Travel, at its best, is about discovery: about losing yourself in a new culture and environment, and opening yourself up to the serendipitous, the unexpected, the unforeseen. All my most astonishing travel experiences have been those I tripped over, coming around a blind corner. For me, going to see what’s in a guidebook is like opening your own suitcase and hoping to be surprised at what you find.
You cannot pack for the sublime. I travel without an itinerary, but I don’t wander aimlessly. I rent a car and drive from the city that the airport is located near (or in those countries so off the grid that renting a car is impossible, I hop on an outward-bound bus). An hour or so down the road, I divert on to some promising smaller road and follow that until, with any luck, I am on gravel or dirt, wandering through the interior, not just off the beaten path but in some blank, roadless area of the GPS.