Easily confused words

The words travel, journey, trip andvoyage can easily be confused by learners of English.

I suppose it’s a good time of year to look at these words, as the spring and summer holiday seasons will soon be starting for many people.

Travel (noun)

The noun travel is a general word, meaning to move from place to place, usually over long distances.

We can say: air travel, food and travel, space travel, business travel, a travel agency.

• Air travel is getting more expensive.
• The magazine is a food and travel guide.

We can also say travels, which is a plural noun:

• Where did you go on your travels?
• Jack Kerouac wrote many books about his travels.

Travel is also a verb:

• I travel 20 km to work every day.

Journey (noun) 

A journey means moving from one place to another, especially in a vehicle. It is asingle piece of travel. A journey can also be a regular thing.

Here is an example. Let’s say we go from London to Leeds then back again. That istwo journeys (London to Leeds is the first journey, Leeds to London is the second journey).

We can say: a bus journey, a train journey, the journey to school, my journey to work.

Be careful with the plural: journeys NOT
journies.

• How long does your journey to work take?
• Did you have a good journey?
• Did you have a good travel?

Trip (noun)

A trip describes the whole process of going somewhere and coming back. (It is more than one journey.)

Once again, let’s go from London to Leeds then back again. As I said above, that is two journeys, but it is one trip.

Some examples: a day trip, a round trip, a round-the-world trip, a boat trip and a business trip. We say go on a trip.

• We went on a three-week trip to Scotland.
• He’s gone on a business trip to Germany.
• Let’s go on a trip to the mountains this summer!
• The trip there took three hours. The journey there took three hours.

Voyage (noun)

Voyages are less common nowadays. A voyage is a very long trip, usually at sea or in space:

• At the age of twenty-three, Sir Francis Drake made his first voyage to the New World.
• A voyage around the world often took four or five years.

The French Bon voyage! translates into English as Have a good trip! or Have a goodjourney!

I hope that’s clear. Here’s a quick exercise for you to test your understanding:

1 Steve's on a business  journeytraveltripvoyage in South America. 

2 The  triptravelvoyagejourney from Manchester to London by train takes about two and a half hours. 

3 My  tripjourneytravelvoyage to Spain lasted over two weeks. I went to Madrid, Valencia, Malaga and Granada. 

4 Eric Newby wrote a book about his  travelvoyagetravels in Afghanistan in 1956. 

5 We  madewentwent ontravelled a trip to Paris to celebrate my wife's birthday. 

6 My  tripjourneytravelvoyage to work today was horrible. I was stuck in a traffic jam for two hours. 

7 Air  travelstraveljourney is much faster and cheaper nowadays compared to fifty or sixty years ago.