The Cleveland steakhouse that planned my London trip

THE WORLD UNFOLDING

Read time: 2 min 29 sec

Two cities, under 24 hours each, that stuck

I live in a big country and a big state.

You can drive eight hours from where I am and still be in California. So when I crossed the bridge from Denmark into Sweden this year, the actual span done in about eight minutes, it did something to me.

One country. Then another. No passport line. No flight. Just a train full of people on their everyday commute.

If you don't know the Oresund Bridge, it connects Copenhagen to Malmo across the water. Locals ride it to work like Americans ride a freeway. For me it was a border dissolving in real time. For them it was a Tuesday.

I'd built Sweden up for years. Ludvig Aberg, one of the best young golfers in the world right now and a source of national pride in Sweden. ABBA. IKEA. And here it all was, arriving as an ordinary commute for everyone around me. That gap between the myth in my head and the mundane for them is the thing I keep coming back to.

Lund was a planned stop. One day, on purpose, wedged into a bigger trip. Luggage and a baby and one incredible pastry from Broder Jakobs, still the best I've ever had.

London was the opposite. No plan at all.

Phoenix to London to Dublin, 2018. I missed my connection and got an unexpected night in one of the world's great cities with zero research done. I'm a planner. This is not how I operate. And there I was with nothing prepped.

So here's what I did, and it's a tip you can steal.

I stayed near Hyde Park, mostly because Hyde Park is a steakhouse back home in Cleveland, so I figured the London version must be a decent area too. It was. Then I just walked. Google Maps open, checking out anything I got close to. Buckingham Palace. A quiet park. Middle Eastern food for dinner. I figured out the Heathrow Express, which felt exotic coming from a country with almost no trains.

No itinerary. Just proximity and curiosity. Some of the best hours I've ever spent in a city.

Under 24 hours, both of them. And they stuck harder than some full weeks I've spent elsewhere.

Here's why I think that is, and why it might matter for your next trip.

A short stop is a preview, not a verdict. I saw Lund and I saw London. Two cities. That should never be my impression of a whole country. If someone flew to the US and only saw Manhattan, they'd miss the Grand Canyon, they'd miss Hawaii, they'd miss almost everything.

But a preview still tells you something real. You know a place is worth returning to when you leave and immediately want more. I want to go back to Sweden for the countryside and another pastry. I want to go back to London for the Cotswolds and the golf courses near Heathrow.

So here's my case for the quick stop. If a layover hands you a free night somewhere, take it. If a trip lets you tack on one extra city for a day, do it. You don't need a week to know whether a place has a hold on you.

I prefer slow travel. I always will. But these two quick, unplanned or barely-planned, slightly uncomfortable stops did what the best travel always does.

They changed me a little. They made the world bigger.

That's the whole case for going somewhere new. Not the photos. Not the checklist. Just the way a place rearranges you, even in a day.

Where's a place you passed through fast that you'd go back to most? Hit reply and tell me. I read every one, and I'll feature the best answers in next week's issue.

Know someone who keeps saying they'll travel "someday"? Forward this to them.

Read these next:

• The art of the stopover — 15 hours in Sweden without buying an extra ticket. Here's how.

• She'd Already Been to Italy and Poland Before Lunch — A five-minute conversation on that same Øresund train that stuck with me.

• Travel is the only class I never skip — Why every trip is my continuing education.

Until next Thursday,

Jeff