you watch only 1 minute from a movie. You wouldn’t know how the rest of the story goes, right?
The same goes with traveling, just that this book called life only ends with our death. So, make the most of your life and travel the world.
8. Henceforth I ask not good-fortune,…
Henceforth I ask not good-fortune, I myself am good-fortune, Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing, done with indoor complaints, libraries, querulous criticisms, Strong and content I travel the open road.
Walt Whitman
This quote is meant to get us off our a**, to finally get out and about.
Occasionally, we get too comfortable in our lives, where we live and stay. Our lives become stale and all the same every day, so we end up a bit frustrated.
When this happens, we need to opt for a therapy called travel. Get out there and discover the world!
9. In spite of the opinions…
In spite of the opinions of certain narrow-minded people who would shut up the human race upon this globe, we shall one day travel to the Moon, the planets, and the stars with the same facility, rapidity and certainty as we now make the ocean voyage from Liverpool to New York.
Jules Verne
The French author, Jules Verne, was a controversial writer in his time. He wrote journey to the center of the world and around the world in 80 days.
He helped us dream bigger and bolder, and his quote shall remind us that things might seem impossible now, but one day the impossible will be our future.
10. Travelling- It leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller.
Quote by Ibn Battuta
Ibn Battuta was a Moroccan traveler who lived some 700 years ago.
This quote is spot on. No matter if you travel as a traveler or as a tourist, at first, you will be speechless, wondering about the new place, the novel wonderful terrains.
Then you are bound to tell your tale to your family, friends, and even to strangers.
Because we want to share what we saw. Traveling the world is magical!
11. We travel to change, not of place, but of ideas.
Quote by Hippolyte Taine
Yes, we wish to discover new places, but this quote reminds us that we seek more than just that.
We travel to seek new ideas, to learn from others, to get inspired and to even find the purpose of life.
12. It is not down in any map; true places never are.
Quote by Herman Melville
If a place is not mentioned in a map, it is truly virgin land. This wisdom holds true a hundred of years ago, and it’s still relevant today.
Locations that are unknown to the traveler, provide the most authentic experience. They are essentially uncorrupted, and people don’t fake.
Places that have been known to be visited by larges masses of visitors have essentially no soul left and are just a shell of what they used to be.
Eventually most places, unfortunately, turn out this way because with tourism comes money and a secured future.
Seek out the unknown if you want to experience true beauty.
13. Live life with no excuses, travel with no regret.
Quote by Oscar Wilde
In other words, get out there and enjoy yourself without future regrets.
Travel and living are considered almost one and the same thing in this quote.
Pack your suitcase, take your first step into the unknown and start a daring adventure of your own!
14. Not I, not any one else, can travel that road for you. You must travel it for yourself.
Quote by Walt Whitman
We have the tendency to read a guide, or watch a travel video and once we get to the destination, we end up visiting the same places without much thought.
But that’s not how things should turn out for you. You deserve more than this.
Pick your own wonderful longer ways, get lost between buildings, discover the world around you in your own terms. Briefly loose sight of the shore to discover a valuable thing or two.
Only you can walk your life.
15. Do the difficult things while they are easy…
Do the difficult things while they are easy and do the great things while they are small. A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.
Lao Tzu
Start at the beginning, take it easy, a step at a time.
Do you want to travel alone for the first time ever? Travel to a nearby town first to get accustomed to the experience. Next time, travel to another state and progress in time.
This will help you to get more confident. You will learn to get better organized so that you can enjoy the experience of traveling the world without paralyzing fears.
16. Like all great travelers, I have seen more than I remember, and remember more than I have seen.
Quote by Benjamin Disraeli
Your perception during a trip is different from what you can recall afterwards.
You are so busy taking in all the visual things, the odors, sounds, feelings, and sensations with your senses, on your travels.
Yet, you will end up recalling your perspective at a later time when you think about it again or when you tell your tale to family and friends.
17. There is no moment of delight in any pilgrimage like the beginning of it.
Quote by Charles Dudley Warner
Do you remember the feeling when you are about to start out a new trip? It’s exciting, invigorating, uplifting and inspiring.
It makes you feel like a child again as the excitement build-ups. We feel alive once again!
18. The gladdest moment in human life is a departure into unknown lands.
Quote by Sir Richard Burton
I feel the same way, unknown lands do have a mysterious aura that needs to be explored.
Secret destinations, are well…. Secret and mysterious, and finding out what’s going on there, can be really fascinating.
19. Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
Quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson
Get out of your comfort zone and be somebody who discovers places. Share them with like-minded people. This is the start of a free man and woman.
There is surely a tiny place in this world that is still unknown. Sleepy villages often harbor interesting people and cultures. Unknown roads lead to someplace breathtakingly beautiful.
20. The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.
Quote by Marcel Proust
This quote might contradict some other quotes here, but in essence, Marcel Proust is trying to tell us what others have been telling us for thousands of years.
Travel is about finding and igniting the beautiful soul, which you might have lost when you grew up.
Look at things in a different light, change your perception, don’t settle for one standpoint. This is what travel should be.
For example, you grew up eating one way, but on your travels you learn from locals that there is another approach to food and that you can do it all differently if you choose so.
21. The first condition of understanding a foreign country is to smell it.
Quote by Rudyard Kipling
Rudyard Kipling knew what he was saying, and I think, nothing hold more true than this travel quote!
The author was born in British-India and this country is known for spices, flowers and different shade of odors.
To understand a country and its people, it is important to also take in all the different smells. It will give you a better and deeper picture and your experience will be more wholesome at the end of the day.
22. Wandering re-establishes the original harmony which once existed between man and the universe.
Quote by Anatole France
Ah, we wanderers! Our pursuit of happiness is endless, but we are still so much closer to understanding this deeply complex world, than those who don’t wander.
This quote might sound like something the Dalai Lama said, yet the French poet, Anatole France, is the one picked our brain with this quote.
23. I have found out…
I have found out that there ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.
Mark Twain
The ultimate relationship or friendship test, you might ask? Perhaps!
Only when you travel with someone, do you get to see their true selves. This is because we are thrown into complicated situations when we travel. Things don’t always turn out as you have planned.
A good exploration buddy will walk with you in good and bad times.
24. Adventure is worthwhile in itself.
Quote by Amelia Earhart
Yes, adventure is worthwhile, Amelia Earhart was right.
The irony is, that she, the first woman to fly alone over the Atlantic, disappeared without a trace on a flight around the world.
But nothing changes this because Amelia made sure that the next generations of women could dream to become and see more of this world.
Generally speaking, I think Amelia inspired mankind as a whole. Her legacy took wings!
25. Now more than ever do I realize…
Now more than ever do I realize that I will never be content with a sedentary life, that I will always be haunted by thoughts of a sun-drenched elsewhere.
Isabelle Eberhardt
Many of us had an awakening after the pandemic. We realized that live is short and that perhaps it was about time to go out and explore the world. A nine to five normal work life won’t do it anymore. Can you relate?
This quote means to remind us all this.
Foreign lands are more appealing than ever. You strive for a moment of discovery and look out for the biggest adventure and the life of your dreams. Go get it!
26. We wanderers, ever seeking the lonelier way…
We wanderers, ever seeking the lonelier way, begin no day where we have ended another day; and no sunrise finds us where sunset left us. Even while the earth sleeps we travel. We are the seeds of the tenacious plant, and it is in our ripeness and our fullness of heart that we are given to the wind and are scattered.
Kahlil Gibran
This is my wife’s favorite travel quote!
It reminds her of a dandelion flower, how it changes, the wind carrying its seeds, the firm tenacious roots…
It also reminds her that travelers are though folks, who have seen things. They have also grown above all the others, making them unstoppable voyageurs.
They are good people, who share what they have learned with others to help everyone in the progress of their lives.
27. I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts.
Quote by Herman Melville
Exciting almost forbidden places have that energy, a way to enthrall us, to make us want to check it out.
There is no bigger statement of freedom, than this quote!
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What do you think, how do you interpret the quotes? Please, share your thoughts with us in the comment section.
