Travel is the movement of people or objects (such as airplanes, boats, trains and other conveyances) between relatively distant geographical locations.

The term "travel" originates from the Old French word travail. The term also covers all the activities performed during a travel (movement). A person who travels is spelled "traveler" in the United States, and "traveller" in the United Kingdom.^{[citation needed]}

"The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page."

Reasons for traveling include recreation,tourism or vacationing,research travel for the gathering of information, for holiday to visit people, volunteer travel for charity, migration to begin life somewhere else, religious pilgrimages and mission trips, business travel,trade,commuting, and other reasons, such as to obtain health care or fleeing war or for the enjoyment of traveling. Travel may occur by human-powered transport such as walking or bicycling, or with vehicles, such as public transport, automobiles, trains and airplanes.

A taboo is a vehement prohibition of an action based on the belief that such behavior is either too sacred or too accursed for ordinary individuals to undertake, under threat of supernatural punishment. Such prohibitions are present in virtually all societies. The word has been somewhat expanded in the social sciences to include strong prohibitions relating to any area of human activity or custom that is sacred or forbidden based on moral judgment and religious beliefs.^{[citation needed]} "Breaking a taboo" is usually considered objectionable by society in general, not merely a subset of a culture.

The term "taboo" comes from the Tongan tabu, related to the Maori tapu. Its English use dates to 1777 when the British explorer James Cook visited Tonga. Describing the cultural practices of the Tongans, he wrote:

Not one of them would sit down, or eat a bit of any thing.... On expressing my surprise at this, they were all taboo, as they said; which word has a very comprehensive meaning; but, in general, signifies that a thing is forbidden.