PERTADAD: The Lost Art of Traveling Without a Map

PERTADAD, I have a confession to make. I have stood in the shadow of Everest and felt nothing but the cold. I have been jostled by a thousand pilgrims at the foot of Angkor Wat and felt utterly alone. I have followed a meticulously planned itinerary through the cobblestone streets of a storybook European city, ticking off boxes with the grim efficiency of an auditor, only to return home with a camera full of beautiful, empty pictures and a soul full of dust.

I was doing it all wrong. I was a tourist, a collector of places, a consumer of experiences. I was following the map, but I had forgotten how to get lost.

The change came not in a grand cathedral, but in a cramped, humid internet café in a nameless Thai town. My phone, my digital umbilical cord to the world of reviews, routes, and reservations, had finally given up the ghost, succumbing to a combination of saltwater and a tragic concrete step. Panic set in first—a cold, sharp dread. Then, as I stared at the blank, black screen, a strange feeling began to bloom: relief.

For the first time in years, I was truly untethered. No Google Maps to reroute me, no TripAdvisor to tell me where to eat, no Instagram to show me what angle to photograph. I was, for all intents and purposes, analog. And in that silence, I remembered a word my grandfather, a lifelong sailor, used to say: Pertadad.

It’s not a place you can find on any map. It’s a state of being. An acronym for a philosophy of movement: Pursue the Rhythm, Travel by Ambiance, Discover by Aimless Drift.

This is the story of how I lost the map and found the world.

Part 1: The Tyranny of the Itinerary (And Why We Submit)

We live in an age of travel as a performance. We are sold “curated experiences” and “hidden gems” that are, by the time we arrive, neither curated nor hidden, but simply another queue of people holding the same guidebook. We travel to capture, to share, to prove. We fear wasting a day, missing a “must-see,” or eating at a “bad” restaurant—as defined by a stranger with a keyboard ten thousand miles away.

This is the antithesis of Pertadad. It is travel as a checklist, and it leaves no room for the soul. It prioritizes destination over journey, photography over presence, and efficiency over essence.

Pertadad argues that the greatest travel memories are never the ones you plan for. They are the ones that find you when you’re not looking. They are the scent of jasmine on a quiet side street, the unplanned conversation with a shopkeeper that leads to a shared cup of tea, the wrong turn that reveals a courtyard filled with the sound of a local musician practicing a forgotten song.

Part 2: Deconstructing Pertadad – A Traveler’s Manifesto

So, how does one practice Pertadad? It’s not about throwing your passport to the wind and hoping for the best. It’s a deliberate shift in mindset, a set of principles to carry with you.

P – Pursue the Rhythm

Every place, from a sprawling metropolis to a sleepy village, has a rhythm. It’s a heartbeat. The frantic, pulsing energy of a Hong Kong night market is a rhythm. The slow, siesta-induced quiet of a Spanish afternoon is a rhythm.

The modern traveler, armed with a packed schedule, often stomps through these rhythms like an elephant in a ballet. Pertadad asks you to stop, and to listen.

• How to do it: Spend your first morning in a new city doing nothing. Sit in a public square. Watch how people move. Do they amble or stride? When do the shops open? When does the city pause? Feel the tempo. Let your own internal clock—the one still set to your home time zone’s deadlines and anxieties—slowly syncopate to this new beat. Let the city pull you along in its current, rather than you fighting against it.

T – Travel by Ambiance

We are taught to navigate by street signs and GPS coordinates. Pertadad teaches you to navigate by feel, by scent, by sound. This is “Travel by Ambiance.” It’s about following the smell of freshly baked bread instead of the arrow on your screen. It’s about turning down a street not because it’s a shortcut, but because the dappled light through the plane trees looks inviting.

Ambiance is your true compass. It will lead you away from the tourist-thronged main arteries and into the capillary network of a city where real life happens.

• How to do it: Pick a point in the distance—a hill, a interesting-looking building, a body of water—and start walking towards it. But give yourself permission to be wildly diverted. See a narrow, colorful alley? Go down it. Hear the lively chatter from a basement-level bar? Pop in. The goal is not to reach the destination, but to be fully present for the unscripted journey. Your only rule is to follow what feels interesting, beautiful, or intriguing.

A – Discover by Aimless Drift

This is the heart of Pertadad, and the most difficult for our goal-oriented brains to accept. Aimless Drift is the active practice of having no objective. It is the rejection of productivity in travel. You are not drifting to “find” anything. You are drifting to be.

This is where magic happens. When you release the pressure to “see something,” you open your senses to everything. You notice the intricate ironwork on a balcony you would have otherwise rushed past. You feel the cool breeze coming from a hidden courtyard. You make eye contact with a local and share a smile.

• How to do it: Dedicate one day, or even one afternoon, to having no plan. Leave your phone in your hotel room. (Yes, really). Just walk. When you come to an intersection, let your intuition decide. Left feels heavy? Go right. Right feels boring? Go straight. You are a feather on the breath of the city. The aimlessness is not a waste of time; it is the fertile ground in which unexpected joy can grow.

D – A – D: The Cycle of Wonder

Pursue the Rhythm, Travel by Ambiance, and Discover by Aimless Drift. This isn’t a linear process, but a cyclical one. Tuning into the rhythm helps you sense the ambiance. Following the ambiance facilitates the aimless drift. And in the state of drift, you become more acutely attuned to the rhythm of a place. It becomes a self-perpetuating cycle of deeper and deeper connection.

Part 3: My Pertadad Moments – The Stories Without a Landmark

The proof of this philosophy is not in the famous sites I saw, but in the moments I lived. These are the stories I tell, the ones that come to me in quiet moments years later.

• The Kitchen in Vietnam: Drifting through the backstreets of Hoi An, led by the sizzle and scent of something incredible, I found myself peeking into a family’s open-front kitchen. The grandmother, with a face like a wise river stone, saw my curiosity and waved me in. No words were exchanged. She simply handed me a bowl of the most sublime Cao Lầu I will ever taste and pointed to a tiny plastic stool. For fifteen minutes, I sat on the sidewalk, part of the family, part of the street, part of the rhythm of life. No guidebook led me there. Only my nose.

• The Accordion in Lisbon: Lost (gloriously lost) in the Alfama district, I was following the sound of a faint, mournful Fado song. I turned a corner and found an old man playing an accordion for no one but his dog and the fading evening light. I sat on the steps across from him. He didn’t look at me, just closed his eyes and played as if his heart were leaking through the bellows. I listened until the stars came out. That song is now the permanent soundtrack to my memory of Lisbon.

• The Game of Checkers in Mexico: In a small Oaxacan village, avoiding the heat of the day, I was drawn to the sharp clack of pieces on a board. Two old men were playing checkers in the shade of a grand laurel tree. I watched for what felt like an hour. One of them looked up, gestured to the board, and then to me. My Spanish was terrible, his English non-existent. We played three games in total silence, communicating only with nods and smiles. I lost all three. It was one of the most profound conversations of my life.

These moments cost nothing. They were not on any itinerary. They were gifts from the universe, delivered only because I was finally present and open enough to receive them.

How to Begin Your Own Pertadad Journey

You don’t need a broken phone or a year abroad to practice this. You can start on your next weekend trip, or even in your own city.

1. Designate a “Pertadad Day”: Next time you travel, block out a day with a big “X.” This is your sacred day for aimless drift.

2. Create a “No-Plan” Plan: Decide on a neighborhood you know nothing about. Go there. And then stop. Let your feet and your senses take over.

3. Embrace the “Wrong Turn”: Make a pact with yourself that there is no such thing as a wrong turn. There are only new paths.

4. Talk to Strangers: Not with an agenda, but with curiosity. The barista, the person on the park bench next to you. Ask simple questions: “What do you love about this city?” or “Where would you go on a day like today?”

5. Travel Slower: Spend three days in one city instead of one day in three cities. Depth over breadth. A Pertadad journey is measured in moments per hour, not countries per week.

The Destination is the Journey

Pertadad is more than a travel style. It is a metaphor for a life more fully lived. It is the practice of being open to the unplanned, the unexpected, and the beautifully ordinary. It is trusting that the most rewarding paths are often the ones not marked on any map, but felt in the rhythm of your own curious heart.

So, the next time you feel the urge to travel, by all means, book the ticket. But when you arrive, take a deep breath, put the map away, and whisper the word to yourself: Pertadad. Let the rhythm find you. Let the ambiance guide you. And have the courage to drift, aimlessly and wonderfully, into the waiting arms of the world. You might just find that what you were searching for was never a place at all, but a way of being.