Megan Singleton: BloggerAtLarge.com writer on the most popular travel destinations for 2024

Travel trends are constantly changing, especially in an era where living costs are keeping Kiwis grounded.

According to new data, plenty of people have been able to make room in their budgets for overseas trips - with Europe being the top destination for travellers based in New Zealand.

Australia comes second, with Asia coming a very close third.

BloggerAtLarge writer Megan Singleton unpacks the findings of this poll further.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudgin
from News Talk SEDB.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Megan Singleton is with us now to talk travel. You
can find her a blogger blogger at large dot com.
Good morning, Good morning. So you did a poll for
US last week and clearly you've now got you got
a little bit of a bug for the poll, and
you ran another one for us this week, which is
kind of interesting. It's pretty interesting as well. You were
asking your fans and your fellow travel lovers where they're

(00:37):
heading to.

Speaker 3 (00:38):
Yeah, I was curious to see so these are already
obviously people who like to travel. Although it was quite
cool to see that some people said they're going nowhere.
I basically said, where's your pastport going next? And it
was really interesting because I was curious to see where
people are going, and of course that's going to help me,
you know, create more content for destinations that people want

(01:00):
to read about as well. So it was all very interesting.
And while about five percent of them said nowhere going
home in the drawer, that's where my passport's going, the
winner was Europe, which is really interesting. And I don't
know about you, but I've just got so many people
filling my Facebook feed with all their Europe photos and

(01:21):
the weather has turned. Oh my, have you seen that?
Everyone was like sweltering two weeks ago and now they're
freezing and raining. I suppose it defense where but Europe
was quickly and closely followed by Australia and then Asia
was a really close third. So that is very interesting

(01:42):
and I thought that that was some great results and
will help us to sort of figure out what people
want to hear from or about.

Speaker 2 (01:51):
I think Europe's interesting because for a lot of us,
the cost of getting there is just still cute, you know.
So are those airfares sort of starting to come down
and you're able to find some better deals?

Speaker 3 (02:03):
You can, definitely, and it's good that more airlines are
coming back in. To be honest, the air fares aren't
really more than they now were pre COVID, and even then,
the air fears have stayed fairly balanced, and I think
that's a good thing. And we've got enough competition, particularly
getting to Europe, you know, through Asia from New Zealand

(02:23):
and also some of these figures included cruises. What I
did was I just picked the destination itself, but some
of them are going on a cruise to those destinations.
So yeah, so like the Japan or Alaska and I
put Asia in America for those results. It's very scientific poll.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
Yeah no, and that's okay, that's all right. That is
interesting though, because I see a lot of ads coming
through for Asia on sale or maybe the US on
sale and things. I haven't seen a lot come through
yet for Europe on sale, but you know.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
Yeah, well you won't yet because they're just coming into
the end of their peak season. So Europe doesn't want
you yet, right, but when they start wanting you, yeah,
you'll start to see good meals. And so that's another
good way to look at ye shoulder seasons because there's
some good value on going to those destinations where they're
preps on your bucket list, but look at when it's

(03:17):
slightly off the peak season and you'll get some good prices.

Speaker 2 (03:21):
Do you think more people are interested in the cruises
these days if they're heading to somewhere like Alaska or
the river cruises in Europe?

Speaker 3 (03:28):
Yeah, definitely. They're really really popular. And as you know,
I did my first riff cruise last year. I took
a little tour to the Christmas markets on the Danube.
And so next year I'm actually taking another tour on
the Rhine. I wanted to try a different river, and
I wanted to try summer. So I'm actually going to
be starting in Amsterdam and heading to Basel and then

(03:49):
we're going to add on another eight nights and do
all sorts of things. And the main reason I chose
the Rhine for this particular one is for the sweet
little French town called Strasbourg. To me, it's the prettiest
town I've ever seen in Europe, and right on the
border of Germany, in the wine region of al Sas

(04:10):
and it's just absolutely exquisite. It's a photo op around
every corner and I'm sure lots of your listeners will
be going, oh, yes, I know it stressful. It's window
boxes and the river runs right around it. It's absolutely exquisite.
So there is so much cuteness to see in Europe.
Olympics are gone, I think people are heading over there

(04:30):
and these are the big trips still that people have
put off since COVID, so they're still they're out there
doing the big seventieths and anniversaries and fiftieth birthdays and yeah,
it's all go. It's just way in New Zealand and
let's all go over there.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
It certainly is. Thank you so much, Megan. For more,
head to blog at large dot.

Speaker 1 (04:47):
Com For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudkin.
Listen live to News Talks the b from nine am Sunday,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio