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Travel Blogger, Digital Marketer and founder of IAmDanElson.com, Dan is on a mission to inspire other people to travel. Featuring his own experiences through images, stories and videos, he also provides excellent tips on how to save and make money for travel. Follow him now on Instagram and Twitter.
music by ben sound. com
Transcript:
Hey, everybody, all right, I have a guest on today that I, I just finished the interview. And I feel so inspired. This guy just gave up his job. Now granted, he was just a couple years out of college, but decided to just travel around the world. And what I realized was that if you have a desire for something, I truly believe if you have this desire in your heart, maybe you want to travel, maybe you want to do something else, whatever it is, you’re supposed to do it. And I may be in a position where I am about to turn 46. And I have a high school kid and you know, a family and a home and I can’t just take off and live traveling all over the place. But I can start to move in that direction. And I can start to implement more adventure and travel into my life. And I have a plan. I’ve hatched a plan since I got off this interview for next summer to take six weeks with my whole family and get our travel on. So I’m I already started coming up with the house and the reasons why it wouldn’t work. And I’m totally avoiding those. I’m not even going to look at them. And I’m just noticing that they come into my mind. And I’m saying Hi, I see you. You don’t get to drive this bus. And I’m just gonna put faith in the universe that if I stay focused, that that’s what I want, it will all work out. I don’t have to worry about the house. I just have to worry about the end result that I desire. So I’m anxious to see if this interview inspires you. And if it does, be sure to jump into our Facebook community group. It is at SS lB community.com that stands for start small live big community.com jump in there. Join us tell me what you think. Tell me if you’re inspired. Or if you know somebody that’s done this. I’m I’m so intrigued and I really hope you like this interview. Welcome to the art of living big. My name is Betsy Pake entrepreneur, author and
personal success coach.
This is the show that brings you stories and small ideas to help you live a big life. I hope this once a week podcast will inspire you, motivate you and encourage you to think differently about what could be possible for your life. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let’s go live big. All right, everybody. Welcome to the show. I have with me today my friend Dan Allison. Hey, Dan, how are you?
Hey, Betsy. I’m good. Thank you.
So tell everybody a little bit about yourself so we can get started.
Excellent. Cool. So a bit, bit of intro to myself is that I’m a travel blogger and digital marketer. And a couple years back in 2015, I kind of quit the nine to nine to five job, the apartment in a city center type of wife and I went traveling for six months, I went to South America, North America, Fiji, Australia, and Southeast Asia. And that’s, that’s when I pretty much got the travel bug. And I’ve been I’ve been kind of saved again in 2015 2016. I went on to travel Asia, again, fall in kind of the different countries which I missed out last time. And now I’m in Australia kind of look into to see what opportunities can arise and
in the land down on the so cool.
I’m sort of obsessed with this. And in another lifetime. I’ll be doing what you do. So where are you from? Like where tell everybody where you originated from?
Cool. So I’m from, you know, kingdom, England, from the north. So you probably can tell from my accent been pretty strong. I’m kind of just just outside of a city called Leeds. So it’s like one hour drive to Manchester. And my background is is kind of living in, in Leeds. I also went to Manchester unit. So it’s a nice, strong Yorkshire Northern accent via
Yeah, yeah. So did you know anybody that was doing this? Or did you just decide to do this on your own?
Yeah. So at the time, I was 25. Like I said, I was I had a I had a good job. I you know, I was I was working to Joe Markin and I’d been promoted and, and kind of, I suppose the lifestyle of a year you meant to get out of after finishing University and your mid 20s is why I add and yeah, it was kind of I was always sort of invited at wanting to do my my dad was in the military say he kind of moved around but lived in Canada lived in Ireland lived in Jim and so I kind of wanted to I just wanted to go traveling and see kind of the world I knew there was something else other than just a nine to five office life. And yeah, I’m tired enough to kind of saved up. It was time to get on a plane to Brazil.
Yeah, that’s really neat. You know, a lot of people start their careers after college or after high school. And they have that feeling that like, you know, is this really it like that, like working all day and in this rat race, but they don’t know any other way. Like, they don’t see another way. And maybe, you know, I’m thinking about my own life. But when I graduated from college, we didn’t have the internet. So I don’t know if maybe things are a little different now. Because you can experience and you can see people doing different things. But you know, because of the internet, is that, like, do you think it was really was it just the exposure that your dad from traveling or, like, did you go out in the internet and find people were doing this? And you were like, Oh, that’s what I want to do.
Yeah, I suppose it is a mixture of you know, Instagram. So massive now, day in and day out. And kind of reading forums, I used to, sorry, just Carlton, I used to read a farm kind of on a on a bodybuilding website. And there were actually somebody on there it is kind of quit the job for America, and gone traveling, and they had all these amazing pictures of these mountains, it’s climbed and these experiences by dad, and so many people asking him so many questions where he was kind of like, you know, I need to be writing a book career, I need to be writing an E book and kind of our website at least and, and kind of helping people to submit questions in the end, that kind of thing. sass was with the power of the Internet, and Instagram and all these kind of things. Yeah, did, I didn’t see these, you know, awesome, awesome pictures. And people kind of talked about their experiences. And, and I kind of thought this, this is why I wanted to do and like you say, this is a weird one that a lot of people don’t really realize right is kind of an option, I guess, or they get into the rat race to get into having kind of real responsibilities and buying a house, early dogs and these kind of things. And I think in my experience, especially with my friends, it’s kind of sometimes something in your life, kind of a big life moment, kind of changing moment needs to place whether it’s your breakup with your girlfriend, or you know, the number of years or, you know, you have a kind of a health problem, which you get over. That’s particularly for two of my friends, that’s kind of what happened with them. And then, you know, they went traveling after I went and, you know, I’ve kind of introduced it to them as well. And they’ve kind of seen kind of, you know, like me, once you get to the side of of this kind of long term travel, you start seeing that the world is completely different to what you kind of fought a war and yeah, and, you know, we got realizing, you can you can kind of live out of a bag, you don’t need all this stuff.
Yeah, you know, and I think that’s so super important because, and anybody that’s listening, if there’s any dream that you have, even if it’s way in the back of your head, and you think well, I could never really do that. If you if you start to search out if you can surround yourself with other people, even if it’s virtually that are doing it, it really does open up your mind to what you believe is possible right? So I find that so incredible, because really once you started exposing yourself to people and you know hearing about the guy from the bodybuilding forum like that really started to trigger stuff for you.
Yeah, supposedly say it’s like a knock on thing kind of, you know, once once you hit that Domino, it kind of just spreads and and then you start getting ideas and you think you’re welcome I’m not traveling. You know, how come I’m not traveling Cambodia alcohol, I’ve not seen that. And yeah, I suppose like you say, you you kind of surround yourself people virtually and in your life and you just think well, wait a minute, you know, what, why, why am I going to do that? Why Chi go do n and once you’ve done it, all of a sudden any kind of barriers have off kind of fears poses the biggest barrier, anything kind of barriers just disappear and the fact that you know, kind of now after a full year’s worth of travel in 2015 2016. Now I find myself in Australia and and looking for opportunity and I’m thinking about, you know, the possibilities are endless, I can pretty much live and work anywhere in the world. You know, you know and I kind of see that, you know, I’ve been that you know given that inspiration to over people is is kind of something I should be doing now should be given back and try inspires as many other people as possible you know, even if it is just that image of of You know, the salt flats in Bolivia and people like, wow was law. Yeah, you know, even if it’s just something like, you know, something so simple as like a hangover cure in a can in Korea, and people are just like Wow, that’s a real thing. I want to go to Korea and see that so it’s kind of you know, he’s just trying to get out there inspire people and and you know, instead of having somebody having a life changing moment you know, before that happens to realize that you know, especially now you know, with with the power of the internet and and fly it’s a bit cheaper and you know, it’s all possible you know, and people probably be amazed by the fact that you know a lot of these crunches especially in the second and third world you know when when you look at your monthly outgoings mg parlane ran food and and all these kind of outgoings but you know you think you need you know for your life when you kind of add it all up when you when you go to these countries, you’d be surprised kind of the fact that you probably spending less money in a month, you know, traveling through Cambodia and Thailand, just because of the costs and and the father You know, you’re not just saving money, but the experiences you get, you know, the people you meet Oh yeah, do and just incredible. So talk
about where you stay cuz people may be able to hear where you’re staying. Talk about that and how you do that how you find it and kind of what that process is.
Yeah, absolutely. So, the interesting thing is that the kind of on the backpacking trail is is I suppose Manley’s its hostels is this free different types of hostels, guesthouses and also hotel savages familiar with hotels and how that works. And obviously in the second and third world hotels are cheaper from you know, in in England and Canada, in America. But obviously, if you are backpacking, then you know the hostels are the best places to stay and buy hostels, you know, the, you know, in England, especially hostels kind of mean Yeah, some were probably for like the homeless and, and places like that. So they have a bit of a weird reputation, but throughout Europe felt Asia and South America hostels are basically a cheap alternative to to hotels, where you stay in a dorm room, so I could be, you know, to up to obscene crazy size dog rooms like 45 people in a room. So person Yeah, you know, insane and personally, I normally go between six and, and a tank, depending on the costs is different in different hostels, different countries, as you can imagine. But you’re basically sharing a room with like minded travelers and it’s, it’s brilliant to meet people, it’s great. As you can tell, you know, in the in the background, you know, there’s this kind of a bar nightclub associated with this, this hostel in Sydney, you know, to be honest, hostels even, you know, it might sound to some of the listeners, but you know, who I want stay in a hostel, it’s perfectly fine, you know, nine times out of 10 to clean and, and we’re an awesome place to stay. In terms of kind of finding hostels, our guest houses guest houses in rural option that tend to be somewhere where you can probably stay with a with a friend, if you’re traveling with a friend, you can get your own room most likely, you know, having a kind of a twin room might be the same as having two beds in a dorm sometimes. That’s up a number of times we have traveled with with a couple of friends and guesthouse ism are kind of they’re not kin they’re ruined by probably you know family and you know, that kind of thing and kind of you’re gonna meet probably meet you still gonna meet people but it’s not got not backpacker hostel type feel where there might be a vibe or there might be going on like kind of thing. So in terms of hostels, the best way to do is this is basically an astral world of advertising for them there. But I use I use also well, you know, all the time you can download the app
called hostile world. Is that what you said? It’s called
hostile. world.com. Yeah,
okay, cool. I’ll put it in the show notes too. Yeah, that sounds cool. And the cool thing you know, that I just heard you say because as you started talking, I thought, well, that’s the downfall is that you’re in a room with six to eight people but really what you’re saying is that’s the upside because you get exposed to so many different people. And you probably it makes the journey so much more interesting and fun.
Yeah, absolutely. Because you know, in terms of kind of solo travel especially, you know, you have the option straightaway to go to BC LS a you know, you have the option to do the things on your own, but also you You kind of never learned, you know, if you don’t want to, because people always wanting to do something. You know, as soon as you’re going through it straightaway, you meet somebody up high and down. And there could be from any country in the world, and each of them is and then you meet somebody from, from Colombia and you’re in, you’re in Australia, or you meet somebody from from Brazil or Germany, and everybody tends to speak English, everybody tends to be in the 20s or early 30s. And it’s just an awesome kind of, kind of atmosphere environment, because everybody’s in the same mindset, everybody has come to travel majority people are traveling solo, so everybody wants to meet people, everybody’s kind of like, oh, there’s the Blue Mountains to go see in Sydney, like, I’m gonna go on Sunday, do you want to corpsman kind of atmosphere and I’m kind of togetherness by you gal, or it’s kind of like, you want to go get there? And you’re like, yeah, so you can start, you can start kind of finding out and meet new people. And, and to be honest, people are just, you know, there’s so much about them. And, you know, the the father leaving this kind of life and, and you find out where they’ve been and why experiences they had. And, you know, I can’t, I can’t tell you how many times you know, I’ve kind of been hostile, you know, and I should see it. And I speak to some guys, and they kind of like might use this company or this talk company when you get to believe here because you you want to do this time you want to do this tar, you know, and you don’t want to miss them. Like, and it’s kind of like, Oh, I didn’t realize this, that about to see and believe me, I didn’t realize you could do you know, right? He just wrote and you can love bicycle downtown mountain bikes, I didn’t know that you could do that. And without talking to people, you just you just, you just don’t know. And and that’s the beauty. You know, I mean, you meet and so many people now, especially with the power of Facebook, jadam to Facebook, and they get tagged in pictures, and you end up meeting them somewhere else, especially if you’re traveling through Asia, the amount of times you just run into the same people and you’re like, Oh, wow. Yeah, it’s just like, the mindset, but everybody’s in is, is so good. And like you said, that’s one of the really good things about it, you know, you can have the option to to be in her town, sometimes. You may, you know, one that kind of break from from hostels. Yeah, from the doctors. You know, for example, I mean, I mean, a hospital called wake up here in Sydney, it’s right in the center. So everything’s within walking distance, there’s bars, there’s restaurants, you know, just last night, they had a free wine and cheese night where you could go and meet everybody who’s in the hostel, everybody gets a couple of glasses of wine, he can have some cheese and and then there were there were free drinks in the nightclub. So it’s, you know, you do get that feeling, you know, not only either in an awesome place to meet people, but a lot of them tend to be right in the action. They offer kind of advice and tips and free walking tours, for example. So there’s so much going on. Right, and you can get as involved or not involved as you want.
Yeah, it sounds I mean, it sounds like a ton of fun. Now, if anybody’s listening, we’re recording I’m in the United States. So it’s 8am for me, but it’s 10pm where Dan is so we can hear that. It sounds fun. Like it makes me when I was 28 and traveling.
Tell me the finger. Yeah, that’s that’s the thing. Like, I think kind of, you know, as long as you kind of in that mindset, you know, I think quite a lot of the hostels kind of suggest to be on the 55 but I think it’s totally up to you you know, Matt, I believe I know in one of the pie hostels are the pie are still on guilty Island just off the coast of Bali and they were there they were all the gentlemen who were in the seminars and they just basically travels around and anyway to go somewhere to meet loads of young people and I just see what kind of what’s going on and that kind of thing and it was crazy to kind of see somebody like him you talk to him you kind of got that feeling about Yeah, he’s done it in the past he did it without the internet somehow. Yeah. Without a smartphone. Well, yeah, I think I think really like you know, it depends what you want to do if you want to go to a nightclub right are bad and Yeah, perfect. But you know, don’t get me wrong, you know, the rooms are far up and you can’t hear the music guys. So planned out and that kind of thing. So it’s up to you kind of what you want to do you know, and the fact that you can kind of go on these apps like are still world and he can kind of find range he can you know, normally I go anything above a normal is is totally fine. And all you got to do is read the reviews. You know if it’s like a pie arced or anything like that, it will say anything videos, they’ll say in the description, you know, see you can kind of work out and find exactly what you want, you know, if it’s a quiet hostile you want, if it’s a pie or, you know, and, you know, this is all available to us all on a smartphone, and
it’s so cool. I’m getting inspired. I mean, I’m about to turn 46. And I have a high school kid. So like, I can’t drop my life and run off. But I’m starting to plan to do that. Because I feel like there can be ways and I always tell people, you know, if something is inspires you, if you have the desire to do something, then you’re supposed to do it. And maybe I can’t do it in the way that you are. But maybe there’s another way that I can. And I’m going to be thinking about that how to bring more of that adventure and fun into my life. And I will keep everybody updated on how that goes. And the other thing I want to say is, you know, I’ve talked on here before my daughter really just wants to travel, we we joke, although it’s not really a joke to her that she wants to graduate from school and live in a van.
And just drive drive all
over. And I have always encouraged her to do that, like do that. I’m gonna tell her to go to college. Like, and I know a lot of people think that’s crazy, but she will do what’s right for her, I’m not going to be the one to say like, you have to do that. Because that’s socially acceptable, you know, like, follow your bliss, because I think that’s, you know, be a kind person and follow your bliss. But this could be a real, awesome option for her. I think she would totally dig this. Tell me and tell everybody, how do you make money? What do you do to make money?
Yes, that’s, that’s the kind of the deal question. So just just to go back to your point, I think, yeah, just, you know, obviously, from my point of view to inspire you, or, you know, and you’re kind of the way you can have your children doing I think it’s just awesome having the having that, having that approach to it. And that kind of right, yeah, just go out and do what you want to do is, is kind of our my parents were, how my, my job time was, when I told them, I was going to quit, you know, everybody was it’s so supply reduce, I go do and the amount of people that I’ve met who, you know, a number of them, they’re 18. And I just think, Wow, if I did it when I was 18 Yeah, I will my my kind of force and not my style, my brain is kind of sad, I’ll be totally different. And the way I would have looked at things and, and nothing. Yeah, seems you can do it, I think he should, should just do it. I think if you don’t like it, then you can go back home, you know, just go just for free for six months, or whatever it is, and aspose like he said, You know, there’s plenty of people here, who are my age, you know, the app, you know, all the people are staying in hostels, especially in Australia, because it’s like a really cheap alternative to a hotel. hotels are expensive. So you know, and like I said, you can get involved as much or as low as you can. But yeah, I totally, you know, that’s the reason why I kind of sell on my website is totally to inspire everybody just gout, like you’re in. And if you don’t like it, that’s fine. You can go back home, you know, homes, always that, you know, you will be amazed kind of how much she’d grow up, or how much kind of knowledge you bring in just by traveling around and meeting people and finding stuff out. So yeah, just brilliant. So think about here. question regarding money. Yeah, money. Money is obviously, you know, unfortunately, you know, you kind of realize one is not the be all end all that you probably fought once fight was, however, obviously, you need money to be doing stuff is, you know, traveling to second and third world countries is, it’s probably the best thing to do because you money just go so much further. So, you know, you could easily travel like Cambodia and Thailand and these types of places in Southeast Asia for around thousand pound a month says is that like 1000 and a half American dollars? Yeah, a little bit more probably. So you can easily do it, you know, food is is a couple of dollars. For noodles and chicken, for example, a couple of dollars a B, you know, that’s what you’re looking at, you know, and it’s so possible. So for me, what I did is Yeah, I had a good job. When I was back in Leeds in a digital marketing agency. I was there about three and a half, four years I I depend money that I saved up. I previously had a cast that somebody there when I sold that. So you know, and to be honest, what I have to do is I had to move out my apartment, and the Lisa sun had to stop my life of going out and kind of spending money, you know, all the time to just save money to save as much as possible. I move back in when mom and dad which as you can imagine is a bit bit difficult. I’m 35 Have you been to university and then lived on my own for a number years?
Right. But you had a goal you knew that there was there was an end game to it. Yeah,
yeah, absolutely. And I think now it’s not merely Paul. You know, if you want to do something like this, just put your mind to it. The angle of what you want to achieve and how much you want to get and like I say you know around thousand pound is what I normally Bucci fall per country, especially, you know, second third world, South America a little bit more but, you know, South and Southeast Asia thousand pound a month is is why I budgeted so the first time around, you know, I had some money savings, I moved back in my parents for about six months. And then that was it was booking time. So original, originally in 2015, I booked through from a TA operator, which is kind of for backpackers for for your kind of use on the 20 fives, I bought a trip through them, and it was kind of a round the world you know, six months go do a gamma system type thing, when I swap all the time and say I booked it through them and I kind of had all my, my flights booked, thinking, you know, that was the probably the safest or the best way to approach it. Obviously, since then, since then, the wave approach is been a slightly different and I get to that in a minute. But But yeah, I kind of I booked my flights I was on, I had my money in a in a savings account. And then I went and so you know, at the time, I was not making any money. I was just at the time, I was not making any money, I was just spending my my savings, which isn’t great. But what you can do along the way is there’s a lot of hostels, which offer kind of either they offer like free nights, if you do some cleaning firm. Or if you want to work in reception, you know, that’s not uncommon, that’s a lot of hostels offer that so you can start saving ammonia a little bit along the way. A lot of people do come to Australia and get the working holiday visa, as well. Yeah, you can start you know, candy bars or restaurants and cafes, admin work, that kind of thing to help support you. And especially in Australia, you know, the wages are quite high, especially compared to to England. So, you know, these, these options there. So that was the first six months, you know, it was pretty much spending my my savings, you know, and enjoying myself and looking for me, my money stretch, right to the end, and it stretched it for six months, I went back home. And then I moved back here mom and dad. Thankfully, that was that was an option. And I got I got another job, you know, based on my experience in digital marketing, I got another job and Lisa Cena So, you know, it was my intention and to work in that job, get my experience but you know, with the the angle of Ghent, Australia, you know, I really loved Australia, the first time I came here, I traveled the East Coast, which is that kind of a backpacker route. I traveled that for four months, and I just loved it. Like everything about Atlanta, I always felt right. You know, I knew I knew there was a big market here for digital marketing as well. So I was like, next time, you know, next time that the plan is get to Australia and get a job and live that lifestyle you know and save money as well as as living because that’s that’s feasible of you with the higher wages. Yeah, the first time around, that was that was what I did in the second time around in 2016. I worked for a company in Leeds for about eight, nine months. Again, it was all about savings. You know, I made sure my my lifestyle was totally different. You know, I didn’t just lost money You know, I had the same as account where money went into every mom sorry about contracture, you know, these little things, but I set up just to make sure you know, our saving all I could and then my job again. And I decided to go travel some of the countries in Asia if I missed the first time round so the likes of Philippine Japan and Korea. I also did Cambodia and Thailand again and then I also went to Indonesia. So you know I managed to get to these countries again and I managed to serve around 7000 pounds not only for my job I also tried to do stuff on the side so I did a lot of eBay stuff you know this is a piece on my website we should talk about you know kind of using EDA and and you know I’ve been having lived out of a ballpark for six months once I go um you know I found all these stuff that I kind of obtains especially when I had a partner and and he was just lying around and I didn’t realize just the font by Regina garish for six months and I completely forgot about
it and and there was so much clothing but I just bought because that’s the thing you do, I suppose when you get a job You know, you end up buying more stuff or stuff. So I ended up selling it on on eBay, I ended up making around seven 800 pounds, just by selling stuff. I just did it and stuff from my, my childhood childhood as well, that was, you know, kind of in the, in the in the Arctic. So it was, you know, I did everything I could do to say I began again, and goal was to get to Australia and do a bit of traveling before and so in 2016 sorry, yeah. 2016 October, I quit my job when I went traveling again. And now I found myself in, in Australia.
So do you think that’s where you’re gonna stay? Like, do you think you’ll ever go back to the UK?
Well, I think I think I’ll definitely go back. But it’ll be more kind of see family type trip, you know, I yeah. I think I think at this, this time in my life at 28 I think there’s so many opportunities and so much to do now. Yeah, and there’s so little time to fail. And, you know, that’s the kind of the attitude of I have, and, you know, what I’d like to do is stay in Australia and I’ve got a working holiday visa, which lasts the full year of where I’ll get sponsored, which means that once I get a job, a company will sponsor me and best appear the government for me to stay for a number of years. And I see myself you know, you know, Sydney is such a massive city, I see myself as I’ve been able to live here and work and live in the center and have a comfortable life as well as being able to save as well as working on my websites. I think there’s, there’s a lot of opportunity about VA, I can do and I can I can start you know pulling together and you know, around 3031 you know, Tango traveling again, you know, I really want to do Canada I really wanted to visit South America and Central America. So there’s so much running through my head and and it’s all about kind of how can I save so much you know, how can it to get going you know, and that’s the idea around the website as well as to help other people you know, understanding kind of how I said you know, yeah, use my blueprint as a way to you know, use my website also to kind of you know, for like affiliate marketing for display you know, these kind of tools, you know, yeah, yeah, put the information out there and I get some money to fund my travels as well.
Yeah, so really like your whole mission is whatever you have to do so that you can continue to travel.
Yeah.
Boys turn into now Yeah, you know, travel is so important to me now. And it’s such Yeah, this massive thing of my life and I’m to do it yeah, it’s it’s pretty much like well, what can I do? What can I do on the side? What can I what what can I what opportunities can I take advantage of you know, where can I make the most amount of money? You know, for my time and Australia, I think you should be
a guide. You can be a guy in a group of people together and you tour them all over. Okay, I have some I have specific questions. Are you ready? So what I want to know like when you are in Cambodia like do you already have your ticket out? Or do you just hang out as long as you want and then get your ticket to leave to that to the next place?
Yeah, so like, like I said, the first trip I took in 2015 I had everything planned out right flights yeah rich country. However, the second time it was book one word flight to Thailand as he had done it the first time around. I knew I didn’t need to go through a travel agent again. I didn’t need to book everything. You know, it’s too inflexible. You have to be in a certain say on a certain day another one that I just flew straight to Thailand yeah then once I got bought the Thailand you know you get once you land you get told how long visa is in Thailand is a moment you can then leave for a day and then go back for example, different countries there’s different visas and it depends if you have to pay for it for example in Cambodia for British passport, you have to pay like 32 bucks and you get four months Jesus so
so the countries aren’t suspicious then when you have a one way ticket to go in
that’s that’s the thing actually. So got a couple of countries you have to look on on the internet. Thank God for the internet. Yeah, well, you can kind of find out how long the visa is and if you need to how would fly so for example, when I went to Philippines didn’t realize you needed that out. Out fly. me my friends were in Korea, and there was pretty much like we can’t let you board the plane. Unless you book a fly and share is the confirmation. Oh, wow, this Yeah, sometimes that kind of happens. But, you know, you
go with the flow right then you booked a flight and you’re like, Okay, yeah, moving on.
And then you book a fly and because Didn’t you know, it was kind of like, right, I’ll book a fly on the last day of my visa the day before. I know just bought the cheapest flight. The cheapest flight was to Bangkok. So I was like, fine, I’ll just go to Bangkok. You know, if I end up being that then that’s the weird my trip works. You know? That’s Yeah.
Cool, like excitement of it in a way like, you end up where you end up. So when you’re traveling, are you once you land, then what do you take it like a cab somewhere? Like, do you just go you find a hostel? And that’s where your first stop is? Or? Like,
are you just Yes.
I tend to have a bit of a plan. So I always think, right? Definitely book a hostel. They’ll be try walk around, try to find one out, though not before. Okay, people do that. And I just think that’s crazy. Like, you’ve got the power the internet, just booked our store for two free nights, right? So you have that kind of
and you can leave your bag and stuff at the hostel, you don’t have to like carry all your stuff with you.
So in a hostel in your room, you pretty much nine times out of 10 you’ll get a locker. So you always bring a padlock padlock where you’ll get a locker so you can put your bag all your valuables in a locker he’s sugars. And once you start talking to your, you know, your dorm mates, as soon as you start talking to me everybody’s in the same boat. So, you know, don’t don’t leaving stuff out like your laptop or your phone because it might go walkers. Yeah,
right. Right,
you know, to talk to people, you know, I think then people, you know, be more
respected than your friends. Yeah. And
I think people are kind of like, never, never really crossed the mind. You know, that’s, I kind of aware to, to make sure that things don’t go that a walk is but yeah, I’d always suggest I always recommend booking a couple of nights to a free night. Especially if hostels just booked two or three nights because under there, you can always extend.
And if you don’t like it, you just move somewhere else.
weeks and weeks,
right? Yeah,
yeah. Especially when you go into a new country, you know, your London airport. Normally I’d look on the internet, kind of how do you get from the airport to the center? Is the boss is he a train? You know, is he you know, sometimes it is attacks and, and you know, sometimes, for example, landed in Manila, in Philippines in a massive queue. So a couple of our pockets and it was kind of like Oh, hi, I’m done. way where you’re staying and like I was staying in this part of the city you like, Jonah chef toxin? And like, Yeah, cause you know, everybody wants to
you can tell. You can tell the other backpackers cuz y’all have great big backpacks.
Is that what it is?
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So everybody’s got, you know, a backpack or, you know, you can kind of tell, you know, some people do choose to bring a suitcase, but, you know, you know, over 9% they’ve got backpacks. You know, I’ve, I’ve, I’ve had my backpack two years now. And it’s, it’s kind of, it’s awesome, you know, you can zip there’s like a deer pack where I put all my valuables in, you can also attach that to the main Park. You know, you think you think you’re carrying quite a lot, you know, maybe 1518 kilograms, it sounds like a lot, but the backpacks are designed so well that it fits any bag on your back nicely. You know, it’s no problems as I said, Yeah, I’d always suggest find it out wherever you gonna land find out how to get to the sun. I tend to not get like bosses, especially across country, or flights at stupid clock. So what I mean by that is I won’t get a fly or bus which should alarm me somewhere like 5am I’ll reload last night. You know, I wouldn’t go into cell power in that train station didn’t realize our big cell power wall is massive. Yeah, realize we get well finding my hostel like 11pm at night on on, you know, on a crazy Metro wasn’t my idea of fun, you know, I got lost
well, and that’s not and that’s not like the safest place either. Right. So
better to travel in daylight, then.
Yeah. Yeah. Like I say you kind of learn you pick up things and you think never do this again, you know, that type of thing. Yeah, you know, if I could tell people now, you know, that people are listening and getting inspired by this, this podcast, if I can tell people now what I learned, you know, then perfect, you know that there were no there they already have the information. So always kind of find out. You know, always try and get somewhere which is there like this, but always, always work out how to get to the center wherever it be taxed. It normally is public transport or some kind of trend, depending on how big the say is, you know, sometimes especially Cambodia, you know, it’s just tough when you get a you know, that’s that’s the transport. Always books always book like our stuff to free nice so you know where you go or always screen grab, you know, Google Maps, you could download something and you can download maps.me, which works offline as well. So if you’re out there and he can’t find any Wi Fi, normally Wi Fi is everywhere.
Yeah, that was gonna be one of my questions. Yeah. Is there internet everywhere? or?
Yeah, so like, when you travel in like South America or Southeast Asia, you’d be amazed the internet is everywhere, you know, there’s Wi Fi everywhere, it’s free. If you go into a coffee shop, if you go into a restaurant, you know, they have Wi Fi signs everywhere. Wi Fi, free Wi Fi, all the hostels offer free Wi Fi. Interestingly, in Australia, slightly different. So Wi Fi is kind of everywhere. You can get in coffee shops, Starbucks, etc. But when you stay in hostels, you tend to have to pair for Wi Fi is such a weird thing. Australia is kind of the exception, is there a class you’ve got a real a pair, but everywhere else, you’ve got Wi Fi. So if you ever get stuck, you know, if you’re in Thailand, just go into a cafe, restaurant on fire do buy a milkshake, and it’s you know, $1 and just get Wi Fi, find out why you’re on Google Maps. And then you can find your hostel, man, you know, you can get directions to it. So, you know, I’m always like you say, you know, you kind of learn along the way, but if I can tell people and people can learn, you know, use my mistakes, and, and, yeah, you know, tear my recommendations on, then that’s great. You know, that’s what I want to do. I want to inspire people, you know, I don’t want to put people off. And I suppose the more information you have, you know, the more you know, the safe you feel. And
you know, see, what about stuff?
What about like money, like, and this is me not having traveled very much. You know, I mean, I’ve been to Finland and Sweden. And but all like, you know, I took an airplane had a suitcase like I wasn’t, but like, if I’m going to Cambodia like Do, do I have? Do I use my debit card? Or do I have to have cash for stuffing? Do you have to get your money switched over? Like, how does all that work?
So Well, why why I bought is like a currency card. So why is this, I’m just getting out my wallet. Now it’s called Caxton FX. And this was like one of the best ones, you know, I kind of did a lot of research before I came aware, you can sign up for it online. And the idea behind it is a super secure, you link it to your bank account. There’s an app, there’s also, you know, on the browser, as well. And what you can do is you can transfer money from your savings account, so any bank account, but your app onto your card. And also what you can do is you can also translate it in into whatever currency you want. So they have a number of different currencies. And that basically means that you can you try and translate into that currency at whatever it is at the time. So for example, I just transferred some money today from my English account, onto the card in America into Australian dollars. And then I’ve just paid for for four weeks in the hospital. On my cards, he works like a debit card, you just put your pin in, you can get cash out of a machine. The reason why this suggests I recommend using that currency CAD is simply because it’s really Shakira. So if somebody makes it, then the car, you can get your money back from it.
And you don’t have all your money on it, right? So it’s not like you’re getting a bank account.
Exactly. So you just keep transferring a little bit. So for example, I knew exactly how much the hospital is going to cost me for a week. So I transferred that until onto my card and then paired on my card. So I always only transfer like so much more than like I said, Nobody can get access to my, to my real account. Yeah, not only that as well. But when you are in countries, I love the countries, it’s actually free to withdraw money or very cheap. So for example, he is free free Australian dollars to get your money out. Now if I use my debit card from my bank, then the bank ovary will charge me my bank will translate the money in terms of the carrying safe translate does also do a such a bad read, right? So with a card you get a really good read. It’s often free or really cheap to withdraw money and you companion like a debit card so it’s really good you know that’s why I have I transfer a little bit money over time and then I just get out of a cash point a lot of these countries you can only get like 100 bucks our time so for example in Cambodia they have their own currency but the pretty much use 90% of the US American dollars so oh interest you just get out onto the mat Yeah, you just get hundred American dollars our time which is pretty much the maximum FCM lecture out and that just last year forever
Wow Yeah, that’s
it Yeah. So you know that definitely in terms of cash you know, I never especially in Sydney is kind of different I suppose Australia is a bit different but Cambodia Thailand I’ve never been walking around with loads of cash and I’d always have a locked up in my in myself in my room. You know, I’d have yeah equivalent to 5050 bucks on me or whatever dependent our theory you know, if I’m going on and I are in Cambodia, I’m taking 2030 books around that say I’m not taking a wallet with me, I’m not taking my phone, remember, you know, these kind of law things you know, you kind of just need to use a bit of common sense. You are in a third world country, you know, people are really poor people are desperate. Yeah, you know, have your wits whips a wits about you have common sense, you know, a doctor taking you for a year if it’s valuable and that kind of thing. And I’m going to one of the recommendations especially for guys who are listening is you know, buy some shots with zips in so the very difficult to find, I always I always find but you can find small shots, you know? Yeah, sure. I did ask I Kwanzaa zips him. And these are these are awesome. Because to go out, you know, we in Monet, and perhaps we Fern, our camera
to zip it up in your Yeah.
Yeah, you never gonna lose anything that the amount of people that you come across, and you speak to of who’ve lost a passport or driving lands or their ad, does the sit down and he falls out of the pocket? And they don’t realize, especially if they’ve been at a couple of beers, right? Yeah. There’s tips like this really, you know, really useful to to to have, you know, it makes you feel safer. Yeah, you know, and I’m just having these, these kind of, you know, like,
one less thing to worry about, yeah, if you have sort of a system. So one of the things I started working on with my daughter, over her spring break a couple weeks ago was that I was making a making her start an online business so that if she does travel, she’s got we’ll have three years of having built up this business. But as we’ve been talking, this is my last, my last question, and I’ll let you go because I know it’s late. But it’s safe. Like for a female, would you say it’s safe to travel alone, or that it’s better to travel with a buddy.
So there’s a lot of kind of, I suppose conversations and, and kind of, you know, follows and against solo travel. And with with traveling with a friend now. Solo traveler friend is kind of totally different. I’ve done both solos, awesome, because it forces you to grow your comfort zone completely, you know, it forces you pushes you over the edge, you have to meet people, you have to speak to people, you have to stop making friends, you have to, you know, have allies, you know, otherwise you kind of miss out on a lot of things. So I think the experience that when you solo traveling is totally different. When you have a friend, it’s kind of like, you know, you end up getting in arguments, you know, you have to be be chilled about things, you know, you can still do your separate thing. That’s not a problem. But you know, sometimes it’s kind of like, you know, when you when you stay in a dorm room, a hearing your friend, your friend talking, you kind of forget about other people, you know, you forget that other people that you want to speak to them, and meet new people. So there’s this fine again, obviously, we’ve traveling with a friend, you feel a bit safer. You know, you’ve got somebody always to talk to, you know, and that kind of thing. And I think yeah, that’s fine against I think what I’d recommend is for people to go there, so Allah first of all, but then also have a mixture and meet a friend out there or meet a friend somewhere. Yeah, that’s why I did I did it myself for a few moms that I met a friend. And again, I did it myself a few moments ago met friends. So it’s kind of like I the best of both worlds. But you know, you you learn so much about yourself when you also will try
Yeah, that’s what I would think that that would be sort of because then you really become, you know, so many times I think we are who the people around us think we are, we’re not really ourselves. And when we can do that and get away from our culture from everything that we’ve experienced in the past, and just be alone and be able to discover who we really are. I could see that be so powerful. I mean Like, I want to go do that. I’m 46
Yeah, the, you know, what you get from it is so amazing and so useful. And, like I say, kind of a opens, yeah, you kind of mindset, you know, you see so much stuff, I experienced so much stuff and like you say, you really find out about yourself and, and kind of what you’re made of, and the fact that you know, when you do get lost, because you will get lost, you know, how do you sell out? You know, what do you do? And, and, you know, are you booked into a hostel is not very nice? Well, you know, you You figure stuff out, you think right, right? Forget that. So I’m gonna go look at that roster, I’m gonna find a bad one, I’m going to ask people where they’ve stayed before, you know, I’m going to ask, I’m going to go online and find out so I think Yeah, you know, so you find out so much about yourself. Again, like I said, traveling with friends is also really good. You know, you have such awesome times, you know, and you experienced something kind of together, you know, but I’d always suggest kind of somebody you know, or you’ve known for quite some time for a number of years, I think he’s probably key, just because you kind of know, each of you probably know about you, you both kind of have the same passions, the same kind of hobbies, that interests Yeah, I think a key, you know, but always be mindful. Like, if you want to go somewhere, if you want to go visit a country or a different set, then just say, Well, hey, I’m gonna go here for a bit. I’ll go, I’ll meet you next year. I mean, so it’s great. Yeah, like, is always bad, I think you should be, especially if you’ve known the person for a while you can be truthful to him. And, you know, let’s let’s just have a bit of time apart, or, you know, I want to go see this place, I want to go through this, you know, I mean, and blah, blah, blah. So, yeah, yeah, I think I recommend solo, I recommend traveling with a friend, you know, you have a bit of both. And to go about to you have a question in terms of solo traveling for women, I think, you know, this question comes up so much. There’s so many travel bloggers out there who are solo women? travelers? Really? Yeah. Yeah, it’s just, you know, yeah, I’ve local we die. And, and, and having a look at these travel bloggers online, I don’t know, I need, I need a top of my head. But if you just search on Google, ya know, there’s so many out that showing, I’m probably given kind of, you know, experiencing into terms of what might happen. I think some countries, you know, I’ve heard stories in India. You know, especially if you’ve got, you know, blown bow blue eyes, you know, that kind of thing is totally different to them. So you might get a bit more attention. But I’ve not, you know, as long as you use common sense, you know, and the thing is, when you are solo traveling, if you are in these kind of countries, like you said, you’re never really alone, so that you’re more likely when you meet somebody straight away, and you get on with them. And you’re like, oh, let’s go have a look at Oh, you ended up traveling with somebody anyway? Or going in the same direction, the same room? You know, again, the same transport to the next place. But I think, yeah, this day and age, like, as long as you’ve got kind of a bit of common sense. Yeah, I think that is that is key. Right? Yeah, learn that. I think you quickly learn that. And I think if you can speak English, everybody speaks English. Yeah, I think is, is, you know, you’ve gotta be careful, like, you know, don’t go out one night and go down.
And just like you want. Yeah, right. Just like you wouldn’t in Atlanta. Yeah, totally. Like,
yeah, the thing is, like, like, the way I see it is, you know, packing leads in America, you know, this place is, you know, that, you know, they’re not, you know, everywhere is not safe, there’s places you know, not to go, you know, you know, they’ll go down a dark alley at night, you know, if you’re going out into a club, don’t be trying to go on your own or walk you down for half an hour. You know, especially if you’ve been drinking these kind of things, you know, you just you just need to just be a bear where, you know, you are in these types of countries, be a bit wherever, you know, especially when you go to a hospital that will tell you, you know, if you’re in Cambodia, you’re in Siem Reap, if you’re going down or in Vietnam, these type of places, if you’re going down the street and you’ve got bagging, you’re, you’re a girl, if you’ve got like a little bag that you’ve you’ve taken out, you know, somebody’s gonna try and snatch it, you know, they’re really poor. So right, yeah. Oh, they’re our daughter cow, a bag, you know, just these kind of things. But, you know, a lot of time like I’ve never, you know, I suppose it’s okay, from from me coming from a male, you know, I’m like six foot one. Yeah. Right. Thank you. No, I suppose it’s alright. For me to say that everywhere. See if I know everywhere isn’t surf. You know, I’ve heard stories, but I think, you know, there’s a lot of people around a lot of people staying in hostels, you know, you can be with other people, you know, a lot of the time. So I think Yeah, is is, you know, as as safe as, as being back. You know, I wouldn’t got told the story. It was actually the girl who sold me the first trip in 2015. You know, I asked her why she relieving leads, because she said you were going back on to down south as I Oh, I leaving lanes. You just got bored. And she was like, No, I am. I bought, I bought moped a couple weeks back. And I was just like, Chris, I was like, you’ve been everywhere on your shoe. And I’ve been everywhere, pretty much nearly every country in the world. And I got I got mugged. Yeah, yeah, no, yeah. So, you know, the thing is, you know, things happen, I suppose things happen generally for a reason. You know, but if, if something bad does happen, like I said, you just gotta be smart about it. You know, if you’re going on and I out here, you’re gonna be drinking, and you’re going out in Thailand, Cambodia, just don’t take your phone with you, if you’ve got an iPhone, which, you know, is worth seven 800 bucks, right? When somebody is really poor. You know, you can’t really blame them. You know,
right. Yeah, I never
suggested stealing, you know, but, you know, sometimes you can’t really blame me if the cat food. So you just gotta be smart about you know, taking off and whenever we’re done going out with fancy watches, our you know, really expensive rings day taking stuff free or traveling by fat means something I suppose you know, about, you know, willing to lose, you know, just looking at my, my big backpack. You know, we’re full of clothing. There’s nothing in there that if if a T shirt goes walk is our, you know, a pair of shorts, I don’t really care. You know, I’m not really that first, you know, but I know of everything that’s valuable passport, my laptop, then kind of things anything valuable or be in my day backpack? And that’s when me all the time. Well, for example, if I’m traveling somewhere, I’m on a bus that’s strapped to me, you know, it’s right. Yeah. That’s, that’s everything that I need. So everything I need is in there. My bag can run under the bus, it’s fine right now. But everything I need keep on Yeah, all times, you know, it’s here for you. I cfmeu van is but it could probably just disappear somewhere else. It’s just keela things like that. And especially for you die, you know, I think you’ll meet so many people. And, and, you know, so many people kind of will, you know, everyone looks out for each other. You know, and you know, it’s very unlikely, but you’re gonna go on on the night out on your own army, you know, you’re in a hospital, and you’re with people in your room, and you’re like, Oh, we left for drinks tonight. And everybody’s together. Everybody says together, you know, and it’s that kind of feeling. Yeah, so I think in terms of travel being safe, is Seth has been backer Yeah, I just use common sense. You know, and make sure that, you know, you don’t be taking valuable. We in so far. Right, right.
Well, this was so fascinating. I want to thank you so much for sharing with us. Awesome. I mean, I am totally inspired. I think that there is absolutely a way for me to experience a little bit more of the world in a real genuine way. And I think just by talking to you, you know, not only does it help enhance your own life and your own belief systems and how you see the world, but it helps you to understand other people too. And right now, especially in America, that’s what we really need is just help standing each other. And I think travel is really a great way to kind of expand your outlook on stuff like that. So I appreciate you coming and sharing with us and inspiring us today.
Yeah, absolutely. Like everybody says travel broadens the mind. And once you’ve done it, you never look, you never look alike. The same, you know, even even if you can’t travel about six months ago, you know, even if it’s just a bit of an extended, you know, it’s not just a vacation where you go sit on a beach.
I’m thinking like six weeks over the summer next year, you know what I’m saying? Like my kid would I could bring her and then she could experience that. And know if that’s something she wants to go out and try on her own. So
that would be super cool.
Yeah, absolutely. That’s, that’s, that’s why I totally recommend, you know, unlike So, you know, I really appreciate Yeah, let me let me come on and kind of, you know, waffle for an hour about kind of, you know, why I’ve done my story, you know, why, you know, I want to inspire other people and, and, you know, you know, just having that, you know, a couple of tips, you know, just having a, you know, an easy conversation like this. If you don’t have any questions, or if anybody else has any questions, you know, they can, they can reach me on my website, which is I I’m down elson.com. So you can search on Google, you can you can find me on there, you can answer you know,
and also any question in the show notes too, so people can find it. I really
appreciate that. Yeah. So, yeah, and anything like that, you know, I’m open to help as many people as possible and well For this podcast, you know that you know not only inspired you Batson and you know, and inspired the rest of your listeners as well, and I really appreciate you. Let me come on and kind of give everybody my story.
Yeah, yeah. Well, thanks for sharing how you live big. Thanks, Dan. Excellent.
Thanks for including me in your journey today.
Remember, you can find me all over social media at Betsy Pake. I’d love to hear what you think. And, as always, here’s the little message from my husband.
That’s it.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
