voyage, voyage..

It's always difficult to talk about travel in English. In French there is one word: "un voyage" et "voyager", whereas in English we have "trip", "travel" and "journey".

In  fact the verb is very easy to translate:

voyager = to travel

The noun "un voyage" is much more difficult to translate:

1) travel

    You can say: a travel agent (agent de voyage)
                           international travel (des voyages internationaux)
                           a travel guide (guide de voyage)

Wikipedia says:
The word originates from the Middle English word travailen ("to toil"), which comes from the Old French word travailler ("travail").


2) journey

    Have you had a good journey? (Avez-vous fait bon voyage?)
    "Journey to the centre of the world" (Voyage au centre de la terre)

In fact a journey is when you travel from A to B, in general when they are far apart.

3. trip

I went on a business trip last week.
(La semaine dernière j'ai fait un voyage d'affaires.)

A trip is when you travel from A to B (usually back again). It's usually shorter than a journey, but not always.


(PS: I'm really struggling with the policy settings. I will improve this page as soon as I have figured out how to impose my will, instead of Overblog telling me which policy to use.)