Why does everyone book 3 nights in a city and call it slow travel?

I keep seeing posts from people who land in a new country, stay for 72 hours, and claim they're 'living like a local.' That's not slow travel, that's a rushed vacation with a laptop. I spent 5 months in Medellin last year and only started feeling like I understood the neighborhood after week 3. My question is, how long do you actually stay someplace before you stop feeling like a tourist? Asking because I'm planning my next stop and want to know if I'm the weird one for wanting at least 2 months.

2 comments

2 Comments

keith_rodriguez24d ago

Week 3 was exactly when the magic started for me in Lisbon. The first two weeks I was still chasing the pasteis de nata and the miradouros, but by day 19 I knew which bakery ran out of bread by noon and which old guy would wave at me on my morning walk. You can't get that in 72 hours, you barely learn where the good trash cans are in three days. Honestly, I think the real metric is when the wifi goes out and you don't immediately panic because you already know where to sit in the park to grab someone else's signal. Tourists count their days, travelers count their routines, and that shift takes way more than a long weekend.

emery1923d ago

Totally feel you @keith_rodriguez, my third week in Tokyo was when the konbini clerk started nodding at me instead of just scanning my stuff.