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    <description>Essays on returning to a place, the contradictions of being a visitor, borders and belonging, and the discomfort an itinerary usually edits out.</description>
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      <title>What Spain&apos;s drove roads still hold open</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[More than 125,000 kilometres of public ground, guaranteed by law for animals walking twice a year, and the seeds, plant genes and medieval tolls that travel with them.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 14 Aug 2026 08:50:32 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>The night train is a genre, and the sleeper cars are its library</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[An essay on the night train as a cultural form: Wagons-Lits history, the sleeper’s literature, the Nightjet and European Sleeper revival, and arrivals.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 05 Aug 2026 04:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>The month between months is when a place is most itself</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[An essay on shoulder-season travel: beyond the 20-40% discounts, the weeks between seasons are when a destination stops performing and starts being itself.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Tue, 14 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>The underrated pleasures of the city with nothing to see</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[An essay on the city with nothing to see: Perec's exhausted Paris square, Koolhaas's generic city, and what ordinary places show that monuments hide.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Sun, 21 Jun 2026 04:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>There is no such thing as a traveler, and never was</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[The tourist versus traveler distinction: Boorstin, MacCannell and Buzard on why the two-century-old division was never about how anyone traveled.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 29 May 2026 04:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>Going back is the strangest trip a traveler takes</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[An essay on going back: Hofer's 1688 nostalgia, the scale shock of the shrunken streets, and what place-attachment research says the return trip is for.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 06 May 2026 04:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>The plotted route and the wander are different kinds of knowing</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[Maps versus wandering: Lynch’s city image, the London taxi driver studies, what GPS does to survey knowledge, and navigate-outbound-wander-home.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Tue, 14 Apr 2026 04:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>What the language barrier gives back</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[An essay on the language barrier in travel: desirable difficulty, the foreign-language effect, and why not speaking the language protects the journey.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Sun, 22 Mar 2026 04:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>What a souvenir is for, once the trip is over</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[An essay on why travelers buy souvenirs: Belk's extended self, the gift shop's manufactured testimony, and how objects get charged with memory.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 27 Feb 2026 05:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>Nobody has ever been in an airport</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[An essay on the airport as Marc Augé's non-place: anonymity, transit choreography, and what leaks through the most placeless architecture ever built.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 04 Feb 2026 05:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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      <title>The frame between us and the thing we came to see</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[An essay on why travelers photograph landmarks, the photo-taking impairment effect, and what memory research says the landmark photo ritual actually does.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Tue, 13 Jan 2026 05:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Marcus Wellington</dc:creator>
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