Travel

The World is Calling

When will you answer?

I like to snowboard. There was a point where I would say that I loved to snowboard, but it has sort of slid down my list of priorities over time.

There is definitely an allure to skiing or snowboarding, there is a call from the mountains to get out there on a crisp sunny day and schuss down the hills, or being first on the lift on a powder day to experience brand new, untouched powder that make you feel like you are floating as you glide along.

One of my nostalgic favorites was listening to Warren Miller narrate ski films, in which, at some point he would always and in his particular distinctive voice, utter his tagline, “If you don’t start this year, you’ll just be one year older when you do.”

Many times, you hear people share that they have, “always wanted to…”, or “always had a passion for…” some particular thing. Often from authors you hear that they have been called to write from a young age, a drive they take for granted in their lives.

Other people feel a call to travel, certainly some feel a call to ski. I can’t say, really, that I have “always” had any particular yearning. Mine have evolved slowly over time and with my 20-year snowboarding passion dying down a bit, a now new one is simmering in the background.

There was a point where I had absolutely no interest in seeing Europe. Didn’t feel a call, didn’t see the appeal. To me, travel to other countries meant Canada and Mexico, and not much else.

That has changed — significantly.

I know that I am doing this all “backwards”; that you are supposed to backpack through Europe as a teen or twenty-something. Not after you have logged over half a century stuck in one place. However, my wife and I are in the process of solidifying plans to adopt what, for now, I am calling a semi-nomadic lifestyle.

I guess that is why two recent stories have really caught my attention and served to fuel the fire of passion for travel for me.

One is by Desiree Driesenaar and does a great job of helping define some of the ideas and beliefs in my head. Desiree talks about changing the mindset of travelers away from a conventional tourist approach. Rather she advocates for reducing “clutter” both physically and spiritually when we travel.

She suggests we consider staying longer, choosing our transportation wisely, using simple luggage and developing an intent to connect with locals. She does a great job of putting words to concepts I have been considering as we plan the next phase of our lives.

Desiree prompted others to write about things like living abroad, blending in with local customs and people and continent hopping. Sadly, I don’t have much experience to offer in response to those asks, but I do have this bubbling compulsion to get out there and start gaining that experience!

As a response to Desiree’s prompt, Livia Dabs wrote a great piece detailing her experiences traveling as a young person (see, she got the memo and did it “right”), as well as some of her motivation to ditch the American Dream in favor of lifestyle that suits her and her family much better in southern Spain.

I had already read some of Livia’s work previously and have added in Granada, Spain as a place to visit. If for no other reason than to set eyes on a place that I have read a little about.

I intend to write another article that incorporates all our plans for our semi-nomadic life. But as a quick glimpse, next September we will quit our lease here in Washington and hit the road for Alabama.

We will winter in our vacation rental home there, do some car traveling to see family to start 2022 and then disembark for Spain on a cruise ship in March, arriving in Barcelona with the plan to stay in Europe for through the spring and summer. We intend to walk the Camino de Santiago as part of our time there.

The rest of the time will be subject to one of Desiree’s suggestions of choosing transportation judiciously. Walking 500 miles is certainly a version of sustainable transportation. The rest of the time we hope to use public transport or whatever means to get to our destinations.

So, I guess that is a way of saying that our travel path will be subject to a bit of whimsy, and we are very okay with that. We don’t have any timelines for return or need to be in any particular place at any given time.

Until then, we have some things to do to get ready. When my wife and I moved into our rental home here in Everett, we intentionally downsized and got rid of a lot of stuff. We both came from previous marriages and huge houses where a lifetime of junk had accumulated.

Still, after purging so much, we still find ourselves with a lot of stuff. And arguably a lot of stuff that we don’t ever use. Part of our evolution over the next 18 months will be whittling down our possessions to those we really and truly need.

We also need to get our financial lives in order. These two topics are interrelated surely, as having plenty of disposable income from my wife working allows frivolous purchases and spending. When she quits working, we will have a significant drop in income for the subsequent 6 years until I hit the age where I can begin tapping into retirement investments.

I don’t think it will be particularly difficult to get used to having less money; just different. It is nice to have some time to wean ourselves towards that end though. After decades of living the mindless churn of earning money so that I could feel “financially secure” it has been tough to envision a life where we may not have much financial flexibility.

Ideally, I want to get one more passive income generator in place in the form of another vacation rental property. However, reading about how Livia and her family live a comfortable lifestyle on $25,000 annually gives me a lot of inspiration!

I am becoming more okay with the idea that we can get by nicely on the small sustained income we already have. Maybe I won’t stress so much over the coming months about how to get one more passive income stream before we cut ties with corporate America. I think it will all be okay.

Besides, to paraphrase the immortal words of Warren Miller:

If we don’t do it next year, we will just be one year older when we do.

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Timothy Key spent over 26 years in the fire service as a firefighter/paramedic and various fire chief management roles. He firmly believes that bad managers destroy more than companies, and good managers create a passion that is contagious. Compassion, grace and gratitude drive the world; or at least they should. Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, and join the mail list.