The Places You’ll GO, part 2

In a previous post called The Places You’ll Go, I talked about the usage of the before places. This time I want to focus on going to these places. In Spanish, there’s a habit of using go to before many actions, but in English, this habit sounds redundant.

Before a place, go to sounds fine:

I go to the gym two nights a week.

But it sounds redundant before actions:

I go to play sports on the weekend.

So simply say:

I play sports on the weekend.

Unless you’re talking about future plans:

I am going to play basketball this weekend.

(be going to + infinitive verb)

And although you can go to places:

She goes to the shopping mall on Saturday.

But you can’t go to actions:

She goes to shopping on Saturday.

So we use go + gerunds to mean do an activity

She goes shopping on Saturday.

They go cycling on their vacations.

We go ice fishing in the winter.


Moreover, we can't use to between movement verbs and the pronouns here or there and where compound pronouns:
Go to there and find out.
Go there and find out.
We don't go to anywhere anymore.
We don't go anywhere anymore.



And go to sounds redundant after other movement verbs:
I drive to go to work every day.
So simply say:
I drive to work everyday.


Using be going to + go in future plans also sounds redundant:

We are going to go fishing this winter.

So simply say:

We are going to fish this winter.

Or use the present continuous for future plans instead:

We are going fishing this winter.


Anyhow, I hope wherever you go and whatever you do is interesting!