Travel Thoughts

As the plane engine started toward home, a baby wailed. My eyes were heavy and blurry, but I held back the tears. Forcing against the hot air outside, the plane rattled and shook to match the chaos in my mind; sad to leave, excited to visit family and friends, scared to move on, relieved to […]

Attaining fulfillment and happiness is not about what we have but what we can give. Chandrawati. Photo by Danika Smith I walked through the gate of the school grounds behind my host, Laxmi, who met me at the bus stop a few minutes earlier. A tiny hand appeared in front of my face and smeared

If are already into solo travel, you could probably give me a long list of why you love it.  But if you could pick your number 1 reason why you choose to go on solo trips, what would that be? My answer:  Freedom.  There’s only one problem though: Having the freedom to do as you

Today I’m going to talk about how our thought process changes while we explore the world—the traveler mindset. Exploring a new place after flying hundreds (or thousands!) of miles is exciting. New sights, new landscapes, new people, new food, new smells—we are filled with wonder as we explore. As we wander with excitement, locals pass

No one plans a trip hoping they will have a bad travel experience. We avoid things like theft by using special wallets, and we might take preventive prescriptions to avoid stomach bugs. But do we ever think about how we might maximize the joy and memories of our travel experience? What’s one item that you

I am back again with another Travel Thoughts blog, this time focusing on natural landscapes that most of us travel for! The past few weeks we have discussed topics such as simplicity vs poverty, craving culture shock, and last week (which relates to today) the power of nature. Today I am going to focus on the attraction to

Today I’m focusing on nature travel and how it provides us with mental escapes long after we depart from the beautiful landscape.  To help discuss this topic I will be sharing some excerpts from The Art of Travel (Alain de Botton, 2002) which I also referenced in my last post.  Remember if you prefer to listen

I’m back with another blog of travel thoughts, and I’m here to share some more book excerpts from two books.  The first, is Full Tilt (1965), by Dervla Murphy (which I talk about in last week’s blog).  The second is The Art of Travel (2002) by Alain de Botton, which teaches several important lessons travel can

This week I’m sharing some travel thoughts with you (ie. philosophical travel themes that keep me up at night). Today’s focus is on alternate views of what many people deem ‘poor’, as well as some views on what the best version of mankind looks like. If you prefer to listen instead of read, you can

The other day I had an interesting conversation with my dad, which has led me to write this blog. I mentioned to him how some members of a family I know in Nicaragua have had problems getting visas to visit their relatives here in Canada. Two family members have been issued visas to visit, however