EDMONDS – There are two different realities when it comes to traveling in the post September 11 world, according to Rick Steves, the Edmonds-based travel business owner, writer and TV host.
One is the perception. It’s what’s causing Americans to stay home, and in turn the fallout in the airline industry, Steves said in a presentation at the Greater Edmonds Chamber of Commerce luncheon March 27.
That perception of danger is what prompted one of his neighbors on the Edmonds waterfront to call the Coast Guard on a scuba diver.
“I don’t care if it’s founded or not, it’s real,” he said. “We almost find comfort in widespread anxiety.”
The other reality is the facts, Steves said, such as 12 million Americans traveling to Europe in 2002 “and not one was killed or hurt by a terrorist.”
“Europeans laugh out loud when they hear we’re staying home for security reasons,” he said.
Steves said he is tiring of being questioned about the issue, especially since the beginning of the Iraq war. If you want to go, you should go, he said.
“I think it’s patriotic to stand up and say, ‘this is bogus – fly!’”
Steves said he has traveled 100 days a year since graduating from Edmonds High School in 1973. He’s parlayed that lifestyle into a thriving business that employs 60 people, leads more than 4,000 people a year on European tours and runs a large travel information center in downtown Edmonds. Steves has written 22 guidebooks, many of which are updated annually, and produces his own TV show that is seen nationwide.
He also conducts a semi-annual European Travel Festival of free classes – the most recent having taken place March 22 – that draws upward of 3,000 people to downtown Edmonds.
The basis for the name of Steves’ company, Europe Through the Back Door, and central theme of his travel philosophy has been a focus on off-the-beaten-tourist-track locations and people. Sticking to this approach and staying out of fancy hotels helps minimize any terrorist threat, perceived or real, he said.
“Terrorists don’t bomb Pedro’s Pension – it’s where they sleep,” he said, drawing laughs from the crowd.
Steves sees travel as a powerful way to promote peace by allowing the people of the world to get to know each other. Spending time talking with the people of the world helps dispel the “ugly American” reputation that can precede travelers from the United States, he said.
“There are ways that divide you from the world and ways that connect you with the world,” he said. One of the former, he said, is to take a cruise and “see if you can eat five meals a day and still snorkel when you get into port.” This isn’t what Steves calls travel – it’s “recreation or hedonism or reward for hard work.”
Steves illustrated the wealth gap between Americans and the rest of the world, which is a major factor in the way we are perceived, as Americans “desperately trying to get rich while most of the world is desperate to make $2 a day.”
Steves avoided direct commentary on the war in Iraq, but came close: “women can’t vote in Kuwait – does that matter?” to the Bush Administration, he asked rhetorically.
Steves also sounded notes of pride in his country and hometown.
“I’m a proud American in Europe – I’m an ambassador of goodwill,” he said.
About Edmonds, he said of all the places he’s been, he wouldn’t live anywhere else. “We have a lot to be thankful for and a lot to be proud of,” he said.
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