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Last Updated: August 3rd
Deciding to set out on the road is rarely an easy decision, so below are some of the best travel podcasts available right now to help pique your wanderlust. These are the podcasts that’ll cover you if you want to kick it in a familiar and well-trod corner of the world or if you want to strike out and turn far-flung travel into your job. Have a listen. Live vicariously for an hour (outside your usual favorite travel bloggers and Instagrammers) and get inspired. Then go.
Related: The Best Political Podcasts Right Now
ZERO TO TRAVEL
Jason Moore wants to give you the tools to not only travel more but to live on the road. His podcast covers topics that are bread and butter for the young traveler. Where Moore lands a cut above the rest are his deep dives into the realities and practicalities of actually moving abroad, finding a job, and starting a new life. His pod is about far more than just taking a trip here and there. While the podcast certainly does have plenty of travel guides, Moore takes focuses on bringing in guests who are making a life of travel.
A great place to dive into Zero To Travel is the episode, Should I Go Location Independent? It’s a fantastic guide to finding a job while traveling. Imagine if you could change your venue of work to Bhutan next week. Would you? Give that episode a listen and you’ll have a clear idea what that move would require.
AMATEUR TRAVELER
Chris Christensen is the Amateur Traveler (though that title is a definite misnomer these days — he’s got over 500 episodes to choose from). Each pod is formatted as a simple location guides, with Christensen bringing in an expert on each location to give an in-depth guide to getting to a place and how best to experience it. It’s like an entire Lonely Planet guidebook in 20-40 minutes.
It’s hard to suggest where to start when wading through the 617 episodes. Whichever one intrigues you? A favorite is a recent episode about getting to and around Greenland, which seems to be a hot new destination. Another recent podcast that’s fascinating and inspiring is Christensen’s guide to Alaska’s Back Country. If those don’t float your boat, scroll through and find your dream destination, it’s most likely there.
THE SEASON PASS
Theme parks are serious tourist destinations. They combine travel and entertainment. What could be better than that? The Season Pass is hosted by three guys who love theme parks. In fact, they love them so much that they obsess over all aspects — from the rides to the temporary installations to the tricks of the trade.
Doug, Brent, and Robert geek out on rides and attractions for an hour or two on every podcast with a big list of recurring guest hosts. Again, this is a very deep archive — 365 episodes to be exact. A great place to start is their personal experience as kids going to Disneyland, paired with a history of the park. Another classic is their episode with Neil Patrick Harris talking parks, the circus, and magic.
INDIE TRAVEL PODCAST
Craig and Linda left New Zealand ten years ago and they haven’t looked back. Over 300 podcast episodes later, they aren’t showing any signs of slowing down… or going home. The couple left New Zealand with little cash and student loans and they made it work by working around the world. Their episodes vary from themed episodes that take a look at the history and art of a place to straight up location guides to extremely important tips and trials of making a life on the road work. They cover it all — like getting drunk, finding the money, and managing a relationship.
The duo shines best when talking about travel practicalities. How To Eat Healthily On The Road is a fun place to start if you’re worried about what to eat on the road. Recently the pair is back in Europe and offering up interesting guides to Berlin, Lithuania, and Latvia.
NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC WEEKEND
Boyd Matson is a bit of a legend over at National Geographic. He’s seen the world, taking part in expeditions most of us can only dream about, and now he’s talking about them with a cavalcade of fascinating guests. National Geographic Weekend tends to blend exploration, science, travel, wander, and awe into each episode. No one is going to be telling you how to move to Prague or launch a startup in Berlin. You’re going to get an amazing story from a corner of the planet you might not have ever heard of. Then you’re going to want to go there too.
The episodes are in a radio format but still functions perfectly well as a podcast. And there are over 1,000 episodes to choose from. A great place to start is a packed two-hour episode that covers “tragedy and triumph on Mount Everest, surviving an eagle attack, revisiting Machu Picchu 100 years after Hiram Bingham, long-distance polar bear swims, making electricity from a can of soda, a movie made on YouTube, uncovering treasures of the deep, saying goodbye in Thailand, and keeping your head amidst headhunters.” Get ready for a wild ride!
TRAVEL TALES
Mike Siegel is a comedian by day and a travel junkie by night. Siegel started in podcasting like many of his comedic counterparts by being funny on a podcast. After a while, he wanted to start his own. Realizing that standing out in the comedy podcast world was not an easy task, he shifted his focus to his next love — travel. Travel Tales takes Siegel around the world and he talks to a lot of people along the way. Some of the best moments are fellow traveler’s horror stories.
Siegel recently went to Kentucky to sample the bourbon and the horses and it’s a great place to dive into the show. Another good place to start is comedian Tom Rhodes episode about being an L.A. stand up working comedy clubs in the Middle East, Europe, and Asia.
EXTRA PACK OF PEANUTS
Extra Pack of Peanuts is a huge project, often at the top of iTunes best travel podcasts list. Travis and Heather have been traveling for a while and focus equally on exotic locales and practical financing of your travels. The couple seems to focus heavily on using credit card rewards and frequent flyer miles to optimize major discounts for travel. The travel episodes stand out purely by the enthusiasm Travis and Heather bring to all things travel.
Dive right in and listen to Travis’ interview with Bo Cordle — who went all in on his dream to sail around the world. If you’d prefer to start with their travel tips, check out Heather and Travis’ episode on all things money and using ATMs abroad.
TRAVEL TODAY WITH PETER GREENBERG
Peter Greenberg’s radio show has been a standard bearer for all things travel for several years now. Greenberg travels a lot every year. He’s able to take a bit of pre-internet radio talent and infuse it with amazingly pertinent travel information for any kind of traveler. Given the radio show aspects, Greenberg also covers travel news and insider tips that many of us are simply too green to have experienced. The man is a professional with a lifetime of travel behind and ahead of him. And you will come away from his show smarter every time you listen.
Greenberg has been talking about travel for so long that finding an enticing episode is simply a matter of scrolling through his large archives.
TRAVEL WITH RICK STEVES
Here we have the gold standard of travel advice. Rick Steves is from the world of radio as well. That doesn’t stop the vagabond’s easygoing demeanor and diverse knowledge of travel from translating to podcast form. Known mostly for his guidebooks on Europe, Steves’ podcast covers the entire world via interviews with experts and locals from those places. The podcast has a high production quality and Rick Steves’ notoriety allows him the opportunity to get big names on the show to talk about their travel adventures.
Again, it’s great to just jump in at a recent episode –covering old Havana, Ken Burns talking the National Parks, and Brent Glass talking about some of the 50 great places in America. Each episode is only an hour but covers two or three varied subjects that will entice you to pack a bag. Another good introduction episode features a family moving to Croatia for a year with young children.
ANDY STEVES TRAVEL PODCAST
Andy Steves stepped out of the travel shadow of his famous father (see above) and started WSA (Weekend Student Adventure). His company helps students studying abroad in Europe to make the most of their time in every way on every weekend. You can read our interview with Steves here.
It was a natural progression for Steves to start a podcast and reach out to his audience of young, student travelers. His podcast doesn’t just focus on weekend adventures, it’s a comprehensive look at the world of travel and each episode features at least one wanderluster ready to share their experience. The podcast is brand-new, so jump in from episode one and enjoy the tips for the young traveler searching for a little fun on the open road. Better yet, listen to his interview with Uproxx’s Steve Bramucci.
OUR AMERICANA
Our Americana is the meeting of two great podcast genres: Travel and storytelling. The podcast travels to small-town America (and sometimes Canada) to tell the story of an oft-forgotten locale. Each episode is intimate, enlightening, and intriguing. As you listen, you’ll be enticed to visit corners America that you may have never even heard of before and that is the ultimate test of a great travel show.
There’s really no bad place to start here amongst Our Americana’s 45 free episodes. Our recommendation is to maybe pick an episode that’s in your state and go from there.
TRAVEL STORIES PODCAST
Travel Stories Podcast and host Hayden Lee delivers exactly what the title sells, travel stories that are engaging and wanderlust-inducing. The podcast is well-produced and often comes to you from the open road. So there’s a rawness and newness to each episode that draws you into a life of a vagabond.
With 118 episodes to choose from, you can really jump in anywhere. That being said, practical travel episodes like “Why I Only Use a 15L Backpack – Choosing a Backpack for Ultralight Travel” are a great entry point that introduces you to Hayden Lee’s style and the show’s utility.
THE BUDGET-MINDED TRAVELER
The Budget Minded Traveler, hosted by Jackie Nourse, is an epic travel podcast. The series is wrapping up a massive Pan-American Highway multi-episode arc right now with all the practical and real information about that trip you could ever need. Overall, the show is just that: Practical and real. That makes it a must listen for itchy travelers waiting to strike out on the open road.
There are 95 free episodes available right now. You can choose from in-depth interviews with travel experts, experiential tales, and travel tips and guides. It’s probably best just to scroll the episodes and start with what jumps out at you.
ABROADERS
Erik Paquet’s Abroaders Podcast is an outlier here. Paquet looks at travel and squares that with business, capitalism, and corporate overlords. The podcast devotes entire episodes to the inner-workings of the travel industry — inner-workings we all often like to sweep under the rug in order to focus on sirens lounging on beaches on Instagram.
The pod is fascinating and very illuminating at the same time. And the show is more than that, it also tackles practical travel hacks, living abroad, starting businesses overseas, and even learning new languages.
There are 221 episodes to choose from here. There’s no serialization, so scroll through and find something that applies to you and give it a listen.
THIS WEEK IN TRAVEL
This Week in Travel brings together longtime traveler writers and travelers Gary Arndt, Chris Christensen, and Jen Leo to talk all things new in travel in the last week with a good dose of travel tips and stories. The hosts often bring in heavy-hitters from the travel industry discuss specific topics from around the world with a deep authority. It’s a great show that’ll have you scratching your head as to why you aren’t out there having adventures already.
Currently, there are 238 episodes to choose from. That’s a lot. In this case, we’d actually recommend starting with the most recent and working your way back (some of the older episodes may be a little outdated since they’re from almost 10 years ago).
LOCATION INDIE
Location Indie is a unique travel podcast that focuses on living abroad as a digital nomad. Jason Moore and Travis Sherry live and work abroad and have created a platform to help all of us who dream of living that dream. Their show is a step by step guide to making your vagabond fantasies into realities.
There have been 113 episodes so far. This is probably the only one of the list that we’d recommend starting with episode one and just working your way through. It’ll be a degree in living and working abroad in the 21st century.
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