How did we get here?

Although this was the year we normally would stay close to home for the holidays, it was a bit different this time around with COVID, not being able to spend this usually festive time with friends.   We were sitting in the living room, watching tv, and I looked over at my partner and said “What are we doing?  We get up, work our butts off, make dinner, watch tv, go to bed and get up and do it all over again the next day.  This isn’t living.”  That’s when the idea popped in my head that we should really take time off and travel.  

What started out as a pipe dream quickly turned into a necessity for our sanity.  We were both burnt out with our jobs, not sure if we even wanted to stay in our current professions (we don’t know the answer to this yet, by the way), and also not sure whether we wanted to stay in Portland.  So, after about a month of me continuing to bring it up, Matt looked at me one night and said something like “Oh, so you’re serious about this?  I thought you were just fantasizing, but if you are into this idea, let’s go for it.”  And there it began sometime in December, the dream started becoming a plan to make it real.

Without an idea of where we would go, we at least knew when.  August was the time to make it happen, and so we had 7 months to get our act together and figure out what needed to happen in the meantime.  My job was delaying our departure out of a deep sense of obligation on my part to leave my team and my company in good standing.  It has been a long road and a lot of work to get to a point where we could stop planning and start enjoying, but here we are!  It’s happening!  Yikes!  

When we decided to make the leap to life on the road, I thought I would set up a journal to record my travels and observations on the road to reflect on later.  However, the more I shared my plans with others, the more requests I received to “send me your blog so I can follow along”.  I really wasn’t expecting anyone else to care about what we were doing, so was surprised to see just how many people wanted to check out our travels. 

This blog will be an avenue for me to see how my perspectives change over time and to share more about the places my partner and I visit, what adventures we partake in, what we liked and didn’t like.  Everyone’s idea of adventure is different and what people like or dislike about an area is also very broad, so take from this what you can, and share with us your experiences as well.  We would love to hear from you!