A Little Background For Y'all

Hello World! The sun's rising on Friday and the birds are singing. This experience in Fiji has been amazing, there is so much to take in and at times it is overwhelming. But before I go into explaining the Fijian life I want to catch up on this past summer and fill you all in on what it took to make this trip happen.

I can not believe we are actually doing it. I think I may have proven once again that it is possible to manifest your own destiny. Whatever it is you desire in this world you can have, all it takes is a little hard work and a dream.

I have been dreaming of a world adventure for years and at the beginning of this year my trigger finger was getting itchy. So in February of 2011 Siri and I began discussing the idea of traveling together. The idea sounded exciting, but we knew that embarking on a trip of this magnitude together had the potential to tear us apart. We also understood though, that if it didn't it would make our relationship that much stronger. Either way it would be an experience we could share, it would make memories that last forever, and it truly would be a trip of a life time.

So we decided to stay together and shoot for the stars knowing that if we only made it to the clouds it would still be one hell of an adventure. I began doing research on a trip from the US to Alaska, Hawaii, Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia, Thailand, Nepal, India, Israel, and Turkey and came to the conclusion that a multi stop trip like this would would cost about $2o,ooo. This was a huge price tag especially considering the fact that Siri was a full time volunteer and I hadn't had a steady job in over a year and virtually no work for the previous three months. So at the time we decided to go for it we had no money and I was barely paying my bills, so $20,000 seemed impossible. But what the hell right, why not try.

So I decided I needed to make some big changes in my lifestyle and needed a good job (any job). Within days of deciding it was going to happen I was offered a job with my good friend John Fitzpatrick doing an office building install which put about $2000 into the travel fund for about a weeks work and at this point I realized the universe had already started its magic. Right after that job I started working for my friend Ron Andrews from King Cage full time and at this point the snowball was already picking up momentum. Shortly after this I moved out of my house and into my truck with my dog, started selling everything I owned, started building furniture on the side, got rid of all my unnecessary bills and started saving every penny I made. If these affirmations weren't enough, I was also finding a penny every single day, which is insignificant in the big picture, but gave me confidence daily that what I was doing was right. At times I would be walking my dog, and best friend, Takoma, and realize I hadn't found a penny yet and literally find one within seconds... Talk about coincidence.

It was truly hard to sell all my belongings I had become so accustomed to and move out of the house knowing that it would be the last place I called home for the next 2 years. But once it was all gone I felt free and realized how unnecessary this baggage was in my life. At this point it was all or nothing.

Takoma took the move hard at first, but slowly began to get used to the drifter lifestyle. We began to spend every minute together, which was great considering my future plans unfortunately did not include him.

I worked for a while and slowly began to realize that at this rate I would not be able to save enough for this trip, so once again I needed to make some changes. First, I needed to sell my motorcycle and second, I needed to find a full time job that paid at least $20 per hour. The night I made this realization I went to bed with the intent that I would have these two things. Within no more than a week I sold the bike and received a phone call from my good friend Dontje asking if I could help him on a job, which turned into a full time $20 per hour gig, once again proving the law of attraction.

Shortly after this I made the decision to buy the around the world tickets through Airtreks, which was the first time I realized this dream may actually become a reality. As the date neared we began purchasing the gear we needed and received an offer to take photos for next year's Gregory Backpacks catalog from my friend John Pieper, in return receiving our packs and duffel bags for the trip. Everything seemed to be falling into place.

The day before we left I decided it would be fun to add up all our expenses and savings up to that point and found that we had saved, in about 8 months, almost exactly $20,000 and I couldn't help but laugh. Manifestation, destiny, or coincidence, this is up to you to decide.

So what seemed to be just another pipe dream in the beginning has turned into the start of an adventure that will live on for years to come through our stories and memories. I truly hope that this trip will inspire everyone I know in my life to follow their dreams, whatever they may be.

Why are we doing this??

To be honest, not a lot of people actually ask us this question. The "Why" seems to be the same for just about everyone who is interested in travel. Here is a list of some commonly sought offerings of the travel experience:

• Getting away. Travel offers a feeling of FREEDOM that you can't get at the office-- being able to do anything any time of day and any day of the week. 
• Finding different ways of doing things. Travel gives insight into other cultures that cannot be understood from textbooks alone, and it gives us a unique perspective on our day-to-day lives.
• A simplified form of living. The traveler is engaged in and aware of every decision he or she makes from the moment of awakening to the moment of sleep.
• Sunrises, sunsets, and landscapes. The natural world offers an inexhaustible supply of food for the spirit.
• Meeting people from all walks of life.
• "In the end, I meet me." The endless journey of self-discovery.
• It is something you just cannot live without anymore.

We can all agree that the reasons for traveling are worthwhile; it is the HOW that seems to be the mystery for most of us. Most often when we tell people that "no, we are not going to school or getting a job, we are traveling the world," they respond with a big smile, lots of excitement, and some excuse as to why they haven't traveled yet, ending with a wistful sigh and a long stare into the distance. The excuses typically revolve around money, age, and time. And often, people will try to figure out how our situation is different from theirs in some significant way which allows us to manage a trip like this. My advice is to stop looking for the differences and start seeing ways in which you can get out there in whatever way you can. I would recommend to those of you who are interested in traveling to not let the struggles with HOW become one of the reasons WHY NOT.  Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen," and I support that philosophy wholeheartedly.
So I suppose rather than ask us why we are doing this, it might be more beneficial for US to ask YOU: Why not??

The Adventure Begins!

...Actually, the adventure for me began a long time ago. As of today, I have not slept in the same bed more than twice since completing my year-long program with the Urban Servant Corps on August 9th and spending the following week in a stupor at my grandparents' house. Since the day USC ended, I have seen two concerts at Red Rocks Amphitheatre; been to various art exhibits and seminars; reconnected with a few good old friends; taken a road trip with my family through Wyoming, Montana, Yellowstone National Park, Spokane, Seattle, Portland, Boise, and Park City; ended the long-distance part of the relationship with my boyfriend; celebrated  with my friends in Durango; said many goodbyes; drove to Michigan; said many hellos; and marveled at the life changes that seem to be occurring like crazy among myself and my peers.

But those were just my activities in the past month and a half. For those of you who haven't heard from me in awhile, let me backtrack a bit and briefly explain my life since graduating from Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado. I graduated in 2009 with a major in Art and minors in French and Psychology, and immediately used my last opportunity as a student to take an Innovative Month trip to India with Reyes Garcia of the Philosophy Department, his girlfriend and traveler extraordinaire Tracy Davis, and several FLC students. Seeing India opened my eyes to the vast differences in cultures and lifestyles that can result from only the slightest difference in location or political and religious belief. I looked people in the eye who had lived in ways I had never even thought to imagine, and I was eager to learn how their experiences had shaped them. I got a taste of the depth of the human spirit, and I hungered for more. When I got back to the United States, I immediately began searching for the next lesson in humanity. I wanted to have more experience working with people and coming to understand the human condition in a more real sense before going back to school or starting a career, especially since I still had little idea of what field I wanted to pursue. I spent the next year living and working in Durango, researching opportunities like teaching in France, living at Holden Village in Washington, and joining the Peace Corps in Africa. I began seeing Neal around Christmas of 2009, and pretty quickly the "2 years abroad for Peace Corps" option was out, so I started looking for programs a little closer to home. My mom, being the ideas person that she is, was the first one to suggest joining the Urban Servant Corps in Denver for a year, and after that moment it was pretty much a swift roll down the steep hill of Fate. The Urban Servant Corps is a non-profit organization linked to AmeriCorps and associated with the Lutheran Church. It combines the tenets of simplicity, service and social justice with the intentional community model. I lived in a house with nine other people, all of us volunteering full-time at nonprofits around Denver and spending our off-time learning the complex meaning of Consensus. My volunteer placement was at Sewall Child Development Center, an inclusive preschool-type setting for "friends" aged 2-5, where I played with sand, practiced yoga, and learned the complex meaning of Give-and-Take. Living and working in community was a challenging, humbling, and transformative experience, one that I would trade for nothing and a lesson I hope to continue learning throughout my life.

And now that the backstory is in place, let's move on to the Year-Long Summer. Neal had been planning a global adventure of his own since before I met him. When I heard his plans, I was excited and a little jealous but had no thought of actually joining him. Little did I know that I was cresting another ridge of Fate Mountain. Ideas became discussion, discussion became research, then guidebooks, then itineraries, then budgets, then plane tickets, vaccinations, visas....and here we are, at the next course in my lifelong Humanity lesson. I knew after visiting India that I would have to do more traveling, though I hadn't expected it would be so soon. Well, no better time than now, right? Both Neal and I had talked to many people who had traveled within the United States or to other countries and stayed with locals. We wanted to have an authentic cultural experience, and be able to see as much of the areas as possible without spending a lot of money. Through our  conversations and online research we discovered the WWOOF program, which is a website connecting local farmers to volunteers in locations around the world. The premise is that the farmers provide room and board and the volunteers work an average of 5 hours per day, for typically 2-6 weeks. It is a good opportunity to get to know local culture through the locals themselves, and get firsthand experiences of the culture, the language, and the land. We also plan to use the websites CouchSurfing.org and servas.org to connect us to local English speakers who are willing to take us in and show us around a bit. In between hosts, we will be backpacking, camping, climbing, surfing, snorkeling, working at an orphanage, visiting friends, and who knows what else.

A lot of people have asked us how we managed to save up the money to do such an extensive trip, and to be honest, I don't really have an answer to that question. You'll have to ask Neal what he thinks did it, because I am convinced it was a side effect of the Cosmos responding to our intentions. Of course, I only made $75 a month the whole year I was volunteering! Neal definitely bore more of the responsibility for the financial sector, by working hard all year long post-graduation, moving into his truck for the summer, and liquidating as many unnecessary bills as possible. It was hard work and a lot of alternative thinking, but I believe it was more than that. How would you explain Neal finding a penny on the ground every single day for the past 4 months? Every bit counts. Hopefully our story will inspire you to start thinking differently about how to travel the way you want, or at least give you hope that this sort of thing CAN be done.

Be sure to take a look at our trip itinerary, which will probably be altered or completely changed many times in the course of the year. And if you are wondering just WHY we are doing this trip in the first place, and what the heck we plan to get out of this whole experience, you'll just have to read our next post!

...The title of the blog is a little misleading, since we had a full summer in Colorado before our year of summer even began, and it will be closer to springtime when we get to New Zealand, but "A Couple Summer Months, a Hint of Fall, Fiji, Spring, then Almost a Year of Summer" seemed a little too unwieldy and not as striking to the imagination. So we're keeping it simple.

Please feel free to comment on our blog and send us your own travel stories and advice! We would love to get some conversation rolling in our communities about what inspires all of us to explore the world outside our doors. Let's make this experience a shared one.