IELTS SpeakingTask card: Describe a recent journey

The second part of the speaking test involves a little speech. The examiner will ask you to talk about a topic for one or two minutes.

Here is a sample task.

Describe a recent journey

I am going to talk about my recent trip to my native place. Interestingly, this was my first trip in almost two years. I don’t travel much. The reason that I decided to take this trip was to visit my parents and sister who still live in my native place. And since I hadn’t seen them in a while, I had been eagerly waiting for this occasion for a while. In fact, I packed the bags weeks in advance. On the day of the journey, I got up early and started getting ready. We left for the railway station in the morning. We had reserved seats and boarded the train at around 8 am. I like train journeys. Of course, trains are slower than planes, but my favourite mode of travel has always been trains. What’s more, trains are less expensive. The journey was relatively event-less. I spent most of the time reading books or watching the scenery outside. I was accompanied by my husband and his friend’s family. We had brought food and ate it in the train. The journey took us a good 24 hours. By the time we reached our destination we were a bit tired; still it was a pleasant experience. My parents had come to the railway station to receive us and we were quite delighted to see one another in a long time.