What it's REALLY like to TRAVEL FULL TIME?
Actually, I thought I would not publish anything this week simply for the reason that all my projects are still ongoing or I didn't finish cutting yet. Also, I need to admit the last few weeks were quite rough personally for me so I thought I would take a small break but then I was thinking I want to show you exactly this. I want to show you the not some nice things of traveling around the difficulties that I have during the travels and also how I live and lastly I want to make a big announcement because in a few weeks I will be homeless and I think I'm the only person ever saying this but I'm super excited Welcome to today's video. My name is George, summer 2021 I decided to change my life and to travel around the world. Experience countries and their nature in the rawest and most authentic way spend time with the locals and learn about their life their way of living their struggles and how they see the world. If you are new to this channel join this community of adventurers and travelers
with this channel, I want to take you every week on a new adventure show your cultures and traditions raw and without any judgment. Right now I am on a mission in the Canary Islands. I want to discover if it's possible to travel these beautiful islands in a raw and authentic way despite the mass-tourism. Last few months I stayed in Madeira in Portugal discovering the unique landscape. And I even learned how to make the national drink Poncha. Right now I'm on a mission in the canary islands I want to discover if it's possible to travel these beautiful islands away from the mass tourism learning about traditions and about the locals the first few weeks I stayed in Fuerteventura before I headed to Tenerife. Not only traveling and discovering the Teide national park. And right now I am in La Gomera the second smallest of the Canarian islands but it is also the greenest. By following my channel you probably know that I had to delay the summit of Mount Teide because of the weather situation and while waiting for better weather I decided to leave Tenerife for now and head to the next island to La Gomera. Which is where I'm right now the first few weeks I spent
in San Sebastian working on some projects and now I'm in a town called Agulo which is actually one of the most beautiful towns in Spain so let me show you around. La Gomera is with its roughly 22.000 inhabitants the third least populated of the Canarian islands. The island is divided into six municipalities and Agulo is the smallest one. Like all Canarian islands La Gomera has a volcanic origin the island is roughly circular and only 22 kilometers in diameter but very mountainous and steeply sloping and rises up to 1487m at the island's highest peak alto de garajonay. The highest mountain is shaped a bit like an orange that has been cut in half
and then split into segments that have left deep ravens or also called barrancos between them. The uppermost slopes of these barrancos are covered by the Laurisilva the Laurel rainforest. The culture and traditions of La Gomera are stunning and rich but about this more in a different video. Agulo is
located on the north coast of the island a small beautiful town in front you have amazing views on the ocean and if the weather allows it you can even see Tenerife and mount Teide. On the backside you can be overwhelmed by views on an impressive cliff. The evenings here I usually spent walking on one of the nearly uncountable hiking trails. Like this one down the cliff of Agulo. Welcome to my apartment! Welcome in Agulo this is where I rented the Airbnb for the last 10 days. It's a beautiful amazing town with a really really nice view. Let me show you the apartment
and this is where all the magic happens this is where I cut all the videos it's amazing I really love this spot you have beautiful view sometimes you even see Tenerife. What are actually the requirements for me for finding Airbnb?Usually, I travel quite on a budget simply for the reason that I have a big project starting in spring where I need to make some investments but I share you later more about this. Right now one thing that I realized is that traveling is only very limited possible because obviously, I have a regular job that pays my bills and Monday to Friday nine to five I need to work for my regular job and in the evening I usually yeah make some workout and then I start editing and cutting my videos. And then basically the adventures so the actual traveling part is only possible on the weekend so Saturday Sunday and right now it always feels a bit like I wait the whole week until I can basically then travel. And in order to compensate this a bit and to allow me to see also during the week some other things I decided to not always stay in the same city - which would be cheaper and more comfortable - but basically to travel around like here in Agulo I stayed now for 10 days and now I'm heading back to San Sebastian because of some projects but basically, I try to have some iteration and then be able to see different towns, different people. With my mission of escaping the
mass tourism, this gives me also the possibility to move to towns that are less touristy. Anyways today is also a big day today I'm moving. I'm already packing so there's a big mess in the house and let me show you also how I travel around. It's quite painful I guess if you watch my loadout video from Teide you can tell that I have a lot of equipment with me and I'm a bit of an equipment junkie. So this minimalism for hiking gear is very difficult for me so I took again way too much. I reduced drastically after my experience in Madeira but still, I took way too many things this is one of the learnings that I have and that I will also need to change for future adventures. I will take only one setup one piece of equipment and so on. Let me show you what I have!
Firstly I have here all my equipment this is my big backpack i think it's 75 liters something like this. Here is all my hiking gear additional hiking clothes then I have here my other backpack here I have almost everything else like some more clothes sports gear inside there is also my regular clothes. I started with seven socks, seven underwear, seven t-shirts so I can live with it one week. I don't have any pullovers or something like this because I use the hiking stuff in the city I also took only one regular trousers because like now I'm using just the hiking trouser and shoe wise I have my running shoes and the hiking boots that's it and now pack my stuff finish the packing and then head out of the apartment I need to leave it at 11 and it's now 10 15. no it's actually 10 50. so I have 10 minutes to finish my packing and then head out of the apartment this is the worst part of all this traveling. Packing! Unpacking!
But I'm already pretty fast I normally can do it in around half an hour which is my record! And this is how it looks this is basically the two backpacks that I use also for regular tours like the big one I will use for the Teide summit and the small one you saw already in all my videos here in the Canaries. Everything packed and time to leave the Airbnb it's getting heavier and heavier I don't know why don't forget the mask! This is what I call the donkey move. Ready to leave the apartment Today is actually quite an unlucky day because the checkout and my previous Airbnb here was at around 11 and the checking of the next place is around four o'clock and in between I need to stay here and the coffee because also, the buses are not that frequent so I need to wait until two o'clock when I can then take the bus from here to san Sebastian the problem is at 2 30 I have a meeting so I need to try to move this meeting somehow so I can catch the bus and continue working in San Sebastian. Normally I try to time it somehow better that I either go
before work or after work because otherwise, I need to move my lunch break always around for traveling going up the elevator ready to check-in it's now six o'clock so I spent another couple of hours in a coffee in San Sebastian and now heading to the apartment finally being able to check-in. Alright fully checked in, arrived in the apartment and I need to say I'm super hyped for it because it has this amazing balcony on top of San Sebastian. Let me show you - whoa there's the beach of and the harbor of San Sebastian and in the back, you have the beautiful and stunning view of La Gomera. Before I tell you exactly the reasons how and why I become
homeless and why I'm excited about it I want to tell you a bit about the downsides of traveling around and my biggest pain points and also I want to share with you quite honestly why I'm having a rough time the last weeks and also how I plan to change this which is actually related to becoming homeless so let me first unpack and then I will share some stories so one thing that I started in the last weeks to do - before I actually lived directly out of the backpacks - now I try to always unload everything put it in the closet to simply have a bit more coziness and also keep better order. I think it improved my life a lot - even though it's a bit more work but now I'm already really fast so I can unpack this in probably 10 to 12 minutes Successfully landed in San Sebastian and made me like home and I also went to the hairdresser today and probably you know it already but I'm really bad with languages in general. Even though I learned Spanish four years in school I know almost nothing anymore so going to the hairdresser is a bit like playing roulette. But it worked out pretty well anyways um I really enjoy being back in San Sebastian I felt a bit in love with this town and i wanted to take now the time to talk with you about what I said at the beginning that I had a bit of a rough time and rough weeks behind me and I want to share this with you. I need to say I'm super thankful that I'm that privileged and that lucky that I can basically, do exactly this just traveling around basically living my dream of seeing new places and learning about new cultures and meeting new people but I also want to be transparent with you and open with you and tell you what is basically the struggles that I have. One of the reasons why I travel is to meet people and that's why I also make these sorts of documentaries and also try to show you the life of certain people because I think doing this kind of traveling you meet super inspiring personalities and yeah super inspiring people and what I need to say despite that sometimes this whole traveling can be really really lonely. Especially because my days are super packed so Monday to Friday
morning to evening I'm basically working for my actual job. In the evening I make maybe a workout but then I continue working and work on the videos cut or edit or even plan some tours and there's not really much time to meet anyone outside of this part of adventures so simply having a glass of wine or maybe work out together with someone, in the evening, is not really possible. And it's one of the things that's I think my biggest struggles that I learned in the last months that I really miss this social interaction. The second thing is what every youtuber needs like the air to breathe is views, subscribers and watch time. I guess everybody who makes youtube was probably also in the trap that he got obsessed with the analytics and the statistics.
To avoid this from the beginning I try to set up sort of goals and approach it more from a long-term plan. So I. have certain goals that I want to achieve and to reach in a certain time frame so the daily statistics are actually not that important but still, I sometimes end up looking too much in the statistics and get really frustrated and also upset by it because I think maybe it should have performed more I think I put a lot of effort into a certain thing and I'm getting upset it's not appreciated and sometimes you think why do I actually doing all this and you go in this endless trap of thinking about this and not really coming out of this. A few years ago as a result from a small burnout from work, I started to have issues with anxiety nowadays I can perfectly live with it. Because I understand a bit better my body and also how to take care of my mental health. But one important thing that I learned from that was that if I am passionate about something I can put endless energy in it. All this traveling and also producing videos for you guys I can put endless energy in I can sit the whole night making a perfect video making the the small parts even more perfect but if it's about my regular job what I learned is that it drains me a lot doing the work I feel sort of artificial, fake maybe even trapped. It's difficult to describe but
despite the fact that I'm not passionate about this work is that it really frustrates me that I have this block of Monday to Friday nine to five where I'm busy and not able to travel because I need an apartment, I need internet, I need to be available. I need to be present and of course also need to do good work. Or work as best as I can and then it ends up frustrating me during the day and uh in the evening where I want to do what I'm passionate about it I take sometimes this frustrations from the day job with me. Of course, there are also some other issues and challenges
that you have when you travel full time around and I also want to share those with you. I need to say most of them I expected but what I didn't expect is that it impacts me that much. Especially if you combine it with other frustrations for example the frustration that I have because of YouTube because as I said before you wish a faster growth, you maybe get a bit obsessed with the statistics or also the other frustration that I have because I'm not able to manage the time as I want to because I have this block time from Monday to Friday nine to five where I need to work and if you combine this then these frustrations get even more and some stuff has even more impact on you Some problems can be related or can be traced back to the fact that they can not manage my time for example that I eat a lot of not so healthy food because I don't have the time to cook but of course not everything is related to this there are also general challenges you have. For example
sometimes you end up eating not so healthy food because there's no supermarket in the town that you live or the supermarket is really small and has no other foods than some canned foods Generally, I need to say the comfort is one of the biggest topics and the biggest challenges you have disgusting showers or like a bad bed that impacts your sleep or simply you end up in our apartment that you really really cannot stand but that's the apartment for the next 10 days. And also what is very difficult I guess it's especially here in the Canaries is buying something or ordering things. For example if I need to add some more equipment I either need to travel a lot to find a place where I can for example buy camping gas or I order it. Which ends up taking a lot of time because there's a special tax system and it needs to go through customs. In
general you can expect everything that you do ten times more difficult because you don't understand the system or you don't speak the language. As I said before I expected most of those problems but compared with the other frustrations this stuff weights suddenly way more and then also if you're already frustrated because of other things then the friend that you miss already seems even farther away. Of course, there are also other parts that are sometimes difficult or annoying but for me, those were the biggest pain points and this leads probably to the most pressing question Is it worth it? Obviously, it is a very subjective question so let me answer it from my perspective. To answer this question let's look at why I'm actually traveling. I travel because
of the characters, the personalities, and the faces, I meet along my travels and to discover the world the beautiful parts of it but maybe also the not so beautiful and the darker parts and with this, I get experiences that I will have a lifetime and nobody can actually take it ever away from me and for this I happily exchange my comfort and exchange these memories that I have forever against the king's size bed and exactly this is what I remind myself always if I am in like doubt or if I'm questioning if I do the right thing. Even with all the pain or the problems or the dramas that can occur by traveling around it is worth it for me and I will definitely continue it and the fact that I cannot live from producing content and from making youtube videos I cannot change and I cannot change that I need to have a main income in order to survive what I can change is to gain more independence and to not only travel Saturday and Sunday and this is basically also how I will become homeless. So what are actually the biggest limitations for me. First of all it is that I can only travel during the weekends because I don't have the time during the week and the second limitation is that I need always Airbnb that I rent because I need to be available for meetings, I need to have electricity and internet, so I started to think how can I reduce this and basically start continuous traveling and reduce the Airbnb's first of all the continuous traveling I can achieve if i'm able to have something continuous ongoing. A mission
or something that I also can try to make during the week. Secondly, the Airbnb is easy I can just move into a tent most of the nights. The internet I can have with like mobile internet and the electricity I can have with solar panels but this, of course, requires me to, first of all, make some investments second of all it requires me to be flexible and if I don't have sun I cannot recharge so I need to go to a coffee or something. I want to set challenges for myself and missions and the first mission that I want to set for myself is what I told you already in a previous video I want to climb the highest mountain of every European country from the smallest hill like in the Netherlands i think or Luxembourg is the smallest one with some 100 meters to the highest one in Kazakhstan with 7000 meters. I don't want to just go again in the different countries and maybe explore there a bit. I want to be mobile and be basically independent of everything else and that's why I will move on my bike and we move across europe and combine this bike packing with adventures like hiking kayaking or whatsoever. The peaks of Europe and lastly
I will combine it as well with culture and continue meeting people and also presenting you their life. There's another big limitation and this limitation is money in order for me to move on my bike i need to have a lot of equipment first of all i need a bike second of all i need bags third of all i need solar panels and also sort of a mobile internet and i don't really have the money for this but what i have is something that i actually don't use i have a apartment in lisbon that is empty that i don't use and in order to be able to get all this equipment i decided to get rid of this apartment and then save the money and also use the deposit to buy this gear and this is actually a very very scary thought because it means that i have no home and all the stuff that i have i need to sell starting from a tv up to some training equipment that i have at home to my playstation i will sell everything and also use this money to make these investments and this is the plan i have amazing news because the first problem is solved i got my bike it arrived at the house of my dad a few weeks ago and with this the biggest problem is soft i contacted also my landlord we agreed on the termination date of the apartment and the next steps is now to buy the gear and to get rid of my apartment rid of my stuff that i have in my house and for right now i will stay still a couple of more weeks here in the canary islands and then i will head to lisbon stay there one month get rid of all the stuff get rid of the apartment hand it over in good conditions and then i will head to my dad's house assemble my bike buy the rest of the equipment and then we hit the road first question you might ask now is where are we heading to to be honest i don't know yet i'm currently planning a bit and as i said i want to involve you my community in the process of deciding where we are going and what we are seeing many of you previously suggested we are heading to romania and for this i came up with the idea to follow the Danube river from beginning to end but right now i'm not so excited about this anymore because apparently this trail or this bike trail is very very frequented so i'm thinking about different options what is fixed that we had to all European countries because yeah we need to go to the highest peak in every european country and what we see where we go and how we go i want to decide with all of you together and for this i want to invite you to join me on instagram and let's have the discussion there and one of the ideas that they're currently working on is maybe to follow the iron curtain the old iron curtain and for this heading also to scandinavia then the baltics and then to east europe and in each country not only bike through it and make the highest mountain but also discover the culture and maybe make some other adventures along the way it's a very rough idea so far i also don't want to over plan it i want as i said decide very spontaneous or more or less spontaneous together with you where we are heading to and if you are one of from one of these countries and you want to show me around or invite me or show me something let me know on instagram and i hope you're as excited for me i need to say this is really no joke i'm super nervous because getting rid of the apartment and basically being homeless not having a home is a very scary thought but i'm also super hyped super excited and i can't wait to start this adventure and we will have more untraveled roads to discover i hope you're excited as me and that you will join me for all upcoming adventures and even this was not a normal adventure travel video i still hope it gave you some insights about how that life as a full-time traveler is what are the struggles what are the problems and also i wanted to show you how a regular day in my life looks like how i travel around and share also these parts with you see you next week for a new adventure. Ciao Ciao
2022-02-21 14:32
