mjp’s Euro16 Intro

January 5, 2016 was the date.  Or approximately I suppose.  That’s when I first read about something that I naively was unaware of: people who take off on journeys with no plans to return.  We’ll call this Limitless Travel.

One permutation of limitless travel is simply to pick and plan a first destination.  Nothing more.  Let’s say that Florence Italy is the first destination.  In the limitless travel scenario, one would order up a flight to Florence Italy, provision for indefinite/long term travel, throw some things together, and march off to the appointed airport.  What happens next is subject to discovery.

Without much hassle, one could stay in Italy for three months.  During that three months the next leg of limitless travel is planned.  If Italy is the place where one wants to live and work forever, then steps are needed to make that happen.  Of course.  But assuming that limitless travel is what was envisioned at first, it’s likely that the traveler would choose another destination.  The people who actually pull this off could be gone for years and years.  This concept is what Patty and I talked about early 2016.

After much discussion and more reading of like-minded articles, what struck us as being a repeated message within those articles was that, at end of day, everyone (or almost everyone) who embarked on limitless travel came home.  The reasoning was fairly intuitive in nature: being away from ‘home’ was being away from home, and, the person who travels to new places all of the time is, well, always ‘a stranger.’  The reality is that foreigners always have a burden on their shoulders regarding cultural acceptance.  It is important to understand the true meaning of being an outsider for years on end.  So for most these long term adventurers they end up coming back to a familiar and accepting surroundings – likely also to be close and accessible to family and other loved ones.  This message resonated with us as well, so lesser options were envisioned and considered.  Then eventually chosen.

We are calling this trip ‘Euro16.’  In spirit of ‘begin in one place, and discover what is next,’ Patty and I have decided to describe each step as it happens.  Overall we will be in Europe for about three and a half months; August through mid-November.  We begin in Copenhagen getting there on a flight which takes off Monday August 1st.  A return flight has not been scheduled.

I am a photographer and look forward to sharing sights and sounds of our experiences.  We plan to cull each day down to one best experience, and a few others.  If you’d like to see what we voted (a vote of 2) as ‘best’, take a look at ‘The Best Thing Today’ tab.  ‘More Wonderful Experiences’ will contain a short list of a few more items.  We’ve promised ourselves to curate these posts down to the minimum.  More photos will be posted online as they are available.  I am capable of taking MANY photos, as most of you know.  So … we will have a very few ‘Favorite Photos’ posted on the blog site.  Then the expanded set can be reviewed over at my photo sharing site.

Nothing here is personal and private.  You may share the blog site with anyone.

We are fully connected during Euro16.  Write or call any time!  Skype if you’d like to see a live face.

Thanks to family and friends who are watching the fort.

Best, Martin