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Discover EPIC Destinations With Travel Expert Kerry Damiano
I am excited to be joined by Kerry Damiano. Kerry, tell us a little about who you are and what you do.
I’m Kerry Damiano, as you said, and I’m Ms. World Traveler. I have a YouTube series about travel and shopping. We try and inspire women to travel and shop locally. We feature women artists, designers, entrepreneurs, and that thing, all trying to get women involved in going somewhere and then shopping locally.
That’s exciting. I love traveling myself. I’ve been fortunate to travel to many places. I’m sure we’re going to talk a little about whether have you been here or what would you recommend. One of the big things I talk about is epic destinations. Those exciting places. There are great things. Things to see both domestically and internationally. I think sometimes I say epic destinations that people go right into internationally, which is always great, but you want to know what? Here in the United States, there are so many fascinating places. How many countries have you visited?
I stopped counting at 130. I’ve been to more than that, but this is over 40 years. It doesn’t happen overnight as you know. It’s a lifetime of enjoying the adventure.
What is it about travel that excites you and floats your boat?
The Educational Value Of Travel
The number one thing is that it’s my continuing education. I love learning about history. History comes alive when you go somewhere and you see it. I enjoyed history when I was in school, but it wasn’t alive. It isn’t until you go and you experience it. You see it and it starts to make sense. It starts to you see the story. It’s something that you can learn from everywhere you go and every time you go.
History comes alive when you travel and experience it firsthand.
A few years ago, I took my daughters to Europe, and I had this epiphany. I want your opinion on this. For Americans, when we go to Europe, we visit churches and museums. That’s how we’re seeing Europe. Not entirely, but my daughters said, “The churches are great, but how many churches do we need to see? How many museums do we need to go to?”
I hear that a lot. Churches are free museums. They’re full of art and architecture and history, which is what you see when you go to a museum.
One of the places that I got to travel to, and maybe you have, have you been to Malta yet?
Yes, but I would say it was in the early ‘90s or late ‘80s maybe.
I have to say that I love history too, and I was beyond fascinated by the depth of history in Malta. For my readers who don’t know, Malta is located in the Mediterranean. It is a fairly tiny island nation. It’s off the coast of Sicily but there’s so much history that’s involved with Malta. It’s mind-blowing from limestone temples that were aligned to the sun for the solstices built 3,000 years before the pyramids. Then there’s Gozo, which is an island just off of Malta, which was supposed to be part of the Iliad. That’s where the siren was tempting Ulysses, I believe. My question is, when you went to Malta, what were the historical things that you saw that made you say, “Wow, that’s cool?”
After a certain age, you can’t remember all the things that you have seen and it has been a while, but I love what you’re talking about, the depth of history, because truly no matter where you go, you can find that if you will just spend a moment to do it. Instead of it just being like you said, the surface things, your stand, the first time you go, it has to be. You can’t go to Paris and not see the Eiffel Tower. The first time you go, you do have to get the low-hanging fruit, but after you’ve done it for a while, then there’s a secondary level that you can sink your teeth into some of those more historical things.
Kerry, this is going to be a hard question for Miss World Traveler, what would you say are your top two or three favorite places that you’ve got to visit?
Living Like A Local In Paris
Everyone says Paris, but I do have to say Paris only because it had been a bucket list thing for me to want to go and live there like a local. I was hoping for three to six months. I couldn’t get that amount of time away. Last year, I was able to carve out five weeks. The beauty of that is it was my sixth or seventh time there.
I wasn’t trying to see any tourist sites. I was living like a local. That meant having an apartment, shopping every day at the grocery store, and making meals. It also afforded me the ability to go into neighborhoods. I never would have gotten to see, if you’re there for three or four days, you’re hitting all the top things, but if you’re there for five weeks, then you truly can get out into the not on the beaten track types of places.
The Beauty Of New Zealand
That’s one of my favorites because I got to delve deep. Then I have some favorites for other reasons. The first time I went to New Zealand was probably 25 years ago. I’ve always said for the last 25 years that it was my favorite place for the friendliness of the people. I was just there shooting the show in November, and December timeframe. It’s still true today. They’re still just amazingly friendly people.
I’ve been fortunate to go to New Zealand myself also many years ago, but what I found, especially the South Island, was spectacularly beautiful. I had pictures of the Fox Glacier, but I didn’t have a lot. I remember my parents asked why don’t I have more pictures. When you have this huge panorama and you look through your camera and have this, you’re like, “No. I can’t, I’m not going to be able to show you what this is.”
I have experienced it too. The camera doesn’t capture the grandeur, the feeling of the majesty that you are seeing. Rather than try and capture it here, capture it in your eyes. Then it stays with you.
The camera doesn’t capture the grandeur, the majesty you are seeing. And so rather than try to capture it with your camera, capture it in your eyes and it stays with you.
Of course, nowadays, if you have a phone, you have a camera, you probably take a video so you can do the whole panorama. No, it’s not going to capture everything, but it may do a better job. Back in the day I only have many rolls and you get home and then you’re like, “I have 25 slides of this glacier.” People are saying, “We already saw it. We don’t need to see anymore.” Any other places that you’ve been to that made you say, “My God, such an epic destination?”
The Shocking Reality Of Egypt
Let’s say for shock value, Egypt. I was there in 1993, and the heat was shocking. The lack of sanitation was shocking, which meant that there were flies. I remember we were on a bus tour and they took us to an outdoor restaurant, and you would set your soda can or soda bottle out and it would immediately be covered with flies on it. You have to try and keep flies off while you’re trying to eat your dinner.
The flies are all over your food.
It was just a shocking place but the incredible things that they did in history, that almost lends itself to the shock value. It’s not a place for everybody but if you like that thing and that history, be mentally prepared for it, and you’ll have an amazing time.
As I said, I’ve been to many places. One of my favorite places to go is South Africa. People are friendly and welcoming. Who doesn’t want to get dangerously close to animals that could potentially hurt you, but they don’t? It’s amazing. I’ve been fortunate to go on some safaris. The first couple of times a lion is five feet away, doesn’t care. How are we getting this close?
In part, because on these private game preserves, the animals are used to seeing and hearing the Land Rovers, they don’t pose a threat to them, which is good. You don’t want to be a threat but you’re like, These animals were close to elephants. Let me tell you, when you’re sitting in the Land Rover and there’s like a bull elephant, that’s a very large animal.
A Mishap In South Africa
Talk about shock value. I do have a little story about South Africa. It was there in, I want to say 2000. The internet was just getting started and it’s not like it is today where it has all the information that you need. It was one of my first trips where I decided to look at my hotel online. You could do a little bit of research.
I stayed at this place in Durban that was half a mile or half a block from the beach and had all these wonderful things about it. When I got there, what they hadn’t told me was that it was right in the middle of the red-light district. You go out to your hotel and you have all these walkers, trying to get to their establishments.
It could have been terrible for it, having to stay inside my hotel the whole time. I ended up going to lunch at a place and some Brits heard me speaking English and started talking to me and this took me under their wing. They showed me some of the beautiful sights of the city and it saved that particular part of my trip for me that I was able to talk to people who lived there and who knew what to see and that thing and then I wasn’t afraid anymore.
Certainly, traveling alone can at times be unnerving. I’ve traveled places alone and it’s not always the most fun, but it is. I feel if you’re willing, opens you up to all kinds of new experiences. My experience in traveling alone has been that sometimes the detours that happen are the best experience.
Travel opens you up to new experiences. Sometimes the detours that happen are the best experiences and make the best stories.
They become the best story, don’t they?
They do. I had one, I was studying in college, I took a semester in Australia, and then I was traveling on spring break. I was down in Tasmania. I was trying to get places and they said, “You can hitchhike, it’s easy.” I did do it and it was fine. The challenge is if you just care that you’re getting from point A to point B at some point, but I would like to get to wherever I’m going next by afternoon because I want to see stuff. I had a bit more of a timetable.
What I did was I rented a car, which was going to be a big financial challenge for me because I was a college student, but it turned out that that little detour turned out well. Why? Because I was staying in youth hostels. By having a car, people wanted rides. I didn’t pay for the six days I had the car. I didn’t pay for a meal and I didn’t have to pay for gas.
You’ve met some very interesting people.
Yes. “You have a car. Where are you going next? I’m going here. Can I get a ride or can you drive me? You’re driving right through here. Can you drive me here?” It started a lot of conversation.
Isn’t that the thing about travel? Yes, it’s about what you’re going to see and what you’re going to learn. It’s about the interactions, the people that you meet, hearing their stories, and sharing your travel stories. Doing that makes it a connection.
Travel is about what you’re going to see and learn, it’s about the interactions, the people you meet, hearing their stories, sharing your own, and making connections.
One of the things I find is it can be challenging, but get curious. Ask people where they’re from, what they’re doing, what they would recommend because that’s where you get the gems. You get that off the beaten track. You get that, “Don’t go here, go here. Go to this restaurant, it’s excellent. Tell them that I sent you.”
You’re getting the real stuff, not just the things that are paid to be in the guidebooks or have advertisements and travel sites. You’re getting into the secrets of the local people.
What are some tips that you have for people who may be saying that one of their epic goals is to go wherever, but someone who has a lot of experience with how to plan and execute a trip, and once you get there, what do you do? Sometimes you’re so focused on getting there that once you get there, you’re like, “Now what?” What are some tips that you have?
Traveling Alone Doesn’t Mean Being Lonely
I’m going to start with just do it. When I turned 50, I decided that I was never going to say again, “Someday.” I’m going to do that. Now, instead of saying someday, if I say that or if I think it, I’m going to do it. That has served me well for the last number of years because I’m not waiting and putting my life on hold before I go do it.
I would say that the first thing if you’re thinking about, “I want to go to Timbuktu.” Then go, plan to go. One of the other things is people ask me a lot about how to save money. One of the things I like to say is to try and stick with one airline as much as possible because if you do, then you can build up some perks. I don’t pay for my check luggage. I get upgrades. If there’s a cancellation, they’re taking care of me, they’re moving me on to the next flight.
Those little things are so valuable if you travel a lot and that helps. It costs to go. It’s not a secret that it’s not necessarily expensive, but you’re going to pay to travel somewhere. Finding these little ways that can shave off a little bit. That’s helpful. The other thing I would say is if you’re thinking about going alone. Is that you are in control of how alone you are. If you think, I don’t want to be by myself the whole time, then join a tour when you get there. Take small tours and then you meet people.
Maybe you make a dinner appointment to get together or, “I’m going to be at such and such the same time you are, let’s get together and go do something.” Strike up a conversation with a person on the plane, on a train or, who’s sitting next to you who might be alone. I’d be very interested in making that connection. There’s no fear of having to do it by yourself. If being alone is the thing that keeps you from doing it.
I talk about that in my book, it is basically, “Just do it.” The only way we get anything done is to say and make a plan. “I’m going to do this.” Travel does cost money. What I always like to say is, to the extent that as you start to travel or you’ve traveled in your life, even small things, understand what is important to you in your travel.
What I always say is, I’d like to stay in a nice hotel. It doesn’t have to be four-star because if the only time I’m in the hotel is really to shower and sleep. No matter how spectacular the view out the window is, I have yet to find myself just standing at the window of my hotel saying, “My gosh, that’s beautiful.”
I’m not saying if you’re fine with a youth hostel or camping or Motel 6 and I’m not slamming Motel 6 at all, but just something that’s like basically utilitarian. It’s a room. If you’re like, “That’s fine. I just need a place to lay my head and be able to leave to go out and see stuff.” That’s what you should do. You don’t need to stay at The Ritz or the Four Seasons but if you want the roofs of the Four Seasons.
Understand that’s part of your experience, then you would be willing to pay for it, but as you said, you don’t have to. That is a place where you can save some money.
Sometimes a lot of money. Nowadays, there’s stuff. There’s the Airbnbs and stuff like that.
Yes, that helps too because a lot of those have a kitchen or something where you can fix food. If you could just do your breakfast or your after-dinner snack or whatever it is, not eating out, that’s going to save you some money too.
I have to say, for me, when I go on vacation, I want a vacation from my day-to-day. I don’t want to travel somewhere and think, “Now I have to go shopping, cook, and stuff like that.” That’s me personally. I’ve certainly rented Airbnb’s and stuff and it is great. It does allow you to get out and find out what the stores or the farmer’s markets are like. You never know, you run into people because you have to talk to people when you go into a store in London, and you have no idea where’s the ketchup. What’s it called?
We’re going to make a shopper out of you.
I don’t know. You said at the beginning that you encourage people to shop locally. I do think that that’s important. In a lot of these places, tourism is part of how they are supporting the economy.
Being A Responsible Traveler
That’s right. That’s important. I take that responsibility quite seriously. Several places I’ve been to have been very poor, like for example, Madagascar. It was just so incredibly poor, you can hardly imagine. Of course, children are begging in the streets, and they stand at your car window and won’t go away. They just keep knocking and knocking that and they won’t go away. Your heart just breaks for them but the way I look at it is, If I give to them, then they’re out on the street begging again tomorrow.
My responsibility is to stay in their hotels, eat in their restaurants, hire their tour guides, and buy local handicrafts. These are ways that I contribute back to their economy to make it healthier and support people without giving to someone on the street. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it’s that creates a cycle and then they can never get out of it. By being part of their economy, I feel like that’s my contribution.
I couldn’t agree more. I have seen that and it is heartbreaking. We’re only able to do what we’re able to do, where we are and certainly be conscious of your choices, of how you’re supporting them. Here’s something related but off that I’ve been seeing lately, which baffles me. I want your opinion as someone who travels a lot, is I’ve seen some places like Palm Springs.
I just heard this about Maui, where they want to start to restrict the short-term rentals, basically the Airbnb or short-term house rentals. I know Palm Springs, I love to travel there and I’m baffled by this because why are you cutting off the hand that’s feeding you? I get people who live there. I look at both sides. Some people want to live there and that’s great, but most of us think about visiting the place.
How long are you going? It’s a short-term.
I’m going there for a week, or even if they consider it long-term, but Snowbert. Want to be able to rent houses for January, February, March, and maybe into April but if you have all these restrictions, all of a sudden, the whole market dries up. That has a ripple effect on the restaurants that everyone wants to go to aren’t there because there aren’t tourists to keep them going. As someone who is Miss World Traveler, what is your opinion on this debate between obviously the local people, short-term residents don’t care? There may be noise stuff. I look at it and I’m trying to understand because I don’t.
I don’t understand it other than I think what they’re trying to do is cut down on parties, noise, and things like that, which it seems to me that rather than restrict the rental itself, make ordinances for the noise. Which we’ve just done here. I’m out of Phoenix and in Scottsdale, they just did that. There’s no renting a place just to have a party. That makes sense to me but as you said, I’m not sure, I go to a place and sometimes I’m just there for two or three days. You still want to be able to have several different kinds of accommodations to choose from.
I used to own a house and it was more of a vacation rental because I live in Northern California and I wasn’t easily getting down to Palm Springs. I don’t own that house anymore and there were noise ordinances, and they were very good. They were working very well to root out the people who were renting to people who were just having loud parties. They lost their rental license very quickly, which is good.
One or two bad apples ruin it for everyone. I read this thing about Maui, they want to restrict short-term rentals. Maui, tourism is what you do. I just I’m baffled. Somebody’s traveled around, you don’t have to have any particular opinion. If that’s where a lot of your money comes from, why would you make it harder for people to travel because then it will get more expensive, which means that fewer people can come? It just has this knock-on effect that made me ask, “How are people not seeing this?”
You want to think about things being visitor-friendly. I’m sure you’ve been to lots of places that you go to, and they’re not visitor-friendly. I don’t mean just in terms of accommodation, but signage, being able to make your way around, enough public bathrooms. There are lots of things that make a place not visitor-friendly.
Not information that helps you to make sure that as a tourist, you’re not stepping on cultural norms or toes, you inadvertently do something that you are unaware is a no-no or you just offended someone when you didn’t intend to. An example might be if you were traveling someplace where there’s a strong Muslim population and women should cover their heads a little. Not hard to take a scarf and put it over your head, but if you don’t know, you go out and all of a sudden people feel offended and you intend to do that.
Research Is Key To A Successful Trip
It has to do with research and going back to the question you asked earlier about some of the tips. One of the things I do is do a lot of research before I go somewhere, even if I’ve been there before. That’s not just where to go. You didn’t want to miss anything important because I didn’t know, you see it. Certainly as Ms. World Traveler, our time is very limited.
We go in, I shop the whole city in two days, write a script, and make a story. We film in one day and then we move on to the next place. It happens very fast. I have to hit the ground running and because that’s become a way that I operate. I do that for any other trips as well. I want to know what I’m getting into. It is not that we’re relying on the internet to tell me. It’s more that it just gives me a running start. I get there and then I can see and pivot if I need to.
I do agree. The information’s fairly easy to get these days. Simple Google search on Istanbul restaurants or whatever. You’ll get it. YouTube is a great place to go watch people who are creating travel vlogs, and travel channels like yours where I can watch you and say, “Look at that. Miss World Traveler says that this restaurant is really good.” Or she goes and says, “I heard great things. Maybe it was an off night. The food was okay, but it wasn’t what I expected. Or my gosh, I just was hungry and I went into this restaurant and the food was phenomenal.”
I’m glad you brought up travel bloggers because there are thousands of them out there. I think it’s a good thing. Again, if you want to travel regularly follow a couple of your favorites who like to travel the way that you do. My shtick of being a Miss World traveler is because nobody else is doing the same thing.
I’m focused on shopping, style, fashion, and art. Which is just different. I’m not giving recommendations about where to stay or the hotels or what to do because there are many, many people, who’re doing that. If you find one of those that you like, then you can get a lot of information before you go. I think that’s a great part of your research.
We’re coming to the end of our time, but I’d love to ask all my guests this. There are two words that for me are so powerful, full of optimism, and especially when it comes to travel, “Not yet.” Here’s my question, Kerry. What are some of your, “Not yet” destinations?
Not Yet Destinations
That’s an excellent question. I’m hoping in the November, or December 2024 timeframe, because I typically travel over Thanksgiving. I like that time to travel. I haven’t been to Laos and Cambodia. I’ve been to Vietnam, but not North Vietnam. I’m hoping to add that in as well. I’ve got a trip tentatively planned. That’ll add four new countries for me. That’s on the bucket list.
Other bucket list things would be going back to some of the wonderful places that I have already been to but didn’t get to spend enough time on. For example, we were filming in Rome in March 2024, we spent four weeks there. Other previous trips, a couple of days here, a couple of days there. You’re just trying to see as much as you can but again, that four weeks, you can breathe, you can see all of those other things. Some new things combined with some things we’ve done before and just do it differently.
I agree, there are places I’ve been that I want to go back to. The deep breath, the if I want to spend. Three hours wandering around. We’re three days wandering around the gardens of Versailles, I can do that versus I want to see it, but I’ve only got three hours to see the garden. Either way is fine, but yes, there are those places that you want to come back and have more time there.
That’s one of the reasons why typically when I go someplace for the first time, it is pretty quick because I want to see it and then I will determine if is this a place I would like to come back and spend more time or I’m glad I’m here. I’m glad I saw it, but I’m done with it now and I can move on.
Yes. I heard this line. I was traveling over Easter and I was on a cruise and the cruise director said it’s buffet travel. That means It is a buffet where just you have little taste and then you get to decide that was good. I’d like more of that. That was okay, but I don’t need more of that. I like that. Yes, what you were just talking about is sometimes like the buffet. I’m hitting every, every dish and I like that one. I’ll come back later for more of that.
Easter Island was like that since you mentioned Easter loved it and had an amazing time but it’s not something that I need to go back and see again. I’ve seen it. Got great pictures. Done.
Thank you for sharing that. I want to say to the readers, that there are absolutely places that you go and you’re happy that you’ve been there, but feel like you don’t know if there’s anything more for whatever reason. That’s part of what makes travel great. There are the trips that are spectacular and they’re the other trips that are like, “That was good.”
It doesn’t solidify a place in your heart where you say, “I’m called to come back.”
I would say that I do feel like I have Africa in my heart because when I have been, I’ve been to South Africa five times now. I get out there and it feels like part of me is home. It’s just a place that I love so much and I love to share it. I love the experience of being surrounded by all of this flora and fauna that is not part of what I have. I’ve been on this experiment to see how many days of Safari is enough.
You haven’t hit the sweet spot yet?
I was on 12 days of Safari and it was great, but when I got done, I still wanted more. What was great about having all that time was, that if you went out and the game viewing just wasn’t that good in the morning, you weren’t worried about it, because you have four game drives, and you want to see lots of animals. They’re not on your timetable. Sometimes there were elephants here, but they’re not here anymore, and we don’t know where they are right now. Or the lions were here, but they’ve wandered off, or they’re sitting in the bush and we can’t see them.
It’s the luck of the draw, isn’t it?
It is, but again, when you have the time like you were in Rome and now I have time to see something. If I can’t get into a museum or whatever today. That’s fine, I can come back on Wednesday and do it. Kerry, I want to thank you so much. This has been an epic conversation.
Thank you so much. Thanks for having me and of course, I love to talk and travel anytime, anywhere.
Clearly. How can people find you? Where’s your YouTube channel? What’s it called?
Our show is on YouTube. That’s Ms. World Traveler. Of course, we’re on Instagram and Facebook, but Instagram is @KerryMsWorldTraveler, and Facebook, is Ms. World Traveler. Follow our journey. We’re having a great time and love to take people along with us.
That is exciting. Kerry, I want to thank you so much for taking the time to talk with me and my readers. Everyone, I want to remind you that epic choices lead to the epic life that you want.
Important Links
- Kerry Damiano – LinkedIn
- Ms. World Traveler – YouTube
- @KerryMsWorldTraveler – Instagram
- Ms. World Traveler – Facebook