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Unusual City Trip Types — Quirky but True
In part three of this blog series, we meet city travelers who take the unexpected path — the ones who don’t rush, don’t follow the crowds, and often don’t even open their guidebook.
These travelers explore cities with their own quiet rhythm.
They sit more than they walk.
They find beauty in a single doorway, a peaceful café, or a museum they never quite enter — because the café looked nicer.
This blog is for them. Check out part one or two to find more kind of travelers.
How to explore this blog comfortably:
Click below to jump to a section — or just scroll through at your own pace.
📚 The Library Camper
Finds the quietest corner in the loudest city.
The Library Camper doesn’t rush through streets — they drift toward silence. While others line up at monuments, they quietly step into a public library or university reading room. The air is cooler there. Time feels different.
They don’t always come for the books. Sometimes, it’s just for the calm. The tall windows. The sound of pages turning. A sense that this place has been here, waiting, long before the tourists arrived.
You’ll often find Library Campers in cities like Vienna, Edinburgh, or Prague — places where libraries feel like cathedrals and a quiet hour is easy to find.
🌿 TravelGlaze Tip
Looking for a quiet break during your city trip? Type “public library near me” or “reading room + [city name]” into Google Maps. Many large libraries are free to enter, especially in cities like London, Amsterdam, or Vienna.
Inside, you’ll often find more than books: peaceful architecture, local art displays, or even a hidden café. Some libraries also offer free Wi-Fi and restrooms — not a small thing when you’ve been walking all day.
🧠 Fun fact
One of the most famous libraries in the world is the Long Room at Trinity College in Dublin. Built in the 18th century, it holds over 200,000 of the library’s oldest books. Its dark wood, high barrel ceiling, and rows of marble busts give it the feeling of a cathedral — but for knowledge.
The library is also home to the Book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript created by Celtic monks around the year 800. Many travelers come just to see this masterpiece, but for some, the true magic is in the Long Room itself.
The smell of old paper, the hush of visitors, the golden light through high windows — it’s a quiet kind of wonder. The kind that stays with you long after you’ve left.
⛲ The Fountain Sitter
Always near water, but never in a hurry.
The Fountain Sitter doesn’t need a plan. They just need a place to pause. You’ll find them sitting at the edge of a fountain, watching the world go by — slowly, softly. Maybe with an espresso. Maybe with nothing at all.
They listen to the splash of water trace the shadows on the pavement. They stay a little longer than most people would. And sometimes, that’s when the magic happens — a child’s laugh, a dog chasing pigeons, or just a moment of stillness in a busy day.
Fountain Sitters love cities like Rome, Granada, or Kraków — places with sunny squares, warm stone, and water that talks back.
🌿 TravelGlaze Tip
If you love sitting near fountains, try following the water a little further. Many cities have gentle rivers, canals, or old waterways where the pace naturally slows.
In cities like Ghent, Amsterdam, or Venice, quiet moments often happen by the water’s edge — on stone steps, low bridges, or beside narrow towpaths.
Bring a thermos or takeaway coffee and follow the waterline on foot until you find a spot that feels right. Then stay a while. The sound of water makes excellent company.
🧠 Fun fact
The Trevi Fountain in Rome isn’t just a postcard icon — it’s part of the city’s living history. The fountain marks the end of the Aqua Virgo, an ancient aqueduct built in 19 BCE. This system once brought fresh water all the way into the heart of Imperial Rome — and still supplies water to parts of the historic centre today.
But here’s something many don’t know: the coins thrown in (with a right-hand toss over the left shoulder) are collected every morning by city workers. The total? Often more than €3,000 a day. That money is used to support food and housing programmes through a local charity called Caritas Roma.
So yes — your wish might help someone else too.
🖼️ The Museum Nomad
Loves the cafés more than the collections.
The Museum Nomad always starts with good intentions: they enter with a ticket and a quiet nod, ready to absorb history, art, or ancient pottery. But somewhere between gallery two and three, their feet begin to drift… toward the café.
They don’t rush, but admire a few pieces — usually the quiet ones no one’s crowding — and then find the exit that leads to coffee. They like museums best when they’re only half full and slightly warm inside.
Cities like Copenhagen, Vienna, and Madrid feel made for them — where museum cafés come with marble tables, strong espresso, and a little soft light from tall windows.
🌿 TravelGlaze Tip
Some museum cafés stay open later than the exhibitions — especially in cities like London, Berlin, or Stockholm. That means you can visit the café without rushing through the museum itself. In some cases, you don’t even need a ticket.
This can be a lovely way to experience the space at a slower pace. Arrive in the late afternoon, when the crowds are thinning, and enjoy a quiet coffee under high ceilings, surrounded by art books and echoes of the day.
🧠 Fun fact
The Victoria and Albert Museum in London was one of the first museums in the world to open a public café. In the 1850s, it served tea, lemonade, and small cakes — not just as a service, but as part of the visitor’s experience.
It was meant to refresh both body and mind between galleries. The café halls were decorated with ceramic tiles, stained glass, and elegant arches — making them beautiful in their own right.
Today, the tradition lives on in museums across Europe. Places like the Rijksmuseum, the Belvedere in Vienna, or the Prado in Madrid all treat their cafés as quiet cultural corners. Sometimes, the slice of cake is just as memorable as the art.
🚪 The Doorway Photographer
Can’t pass a painted door without stopping.
The Doorway Photographer isn’t in a rush — not because they’re lazy, but because cities keep giving them reasons to pause. Especially when it comes to doors.
Bright blue ones, cracked wooden ones, ones with iron knockers or potted plants on either side. Some doors are grand, others forgotten. But each one seems to whisper: Look at me. I’ve seen things.
This traveler often walks with a camera in hand, or just a phone held at a gentle angle. They kneel in cobbled alleys, tilt their head at shutters, and wait for that one moment when the light falls just right.
Lisbon, Porto, and London are their dream cities — places where every street corner could be a postcard.
🌿 TravelGlaze Tip
Looking for the best door-spotting route? Try exploring residential neighbourhoods just outside the city centre. Streets around old theatres, uphill roads, or anywhere with a local bakery often reveal beautiful façades.
Early morning or late afternoon gives the best light for photos — and fewer people walking through your frame.
🧠 Fun fact
Lisbon is one of Europe’s best cities for doorway spotting — and not just because of the colours. After the great earthquake of 1755, large parts of the city were rebuilt with care and intention. Painted wooden doors became part of that renewal: bold colours to bring life back to broken streets, and solid wood as a sign of protection.
Each door has its own little story. Some are framed by patterned azulejos — traditional Portuguese tiles — often in blue and white. Others have saintly icons above the lintel, offering quiet blessings. A small swallow painted near the frame is a traditional symbol of loyalty, love, and safe return.
And if you see the number on the door painted by hand, not printed? That usually means the building is still privately owned — often by the same family for generations.
For many Lisboetas, a doorway is more than an entrance. It’s memory, identity, and shelter — all in one frame.
💌 The Sentimental Traveler
Collects moments, not miles.
The Sentimental Traveler doesn’t rush from one attraction to the next. What stops them is something familiar — the smell of laundry from a window that reminds them of home, a curtain blowing like it did in a hotel years ago, or a street corner that looks almost exactly like one in a city they once loved.
They return to the same café every morning, even if the coffee isn’t perfect and keep metro tickets in their wallet. Or fold museum flyers neatly into their notebook. They walk back to a square just to see if that orange cat is still sleeping under the bench.
You’ll often find them in cities with history in the cracks — places like Venice, Prague, or Edinburgh. Cities where the past isn’t polished away, but still clings to doorframes, stone steps, and handwritten shop signs.
🌿 TravelGlaze Tip
Use your trip to create a new quiet habit. Some travelers always visit a local bookshop, others carry one photo in their wallet and take a new picture to match it.
Want to take something home? Skip the souvenir shop. Instead, keep a napkin from that one lunch, or the receipt from a bookstore. Memory lives best in the little things.
🧠 Fun fact
The word souvenir comes from the French word for “memory.” But souvenirs haven’t always meant fridge magnets or T-shirts. In the 17th and 18th centuries, travellers often brought home natural or handmade items — pressed flowers, stones from a river, or sketches of buildings they’d seen.
During the Grand Tour era, young Europeans collected objects like shells, miniatures, and bits of marble to show they’d “been somewhere.” These souvenirs were deeply personal, often stored in memory boxes or journals — more keepsake than product.
Today, the most meaningful travel mementos are often still the smallest: a faded ticket stub, a handwritten receipt, or a dried leaf tucked into your notebook. These are the things that don’t just say where you were — they remind you how it felt.
🕊️ A TravelGlaze Memory
When I was younger, I collected a very specific kind of pen — the ones with little scenes inside, where something moved when you tipped the pen upside down. A boat crossing a river, a skier going downhill. Most had the name of a city printed on the side.
I still have them all. Holding one brings back entire trips: how the air smelled, what I was wearing, the sound of the train on the way home.
They don’t really make those pens anymore.
But once, in a small museum shop in Amsterdam, I told the story to the man behind the counter — and he gave me an old one he used himself, just because.
Now I collect different things:
Tiny musical instruments — the most special one from Mongolia: a small horsehead fiddle.
Sometimes just a stone or a shell. Something I picked up myself.
Like a smooth grey stone from the beach in Menton, which I painted myself when back home.
No barcode, no plastic. Just a moment, made solid.
🌙 Final Thought
There’s no one way to explore a city — no perfect route, no checklist that suits us all. Some of us walk faster. Some of us sit longer. Some of us fall in love with doorways, fountains, or forgotten library corners. Maybe you recognised yourself in one of these gentle travelers. Or maybe you’re a mix of a few — a little sentimental, a little curious, a little slow on purpose.
Wherever you go next, may you find the quiet streets, the second benches, the stone you didn’t plan to carry — and may they bring you back to yourself, every time.
💬 Did one of these city trip types feel familiar to you? Or do you travel in a completely different way? I’d love to hear about it — feel free to share in the comments.
