It has a been over a year since my husband Lewis and I started traveling. Over a year since we quit our comfortable jobs and left the great city of New York indefinitely, chasing eternal summer with our bicycles. It has really been an eye-opening journey, and I have been thinking a lot about it since the first anniversary has passed. I wanted to share some of my thoughts with you.
1 ) IT IS NOT AS ROMANTIC AS EXPECTED
...even with low expectations.
I am no noob when it comes to travel, or to life in general. I know high expectations tend to spoil the party. I also knew before we started that there would be hard times both on the bicycle and off. Yet still I couldn't help but dream... with over a year to plan and wait for "the big trip" to begin, how could I not? I dreamed of all the adventures we would have, all the amazing people we would meet. I also visualized the way I would change, the kind of person I would become. I imagined I would become more cultured, more textured, that I would be more outgoing and friendly with a deeper understanding of the world. I thought I would become more badass too, and perhaps a little crazy, but interesting.
It brings me to the same lesson I have learned many times before: it is all just life, and I am living it. Here's the thing, I knew I loved to travel but - big BUT - I had never traveled for more than a month at a time, and usually much less. That is what you call a "vacation". A holiday, an exciting week or two where you get away from it all and SEE THE WORLD. A break from life. Long term travel is life, with the same hardships, the same mundane chores and the same low points where you are just too tired to do anything. If we stay in one place for a while, we see far less of it's attractions than we would if we had flown there on vacation. One key difference though is that in working life your time is organized for you, for better or worse, and you have a steady flow of income. In this traveling life, we are always thinking about how to optimize our time (yet still wasting a lot of it), and we are always counting pennies and saying "no" to many things that would have been acceptable to indulge in on a week-long excursion. But the point is, it is OUR time. All of it. Time is so much more valuable to us than money. Time is not replaceable.
I am no noob when it comes to travel, or to life in general. I know high expectations tend to spoil the party. I also knew before we started that there would be hard times both on the bicycle and off. Yet still I couldn't help but dream... with over a year to plan and wait for "the big trip" to begin, how could I not? I dreamed of all the adventures we would have, all the amazing people we would meet. I also visualized the way I would change, the kind of person I would become. I imagined I would become more cultured, more textured, that I would be more outgoing and friendly with a deeper understanding of the world. I thought I would become more badass too, and perhaps a little crazy, but interesting.
It brings me to the same lesson I have learned many times before: it is all just life, and I am living it. Here's the thing, I knew I loved to travel but - big BUT - I had never traveled for more than a month at a time, and usually much less. That is what you call a "vacation". A holiday, an exciting week or two where you get away from it all and SEE THE WORLD. A break from life. Long term travel is life, with the same hardships, the same mundane chores and the same low points where you are just too tired to do anything. If we stay in one place for a while, we see far less of it's attractions than we would if we had flown there on vacation. One key difference though is that in working life your time is organized for you, for better or worse, and you have a steady flow of income. In this traveling life, we are always thinking about how to optimize our time (yet still wasting a lot of it), and we are always counting pennies and saying "no" to many things that would have been acceptable to indulge in on a week-long excursion. But the point is, it is OUR time. All of it. Time is so much more valuable to us than money. Time is not replaceable.