Wanderlust: the strong desire to be somewhere else has driven the planet’s population from pole to pole and across oceans since the beginning of time. Americans take over 2.29 billion domestic trips each year and approximately 93 million trips to other countries, and we love to commemorate our trips with souvenirs! From keychains and shot glasses to local handmade treasures and art, we love to remember our adventures with an item that we can show family and friends, regaling them with tales of our travels.
The seasoned traveler learns to collect items of personal value that can be displayed in the home and bring joy to each person who sees it, specifically reminding us of those special moments we spent immersed in a different town, state, or country. A common goal of any souvenir is to evoke the feelings we experienced while traveling – curiosity, boldness, and wonder – and recreate them in our daily lives.
Why We Buy Souvenirs
We love to buy souvenirs almost as much as we love to travel. We spend months – or even years! – preparing for that amazing vacation, and when it is over, it can seem to pass so quickly it is almost surreal. A souvenir, along with our many selfies, grounds us in the memories of the experience and reassures us the vacation actually happened. Souvenirs serve a specific purpose in the tradition of travel:
- Souvenirs validate that we were in another place
- They keep our travel destination close to heart and in the front of our minds
- Trinkets from our travel make great gifts for friends and family
- Souvenirs remind us of a specific adventure we have experienced
The more beautiful our travel destination, the more we desire to match its beauty in what we bring back with us. When we bring back souvenirs for our friends and family, they best reflect the undeniable allure of the destination and let them know we thought of them while we were gone.
Celebrate with a Wood Map
The experienced traveler celebrates their adventure with a wood map. Wanderlust strikes consistently over time, causing the wanderer to explore ways to keep the memories of each destination alive and well in their day-to-day life. Wood maps are a beautiful way to commemorate the depth of wonder in your destinations and offer visitors to your home a glimpse of what lights your fire to travel.
Each wood map shares the journey you have taken as well as the detailed bathymetric (underwater topography) rendering of your travel destination. Your wood maps come in a variety of practical styles, allowing you to delight your guests with the quality of the décor in your home, as well as giving you an opportunity to walk down Memory Lane every time you pass each work of art.
Types of Wood Maps
Souvenirs come in many shapes and sizes, but none satisfy the heart and vision of the ever-curious traveler like a high-quality wood map. The curious traveler wants to continue to explore the destination, even after returning home. Want to discover new territory? The wood map will continue to delight day-after-day as details reveal themselves, inch by inch, to your inner explorer and let you fully appreciate the depths of the beauty you experienced.
What Souvenir is Better Quality Than a Wood Map?
There is truly nothing classier than a wood map. It can be unmatched when purchased from an exceptional purveyor that takes pride in the materials and workmanship in terms of quality.The best wood maps are made from Baltic wood, and the details are laser-cut with such precision that the land and the depths of the water will stand out in distinction. Wood maps made with attention to detail appear to wrap right over the edge because the frame has been fit to the depth of the mapped area, dramatically encasing the section of land and water.
With high-quality wood maps, the pieces are placed precisely, prepared for laser-cutting, and hand stained with shades of blue and green to help the eye discern between land and water. Protected by durable acrylic, the dynamic landscape of the wood map will provide years of enjoyment, conversation, and reminiscing about your adventures with friends and family.
What Areas are Reflected on Wood Maps
Whether you are visiting the scenic Pacific-Northwest, the warm, sandy shores of the South, the history-rich coastline of the Atlantic, the Great Lakes of the Midwest, or another country entirely, chances are good that there is a high-quality wood map in your future! From Bar Harbor, Maine, to Lake Tahoe, California, and many places in between, you can relive your domestic travels many times over, soaking up the beauty of the wood map and letting it stir your memories of the time you spent at the water’s edge.
World traveler? No need to look any further! There are wood maps that will hit home for you as well. Some favorite wood maps include:
There are few feelings as sweet as the feeling of freedom that comes with travel. To explore more of our world and its people is a privilege most people aspire to experience. The ability to travel brings us closer together and broadens our personal horizons. Whether you explore this great country or venture into lands across the ocean, traveling broadens our appreciation of the world at large and allows us to deepen our understanding of others. Education through exploration is a life-changer, enriching our relationships with others and ourselves. Our ability to relate these experiences through souvenirs, and specifically the detail of wood maps, allows others to experience adventure, as well.
We have a lifetime to bask in the warmth of memories, and souvenirs help to shape the description of our adventures to our friends and family. Wood maps mirror back to us the stunning beauty we witnessed and add a visual reminder to our daily lives, bringing smiles for years to come.