Reflections - Our World Trip
As the door closes on our ‘round the world adventure, we’re beginning to reflect on everywhere we’ve been, everything we’ve done, and all the people we’ve met along the way. Turns out, after visiting 31 countries and spending nearly 400 days on the road, that’s pretty tough to do. Memories begin to blend into one and suddenly, a year compresses into a fever dream. Think back to when you were six years old, try and count every memory you have from that age. You’re probably able to tally up a few, maybe even a few dozen, but you know that six years old was made up of 365 days – countless afternoons spent running around outside or spending time with friends or family, playing sports or reading a good book. Your brain experienced and kept plenty of moments, some that resurface later in life, yet only a few make the cut to the highlight reel. These memories likely had strong emotional importance, were one of the ‘firsts’, or maybe just moments other people attributed importance to. That’s sort of how looking back on this trip feels for us now. Our brains not only captured an unusual volume of memories in a single year, but were asked to process so many new experiences, catalog all of them, and decide which ones were important enough to make the forever-memory-bank. We recently heard one of our favorite TV personalities, Richard Hammond, describe returning to his old haunts at Top Gear as being in a place from the “memory of a memory”. As we sit here almost two full months after our trip has concluded, many of our memories of life on the road have started to feel this way, like a phantom thought, a fever dream, or a memory we read about in a book. For that reason alone we’re so glad that we kept this blog, took the thousands of photos we did, and shared our adventure with all of you on social media. Trying to take stock of it all again, we wanted to share our reflections about our trip, now removed from some of the immediacy of each day’s new adventure.
Our adventure was filled, of course, with some of the best days of our entire lives. Our days spent swimming with sea turtles in Oman, running down sand dunes in Namibia, hiking for eight days in Patagonia, and relaxing on Indonesian beaches don’t begin to cover the half of it. Yet for all of the good moments we were lucky to experience, there were plenty of difficult ones too. We lost more than a few nights of sleep to rough accommodation, had a few meals we regretted pretty quickly, felt the heartache of being away from loved ones, and fought through plenty of days when we got on each other’s nerves. Each tough moment didn’t last too long though. It is a challenge to stay fuming when you suddenly realize where you are and how lucky you are to be there. Alongside the expected challenges, it was the speed of it all that really got to us. We’ve all heard the saying a million times, “time flies when you’re having fun” but we can tell you, that has never felt more real than in these past thirteen months. Beginning our journey, we had so much to look forward to, so much to be nervous about, so much we didn’t know yet. And then, in what genuinely felt like the blink of an eye, we were on our final flight and jetting back to reality with an unfathomable cache of adventures in the rear view mirror.
In this final post of our round-the-world adventure we want to share with you our final thoughts, and the lessons we’ve learned about travel, the world, and ourselves. To be clear, we’ve learned far more than we can condense here, but we’ll talk about the biggies – the lessons that we don’t think we’ll ever be able to shake.
What We’ve Learned About Travel
Coming from a couple who spent the last thirteen months exploring thirty-one countries, it might sound a bit hypocritical to tell you to slow down, don’t rush your adventures. If someone had given us that advice before we left, we probably would’ve just ignored it. The truth is though, that we struggled with the question of how to structure our trip for a long time as we were planning it. Should we try to fit in as much as we can and cover as much of the world as possible? Or should we focus on just a few places, really diving into the culture and environment of each one? We began our trip with a tilt towards the former, and ended up finishing it almost fully in the latter camp. Our trip really tells the story of two halves, before and after our summer break in Switzerland, where we reflected on our first six months and made changes to how we approached the back half. For the places we could control, we decided to take some countries out and redistribute their dedicated time amongst our top destinations. This is how we wound up with a month in Peru, nearly six weeks between Chile and Argentina and our final stop in Japan for another four weeks instead of bouncing through Central America with four to seven days in each country. We had found that over the previous few months in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, we just weren’t getting enough out of each destination. It felt like we were missing things, not connecting with locals, bouncing from place to place without ever truly understanding where we just were. We’ve already covered a bit about how we would have slowed down here, but to recap briefly: we would have removed four or five countries completely and limited our time in a few more to maximize the days we could commit to the places highest on our bucket list. We would have loved the chance to explore more Indonesian islands, dive deeper into Middle Eastern cultures, and gotten way off the beaten track in a place like Mongolia. So our advice to you is, slow down, take your time when you travel. Don’t just go somewhere to add a pin to your map, but make each trip linger as long as you can with time well spent, more lasting connections made, and more profound memories to take with you.
It’s also quite easy when traveling this long to second guess what you’ve done (case in point in the previous paragraph), but we’ve found it’s never productive in the moment. Yes, hindsight is 20/20, we’ve all heard the expression, but when you’re somewhere new or unexpected it’s so vital to stay in the moment as much as possible. You’re only going to live each experience once – even if you recreate it, some of the variables will be different! Additionally, you may find that you’ve changed in the meantime and that the experience you had the first time is now entirely different because of an altered perspective. Staying in the moment, focusing on the world around you, what each sense is taking in, is the best way to fully experience the special place you are in. The choices you’ve made about where you’ve traveled, where you’ve stayed, or how much money you’re spending are already done. Don’t waste your time rehashing those same conversations with yourself or your travel partner(s). While a “bad” decision may feel like one in the moment, it’ll add to the story later on and likely lead to a thread of experiences you may not have had with a “good” decision. Hand in hand with this is our next learning: try, try, try, not to regret what you’ve chosen to see or do. The beautiful thing about our world is that each experience has something to make it worthwhile, each place is full of unique, interesting people, and each little moment can turn into something special. Jackson has this philosophy that many people share: everything happens for a reason. He doesn’t just mean the big stuff like getting into college or finding a job, he means the small stuff: the traffic light you hit today, the neighbor you chatted with on your walk, even the fly you had to swat away in the kitchen. These little things can lead to huge, gigantic, amazing moments that you might have missed had you made the light, or not chatted with your neighbor, or spent those few fleeting seconds battling the fly. With this mindset, it means that every experience, even the ones that are maddening or seemingly meaningless in the moment could be setting you on a path to something spectacular. With that, be sure to embrace the unexpected, the challenges, or the momentary regrets, as they’re part of the fabric of your story.
Okay, enough big philosophical opinions, let’s talk about how we traveled and what we learned about our day-to-day well-being. Here, we have a few observations. First, not ‘roughing it’ doesn’t automatically mean that you’re “doing it wrong” or “not immersing yourself”, it’s a matter of what you do outside of your accommodation that defines an adventure like this. There were several times this year that we stayed in nicer-than-average hotels or Airbnbs, but these didn’t always define the destination for us, it was all about what we did when we left those walls, the neighborhoods we visited, the restaurants we ate at, and the people we met along the way. That said, sometimes the accommodation is the destination and it’s okay to soak those moments up too! In Oman, we were lucky enough (through points) to stay at the Ritz-Carlton Al-Bustan Palace, and in Qatar (again with points) we spent a night at the incredible Waldorf-Astoria Doha. In both of these destinations, we spent a lot of time relaxing at the hotel, which was the whole point! We wanted a few days to relax, eat well, and recharge for the rougher days we had coming up. This brings us to our second well-being lesson: listening to our bodies. Especially early on in the trip, we noticed we were feeling out of it at times and quickly realized that we’d been ignoring our bodies. We’d been trying to do too much, fit in too many activities because it already felt like our time was running away from us. We were pushing ourselves too hard to take advantage of every moment in the day, feeling unnecessarily concerned that we were missing an experience if we didn’t make the most of each minute. This behaviour eventually led us to needing entire days off to recharge or to be too tired at the end of day to even see what a new town had to offer. As strange as it is to hear, you can get burned out just from traveling! Once we recognized this behavior, and allowed ourselves to slow our pace down (turning in early when we wanted to, skipping an attraction that we weren’t overly interested in, etc.), we were actually able to see and do more because we were clear-minded and energetic for a new adventure. However, this doesn’t mean you should only stick to what you’re comfortable with, bringing us on to our final learning: get outside of your comfort zone! While listening to your body and traveling comfortably are both great, doing things you’re not used to is one of the best parts about traveling. You’re in a new place, with new activities, foods, and people – get outside and experience it all! We really pushed ourselves to do this, especially in places we realized we might not be coming back to, but it wasn’t always easy. New experiences or foods can be daunting, scary even, but trust us, 99% of the time you’ll only look back and regret the things you didn’t try, not the things you didn’t like!
One last thing we learned about travel is actually something we had a small understanding for beforehand, but really learned to appreciate on this trip - rewards like points and miles can make all the difference. Jackson had already been a bit of a points aficionado for some time before our departure, making sure we had a big points bank saved up before our trip, but on the road they turned out to come in handy more than we ever expected. Not only did our points cover most of our flights, they also allowed us to stay at some truly amazing hotels, eat lots of free meals at the airport or during our stays, and critically took some of the financial strain off of our minds during these thirteen months. Before heading off on a big adventure like ours, we can’t recommend highly enough to start building your own points and miles bank. There are tons of ways to earn these rewards, from airlines, hotel stays, credit card spending, and more which we’ve covered in some of our previous blog posts. You can learn more about our approach to credit card points here, airline points and status here, and how we flew almost all the way around the world without paying for it here. While not everyone needs to accumulate as large a travel bank as we had, anything helps and can make just one flight, night’s accommodation, car rental, or meal much more enjoyable. Honestly, a better bed to sleep in was often enough to turn a difficult day around, and that alone was enough to make the effort worth it.
What We’ve Learned About the World
Not only have we learned about the nuances of travel, but we’ve come out on the other side of this adventure with thoughts about the world and the people we encountered. Of course, we’ve only scratched the surface and may have very different experiences to other travelers, but we’ve encountered such a breadth of cultures and individuals to allow us to draw our own conclusions.
The Far & Familiar
First, the world is smaller than you think. Before going on this trip, we’d already established this, yet the rapid nature of our travels truly contextualized and added color to this phrase. Whilst traveling throughout New Zealand, we repeatedly ran into the same woman, nearly at every stop we made. In Cambodia, we managed to spend time with friends from the UK and Switzerland when we realized we would find ourselves in the same city, at the same time. A similar scenario occurred during our time in Jordan. In Patagonia, we crossed paths multiple times with people who were weaving their way through Tierra del Fuego the same as we were. No matter how far from home, we still found ways to see old friends or run into new ones, often unplanned. This truly became one of the many joys of our trip and always gave us someone to look forward to, no matter if it was an unexpected run in with a familiar face or a slice of home.
Now this is going to sound contradictory, but hear us out! While the world did feel small at times, it also felt unbelievably big. What we mean by that, is that even though we spent 392 days on the road, constantly moving from place to place, we still felt like we were missing so much! Those repeat encounters with people we met along the way were part of what fueled our FOMO (fear of missing out). In the time that our paths separated occasionally, like two diverging rivers, we went on separate journeys to different places, until we finally converged again and caught up on our experiences. Hearing everything we could have experienced created an ache in our chests, a longing for all the adventures we were missing due to our short timeline. We heard stories of horseback riding and yurt dinners in Mongolia, tranquil moments during yoga camp on a remote Malaysian island, and tales of unforgettable views on the Peruvian Huayhuash Circuit. All places we weren’t able to visit. Despite the gentle gnawing, this fernweh for a place unknown, we tucked it away and tried to focus on the incredible experiences we were having. Now, with only a rich archive of experiences left, we are doing our best to separate our longing for adventure into two camps: a yearning to relive the moments of the past 13 months and a hunger for the adventure that is yet to come.
The Beauty of Enough
We have had, and still have, the great privilege of growing up in a bubble, where we have more than we need. We both grew up with endless opportunity, a wealth of experiences and perspectives, the means to buy anything we want or need, and the access to resources unheard of to most - all handed to us on a silver platter. While we were taught to appreciate and acknowledge our privilege, we went through most of life not grasping that many others around the world grow up with next to nothing, and likely have no concept of abundance or the privilege we experience. And so, departing on this adventure also meant that we would have to approach every experience with an open mind, with humility and understanding of our advantage and power. The first few months of our trip didn’t challenge us on these terms, given we were still in developed nations, like Australia, New Zealand, and Japan. Yet when we arrived in Cambodia, we were suddenly confronted with a world so unlike our own. While Cambodia is a rapidly growing country, decades of destructive conflict, civil war, and economic, political, and social instability have contributed to the widespread poverty that still exists in the country, especially amongst rural communities. We felt this through the dirty unpaved streets, the tattered clothing of many on the street, and the homes made of mismatched wooden planks and metal sheets. We encountered signs of poverty throughout our trip - in Lao where children work the fruit stands, in Jakarta where homes are built along the sewage waterways, in Egypt where children as young as four grabbed at our clothes for change, or in Namibia where a father was literally willing to sell his toddler for a few thousand dollars to another traveler…Don’t worry, this offer was thankfully not acknowledged. The stark, brutal reality of how much of the world’s population lives in poverty suddenly became clear, just as our privilege did.
From our exposure to these realities, we learned what it truly means to grow up to white, well-off parents in the United States. We experienced the power of money – understanding how a single dollar can mean barely anything to us, but dinner on the table for someone else. We discovered that yes, we enjoy the luxuries of our lives, but maybe, maybe we don’t need as many things as we think we do. We also learned that by simply looking the way we do, we exude a privilege, a wealth that creates the groundwork for someone’s impression of us. Alongside understanding how we see ourselves and how the world sees us, we discovered how others, who aren’t as lucky as we are, experience the world. Despite the hardships the people we encountered face, we were surprised to find that people all around the world are still happy, and perhaps, happier than people back home. The children running after our tuctucs in Cambodia wearing tattered clothing, but beaming from ear-to-ear as we waved or yelled, “hello!”. A young woman sharing her meal with the loyal stray that appreciates the daily sacrifice she makes. An elderly man walking the streets of Al Aqaletah, quietly greeting us on his nightly route to manually turn on the street lights, a gentle smile on his lips as he proudly does the job that his community relies on. The people we encountered on our trip taught us an important lesson, one we will cherish for the rest of our days: joy lives in the little things. While ‘the little things’ can mean something different depending on the person, it’s appreciating what you have and knowing that things could be worse. Maybe it’s relishing a moment of sunshine on a gloomy day, sharing some kind words with a stranger, or simply appreciating that you’re alive, but it truly is the things we can’t buy that make life worth living.
In a similar vein, we discovered that for many people around the world, it’s their sense of purpose that brings them joy and satisfaction in life. I don’t mean being on the board of directors for three different companies, being your own CEO, or investing in start-ups. I mean knowing that you make a damn good cup of coffee for your customers every morning, feeling like you’ve raised a good kid, or noticing that someone looks up to you. Sure, the business-guru thing could also bring you joy, but for the people we met around the world, it was simpler than that. Japanese culture left a particularly big impression on us with their culture of kaizen, a philosophy that emphasizes continuous improvement and a commitment to refining processes and skills, no matter how small the skill. It's not about achieving perfection in a single step, but rather about ongoing optimization and striving for excellence - finding and growing towards your chosen purpose. From the conductors on the Shinkansen who quietly perform a series of hand signals at every station, to the baristas who examine each cup of coffee with intense focus, to the skilled workers that have perfected mochitsuki, the generationally-ingrained pounding of mochi dough at breakneck speed. Other cultures we encountered also find great pride in perfecting a craft - in Thailand it’s the fierce, young muay thai fighters, in Tanzania it’s the teachers that would do anything for their kids, in Jordan it’s the nomadic tribes that herd their sheep atop Petra, and in Peru it’s the Andean women proudly weave the patterns of their ancestors. In the wise words of Mr. Keating –
“[..] the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, ‘O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless... of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life?’ Answer. That you are here - that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.”
The verse we contribute reveals itself in how we feel we can make an impact, or make a difference no matter how small. That is how joy becomes purpose, purpose becomes joy.
Kindness Goes A Long Way
Whether you’re on a year-long trip, visiting for a little while, or simply passing through, it’s important to remember to treat people with kindness and respect. In being removed from what we know as “home” for months on end, we fell into our role as visitors, global guests of the world and all its cultures. What does that mean exactly? It means that we approached every space, no matter if it was someone's house, a religious site, a park, or a restaurant, as if we were guests in a friend’s home. We addressed people with respect, spoke softly, and made sure to ask questions on proper etiquette if we were unsure. As someone entering a new culture, we felt it was our responsibility to be adaptive to how people live in their own country, to mirror their behavior or otherwise remain a neutral traveler. Much to our annoyance, other travelers did not share this perspective. Some people were loud, boisterous, and refused to adhere to local customs or rules, which beckoned the looks of others, outing them as imposters. While some locals are accustomed to this behavior, we, as visitors, absolutely do not have to lean into our stereotypes and can instead, opt to positively surprise them. Simple actions that demonstrate respect or words of kindness, even a simple smile, can go a long way in creating a more enjoyable experience for yourself and those around you. It’s a fool-proof way to be welcomed back again.
What We’ve Learned About Ourselves
I, Sarah, have discovered an array of things about myself - some positive, others more of a struggle. Even before the trip, I knew I would face the difficulty of travelling with fewer clothes, crazy sleep schedules and travel itineraries, the fear of the unknown, and the learning curve that comes with experiencing new cultures. That said, I definitely didn’t expect to face these challenges with such intensity! As soon as we were on the road, I noticed my difficulty in bouncing back from a tough travel day - the immense sleepiness, drained battery, and lack of willingness to immediately hit the ground running in a new place. While this was more intense than expected, I began to make adjustments to how I approached travel itself and the recovery that followed. Instead of spending time on planes, trains, and automobiles working on our blog or content for social media, I opted to rest and watch movies instead. This might have led to some delayed posts (oops), but allowed me to spend my energy entirely on getting from place to place. In terms of recovery, I made a point of taking a breath to settle into a new time zone or rhythm by carving out moments to listen to music, take a nap, or simply watch the world go by from a cafe. These simple tweaks to our schedule allowed both of us to feel most rested and actually led to some of our favorite memories of in each destination - the first taste of pão de queijo in a cafe in São Paulo after one of our worst travel days, a delightful rainy-day nap upon arrival on the Kilimanjaro Coffee Farm, and a comforting afternoon at the hotel in Seoul after hearing of my grandmother’s passing.
Both of my grandmothers passed within a month of each other, as if they had a silent agreement they would leave this world hand in hand. Jackson’s grandmother also passed while we were on our trip, making 2024 one of the most difficult, heart wrenching years of our lives so far. Losing someone you love is hard enough, but imagine being worlds away from most of your support system, without the ability to give them a hug when you (and they) need it most. The distance not only made grieving difficult, but it threw a wrench in how we processed our pain and loss. To this day, it doesn’t feel real that both of my Omis are gone, that they won’t be waiting for me when I return to northern Germany. Omi Maria won’t open the door, slipper shuffles announcing her arrival, ready to offer me a delicate cup of coffee and Lindt chocolate. Omi Almuth, while her health had already rapidly declined before we left, won’t be waiting for me to bring her Sahnetorte and grapes. Similarly, Jackson’s Grandma Starr won’t be there to greet us with a to-do list and a warm hug. While we tried to prepare for the worst before leaving, we truly didn’t anticipate it would be even worse. Little did we know that we would find it so difficult to come to terms with the reality of their deaths and that our families would find quicker ways to cope, naturally by being thrown into the turmoil of dealing with funeral arrangements or what they left behind. We were left on the other side of the globe, unable to grasp that some of our favorite people would never see us get married, never hold our hands in theirs, or send us another birthday card again. We were left feeling the guilt of having left them behind for our own adventure. As time passed, we began to think that, perhaps, it was better to have kept them in our memories as we last saw them, rather than to have witnessed the pain of their final moments. We realized our grannies were rooting for us from the moment we left - living our adventures with us through photos, videos, and calls - and that they were doing just the same from somewhere beyond the ether.
Okay, let’s take a breather from all-things emotional and existential. What have I, Jackson, learned about myself while traveling the world? The first thing I noticed, especially once we picked up our pace moving through new cultures, is that we’re far more adaptable than we realized, but perhaps that was only as a result of this trip. In southeast Asia or sub-Saharan Africa, we were often only spending a few days to a week in each country, having to learn new customs and norms each time we crossed a border. That’s not even to mention the plethora of new languages we would hear and new people we would meet in just one month. Surprisingly, each time we moved on, we were able to adapt to our new surroundings in a heartbeat. Growing up in America, a hugely vast country with just one dominant language and culture, I would have expected to need more time to adapt, but I found that the human mind is shockingly adept at picking up new things. We would quickly learn some helpful phrases like ‘hello’, ‘please’, or ‘thank you’, retain them while we were there, and then promptly forget them as soon as we moved on to the next locale. While it’s a shame we didn’t remember all of these phrases over the long-term, it affirmed to us how impressive the human mind and short-term memory is. To be able to feel comfortable in new surroundings in just a few hours doesn’t sound right, but somehow our bodies adapted to it and moved on. Now, that’s not to say that everyone on this planet is as adaptable as we turned out to be, leading into my second learning about myself: I have less and less empathy by the day for ignorant people. Let me be clear, there are lots of ignorant people in this world, and while I do mean I have less empathy and patience for them overall, I am speaking here about a few specific groups. The first group of ignorami I learned to loathe, are people who don’t know what they’re doing at an airport or a border. Yes, I get it, some people haven’t traveled at all or much, but c’mon it’s tough to ignore the grumpy TSA agent, yelling at you to take off your shoes, remove your laptop from your bag, or that it’s one at a time up to the immigration counters. And yet, these people closely resemble the sloth from Zootopia when they unzip their bag in slow motion or are shocked to find out that you can’t, in fact, pack a jumbo shampoo bottle in your carry-on. More than a couple of times this year, there were some choice words muttered under my breath towards this group of dimwits. The second group of thick-skulled travelers I had no patience for was: Americans. I hear you already saying it, “But Jackson, YOU’RE American!” I know, I know, but the Americans I speak of, are the ones who travel to Peru or Indonesia and only eat at McDonalds, the ones who think they own every room they walk into, and who insist that speaking louder and slower will definitely bridge a language barrier. While plenty of nations send their most entitled travelevers out into the world, my US passport made me cringe at each of my compatriots who had never stepped off the farm before. The final cohort of idol tourists I developed an antipathy for on our trip were “tour-bus tourists”. I know, I’m really starting to sound like an entitled prick here, but hear me out on this. I believe there is almost always a better way to travel to a new place than to take an isolated, pre-planned trip with a bunch of other people from your home country. Traveling like this doesn’t push you out of your comfort zone, doesn’t allow you to meet locals, and doesn’t let you go down any off-beat paths, leading to hidden gems. I concede, it is the right choice for a small minority of travelers who have no other way of seeing a new place because of their age or disability, but please, I’m begging you, if you can, get out and go somewhere yourself! I’ve never gotten off a loud, stuffy tour bus thinking “ah yes, this is what travel is all about!”
One thing we were fortunate enough to do on this trip was sharing it all with our family and friends, in almost real time, through our social media accounts and this blog. It was amazing knowing that people back home could experience some of what we were seeing with us, and take a small part of our adventure home for themselves. That said, we didn’t quite understand how much time those two channels would take up and the level of focus and effort required to pull them off well. At times, keeping up this blog and sharing content to our social media felt like we were missing out on the moment, not truly experiencing each place as fully as we could. We’ve asked ourselves a few times: if we were to start again, would we keep our blog or socials up? It’s a difficult question to answer and one that we tried to learn to strike a balance on. While we loved sharing as much as we could, ultimately this trip was for us – we were the ones taking the leap and leaving it all behind, so we needed to stay in the moment as much as we could. So, if we were to do it all again, we probably would have scaled it back, made these posts shorter, focused on the trip reports, and maybe posted to our socials only every few days, rather than trying to document each amazing moment. The strangest side effect of our endeavour to share this adventure, was that it almost seemed to work too well. Thanks to our blog and social media, most of our friends and family were up to date on our travels when we got back. As a result, people felt unphased by our experiences by the end of our trip. They didn’t seem to have many questions for us because they were part of the experience. While it’s good to know we did a good job of documenting everything, the lack of questions almost makes it feel like the trip didn't’ happen at all. A blip in the timeline, a fever dream. We expected to be talking about this adventure at dinner parties and with family for months, but the questions we expected never came. At first we were a little saddened by this – we were just so excited to talk about it all! Maybe we needed the questions to process it all. Maybe it would have made processing it harder and our return to reality all the more difficult. We’ll never know. One way or another, our loved ones were along for the ride, witnessing the ups and downs of every destination. No matter the challenges of running online channels or realizing that everyone was updated, we knew we had them with us with every step of the journey.
Having returned from our trip, we were immediately thrown into the tumultuous waves of what we were dreading for months: reality. The reality of finding a job, getting back to work, looking for a place to live, moving, buying new furniture, finding new hobbies, and simply being a regular human being. We fully expected to slow down, to sit with our experiences, especially in the sudden contrast to our last year. Yet somehow…that didn’t happen? Instead, our focus was taken away from processing our incredible, life-changing experience and shifted to the mundane, which oddly has been taking up an incredible amount of time! While we haven’t hit a wall of emotion, broken down over something simple, or felt an existential crisis brooding in the back of our mind, there have been quiet, unexpected moments when our emotions bubble up. When Sarah visited her parents in Switzerland directly after our trip and was watching a documentary about Patagonia with her dad, she suddenly felt fat tears running down her face during a segment of aerial shots of Tierra del Fuego. As if a switch had gone off, she encountered a wave of joy, gratitude, and nostalgia for the places on the screen that she had experienced herself not long before. While Jackson hasn’t had quite the same kind of response, he has encountered moments during the day when the humdrum of work suddenly feels empty, pointless. He suddenly feels a drop in motivation, like the silly spreadsheet numbers mean nothing at all unless they represent the budget sheet of a new travel destination. Processing everything we felt, saw, tasted, and learned will take time. It will take patience and will not happen all at once. Digesting this life-changing trip can’t be forced and may take a lifetime, but we’ll revel in the moments in which we get to relive it and count ourselves lucky to have taken the leap of faith when we did.
Jackson has already talked a little bit about this before, but another change we noticed within ourselves was our new perspective on where we’ve come from. Not just the countries we’ve grown up and matured in, but also the cultures we were a part of while we were there. While traveling abroad, we started to feel differently when telling people we were American or German, this got especially worse after the US presidential election. We just felt like saying where we were from didn’t do enough to explain who we were, what we believed in, or how we saw the world. This feeling continued when we returned to the US in early 2025. When we “came home” to Arizona, we found it has been difficult to find people who understand our experience or our world view. We’ve seen and done so many things that most people we talk to aren’t even aware of, not because they're ignorant or dumb, but because they don’t have the means to travel, or simply stick to the safe, or expected destinations. That can make keeping existing friendships strong difficult and developing new ones even harder. It can take some time to adjust back into the “normal flow” of life, but that’s okay. After all, we’ve just experienced over thirty countries in just over a year and that’s not exactly “normal”. Speaking of what’s considered “normal”, going on an adventure like this often has the consequence of making you question if the standard life path is right for you. We all inherently know there’s a lot to see out in this big ol’ blue marble, but after being in the deep end of what it has to offer for 13 months, the scale of just how much there is to see is so much clearer to us now. The typical path – house then dogs, kids, and working until we’re 65 to retire at home – just doesn’t quite feel right anymore. We started to think about how we can keep traveling, what we still want to see before we have kids, where we can take them when they’re little, or how to prioritize such experiences alongside the typical path. To cherish and maintain this perspective on the world, we won’t be waiting for retirement until our next big adventure and kids will certainly be along for the ride!
Snapping back to reality can feel harsh and challenging, something we have now learned first-hand. Despite feeling off-balance in our first few months back in Phoenix, we now know that it’s okay to feel uncertain, fearful, or nervous about the experiences you have left behind, as well as what lies ahead. It’s okay to cope, process, and give yourself grace, to soak up the forgotten luxuries of home, like rediscovering the endless items in your closet, spending too much time at the grocery store, or treating yourself to another pastry of the day. Allow yourself to feel every emotion, to become that familiar version of yourself again,and to appreciate the privileged life you get to live. That said, don’t lose sight of all the things you’ve learned along the way or the people who made an impact on your trip. While we’ve returned to our day-to-day, which now involves cooking meals at home and sitting at our laptops for our 9 to 5s, we will never be the same people that left the US in December of 2023. As we grapple with this evolution of ourselves, we know we have changed for the better. After 13 months on the road, we’ve returned changed – humbled by the strength of those who face hardship with grace, and inspired by the joy they still find in life’s smallest moments. We’ve stood in places so beautiful they almost didn’t feel real, landscapes that will stay etched in us forever. And somewhere between border crossings and long, quiet drives, we learned more about each other than we had in all the years before. Together, we crossed continents, yet the greatest distance we traveled was inward, toward a deeper love, fuller hearts, and a truer sense of what it means to be human.
Final Thoughts
Having said all of this above, we want to take the chance now to acknowledge the massive privilege we had in taking this adventure. The vast majority of people in this world can’t even dream of a trip like this, let alone plan it at our age. We are so grateful for our personal circumstances in life and thankful for all of the people who helped us make these 13 months happen. We could list them here, but we’d have to write up another 400 pages…they know who they are. Thank you for your encouragement, your interest, your love, and unwavering support for making our dream come true - you gave us an unimaginably meaningful gift.
This trip was a once in a lifetime opportunity, and we are so happy that we’ve been able to do it now – before marriage, kids, and a mortgage. We believe that this is the best time to take a trip like ours, before you have major commitments or too many people relying on you to be in one place. In the wise word of Ferris Bueller, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it". We didn’t want to wait too long, for our window of opportunity for this adventure to shut, and so, we embraced the unknown and went for it. If you’re able to do it, expect it to be difficult. There will be challenges and learning curves everywhere, but it’s all worth it in the end. Even when it’s all over, after you think you’ve learned all you can about yourself and your place in the world, you’ll get one last curveball thrown at you when you come home. You’ll learn there’s no easy way to adjust back into everyone else’s day-to-day, no way to remember who you were before. You’ll find ways to distract yourself, to construct a memory of a routine, but something will be brooding on the horizon. Someday, somewhere, you’ll be minding your own business and then, boom!, the fear of missing all the wonderful things the world has to offer will hit you like a freight train. You’ll yearn for what’s just beyond the horizon, hear the friends you met along the way calling out to you, asking you to return to the wild side. You’ll feel that ache, that familiar fernweh, wondering if you should just seize the day and do it all over again.
The thing is, one of these days, you just might.
Sarah’s Top 10
Al Bustan Palace Ritz-Carlton, Muscat, Oman
Palm Bungalows, Hamilton Island, Australia
Amber Hotel, Lombok, Indonesia
The Shilla, Seoul, South Korea
Silverland Ben Thanh, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Mesm, Tokyo, Japan
Kilimanjaro Coffee Lodge, Tanzania
Nyumbani Lodge, Serengeti, Tanzania
The Riverside Hotel, Vang Vieng, Lao
Kilimanjaro Coffee Lodge, Tanzania
Sarah’s Top 10
White Horse Hill, New Zealand
Gillespies Beach, New Zealand
Elephant Sands, Botswana
Spitzkoppe, Namibia
Okavango Delta, Botswana
Fitzgerald Bay, Australia
Seron Campground, Torres del Paine, Chile
Betty’s Beach, Australia
52km Peg, Nullarbor, Australia
Tschaub River Camp, Namibia
Sarah’s Top 10
Trinidad Ritual de Sabores, Mexico City, Mexico
Modena Italian Eatery, Johannesburg, South Africa
Park Street Pasta & Wine, Melbourne, Australia
Happy Mango, Vang Vieng, Laos
Sufra, Amman, Jordan
Kobe Entrecote, Kobe, Japan
Uchan, Seoul, South Korea
Sutorīto Māketto, Lima, Peru
Khufu’s, Cairo, Egypt
The Craypot, Jackson Bay, New Zealand
Sarah's Top 5
Laborum, El Chalten, Argentina
Lost City Pizza Society, Siem Reap, Cambodia
Savoy Tomato & Cheese, Tokyo, Japan
La Pizza Napoletana Regalo, Osaka, Japan
Pachi Pizza & Pasta, Aqaba, Jordan
Sarah's Top 10
Boulangerie Django, Tokyo, Japan
Alveoli Bakeri, Puerto Natales, Chile
Cercania Pan y Cafe, Cusco, Peru
Austro Bakery, Melbourne, Australia
El Pan de la Chola, Lima, Peru
Konnichipan Bakery, Bangkok
Mary Street Bakery, Perth, Australia
Brother Buba Budan, Melbourne, Australia
Federación, Montevideo, Uruguay
LIT Bakery, Jakarta, Indonesia
Sarah’s Top 10
COFFEEMAN good, Aomori, Japan
Cubed Espresso Bar, Tasman Peninsula, Tasmania
Rabica Cafe, Vang Vieng, Laos
The Workshop, Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam
Gun Cotton Coffee, Yandina, QLD, Australia
Cafe La Farmacia, Montevideo, Uruguay
Bush Radio, Kuta, Indonesia
Xipiri Ground, Cusco, Peru
Kawon Once Upon A Time, Madaba, Jordan
The Mist, Sapa, Vietnam
Our Favorites
HOTELS
Jackson’s Top 10
Al Bustan Palace Ritz-Carlton, Muscat, Oman
The Shilla, Seoul, South Korea
Mesm, Tokyo, Japan
Waldorf Astoria, Doha, Qatar
Palm Bungalows, Hamilton Island, Australia
Kilimanjaro Coffee Lodge, Tanzania
Amber Hotel, Lombok, Indonesia
Nyumbani Lodge, Serengeti, Tanzania
Silverland Ben Thanh, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Grand Hyatt, Tokyo, Japan
CAMPSITES
Jackson’s Top 10
White Horse Hill, New Zealand
Gillespie’s Beach, New Zealand
Elephant Sands, Botswana
52km Peg, Nullarbor, Australia
Spitzkoppe, Namibia
Betty’s Beach, Australia
Fitzgerald Bay, Australia
Okavango Delta, Botswana
Tschaub River Camp, Namibia
Seron Campground, Torres del Paine, Chile
MEALS
Jackson’s Top 10
Sushi Gonpachi, Tokyo, Japan
Trinidad Ritual de Sabores, Mexico City, Mexico
Park Street Pasta & Wine, Melbourne, Australia
Tempura Dining ITOI, Tokyo, Japan
Kobe Entrecote, Kobe, Japan
Modena Italian Eatery, Johannesburg, South Africa
Sutorīto Māketto, Lima, Peru
Jacinto, Montevideo, Uruguay
Sufra, Amman, Jordan
Roobaru, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
PIZZA
Jackson’s Top 5
Laborum, El Chalten, Argentina
Savoy Tomato & Cheese, Tokyo, Japan
La Pizza Napoletana Regalo, Osaka, Japan
Lost City Pizza Society, Siem Reap, Cambodia
Pachi Pizza & Pasta, Aqaba, Jordan
BAKERIES
Jackson’s Top 10
Boulangerie Django, Tokyo, Japan
Cercania Pan y Cafe, Cusco, Peru
Federación, Montevideo, Uruguay
Hirami Pan, Kanazawa, Japan
Austro Bakery, Melbourne, Australia
Lune Croissanterie, Brisbane, Australia
Flaaah the Bakery, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
The Grey, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Galia Bakehouse, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Alveoli Bakery, Puerto Natales, Chile
COFFEE SHOPS
Jackson’s Top 10
COFFEEMAN good, Aomori, Japan
%Arabica, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Bush Radio, Kuta, Indonesia
Kawon Once Upon A Time, Madaba, Jordan
Adventure Cactus Coffee, Puerto Natales, Chile
fog., Sapporo, Japan
Haus Coffee & Bakery, Seoul, South Korea
Oso Cafe, Arequipa, Peru
Cubed Espresso Bar, Tasman Peninsula, Tasmania
The Workshop, Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam