There are times when you want a vacation that challenges you. But there are other times when you crave a familiar scene, a traveler’s version of comfort food.
What is it that brings people back to the same destination again and again?
Charlotte Russell, a Manchester-based clinical psychologist and founder/editor of the Travel Psychologist blog, didn’t see value in visiting the same place twice when she was in her 20s, but as she got older, her opinion changed.
Now one of her most frequent destinations is Seville, a short, direct flight from her home airport. However, her travel cadence is strategic. “I don’t want to spoil the connection I have to the place by visiting too frequently,” she says. “For me, once every few years seems to be about ‘right.’” Once there, she savors “the beautiful buildings, the orange trees, the smells and flavors of the food,” enjoying the chance to get to know the culture more deeply than a one-time visitor might.
Then again, Russell acknowledges, maybe we can never truly visit the same place twice.
So says psychology professor Andrew Stevenson in his 2023 book “The Psychology of Travel.” In his view, “places change all the time, and so do we. Yes, we can visit the same location again, but are likely to experience it in a completely different way when visiting again, as the place becomes more meaningful, more full of memories, more vital, each new time we arrive.”
We asked Southern California readers to tell us about their most prized repeat destinations. The answers took us all over — Hawaii, Utah, Arizona, England and Hermosa Beach, for instance — for all sorts of reasons they share with us below.
