I often get wacky trip ideas.

[randomness]

Sometimes I even implement them.

This is one I'm unlikely to implement, because I have more sanity than money, but here it is:

The largest 52 metropolitan areas in the world, one a week for a year!

The reasoning goes like this. I like cities, and I like travel. I've been to a lot of these places, and I'd like to visit most of the ones I haven't been to yet. (Clearly, there are exceptions: for example, I won't be going to Baghdad as a tourist until the security situation improves.)

Wikipedia and world-gazetteer.com both have lists of metro areas, which of course conflict. In fact, Wikipedia has two: a list of urban areas by population and one of urban agglomerations. (I prefer the former, because Boston/Providence is on that list at #37, while on the latter Boston is way down at #56. On world-gazetteer.com it just misses the top 50.)

Needless to say, this trip would be very expensive and quite a test of stamina. Even if I didn't visit them in order of population, but chose some (relatively) sane geographic order instead.

But boy, imagine the food blogging!

Comments

[ladybird97.livejournal.com]

DO IT!! And write a book. Seriously!

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Huh!

I think I'd want to shop the book idea around first. You may be onto something, though. It'd be a stunt, but there seems to be a market for stunt travel books.

There are a lot of third-world cities on the list, which isn't a particular problem for me, but may limit the number of potential buyers.

[ladybird97.livejournal.com]

Seriously! There's a market for stunt travel and a market for stunt food tourism, too. Multiple food-tourism books have just come out, and if they do well, other publishers are probably going to want to jump on the bandwagon.

And heck, I know I'd buy it! I mean, even if it weren't written by someone I know :)

[(Anonymous)]

I'm not sure that would actually be a problem. My scan of the first Wikipedia list you cited suggests that it's mostly a bunch of cities in each of China, India, and the United States, plus a smattering through the rest of Asia including Indonesia. All of those seem like things people would be interested in. Then there are the "most important cities in large but not huge countries", like Tehran, Baghdad, Istanbul, and Kinshasa. Many of those have a fair amount of allure anyway, and you can play up the ones that don't precisely because they don't. I think lots of people would be interested in a chapter on Kinshasa: the largest city you've never even thought of going to. (I don't know how safe Congo is these days, but...)

Anyway, I think if you planned the trip carefully, it would be exhausting but not nearly as bad as it seems on the surface. For example, spending a month and a half or two months touring China seems less tiring than "visiting 6 or eight Chinese cities." And I think it totally could produce a book-- or even multiple books. I bet you could get both a "food of the world tour" and a "touring the world's great cities" out of the same trip. One of the keys would be organizing the books coherently, but that could be part of the same process as planning the trip.

--Adam

(All that said, it might be easier to do this as several distinct regional trips: the great cities of China, the great cities of India, etc. And that would still probably be marketable.)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

As a matter of fact, I was looking at Kinshasa-Brazzaville. I think it's a bit hairy, but so is Lagos.

But yes, I noticed that many of the cities group naturally.

[in-parentheses.livejournal.com]

I don't think that limits the number of buyers. I think it increases it, if anything. Those are the cities most people will never visit, so they want to read about people who have! Plus, the adventures you can write about are likely to be more...adventurous.

[oneagain.livejournal.com]

this trip would be very expensive and quite a test of stamina.

FWIW, I think if you are going to travel for pleasure, it should be enjoyable and not a marathon run. YMMV:)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

YMMV

Clearly, because some people find marathon runs enjoyable.

I think I would find this more fun than you would (surprise!) but not enough to actually do it. But that's why I said I had more sanity than money.

(Unless I got funding. That would be different.)

[oneagain.livejournal.com]

(Unless I got funding. That would be different.)

If I got funding, that would be different, too, and I would seriously consider joining in:) (is that a surprise?) It would work better for me, of course, if I could figure out ways to be able to continue to swim, like at local Y's or something, but I am guessing that would be a casualty...

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Yes, that would be problematic.

[oneagain.livejournal.com]

Then I would probably have wait 2-3 years after my commitment to that has been satisfied, unless I find something else that does for me what swimming does before then, or the issues I am trying to address by swimming resolve sooner...not holding my breath, though (so to speak:)

Who knows--maybe Baghdad will be in better shape at that point (though I'm not holding my breath for that either).

[oneagain.livejournal.com]

And of course G would have to come.

_{I'll stop posting now. Really:)}

[chris-warrior.livejournal.com]

you could limit it to the US. Syracuse might even make that list. *grin*

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

*grin*

I'll have to come up sometime. The last time I came through your part of the world I was helping someone move and we came barrelling through with a van filled with her earthly possessions at an unholy hour.

[serendipity9000.livejournal.com]

So I think the next question is in how many of those cities could you find a friend or a friend-of-a-friend to stay with? That plus one VERY well plotted round the world plane ticket could bring the cost down. Of course that doesn't deal with the stamina issue.

[apintrix.livejournal.com]

I knew it was big, but... my god is Tokyo big.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Seriously! It just goes on and on.

[emilymorgan.livejournal.com]

Wait, how is this different from your normal life? :)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

In my normal life, I am too dumb to go places in a reasonable geographic order. :)

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

And by eliminating Baghdad you get San Diego! Good trade all around, not that I don't hope eventually to go to Baghdad.

[shostack.livejournal.com]

You may have just described what for me would be the worst possible year of travel ever. :)

I'm sure you would like this. So I encourage you to do it, but it would drive me nuts to never get out of the cities.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

it would drive me nuts to never get out of the cities.

Totally! I seem to remember having a conversation with you about just that topic, maybe under that big awning/tent thing in your guesthouse in Siem Reap or something. Or maybe it was somewhere else, but still.

[antoniusrex.livejournal.com]

And I'll be your (not so british) bat man.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I'm surprised Boston is on there at all. It feels so small sometimes...

[sea-bound.livejournal.com]

*drool*

Do you realize that I hit 15 of the cities on the first list on this trip alone? (19 on the second list and 46 from the first few hundred on the third list, before I became disgruntled by all the places I'm forced to skip due to time and gave up.) Holy cow.

Yes, it helps to have funding. You can use my level of (in)sanity upon my return as a gauge for whether you should attempt something like this in the future. *grin*

(It's a great idea, btw.)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

You can use my level of (in)sanity upon my return as a gauge for whether you should attempt something like this in the future. *grin*

Your funding source is driving you crazy. I think maybe it would unfair to use your experience as an example? :)

(It's a great idea, btw.)

Thanks! Maybe I'll do it on a longer schedule.

[sea-bound.livejournal.com]

Actually, now that I no longer have to interact with them on a daily basis (or weekly, or even monthly, as it turns out), my relationship with my funding source is tolerable. I was really referring to the insanity accompanying being on the road for 9 months without a break. :)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Actually, now that I no longer have to interact with them on a daily basis (or weekly, or even monthly, as it turns out), my relationship with my funding source is tolerable.

Rockin! I was hoping it would work out that way.