Hi, welcome to my no-longer dormant blog! What a ride the last few years have been. From a global pandemic to job hopping to buying my first home and adopting two cats, there has been a lot happening! That includes some travel, but unfortunately very little writing. It’s time to change that…

The original goal

If you’ve seen my first blog post, or spoke to me in 2019, you might know that shortly before my 35th birthday, I set a goal of visiting 40 countries by the time I turned 40 (I shortly revised it to 40 by the time I’m done being 40.) This was ambitious. I had only reached 13 at that time, meaning I needed to visit 5-6 new countries every year. As someone who has only worked traditional jobs, this goal would require a great deal of resourcefulness and planning. As someone who is not independently wealthy, it would also require flexibility so as not to break my budget.

What happened

Obviously, the world locked down in March 2020 (for good reason). Plans for a three-country tour of the Southern Cone of South America had to be postponed indefinitely, and the focus for everyone turned to making it through the pandemic. For someone who thrives on adventure, this was a challenging adjustment. I had every intention of writing about my past travels and planning for the future, but ended up in a deluge of work chaos and fast-forwarding my home buying plans. I sadly ended up putting the blog on the back-burner…until now.

Changing focus

After realizing the pandemic and its after-effects weren’t going away in short order, I changed my goal to a more realistic 20 by 40 (50 by 50 is not ruled out yet). And now, as I close out my 40th year, I’m happy to announce that I’m almost there! While being between jobs puts the goal in a bit of jeopardy, it does give me more time to write.

So, welcome back! And let me know, what places do you want to hear about? What travel topics are on your mind? I’m looking to write about a wider range of topics about travel, as well as share more of my life.

Happy travels, and I look forward to engaging!

Current Country Progress

Guatemala
The Netherlands
Belgium
France
Hungary
Hong Kong
Macau
Mexico
China
Iceland
Philippines
Colombia
Spain
Uruguay
Argentina
Portugal
Canada
United Kingdom
Panama
???