Itching to travel

For awhile now I’ve been wanting a change. I’ve always had this itch to travel. Through all of the books I read, I get to know different places through the eyes of the heroes and heroines. One of the many reason why I get lost in a book is because of the amazing locations characters are in that are so different than my own. It would be amazing to actually experience these places myself. In fact, I’ve been watching the STARZ TV series, Outlander on Netflix, which is also a historical romance book by Diana Gabaldon. It makes me want to spend some time in Scotland.

Almost a house-sitter

In 2016, I had been thinking about ways I could travel but still work. At one point, I was fairly confident that I was going to become a house-sitter. There are full-time house-sitters all over the world who travel from place to place by staying at other people’s houses to take care of their pets or do other house maintenance type of things while the owners are away from home. The best thing about house-sitting is that you stay at the house rent-free in exchange for doing whatever duties you’re given. I thought that this would be perfect for me because I could travel, not have to pay for lodging, and I can still work since all I need is my computer and an internet connection. One of the downsides of house-sitting is that it looks like it’s fairly competitive. With no prior house-sitting experience. it may be difficult to get my foot in the door. Another downside, for me anyway, is that a lot of people looking for house-sitters are cat owners. Unfortunately, I’m allergic to cats so that narrows down the type of house-sitting jobs I’d be able to take. I would still like to give house-sitting a try sometime. If the opportunity ever arises to house-sit for someone, I just might take it.

An email conversation sparks a new path

I design book covers for author, Paula Kay, and it seemed like every time I communicated with her through email she was always in a different country. I commented one day on how I envied her ability to travel so much. She explained how she was location independent and traveled to a new area every few months. To me, that sounded fantastic and got me thinking that I can do that too. My career choice is perfect for a nomadic lifestyle. I just have to get up and do it. The key is to find places that are not too expensive to live and budget my spending.

After expressing how I wanted to travel, a followup email from Paula went something like this…

Well, I have this place in Puerto Vallarta that I want to sublet. If you’re interested…

I was definitely interested but I did have my reservations. Even though I already had my heart set out on doing so, the idea of actually traveling to a foreign country on my own was a bit daunting. Plus, I took 2 years of Spanish in high school but I’ve forgotten a lot of it. How will I communicate? Paula assuaged my concerns and assured me that Puerto Vallarta is a very tourist-friendly city and many people know English. After discussing this amazing opportunity with my family, I decided to do it and committed to staying 3 months in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.

Puerto Vallarta is just the beginning. I decided that I’m going to try giving the nomadic lifestyle a go. I will go back home to California in November and December because I want to be home for the holidays. If all goes according to plan, 2018 will see me in Phoenix, Manila, Patang, Reno, Victoria, Vancouver, Anchorage and Seattle.

Hello world… here I come.