At Overland Ireland, adventure is at the heart of everything we do – specialising in intrepid and fun-filled tours of Ireland.
Adventure travel has soared in recent years, climbing its way to becoming the number one style of holiday. In 2019, this style of holiday is slower, quieter, smarter, and greener than it has been before, but it’s even more popular: travellers want downtime away from work, the ability to switch off from everyday life, and the experience of trekking through some of the most incredible spots in the world without having a detrimental effect on the environment.
We know that everyone who travels with us is an adventure seeker at heart, and so in our new research we decided to find out which country is home to the most adventurous people – turning to Google for our answers.
We analysed Google search behaviour for various adventure travel phrases for every country around the world, to determine which country is the most adventurous.
Read on below to find out the full results.
Results
In the top spot as the most adventurous country in the world is Australia, with an average of 45.21 on Google Trends, across a number of different adventurous activity search terms. The most searched for term was sky diving with an average score of 57.90 since 2004– and when that comes with views of the Australian outback or the Sydney Opera House, this isn’t surprising.
Australia is the place for adventure – serious adventure. It’s a country with no shortage of open space, and the environment is full of diversity: from the outback and desert to the mountain ranges, local paradisal islands, and numerous national parks. That’s why Australia scored highly across all of our categories, with a score of 57.76 for safari searches, and even 36.92 for skiing.
Following Australia, the second and third place spots went to the USA and the UK. The most popular adventurous search term for the UK was safaris, while people in the US enjoy trekking the most.
We were thrilled to see Ireland score in the top 25. Having long been aware of the adventure possibilities that can be found on the Emerald Isle, it’s interesting to see that the statistics match up. Turns out, the Irish are big fans of safaris, with a score of 48.54, while hiking also scored highly with 37.16.
Following Australia, the top 10 most adventurous countries are:
- United States
- United Kingdom
- New Zealand
- Germany
- Canada
- India
- Netherlands
- Switzerland
- Austria
It was interesting to see countries from all over the world featuring in the top 10, proving that a love of adventure is worldwide. Across the categories, the USA was most interested in hiking, while New Zealanders proved to enjoy rafting the most. Interestingly, the United Kingdom loved kayaking the most, with a score of 47.62, as well as sky diving which got a score of 61.62.
The results by continent are as below:
Most adventurous country in North America: United States
Most adventurous country in Oceania: Australia
Most adventurous country in Africa: South Africa
Most adventurous country in Europe: United Kingdom
Most adventurous country in Asia: India
Most adventurous country in South America: Brazil
At Overland Ireland, we’re very keen to get people from all walks of life involved with adventure. That’s why we thought it was really interesting to see the least adventurous countries in the world and see what we could do to rectify that.
The overall least adventurous country was Tajikistan, which scored 0 across six of the categories, including kayaking, rafting, scuba diving, and skiing. The most searched for term was safari, with a score of 3, while hiking and camping both got a score of 1.
That’s why we’re offering a 10% discount on any of our tours for residents of Tajikistan, all you have to do is enter the code: Tajikistan2019 when booking. The offer expires on 31/12/2019 and only one discount can be used per booking.
Following Tajikistan, the top 10 least adventurous countries were:
- Lesotho
- Malawi
- Yemen
- Grenada
- Sudan
- Kyrgyzstan
- Uzbekistan
- Papua New Guinea
- Seychelles
The results by continent are as below:
Least adventurous country in North America: Grenada
Least adventurous country in Oceania: Papua New Guinea
Least adventurous country in Africa: Lesotho
Least adventurous country in Europe: Faroe Islands
Least adventurous country in Asia: Tajikistan
Least adventurous country in South America: Paraguay
Methodology
In order to compile our list of the most adventurous countries around the world, we first curated a list of relevant search terms relating to an adventurous holiday. These were:
- Hiking
- Kayaking
- Sky Diving
- Scuba Diving
- Safari
- Trekking
- Skiing
- Camping
- Rafting
We used Google Trends to work out the average search score for each of these categories for each country, from 2004 to the present. We then calculated the overall average across each of the categories for each country, and used this as the final ranking score.
Sources:
https://trends.google.com/trends/?geo=US
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