How Keeping Bees Changed the Way I Travel the World
Four ways keeping honey bees will sweeten up your next journey
Have you ever travelled feeling disconnected from the people or nature around you? I used to be a typical consumer of places — taking photos, ticking places off my list — but I never felt a deep connection to them. When I discovered beekeeping, my approach to travelling changed for the better.
Thanks to honeybees, I have learned about biodiversity in Bethlehem, kept bees in Denmark, and met a youth group in Spain, and I’ve traveled Europe by bike to look honeybee experts over their shoulders. For me, honeybees have become a centrepiece of my travels. Keep reading, and you’ll see how these tiny messengers of nature change the way you see the world around you.
You’ll have the best travel gifts to bring home
Although honey should never be the main reason to keep bees, you’ll for sure appreciate the sticky and sweet days of harvest, no matter where in the world. You will discover the wide varieties of flavours honey has to offer, given by the kind of nectar and the type of bee which foraged for it. You’ll find slightly bitter chestnut honey in the north of Slovenia, sweet Acacia in Italy or a blend of Xtábentun flowers in Yucatán. As a real honey connoisseur, tiny honey jars will be your favourite souvenir to bring home (but woe them they call it better than your own honey). The real geeks always have a portion with them to sweeten up their porridge, no matter if backpacking Central America or for a quick business visit in Brussels.
You’ll make more friends faster
Many beekeepers I know are introverts. Don’t ask me how this comes. However, once they are being asked something about bees, they burst out in stories and endless fascination. The beauty about honeybees is that you’ll have any person’s attention once you mention bees in any context. They either love bees or they want to share bad experiences, so either way, bees are a common interest of us all.
For example, if you see someone fidgeting around their plate to get rid of a honeybee in the café’s patio, you’ll consider it your duty to help a rather nervous coffee lover — and the striped intruder - not to freak out. As a beekeeper, the fun facts won’t stop and you’ll have a conversation going real quick.
Once you keep bees, other travellers will want to talk to you, and that will make it very easy to connect to both travellers and locals. I can only recommend finding local beekeepers in weekend markets and starting a conversation. It happened multiple times that I got invited to their apiaries, being able to see how people really lived and worked, not only with bees. Beekeeping will open new locations that no other tourist could discover as you can.
You’ll seek out nature
Unlike many other insect geeks, back in highschool I preferred to do my nails during biology class. So, not much botany stuck to my memory. I only learned how pollination really works thanks to beekeeping, which I started much later. Along with apicultural knowledge comes more curiosity and more appreciation for every flower around you. As a traveller, you will want to know which honeybee species is endemic, and which flower it pollinates. Good beekeepers know about other pollinators, such as wild bees or butterflies, too. You’ll find yourself crossing the street to check out this vibrant linden tree. You’ll notice a butterfly resting in the lavender bush and know it’s a swallowtail. Equally, you will have a feeling for the overall quality of habitat and find appreciation for touristic sites which do pay attention to biodiversity and its preservation.
Anthropology becomes part of your journey, too
Last, but not least, you will enrich your travelling experience by adding a twist to your cultural understanding. Knowing the history of honeybees enriches the cultural, spiritual and ecological perception of almost every part of the world, since bees enjoy an almost archetypical standing among humanity.
Beekeeping goes back thousands of years. Beekeeping techniques, values and goals vary according to the geographic location, the honeybee species and of course the keeper. For example, some cultures keep them in hollow trees while others hunt for honey from wild species.
On your next journey, look out for bees
Beekeeping means awareness for your environment. I challenge you to pay attention to the vibe, the environment and the human-nature relationship of your destination, and I promise it will sweeten up every journey you’ll undertake.
