Why we traveled around the world

A lot of people have asked us why we traveled so extensively and for such a long time - 'cause lemme tell ya, this shiznit ain't cheap! I’m here to tell ya.

It took us almost 5 years to work up the guts, and line-up everything, to be able to takeoff. Truth be told, we were bitten by the travel bug early but settled into corporate life mostly because we had to - but not unhappily mind you. We both paid for our education at universities in the US, and those student loans can cost a pretty penny. Once we were done paying loans we continued adulting and acquiring the things people our age were getting - a home, 2 cars, and little luxuries here and there. Except for a yearning that our vacations would juuuust be a little longer (2 weeks/year not very much when you want to travel far) we were quite happy.

Enters Wilma - Fermin and I dragonboated ( a paddling sport). We were active in that community since before we got married; they are literally, our second family. As with any volunteer sport people come and go, and one of these people was Wilma; except, she didn't come and go like everyone else.

Wilma was infectious in her energy and love of life. We always attributed that zest to having had a close brush with death in her early 20s. You see, Wilma was a cancer survivor. When we met her, her cancer was in remission and as far as remissions go, we understood it was strongly remiss. We paddled with her for a couple of years but she had to move too far to make our practices, so she started to paddle with another team. We'd see her at racing events and catch up a few times a year. She got married and then the unimaginable happened - she got pregnant! Doctors had said she wouldn't be able to have children so we were all overjoyed. At her baby shower we played the guess-the-poop game; guess the belly’s girth-in-toilet-paper-squares length and took a stab at guessing the baby's name. On that note, why are all baby shower games guessing games? I digress...

Shortly after the baby was born the cancer came back. We couldn't believe it but, she'd beat cancer once, so we all hoped she'd beat it again. She didn't. It was fast.

The same year Wilma passed away, we took a trip to the Philippines. On the way home we had a quick stopover in Singapore where we met some German girls in their gap year.  This is a common practice in Europe, where students take a year to just travel around, generally working to help sustain the travel. We joked about how we’d like to do that, imagine us ol' farts! (for the record, we are not that old, we are just not in our early 20s). We decided to travel the world when we retired, why not? After all, we’d have all the time in the world, pun intended.

After the funeral something changed... All of a sudden, it didn't seem so crazy to prioritize this trip.

Initially the idea of putting our life on hold was paralyzing - fear grips you in all the wrong places. Additionally, we liked our jobs; but we also liked this adventure, and its magnitude, a lot! We sat down to break down what made this decision so crippling and realized that our careers could withstand the 12, or 18, months it would take us to complete this adventure. Would it be hard to find a job upon our return? maybe. Might we have to take a pay cut? maybe. Would we regret not having tried? most likely yes.

Planning a trip like this wasn’t always easy. Some days we were less committed than others. However, neither one of us forgot how we felt the day of Wilma’s funeral. We knew this was the right path for us and so 5 years later we left, days before our 10th wedding anniversary. For more info read About Us .

And now you know why we decided to travel around the world.

With much love from our road to yours,

Siori & Fermin