Simon Reeve on why the best journeys are off the beaten path

The best travel tales, says the writer and broadcaster, come when you look beyond the tourist traps

Illustration by Vesa Sammalisto
(Image credit: Illustration by Vesa Sammalisto)

From the shadows around the flickering campfire there was a gentle crunch of footsteps on sand, then a Tuareg nomad, wearing an elaborate headdress and full-length faded purple robes, stepped out of the darkness and sat down next to me.

I was crossing a remote and starkly beautiful region of the Sahara with a small BBC crew, and I had thought we were the only two-legged creatures for miles around. But the Tuareg gave me a simple nod, as if he’d just joined us in an empty train carriage, and behaved as if it was completely normal to chance upon an open-mouthed group of telly travellers. My guide passed him water, and bread we had just baked in the sand, and we sat there munching, as I gazed at him, and a billion stars above, in utter wonder. The wanderer ate his fill, tilted his head again in gratitude, and slipped back into the darkness.

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