What happens when people use TikTok and Instagram to make travel plans
Nearly one in three travelers turn to social media for holiday inspiration, according to a new study.
The figures are even higher for younger travelers. Some 60% of Gen Zs and 40% of millennials use social media for travel purposes, according to an April 2022 report by the travel company Arrivia.
On TikTok alone, the hashtag “travel” boasts 74.4 billion views, while some 624 million Instagram posts are about travel too.
But there’s a darker side to social media’s flawless travel photos. Expectations may not match reality, with many photographs edited to look better than they actually are.
Disappointed travelers are now striking back, using the very mediums that led them astray. They are publishing their own videos that show what immaculate places on social media actually look like in real life.
A town from a Disney movie?
A TikTok video inspired 26-year-old Olivia Garcia, a graphic designer and YouTuber from South Florida, to take a one-hour detour from her road trip, she said.
Showing snowcapped mountains and a town seemingly ripped from the script of a Disney movie, the video captured the supposed beauty of Gastonia, a small city in North Carolina. Garcia said she needed no more convincing to visit.
The only problem? The imagery in the video was actually Switzerland.
It was part of a tongue-in-cheek video series on TikTok in which a user labeled some of the most beautiful and recognizable spots in Europe as places in North Carolina. One video named the soaring Milan Cathedral as the “the new Bass Pro shops at Concord Hills Mall, near Charlotte.”
“We get into town, and it was just a normal town,” said Garcia. “There were no mountains. It wasn’t like the video.”
Garcia made a humorous TikTok video documenting her visit to the city, showing a dirty gas station and rundown buildings, though she noted she did focus on the “not so nice” areas of Gastonia.
“You always think like, okay, you see this happen to other people, but it never happens to you — I’m smart enough to know when things are real and when things aren’t real,” she said.
Since her video went viral, Garcia has spoken to the mayor of Gastonia, who offered to take her on a tour of the town if she returns. She also appeared on “The Kelly Clarkson Show” to share her experience.
“Do your research … because you might end up somewhere you don’t want to be,” Garcia said. “[And] don’t believe everything you see on the internet.”
A ‘beautiful, hidden garden pool’
Thirty-year-old travel blogger Lena Tuck also fell victim to a glamourized TikTok video.
While driving from Brisbane to Melbourne, Tuck said, she made an impromptu decision to visit a “beautiful, hidden garden pool” that she had seen on TikTok — the Yarrangobilly Caves thermal pool walk.
“It looked like this out of world place where topless men would be feeding you grapes or something like that,” she said.
But on the drive there, her phone lost reception — which meant she had no directions to guide her — and she had to drive on a rough, unpaved road for 10 minutes before trekking nearly half a mile down a steep hill.
When she reached the pool, she was surprised to find it packed with families and screaming children, much like a public…
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