I'm not saying you're wrong, but in the context of travel, I would suggest most people use the VPN because they don't trust the networks they're connecting to,

I'm not saying you're wrong, but in the context of travel, I would suggest most people use the VPN because they don't trust the networks they're connecting to, more than wanting to avoid surveillance, which would apply without the travel component. I also can't think of one of the popular VPNs that get heavily advertised that I'd trust to actually protect my privacy.