BootsnAll Travel Community

Hi,
I'm Becca. During the off-season, I teach English to public high school students. I actually like my job, but that's easy to say right now because it's summertime.

Only in the past 2 years have I sufficiently drawn out my wanderlust... and I've been trying to make up for it ever since.

The only thing I really dislike about travel is that I miss my dog. A lot. Like so bad that I cried (and I'm not a crier) in an internet cafe last summer when I received a digital picture of him. You know how dogs can smile in just that certain way? Well, he was doing that.

My favorite book is impossible, so I'll just go with my most recent enjoyable read: David Eggers' A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. Aptly titled.

As for movies...I really like this movie called Ghost Dog with Forrest Whitaker.

I dig music, books, movies and travel. And I vehemently hate George Bush. I'm moving to Canada if he gets re-crowned.

I guess that's enough.

A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it.
-John Steinbeck

Hello/Hola/Bonjour/Konnichiwa! I am new to this site, and even fairly new to travelling (especially independently). I currently have a crappy marriage and a great job that I hate at a Fortune 500 company. I am considering ditching the husband and the job to travel, and would love to here from others who have done something like that. Oh yeah, I'm 28, and my hobbies are pretty much the standard for anyone on this board-- travelling, learning about languages & cultures, hiking, canoeing, kayaking.

quote:

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Originally posted by thecuriousgirl:
I am considering ditching the husband and the job to travel, and would love to here from others who have done something like that.

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I more or less advise you to ditch your husband, mainly on general principles, but if you need an excuse, travel is as good as any. Welcome to the BootBoard.

Free your mind, your ass will follow. - Oliver Stone
bloggylicious

Ello, I'm Karma and I'm here because (wow I just made this sound like an AA meeting) anywho, because I am getting the hell out of here this time next year (hopefully). Intending to travel around Italy and Greece with a small stop over in Paris ^^ Currently still in high school, so I'm gonna have to raise alot of money once this year finishes and I'm free! Yay!
So... what else. I'm 17, from WA (Thats Western Australia, thank you very much), feeling very very cold at the moment because its past midnight and I can't find my jumper. Interests? Surviving this year (TEE), reading, getting to actually travel, music, most of your typical interests...
Oh and I have a tendency to ramble a bit, so be warned.
And I hate George Bush as well ^^
-Karma

We could learn a lot from a box of crayons:
Some are sharp
Some are pretty
Some are dull
Some have weird names
And all are different colors...
But they all have learned to live peacefully in the same box.

I guess I haven't really introduced myself yet, so now seems like a great time. Something about 1:30 in the afternoon gives me the need to introduce myself.

Anyway, I'm Gabriela. I live in Chicago and am a college student and do everyday collegiate things. I'm employed as book slave at your standard cookie cutter chain book store. In short, good times.

I'm planning a quick trip to Mexico this summer, nothing big. I'm also heading to europe next summer and doing a study abroad the fall of that year. I have plans on deck, but nothing is on right away. I'm new to this independent travelling thing, but I'm thinking I like it already.

Hi,My name is Jet and I too am a non-recovering Traveler. I can't help myself and I don't see an end to this. I started traveling at the age of 17,a long time ago. I have been to Hawaii(big deal),Costa Rica,Cozumel, New Zealand,Australia,Fiji,China,Hong Kong,Singapore,Java,and then I found Bali in 1988 and I can,t stay away to save my life. I have been there 50+ times and have actually lived there for a year at a time twice and am about to do it again. I think I lived there in a former life. This is an addiction right up there w/ my bigamist Rocker no good husband . Only kidding. He's a nightmare and Bali is Heaven. I design clothes in Bali and sell them in the U.S. I do fairly well and it affords me to be able to take these trips.I should be back in Bali by September and am looking for a house to contract. I'm serious about blowing off this ratrace in L.A. If anybody needs advice on Bali feel free to ask me.My ending quote for everyone is this "When you step outside your comfort zone and take chances that is when you know you are really living,Travel till you drop,seek adventure"Jet

I'm Claire i'm 31. I taken lots of holidays but never travelled! I'm a sales manager for P&G and have lived in England all my life.
I'm selling my house storing my stuff and going away for a year. My first stop is Thialand in November and can't wait....although getting off that plane on my own is a little scary thinking this is it just me and a backpack.!! So anyone that will be in Bankok for a couple of days the beginning of nov and fancy a beer let me know!
Leaving your marriage and job?
thecuriousgirl: - well just remember if your not happy, having this in the back of your mind for life will never make you happy!
Would your hubby not go? If not is he really the one? If you go you can always come home if you don't like it ..if you don't i guess you'll never really know how life could have been....good luck!
jobs - if you have done a good job they will have you back!

Hello All!
My name is Rachel & I'm a newbie here. I grew up in upstate NY but was lucky enough to travel a lot. My father is a professor & so would take us to Europe when he was on sabattical. I've continually done short trips (England, France, Caribbean islands, Mexico) but nothing more than one or two weeks & usually fairly toursity. I recently decided that the time has come (spurred on by my turning 30) for me to check out of corporate America for a while & do a round the world trip. My target departure date is March 05. I'm just starting the planning process now & am looking foward to relying on all you experienced rtwers for tips, advice & funny stories.

Hello folks,
My name is Lesley and I'm Canadian. Other than family camping and a high school trip to England I wasn't much of a traveler until two years ago. I spent a week camping with friends in Newfoundland and I was amazed at the people I met. The highlight was a climb up Gros Morne mountain (800+meters) and having a moose eat supper with us. Since then I've been exploring my own back yard in Atlantic Canada.
Next up is a backpacking trip around Britain in the spring of 2005 and I need all the help I can get to prepare!

Look forward to chatting with you all

Hi, I'm Mel, 25, from near Manchester, England and am embarking on my first RTW trip in September (only 8 weeks to go!) - am starting to get nervous already! It's always been a dream for me and decided it was now or never with regards to travelling as otherwise a mortgage beckons.... A break in a long-term relationship gave me the kick I needed to get going and very lovely employers who are letting me have 9 months to go off and "find myself" and keeping my job for me for when I get back - if I actually decide to come home!. Not done much travelling before so this is all pretty new. Am going to west coast USA, Cook Islands, Fiji, NZ, OZ, SE Asia and South Africa and am boring all my friends rigid with talking about it. If anyone has any advice/tips all will be welcome! Mel

Hello everyone...I just came across this thread while I was exploring all the amazing advice, friendships, and information here on the boards. I figured I might as well introduce myself too!
My name is Brittany and I grew up in Southern California but I have been living in Colorado for the past few years (just graduated CU this May)...I willingly admit that I just can't seem to adjust to snowy winters so after a six month stint in South America, I plan on moving home...unless of course I never return to the states!
I too don't have a whole lot of use for my degree, but I want to teach special ed after I go back to grad school..all goals that are a bit far off since I need a well-deserved (in my so humble opinion) break. I figure I've got some time to let the dust settle on the whole degree thing anyway...
Honestly, I'm pretty scared to be leaving the country for so long...it's my first trip away besides visiting Mexico and Canada (which everyone will tell you doesn't count) and coming from a country where we've put so many people at odds definitely freaks me out somewhat as well. I'm going to miss my family, esp. my five year old brother and four year old sister, SOOO much..and my dog, who will currently be taking residence in Boston until we return. Every day I keep thinking to myself: what if I just want to come home?? Likewise, I am a planning freak and I might drive my boyfriend crazy if I try to organize any more adventures so I've decided to hold my breath and just let go and see where the wind takes us...
anyway, that's about it for me....pretty standard stuff I suppose..but you haven't heard the last from me. I'll do my best to share what I can after i've been officially travelling de-virginized (so to speak)

*BB*

Well, though I post frequently in other topics, I think I've yet to properly introduce myself.

My name is Neil, and I live where I've always lived, in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Currently I'm a student studying Electrical Engineering at the University of Alberta. Happily, my current arrangement of leeching of my parents leaves with a not entirely unreasonable ammount of disposable income, so I'm able to get out of here periodically and see the world.

Anyway, travel addiction goes back to childhood, when I went on several trips with my parents which, after the Disney vacations to California and Florida when I was really young, evolved into more interesting trips which included three to Western Europe, one to the Carribean, and several driving holidays in British Columbia and the American inland northwest.

When I got too old to travel with my parents, I spent several years not going very far...maybe a weekend trip to somewhere in Alberta, a real holiday would be a four day skiing trip to the rockies.

But a couple years ago, when I decided to take a year off school, I signed up for a chance to discover more of my own country, with the federally funded "Katimavik" program. To describe everything involved would take a while, but the jest of it was that for seven months, I had the chance to live at government expense in three different regions of the country in exchange for doing volunteer work. So that gave me the opportunity to live in and get to know Owen Sound, Ontario, St-Jean-Port-Joli, Quebec, and Vancouver, BC.

After that, I've had a hard time staying in Edmonton for any length of time. Last summer, the only break I could was one week, so I went out to Labrador to visit some friends from Katimavik. This year, however, I spent the whole year budgetting for a big working holiday in Ireland, which I'd hoped to break even on, so I could follow 3 months there a trip through Scandinavia and the Baltics. Unfortunately, once I got to Ireland, I ended up not finding a job, so I just had a good two month holiday, which I finished by attending the London BnA party, and then came back home.

Having been home for about a week and a half now, I'm already planning my next trip, which will hopefully be to Peru next August. Now I just need to get on top of that money thing, and I'll be all set.

Bonus points to anyone who read the whole thing.

-Neil.
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Please reinterpret my previous statement in such a way that I'm no longer wrong.
- Jake Troughton,
Univ. of Alberta Gateway Sports Editor

hello - i've just joined.My name is jenny Tobias, I'm 18, and I live near Brighton. I've just finished my a-levels and i'm taking a year to travel (i'm going to Mexico and the USA)and save money before i go to university to study languages. I have always wanted to travel for as long as I can remember, but my family and a lot of my friends don't seem to understand -'why would you want to do that?' etc but finding sites like this made me realise i'm going to do what I want.
Anyway, i've visited much of Europe on school trips, family holidays, weekends in amsterdam on Easyjet etc. I want to visit Latin America, India, China, Africa and lots of other places -it's just so hard to choose. At the moment im doing three crappy jobs to pay for my trip.

This is a local shop for local people - we'll have no trouble here!

Hey all! My name is Brian Adams-Thies. I am a PhD student in Cultural Anthropology at the University of Arizona. I graduated with a degree in Theology from Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska (yeah I thought I wanted to be a priest!); and then a Master's in Latin American Studies.

I lived in the Dominican Republic for a year; Mexico for almost a year; and have done extensive research throughout Baja California. I have also spent a couple of summers in Western Europe.

In about a month I will be headed to Madrid, Spain for a year to finish my dissertation research on a GLBT community there.

In addition to being a brainiac and reading all the time I love to play capoeira, workout, run, eat as much chocolate as possible, and meet new people!

I look forward to interacting with the Bootsnall community! If you have any pointers on saving some cash in Madrid if one stays a long time let me know!

badamsth@email.arizona.edu

Hi,

I'm Tassy, and I'm a try-hard traveller! I feel like a traveller, but to be perfectly honest I haven't done much except backpacking round Eastern Europe and a bank-balance-busting trek across the USA and Canada!

I didn't really do any travelling as a kid, most of my holidays were spent in Cornwall, but orchestra tours while I was at school really inspired me. Since then I have been a bit of a Prague-aholic, going there every two/three years, and desperately saving to go elsewhere.

I’m 25 and working in science communication in Yorkshire, which is great, but they don’t tend to give you month long holidays to get out of the country! So I spend most of my time sailing and hiking and camping in the bits of the UK that can be reached easily from York. I really want to go back to over pond and camp in loads of national parks, so if anyone knows where you can hire camping equipment in Vancouver/Calgary/San Francisco/Seattle/Wyoming let me know!!

For those of you finding yourself in York in the future, drop in for a pint of warm ale…..

Tassy

Hi everyone, my name is Gijs (or Gus, if that's easier for you). I am 25 born and raised close to Amsterdam in The Netherlands.
Friday I will receive my Bachelor degree and at last have another opportunity to go and see a bit of the world.
In '98-'99 I travelled through Autralia for 9 months and that's where I discovered that I was never going to be a one-place, morgaged-home, lifetime-job kind of person.
Right now I'm contemplating going to BC,Canada and seeing as much as I can of that great land.
My biggest worrie is what to do when I come back, if I come back. I have never done long term travel without a safetynet in the form of parents/finances.
So, if anyone has any tips or advice for me, those would be more than welcome!

This is my first post ever. I have been lurking and reading the site for about 3-4 months. I am not that well traveled. I have around central US, Mexico, Jamaica, and Japan.

I am 22 years old and married (yes, I know I seem too young to be married). But all of my high school years I always wanted to be older and farther along in life than I was. So I ended up basically killing myself to graduate from college with my BA when I was 20 (missing out on all the fun college experiences and doing internships and taking extra credits instead). I got a corporate job 1 month before I even graduated and then bought a townhouse and got married the second I turned 21.

Now I am finally relizing that this "American Dream" stuff isn't all its cracked up to be.

My husband and I are currently in the process of selling all our belongings (cars, house, all those expensive toys we thought we needed). And we are planning a trip around North America hoping to leave in April of 2005. We are leaving MN heading west than north up to Alaska, where we are hoping to work for a few months. Than basically traveling around all of the coastal states (and any state that seems interesting). We are hoping to stop along the way and get jobs to raise some money for the next part of our trip. At the end maybe we will find a great place to live, or maybe we will keep traveling and leave the country and head off to see the world. (My husband wants to get settled again, and I want to travel.)

I am looking forward to getting lots of advice from all you experienced travelers.

HI there all! I am a new BootsnAll member (delighted to be!) and my name is Sandy Azancot. I have traveled extensively, although most of it was when I was young, plus I lived in Nigeria for 4 years as a kid. Lately I have been traveling in the Caribbean and Belize. I would like to travel more, but my husband and I have 3 dogs and 4 businesses (1 tattoo shop that I work in full-time, 3 body piercing/smoking accessory shops that he rotates around through). I would like to tattoo outside the US some---I've been tattooing here 18 years. I tattooed in Belize last time we were there! Our next trip is going to be flying our plane (Piper Cherokee) down through Mexico to Belize. I am going to try to learn how to make a cool website of our trip so everyone can check it out!
Yeah! Dermagraphic Studio
I hope I embedded the link to my site right.

(edited to fix link)

Knowledge = Power

[This message was edited by delara on 08 July 2004 at 15:28.]

Hello, travel junkies. I have been submitting articles for BnA for a few months (though considering the debilitating length of some of my essays, Chris/Court/Donovan might argue that “novellas” would be a more accurate description of my submissions), but I am just now joining the forum, mostly because I have just gotten internet wired into my very own pad and will have unfettered access to all things cyber for the next three months, as opposed my former arrangement which was an ultra slow connection four blocks down the street that had a one hour daily limit, which I endured for five months while I was living in Cadiz, Spain.

In spring of 2003 I quit my job at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, sold my house and nearly all of my belongings and hit the road. I’m one year into a two-to-three year balls-out, travel writing odyssey. In 2003 I did all of Western Europe (minus Finland and Switzerland). I spent the first five months of 2004 editing my material into articles in Cadiz, Spain and getting tanner (and drunker) than I have ever been. Currently, I am in Iaşi, Romania where I will spend three more feverish months trying to cobble together a book edit out of this mess. This should be just enough time as long as I don’t let my thoughts linger on the fact that I have a better chance of being struck in the ass by lightning twice than I have of getting this book published. Accordingly, I will be coming here to unload when the uncontrollable sobbing gets to be too much and to seek moral support in resisting the urge to stay drunk on the alarmingly cheap and tasty Romanian wine and spending the entire day surfing for porn.

In November I head to Sydney and start the process all over again, traveling through Australia, New Zealand, Asia and a few choice Pacific Islands. After that I assess my budget and either plan a new trip or move into my friend’s garage.

I graduated from the University of Minnesota with a B.A in Theatre Arts (acting focus). After two backpacker stints in Europe I did eight years at the aforementioned Fed, where I served in varying, low paying, capacities that are specially reserved for people with a Theatre degree (Six different jobs in eight years. I’m a little fickle). I have been a juggler for 22 years and I have better developed reflexes, dexterity and hand-eye coordination than anyone that you will ever meet, unless you meet a juggler that is better than me. I love to write, but I stink at editing, grammar and spelling. I’m 34 years old, 5’-9” (172 cm), 150 lbs (68 kilos), blond, green eyes (though some deranged, color-blind people say blue), a Gemini and I have a butt that doesn’t quit.

I think that about covers it. I look forward to being an interactive part of the BnA community.

Leif
http://www.geocities.com/leifswriting

WOW!!! What an amazing guy you are. I think you are the male version of me. I also think I just found my new best friend on this site. I will be leaving for Bali again in Sept. and don't know if I 'm ever coming home again. Let's share adventure syories. Jet