Is Luddite travel a thing now? The next iteration of unplugged travel and off-grid weekends is here

If you’ve never traveled abroad without a smartphone before, the idea of doing so probably feels either freeing or terrifying. You won’t have any notifications to weigh you down, yet you also won’t have Google Maps to save you from wrong turns.

But there’s currently an overwhelm associated with our devices, and headlines are popping up about people of all ages ditching their smartphones in an attempt to simplify their relationships with technology. According to Hilda Burke, psychotherapist and author of The Phone Addiction Workbook, there is a strong link between heavy device usage and relationship issues, quality of sleep, our ability to switch off and relax, and concentration levels.

“Many people have a constant drip feed of requests coming their way via their device, many with a false sense of urgency,” she told the BBC. “They feel unable to lay boundaries down, with the result that they feel compelled to check their emails and messages last thing at night and first thing in the morning.”

And now, to put it simply, some people are over it. According to one poll conducted in the United States, about two-thirds of people over the age of 18 would prefer for society to return to a time before constant connectivity. That number skyrockets to 77 percent of millennials and Gen X-ers between the ages of 35 and 54. 

Enter ‘Luddite’ travel. The idea requires travelers to go without their smartphones, ditching them in favor of borrowed landlines, paper maps, and printed tickets.

The idea of disconnecting during your travels isn’t new, as many nature-focused companies have tapped into delivering on the desire for disconnectivity. British company Unplugged, for example, advertises three-day digital detoxes where you’re intended to literally lock away your phone for the duration of your stay (don’t worry—they’ll give you an ancient Nokia dumbphone at check-in, in case of emergencies.) Unyoked, which operates in the UK, Australia, and New Zealand, charges a premium for their disconnected cabins.

But traveling without a phone, even with a guide, is rare. On vacation, many people—at least in the United States—continue to use their phones to check work email, fearing that they’ll have far too much to catch up on when they return to the office if they don’t stay on top of messages while they’re away. About 66 percent of people admit to checking their work email on vacation. A separate US study found that the same percentage of people still work while on holiday. That’s despite research showing that work-related stress leads to hundreds of thousands of premature deaths around the world each year.

So some travel companies are tapping into our inability to self-control the scrolling. FTLO Travel currently offers completely phone-free itineraries. The company is catering to solo travelers in their 20s and 30s and recently launched a new collection of phone-free international group trips specifically for people who don’t want to look at screens while they’re traveling.

“I think we’ve gotten to a point where we don’t even realize how distracted by and reliant on phones we are,” FTLO founder Tara Cappel said via email. It can be even worse while traveling, she added. “Unfortunately, being constantly on your phone when you travel dulls the experience and robs you of serendipitous moments.”

FTLO’s current listings for phone-free departures include trips to Cuba, Mexico, Iceland, Portugal, Italy and Costa Rica. While their guides won’t confiscate phones at the beginning of the adventure, travelers are asked to avoid using their screens in front of one another.

“We have some rules about phone usage for trip leaders—no phones at meals (they have to step away if they need to arrange or confirm something) and no idle phone usage, meaning they can only use it to actively confirm something trip-related,” Cappel said. “They also can’t let any travelers use their phone unless it’s an emergency!”

A humorous FAQ section about the tours on FTLO’s website pokes fun at just how tech-reliant we really are, with razzes like: “How will guides communicate with guests? By speaking to them, or posting trip updates on sheets of paper taped up in the hotel lobby, or by physically slipping notes under travelers’ hotel doors, super old-school-style.”

It seems that everything old really is new again in the world of smartphones.

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