Is the phrase " in the direction" commonly used?

Question

I came across the sentence "The bird went off in the direction from which it had come.". I wonder if why "in" was used instead of "to".

Is "in" commonly used instead of "to" like I go in the U.S instead of I go to the U.S.

Answer 1

"to" defines a destination, and "in the direction" defines a route to that destination.

If the US is a place you want to go, you say

I would like go to to the US

If you were to sail away from the east coast of Japan, you would say

I am heading in the direction of the US

or

I am heading toward the US.

The more natural way of expressing the original sentence would be

The bird went back to where it came from

but some people don't like sentences with prepositions (eg from) at the end: to avoid this, they use complicated sentences to say simple things.