50 Important English TRAVEL Phrases

Hi, I'm Vanessa from SpeakEnglishWithVanessa.com.  Let's travel together.  

Do you like to travel? Do you wish that you  could travel more? Well, if you have ever  

visited another country, you know that English  is essential or at least very helpful when you  

travel. So, I have some good news. Today, you are  going to learn 50 important phrases for travel.  

You'll learn how to plan for a trip, how to talk  about directions and transportation, how to talk  

at the airport and at a hotel. And finally, how  to tell someone about a trip that you just took. 

I know that 50 expressions is a lot. So, to  help you, I've created a free PDF worksheet  

that you can download with the link in the  description. Never forget what you've learned,  

review everything and answer Vanessa's Challenge  question at the end of the PDF worksheet. 

Let's get started with how to  plan or book a trip in English.  

Where would you like to go? Excellent starter  question. Where would you like to go? Also,  

you can answer this by saying, "I've never been  to Rio de Janeiro. I've never been to Rome.  

I've never been to Tokyo." Excellent phrase. "We should book tickets now." This verb, to book,  

means to reserve. We're not talking about  something that you read. This is the noun,  

a book. This is talking about reserving something.  "We should book tickets now because it's a  

popular destination, so let's book tickets." "I hate making plans. Let's just do something  

spur of the moment." Spur of the moment  means without plan, something spontaneous.  

Well, you need to book tickets to go to another  country, but maybe when you get there, you don't  

want to have every hour planned. You like to do  things spur of the moment. "Oh, there's a great  

park. Let's go there. Oh, that's a cool museum.  Let's go there." This is spur of the moment. 

A similar phrase you can use is, "We decided  that we'll just go wherever the wind blows us."  

Maybe the wind will blow me to that museum.  Maybe the wind will blow me to that restaurant.  

I don't know. This has the same idea as spur of  the moment. It's not planned. It's spontaneous. 

Maybe you are the opposite kind of person. You  might say, "We need to make a reservation."  

This is a great phrase to know: to make a  reservation. You can make a reservation at a  

popular restaurant, you can make a reservation  at a hotel, you can make a reservation for a  

seat at a concert. There's a lot of different  things that you can make a reservation for. 

When you go to a museum or somewhere similar,  you might ask, "Do you have an audio guide?  

Do you have an audio guide?" This is actually a  great way to improve your English. Because if you  

listen to an audio guide in English,  as you're walking around the museum,  

I bet you are going to learn a ton of new  vocabulary, some great expressions for describing  

what you're seeing. This is an excellent way to  enjoy something, but also learn some English.  

You can ask, "Do you have an audio guide?" When you go somewhere, you can ask, "Do you  

accept cash or credit card? Do you accept cash or  credit card?" Depending on the country you're in,  

they might prefer one option instead of the other.  And we often use the word cash to talk about  

physical dollar bills or the physical  money of the place that you're visiting.  

"Do you accept cash or credit card? Because I only  have a credit card. I don't have any cash with me.  

If you need cash, then I got to come back." You might ask, "What are the hours for the  

museum? What are the hours for the tour? What are  the hours for some kind of event or place?" It's  

a great question to ask, "When are you open?" What  are the hours for something that you want to see? 

Our final question under this first category of  planning or booking your vacation is an excellent  

question, "What should I pack for? What should  I pack for?" Well, of course, for vacation. Now,  

this question has another meaning. It means I  want to know what kind of activities we'll do,  

what the weather is going to be. I want  to know, do I need to pack a swimsuit?  

Do I need to pack a winter coat? What should I  pack for? That means what should I prepare for? 

This is really helpful as you're trying to  fit everything inside your small suitcase,  

this always happens to me, and you really need  to decide, "Okay, what do I need to pack four?  

Okay, I don't need three winter sweaters.  It's probably going to be not too cold.  

I'll just bring something else." You  can ask, "What do I need to pack for?" 

The next phrases have to do with transportation  and directions. I want to help you not be lost in  

a foreign place with no words to say to help  yourself. So, let's talk about 10 important  

phrases for transportation and directions. The first one is a great question. You can  

ask someone else or they might ask you,  if you look really lost, you might hear,  

"Where are you headed?" This is often reduced to  simply, "Where ya headed?" We cut out the verb  

are and we reduced you to ya, "Where ya headed?  Where are you headed?" If you look really lost,  

someone might say, "Hey, where ya headed?  Can I help you?" This great verb, to head,  

means the direction that you're going in.  So, you're going somewhere. "I'm headed to  

the store. I'm headed to the doctor's office.  I'm headed to the metro station. Where is it?" 

So, someone might ask you, "Where ya headed?"  Or, if you see someone who's lost, you can ask  

this too, "Excuse me. Can you tell me how to  get to the metro station? Excuse me, can you  

tell me how to get to the subway station?" It's  great to introduce a lot of these questions with,  

"Excuse me," because you're interrupting someone  else and really it is the easiest way to be polite  

in a simple way. "Excuse me, can you tell me how  to get to the subway station? Excuse me, can you  

tell me how to get to the museum?" To wherever  you'd like to go. "Excuse me, how far is it to the  

airport? Excuse me, how far is it to the airport?" You might ask this to your bus driver as you're  

getting on the bus to go to the airport and you're  worried about missing your flight. You'd want to  

know, is it going to take 30 minutes? Is it going  to take two hours? Is it going to take 10 minutes?  

"Excuse me, how far is it to the  airport?" And then they'll tell you,  

"Oh, don't worry. It's just going to take  10 minutes. We'll be there pretty soon." 

I don't know about you, but I have had many  experiences looking for a bus stop and being  

so lost. Sometimes bus stops are not obvious. It's  just a little sign or maybe it's just a pole and  

everyone knows where you should go, except  for you because you're not from that area.  

So, this is a great question. You can ask,  "Excuse me, which way to the bus stop?  

Excuse me, which way to the bus stop?  This way, that way, over here, back  

there?" "Excuse me, which way to the bus stop?" "Excuse me, where's the closest ATM?" This phrase,  

ATM, stands for Automated Teller Machine. And it's  just that machine, some other countries call these  

cash points where you can put your debit card  or credit card into the machine and you can get  

cash. So, if you happen to go to a store  that requires cash, but you have no cash,  

you can ask this question, "Oh, do you  know where's the closest ATM?" "Excuse me,  

where's the closest ATM. I need to get some cash."  Great question. And the word ATM is most commonly  

used in the US. Some other countries might use  other expressions, but if you're visiting the US,  

ATM is an excellent word to use. Are you hungry? You can ask,  

"Is there a grocery store nearby? I don't  want to go to another expensive restaurant.  

I just want to get some simple food that I can  cook back at my place. Is there a grocery store  

nearby?" Notice the pronunciation of this  word. There's two pronunciations. Actually,  

you can say grocery, grocery with an S, grocery.  But you're more likely to hear, at least that's  

what I say, you're more likely to hear it grocery,  like an SH. Grocery, grocery, grocery store.  

"Is there a grocery store nearby?" Great question. "When is the next train? When's the next train?"  

If the board with all of the train information is  so confusing, just ask someone, "Excuse me, when's  

the next train?" Great. If still confused, you can  ask, "When does the next... leave? When does the  

next bus leave? When does the next train leave?  When does the next flight leave? I need to go  

now." When does the next... leave? Great question. Will the departure be on time? Maybe you come from  

a country where things are always on time and  you expect it to be on time, but you realize  

in the country that you're in right now,  things are not on time or maybe the opposite  

and you need to know, "Excuse me, will the  departure be on time?" That's important. 

Our final phrase for transportation and directions  is actually kind of a two for one. Let's imagine  

that you're in a taxi, sometimes we call those a  cab, and you're at your destination, but maybe the  

taxi driver is looking for, "Oh, where should I  drop them?" You can use this phrase, "You can drop  

me here. You can drop me here." It doesn't mean  that they're holding you and dropping you. This is  

shortened from, "Drop me off." To drop off someone  means that you're driving them and they leave.  

You're dropping them off. Maybe you drop off your  kids at school every morning. This is a great  

phrase to use in a taxi, "You can drop me here." Or if you want to make it even shorter, you can  

just say, "This is me." You see your hotel out  the window or you see the place you need to go,  

you can just say, "Oh, excuse me. This is me."  Well, this is you here now. This just means,  

"This is where I need to go." You'll often  hear this in a taxi and you can use it too. 

The next 10 important phrases for travel  will help you to talk at the airport.  

They'll help you to speak, but also they'll  help you to understand, because a lot of these  

phrases and questions, you will get asked. A  lot of things get asked when you're traveling,  

when you're entering a new country. And I want to  make sure that you can understand completely. So,  

let's start with the first one. You get to the airport. You look around,  

there's so many people, so many things going  on, you feel lost. Well, you can easily ask,  

"Excuse me, where's the Delta counter? Excuse  me, where's the Delta check-in?" Both of these  

questions are great for finding where can I go  for my airline? If you know what your airline is,  

and I hope you do, you can just insert that.  "Excuse me, where's the American Airlines counter?  

Excuse me, where's the American Airlines  check-in?" Excellent question to get started. 

After you arrive at your gate, you want to  make sure that you don't miss your flight.  

Even though you're there, you're so close, but  maybe you need to go down the hall and get some  

food or go to the bathroom. You need to ask,  "Excuse me, when will the plane be boarding?  

When will the plane be boarding?" And that means:  when will the people be going on the airplane?  

When will the people board? "Excuse me, when will  the plane be boarding?" If they tell you, "Oh,  

we'll board in 30 minutes." Cool. You have plenty  of time. Go get some food, go to the bathroom,  

stretch a little bit. Excellent question. If you've ever been at the airport, you know you  

get asked lots of questions. One of those might  be, "What's your flight number?" Especially if  

you're lost and you're not sure where to go. And  you say, "Excuse me, I'm lost. Can you help me?"  

They might ask, "Oh, what's your flight number?"  And they'll look either at your tickets or they'll  

look on your phone or they'll look on the board  and they'll be able to help you not be so lost. 

When you're checking in, you will be asked,  "Do you have your passport? Do you have  

your passport?" You might be asked a more direct  question. They might just say, "Passport, please.  

Passport, please." And as long as you're familiar  with the word passport, you know, "Aha, I need to  

give them my passport." Just a little note. Make  sure that you always get your passport back. 

When I first traveled to another  country, I didn't know this.  

And I thought that you were supposed  to give them your passport and they  

kept it until you got on the flight. I don't  know. I was a young traveler. I had no idea.  

So, make sure that you get your passport after  you check in, when you enter your flight. 

When you go through security,  you'll hear, "Boarding pass, please.  

Boarding pass, please." Or when you enter  the airplane, they might ask you this,  

"Boarding pass, please." And that's the piece of  paper that the airline has printed out, and it has  

all of your information, your flight number, your  seat, all of this stuff is on your boarding pass. 

You'll also hear the question,  "Are you checking any luggage?"  

Or, "Do you have anything to check? Are  you checking any luggage?" It doesn't mean  

I'm checking luggage. No, this means that  you are giving the airline a big suitcase  

and they will take it and put it  under the airplane. If you do this,  

maybe you might need to pay extra. They need to  probably weigh your suitcase. So, this is a good  

question that you will be asked, "Are you checking  any luggage?" Or, "Do you have anything to check?" 

When you are returning home from your wonderful  travels, you might be asked at the airport,  

"Do you have anything to declare?" To  declare. Usually this means to speak,  

"I declare that it's a beautiful day today," kind  of old fashioned English to use it like that.  

But in a modern sense, we use this at the  airport to mean, if you bought anything,  

especially anything expensive on your travels,  well, you might need to pay a specific tax  

to bring it back to your home country. So,  make sure that you know, so that they don't  

see something in your suitcase and say, "Why did  you not declare this $500 million diamond ring?"  

So, you will be asked, "Do you have anything  to declare?" And you can say yes or no. 

Oftentimes when you land in a new country, for  example, if you land in New York City, they  

might ask you, "Is this your final destination?  Is New York your final destination?" If you're  

going to Chicago, you could say, "No, I have a  connecting flight. I have a connecting flight."  

Or maybe your flight is late, so you might say,  "I missed my connecting flight." That's always  

really annoying because you're going to have to  figure something out. Spend time on the phone,  

spend time at a counter, talking to someone. But  it's a good question to understand, and to be able  

to answer, "Is this your final destination?"  "Yes." Or, "No, I have a connecting flight." 

So, you finally land in your destination and you  need to get your luggage. But what if you can't  

find it? What can you ask? That's a great  question. You can ask. "Excuse me, can you tell  

me where baggage claim is? Excuse me, can you tell  me where luggage claim is?" Both of these words:  

luggage claim and baggage claim are both used  interchangeably. And it's a great question to ask  

if you're trying to find your suitcase. "Excuse  me, can you tell me where baggage claim is?" 

When you go through customs, you will probably  be asked this coming question, "Are you traveling  

for business or pleasure? Are you traveling  for business or pleasure?" And that means,  

"Are you coming here because of work or are you  coming here just for the fun of traveling?" This  

is also a question that a fellow traveler might  ask you. Maybe when you sit down on the airplane,  

your seat mate might ask you, "Hey, are you  traveling for business or pleasure? Why are you  

going to Chicago?" Maybe they'll ask you, maybe  they won't. But it's a common question, especially  

in customs, "I'm traveling for business."  "No, I'm just traveling for pleasure." Great. 

The next 10 important phrases for travel are at  the hotel to help you speak naturally and have the  

right words to use when you get to your hotel. The  first one is when you first arrive at the hotel,  

you need to check in. So, you can say, "Hello.  I have a reservation for Prothe." That's my  

last name. Or you might say, "Hello, checking  in for Prothe." Whatever your last name is,  

you can insert it here. That's when you come up  to the counter or maybe you call in, in advance,  

depending on what that hotel does. You can use  this phrase, "Hello? I have a reservation under  

Prothe." Or, "Hello. Checking in  for Prothe." You can use either  

one of these phrases and both are perfectly fine. "Is there somewhere I can print my boarding pass,  

bus tickets?" Et cetera. This is a great  travel tip. Most hotels have a business room  

that has a printer, and most guests can use this  for free. So, if you need to print anything,  

print a boarding pass, ticket, something  like this, just ask the hotel this question,  

"Is there somewhere I can print my boarding  pass?" And there probably is. Great. 

If you arrive late, you're super hungry,  you can ask someone at the front desk,  

"Is there a good restaurant nearby? Is there a  good restaurant nearby?" Don't feel hesitant to  

use the staff who works at the hotel for some  advice. They really know about the area where  

you're living, especially that specific area close  to the hotel. They might know, "Oh yeah, there's  

a good restaurant just two blocks over. Make sure  you check it out. You don't need to take the bus  

and it's open late at night. Go check it out." You might ask, "Can I get some more towels?  

Can I get some more pillows? Can I get some  more blankets?" These are all polite questions  

and perfectly reasonable at a hotel. "Do you have a map? Do you have a map?"  

Most hotels have a map and they will be more than  happy to help you find your way around the city.  

And they often have free maps that you can  use to find your way around, "Excuse me,  

which way to the elevators?" This is especially  helpful if you have a lot of luggage and you don't  

want to go down one hallway and then try another  and pull your luggage everywhere, or maybe you're  

just tired. It's the end of the day. You're not  thinking straight. You just traveled 24 hours  

from your home country to New York City. Just,  "Excuse me, which way to the elevators?" Maybe you  

can't even see the sign because you're so tired.  I just need a little help. That's totally fine. 

When you're booking a room, you might ask, "Can  I get a queen bed? Can I get a double bed? Can I  

get two twin beds?" Depending on your sleeping  situation, it might be helpful to be specific,  

"Well, it's going to be my husband and I, and my  two kids. They can sleep in the same bed, but it  

might be best if they each had their own beds, so  they don't stay up all night." So, you could ask,  

"Do you have a queen bed and two twin beds in  a room?" Great. You want to be specific so that  

you can have the most comfortable time possible. Oftentimes hotels in the US will have a breakfast  

option. It's sometimes included and sometimes  not in your fee. So, you could ask, "Excuse me,  

is breakfast included? Excuse me, is  breakfast included?" And that implies,  

"Is it included in the price that I already paid  for the hotel room?" Sometimes it is, sometimes  

it's not, but it's a great question to ask. Usually breakfast is not available all day,  

so you can ask, "Excuse me, what time is breakfast  served? Excuse me, what time is breakfast served?"  

And when you check in, the person who's  checking you in, they'll probably tell  

you those things in advance. But if you didn't  catch it or maybe they just didn't mention it,  

these are good questions to ask so that you can  not be too hungry in the morning when you wake up. 

Another common way to get food, while you're in  your hotel room, is room service. You can ask,  

"Can I get room service, please? Can I get room  service?" That means someone comes to your door  

with food that they've made in the hotel. In my  experience, in the US this is very expensive and  

not always the best quality food, but in certain  circumstances, maybe this is something you want.  

So, you could ask the question,  "Can I get room service?" Excellent. 

Our final 10 important phrases for talking  about your travels is to talk about your travel  

experiences. That this is when you have finished  traveling and you want to explain to someone the  

great or terrible vacation that you just had. If  you'd like to take these expressions to the next  

level, don't miss a chance to tell me about your  city and where I should travel to in your city.  

In this lesson, you'll get a chance to practice  speaking with me and tell me about where you live. 

The first important phrase for talking about  where you just went is to ask this question,  

"Have you ever been to Paris? Have you ever  been to LA?" When you're telling someone about  

your trip, you want to see if they've had  a similar experience. Great question to ask  

if they say, "Oh, no, I've never  been to LA, but I would love to."  

What a good chance to give them some tips  or advice about good things that you did,  

maybe things they should avoid. And they might  be interested to hear what you have to say. 

You might hear the question, "What  was your favorite thing about  

LA? What was your favorite thing about Paris?"  Well, you can ask this question to someone else,  

or they might ask you that, and it helps to  kind of prompt a conversation about where you  

just went. If someone just heard that you went  to Paris, the first question they might ask is,  

"Did you see the Eiffel Tower?" Of course, everyone who goes to Paris sees the  

Eiffel Tower. Why not? It's amazing. Every time  that I've seen it, even though it's been hundreds  

of times because I used to live in Paris, it's  always amazing. I still love it. But there are  

often places that are not touristy that you enjoy.  So, you could use this phrase, "My favorite places  

are off the beaten path. I love finding new places  to visit." So, "Yes, the Eiffel Tower is great,  

but I love to find places off the beaten path." The beaten path is where your feet are beating  

down the path. There's so many people, everyone  is visiting the Eiffel Tower, but over here,  

there's a hidden cathedral that's so beautiful  and no one visits. But right beside it,  

there's a little hot chocolate restaurant, "You  have to go there. It's off the beaten path." 

On the same note, you might say, "There's so  many hidden gems in Paris, you could spend  

years discovering them all." Hidden gems. A  gem is like a diamond or a ruby. These kinds  

of precious stones. And we can use this  in a more figurative way to talk about  

an amazing place, especially somewhere that's  hidden, "There's so many hidden gems around  

the city. It's an excellent place to visit." On the other hand, what happens when everyone  

is there? Well, you might say, "That city used to  be nice, but now it's just a big tourist trap."  

Have you ever been to Venice? Venice is  beautiful. It's so cool. But now it has  

kind of turned into a tourist trap. All of the  shops, all of the restaurants, all the activities  

are only for tourists. It's kind of lost that  livable feeling. And I don't know if that's  

just something that's inevitable, it's going  to happen no matter what, or if it's something  

that can be prevented, but that's the way it is.  It's kind of a tourist trap. Still worth visiting,  

in my opinion. But it's a tourist trap. When I was 18 years old, I went on a road trip  

with my best friend and we drove for three days.  In the US, it's extremely common to go on a road  

trip. We don't have great public transportation.  There's not trains that go all over the US in an  

easy way. So, instead, we drive and we often take  a road trip. This is a common form of vacation  

in the US, maybe in your country too. Do  you ever take road trips for a vacation? 

The next phrase for travel is one that  you might see more often in writing than  

in spoken conversation, but I want to make sure  you can understand it. It is, "I need some R&R."  

And it's often used with the symbol &,  and a capital R and another capital R.  

This does not mean railroad because sometimes RR  means railroad. This means rest and relaxation. 

So, if you're feeling super stressed and  you're just texting with your friends saying,  

"I think I'm going to go on vacation next week.  I need some R&R." We don't often say that,  

"I need some R&R." But you might write that in  a text or write that in a message to talk about,  

"I just need to take a break. I need some R&R." If you need some R&R, you don't want to take  

a whirlwind trip. I have done this. It is very  hectic. It means that you visit a ton of places in  

a short period of time or you see a ton of things  in a short period of time. It's a whirlwind. 

When my husband and I visited Thailand, we  only had four days, I think. And we visited  

Bangkok for a couple of days. And then we took  a train, a bus, a taxi, and then another bus  

to the south of the country, to the beach. And  then we did the same thing to go back to Bangkok,  

to fly back to where we were living in Korea. It  was a whirlwind trip. I wish we had more time. And  

someday I'd love to go back and spend a month, two  months just exploring the country in a little bit  

more of a slow pace. That would be amazing. When you travel somewhere far away,  

you might use this phrase, "I'm so  tired. I'm still suffering from jet lag."  

Jet lag. It's one of the worst things  when you travel. If you travel far away,  

maybe the morning for you is the night where  you're traveling to. You need some time  

to recover. Your body needs some time to not  feel tired, to realize what time of day it is. 

It's something we don't often think about when we  travel to another place that's far away. At least  

I don't often think about until I get there and  realize, "Oh no, it's the morning. I haven't slept  

for two days. I have to wait another 12 hours  before I sleep." You are suffering from jet lag. 

Our final phrase is an excellent one to conclude  talking about your travels. And that is, "I can't  

wait to go back. I can't wait to go back." If you  had an excellent time, if you're dreaming about  

it, you can say, "I can't wait to go back." Well, congratulations practicing these 50  

important phrases for travel. And now I have a  question for you. Let me know in the comments,  

where would you like to go? Where is your dream  destination? Or maybe somewhere that you've  

already been, and you say, "I can't wait to go  back." Let us know in the comments. And don't  

forget to download the free PDF worksheet for  today's lesson. I know 50 expressions is a lot.  

So, download the worksheet, review them, never  forget what you've learned, and answer Vanessa's  

Challenge question at the end of the worksheets. Thanks so much for learning English with me,  

and I'll see you again next Friday for a new  lesson here on my YouTube channel. Bye. The next  

step is to download the free PDF worksheet for  this lesson. With this free PDF, you will master  

today's lesson and never forget what you have  learned. You can be a confident English speaker.  

Don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel  for a free English lesson every Friday. Bye.