I check into Paradero, the luxury resort located in Todos Santos on the southern tip of Baja California, and it’s absolutely picturesque; the kind of place where everywhere one looks has you going, “Damn!”
Upon pulling up, I’m offered a cold towel, a glass of juice made from local produce, along with a smoking bushel of sage, all presented on a platter. I make my way to my room and gaze out onto a vista of rich brown sand dotted by a bountiful garden and rolling mountains in the distance. The property is an architectural feast for the eyes all on its own, with stark concrete buildings that essentially resemble a stylish spaceship that somehow went off course and landed here in the Baja desert.
Yet my first thought when I’m presented with the platter, the vista, and my room isn’t to take them all in with the naked eye. Nor am I “living in the moment,” as someone like Oprah might say. Sorry O, I’m actually doing neither. Instead, I’m fumbling for my iPhone and taking pictures of everything at every angle, both landscape and portrait, all for future Instagram uploading purposes. Before I reach for the fresh glass, I pause to snap it on the platter. When I see those mountains, I’m clicking away as well. Once in my room, my first thought isn’t to put my bags down and unfurl on my bed after a day of traveling. No, instead the knee-jerk reaction is to take a picture of my new digs completely unspoiled, luggage just out of frame as if I somehow came here completely empty-handed. It’s the kind of picture that can easily be found on the hotel’s website. But now, I have a less-good version on my phone. Throughout my entire trip, call me Annie Leibovitz: my camera practically overheats from all the photography.
It used to be that you had a couple rolls of film to take travel pictures, and beyond that you’d do something many humans refer to as just “enjoying” a vacation. (I’m still researching what that must feel like.) But in this current age of social media-saturation, it’s clear that apps like Instagram have an absolute chokehold on traveling in the modern era. Call it Instagramxiety, a term I will soon campaign to enter into Merriam-Webster. No, it’s not enough to actually experience something. In fact, studies have found that nothing matters if you don’t post it to your story or it doesn’t make it on your grid. Or so it often seems.
I can’t count how many pictures of the beach I have on my camera roll. All of them look almost exactly alike: sand, waves, and more often than not, blue sky. Maybe there’s a seagull in the distance for some extra pizzazz. Instead of actually breathing in the salty air and feeling the soft sand beneath my toes, I’m squinting at a phone I can barely see in the blinding sunlight, trying to see if the shot I’m taking of the waves is captured at just the right crest. It was the same scenario during a recent stay at the Fairmont Grand Del Mar, which, despite being located north of San Diego, resembles a palatial European hotel from its sprawling grounds and cavernous interiors. I now have more pictures of the inside and outside of this place than parents have of a newborn baby.
However, the worst part, which amounts to a particularly arduous form of digital torture, is actually choosing which photos to upload and post to the masses. People refer to this as a “photo dump,” a skill that acclaimed experts like Dua Lipa have perfected. Photo dumps are a carousel of glimpses of your adventures, either posted at the end of each day or (if you have the willpower to wait) at the end of your trip. No one is immune from the primal urge to post a travel photo dump, from frequent Instagrammers to those who log into the app three times a year.
You might wonder how long crafting a post of your trip can take. A minute or two, tops? On the contrary, you may as well clear your schedule for the entire day. Have you ever asked the people you’re traveling with to AirDrop their photos to you? This task, while seemingly simple, almost always devolves into a waking nightmare of reminding and begging, followed by tearful pleading. Warring nations have enjoyed easier negotiations than convincing a gatekeeping friend to AirDrop their pictures. And once you’ve won your knock-down drag-out fight for all the pictures, the next step is to sift through countless duplicates of the same shot, all with extremely slight differences invisible to any human eye, except somehow to yours.
When uploading a travel dump, it has to be the correct collection of pictures, too. Too many pictures of buildings and not enough of nature, or vice versa, and it’s back to the drawing board. A general rule of thumb is to avoid posting pictures of the most obvious scenes, like the Eiffel Tower or the Hollywood Sign. Instead, close-up artsy angles here and there are considered the most tasteful. According to Instagram Law #1292, at least one picture must have the partial view of a popular restaurant’s logo on a menu, preferably peeking from behind a dish from said restaurant. There are other important guidelines to keep in mind. Instagram Law #3748: Group pictures are strictly limited to bachelor/bachelorette parties, family excursions, and work trips with colleagues. Also keep in mind that when you’re on vacation, you’re granted a limited-time Instagram Story License—the only instance when it’s socially acceptable to post a stream of stories throughout the entirety of the day. (Please keep in mind that these all-day posting licenses are revoked after 10 days.)
Then it’s caption time, a whole other task which usually involves a travel-focused rhyme (“Sippin’ and Reminiscin’”), a pun (“Suite Dreams”), or something cheeky like “Out of Office” when you’re very clearly in the tropics. (Hold for laughter...) By this point, I’m almost completely depleted and have resorted to just choosing emojis representing my trip. Following a recent Heineken-drenched sojourn to Amsterdam, I resorted to the Netherlands flag emoji as a caption and called it a day. That felt good.
Then, once it’s all ready to go live, one of the two following scenarios nearly always occurs. Due to those weak cell and WiFi signals when you re away from home, after 45 minutes of super-slow uploading the whole post disappears into the ether, never to be seen again, and you have to start over completely. (I’m still suffering from a severe form of PTSD from when this happened to me.) The other nightmare scenario is that when it does finally upload, every picture is automatically cropped off-center and heads are chopped off, an equally cataclysmic outcome that will prompt another do-over. (Except, as per Instagram Law #3948, if you’re a boomer. Then it doesn’t matter if pictures are cropped incorrectly).
What’s it all for, anyway? Are we trying to make our followers jealous? Provide travel inspiration like pseudo-influencers? Show everybody just how much fun we’re having? Are we really simply uploading it all for the memories? That can’t be true, because if it was, nothing would ever be posted on social media for anyone else to see.
Back in Mexico, there’s no easy way to say this: I’m on a yacht, sailed by Paradero, cruising down the Sea of Cortez. Again, I’m overtaken by the natural beauty around me as the sun sets over crystal clear blue waters. I go to reach for my phone, and then decide against it. But then again, it’s all just too beautiful to let it pass by. One more picture won’t hurt.