Monthly Archives: September 2024

Travel is also… People being their worst.

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We have all seen horror stories by now showing unruly, typically drunk passengers on airplanes who are refusing to comply with the flight crew’s requests. The pilot gets involved and begins issuing commands, the person becomes increasingly agitated, and if the plane is in the air, it may even make an unscheduled detour to disembark the problem passenger before proceeding.

This gets amplified by social media 1,000 fold and that person will make or break themselves in how they respond.

What I feel isn’t up for debate is the behavior itself taking place at all. I understand that traveling is stressful, and to have rules and regulations imposed upon you is an additional strain, but those rules and regulations are in place to protect the rest of us from your bad day turning into our last one. We all know these rules by now and they are just a fact of life. If you want to travel anywhere interesting that requires a flight, just suck it up and you’ll be there in no time, no incident required.

If you’re one of the unintentional witnesses to this kind of behavior, try and have just a little bit of compassion. For the sake of basic decency, don’t record it and put the person on blast, because you don’t have the first clue about what that person may be going through. The relevant authorities will handle the situation and you can get back to your travels, hopefully without distractions. Feel free to tell the story as a lighthearted anecdote but that’s all the more reach it needs.

Travel is also… Bigger crowds than you can possibly imagine.

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No matter how many people you think there will be at the famous thing you traveled across the globe for, double the number twice. Your one-of-a-kind plan to be there at the perceived “down” time will end the same as someone who visits a popular thing on a whim.

Dealing with crowds is just part of the experience and you have to find a way to accept them as a fact. When a country has a feature worth visiting, people will travel absurd distances to see it. A great case in point is right here in the United States. We have 63 national parks that rack up millions of visitors every year collectively and these visitors come from all over the world.

You can just bet that no matter when you arrive, there will be a crowd, and it is best to reframe how you think about this situation. You get to share this experience with other human beings, potentially from a place radically different than where you come from. It is an opportunity to learn how citizens from around the world engage with the sights offered by countries that are not their homeland. It can give you a greater appreciation for how to best attend the places of interest in your own country.

I have found it is best to visit the popular places prepared to wait your turn to witness them firsthand. Be polite and allow others their moment to the best of your ability. It’s a fantastic way to build your patience. The world doesn’t owe you anything, and this includes preferred treatment at sights of significance.

Travel is also…

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We will have a series of posts dedicated to what travel entails in the best circumstances, but we will also cover the less-than-ideal circumstances with a category called “Travel is also…“.

Just as an example:

Travel is a lot of planning to ensure that you arrive at your departures on time, but it’s also all of the obstacles that will seem to be thrown in your way when you are cutting it close. Time will compress to seem non-existent in these moments and you will feel excess pressure. You can do yourself a huge favor by considering all of these potentially devastating detours ahead of time so that when you arrive early without incident you’ll feel relaxed and ready to engage fully with the experience.

These will be examples of real-life stumbling blocks we’ve encountered or those from the community. They’ll be short and sweet posts to remind you of the importance of remaining flexible and ready to pivot in case something unexpected happens.

Spoiler alert: Something unexpected always happens. You can’t be ready for everything, that isn’t realistic. But you can condition yourself to become desensitized to the infinite number of things that could go wrong.

Welcome!

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Today is a special day in the history of this website. It’s the first day I shared this space to the public in the hopes of turning it into something more than a journal for my own pleasure.

So if you’re new here, and you likely are, then welcome. Thank you for stopping by to have a look at my humble corner of the internet. Many of the stories from the past are already here, ready for you to stumble upon them and laugh with or at me.

The initial goal of this website was to chronicle my journey to visit every country in the world, and I still hang on to that lofty goal as the primary purpose of this endeavor. I realize the size of such an undertaking, and I see no better goal to aspire to in a lifetime. But I also know that I’ll have to get back out there and put some serious miles under my belt to get it done. I joined this party late in life, but I’m ready to make up for the lost time.

Today also would have been my father’s 68th birthday and I decided to dedicated this effort to his memory. Were it not for him, I’d have had a hard time getting out there and experiencing all of the things that travel has taught me. Though he was not much for traveling, he encouraged me to pursue what made me happy and I loved to share anecdotes with him when I got back from some far flung place. I’d have loved to take a journey with him, but we ran out of time. He may be gone, but I will bring him along in spirit every time I set foot in a new country and make my way toward visiting as many as possible.

You’ll also be able to join me for narrated versions of my stories over at the Itinerary Earth podcast on Spotify. I am thrilled to share these stories with my literal voice because recalling them renews them and keeps me focused on where I should go next.

Now that you’re here, feel free to browse through my catalog of old stories and stay tuned for new ones about my travels to Southeast Asia in late 2019, domestic trips, and an upcoming week-long sojourn to Scotland. Thank you so much for stopping by and I hope to see you out there while I trot the globe.

Online Passport Renewals!

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The State Department of the U.S. announced that you can now renew your passport online with a few simple steps as outlined here:

https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/passports/have-passport/renew-online.html

This is awesome news for anyone who hates the old way of submitting paperwork and waiting for whatever time it takes to receive, process, and send you your updated information. I no longer dread the process I’ll need to do in just a few years.

Most people should be able to qualify for this type of renewal and there appear to be very few exceptions that apply to common folk. It is an awesome advancement and I hope they follow suit with other routine federal processes, but that is for another blog.

Less than two weeks.

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Yesterday marked two weeks until we will be heading to Scotland. The reality of the trip has finally come into better focus and I have started to get excited.

I always find that it is best to reserve these feelings for the last few days leading up to the departure, but in this instance, I simply can’t help myself. It’s the first time either of us will have traveled internationally in years, and the idea has the power to send my imagination off on tangents all day long. We haven’t traveled together internationally since 2006, so we will both be bringing entirely new perspectives and sets of experiences to the table.

This will be an easy way to test the waters of our future travels together and establish our rhythm as a pair in novel circumstances. Travel has a way of putting a lot of undue stress on the individuals and on the relationship itself. Navigating that stress joyfully adds a rich layer of appreciation that you get to keep well after returning home.

For my part, I intend to dedicate my attention fully to the experience while documenting the events for storytelling purposes. I am ready to enjoy it all with her, as well as provide needed support in times that are anxiety-inducing.

Itinerary Earth Podcast.

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I’ve decided to make use of some recording equipment to host a travel-related podcast as another means to tell my stories of adventure with my literal voice. As I’ve started to tackle the bear that is my epic travel tales from Southeast Asia I have come to realize how much more oomph these stories would have if I could narrate them. Plus, it’ll be a riot to do.

I have an existing podcast that was used for my more esoteric monologues but I think travel will have broader appeal. I will also sneak in little bits of my life’s philosophy because travel is one of the threads that make up the tapestry of my life so far.

I will post the stories to read in the traditional fashion here and also narrate them there if you’d like to hear how it all went down. There are some hilarious tidbits that I tell far better in an audio format so it will be a real pleasure to create.