It’s mid-May. Wow. We left the US on March 21st so have been homeless and travelling in Europe for 8 weeks or so. It’s hard to fathom how suddenly and completely different our lives have become. In this time, we’ve:
- Been to 8 countries – England, Whales, Portugal, Spain, Italy, France, Monaco, Greece
- Visited dozens of cities
- UK – London, Manchester, York, Chester, Wrexham
- Portugal – Lisbon, Villamora, Faro
- Spain – Sevilla, Rhonda, lots of white hill towns around Rhonda, Marbella, Malaga, Nerja, Almenecar, Madrid, Gerona, Barcelona, L’Ampolla
- Italy – Rome, Bologna, Lucca, Monterosso al Mare plus 2 other Cinque Terre towns, Genoa
- France – Nice, Marseille, Aix-en-Provence, Arles
- Monaco
- Greece – Athens, Delphi, towns in Crete
- Slept in many different beds in many different types of lodging ranging from terrible to decent – nothing amazing and only 2 truly terrible so far (looking at you Chester and Nerja…)
- Packed, unpacked, and repacked all the same stuff MANY times. Kids are getting pretty good at it.
- Figured out how to get laundry done frequently enough to keep us in an acceptable state of hygiene (though we wear basically the same clothes every day)
- Walked a lot! – According to Fitbit, I averaged 14,055 steps and 57 flights of stairs per day (Lisbon really anchored the flights of stairs!)
- Eaten lots of different things… Italy and now Greece are the clear winners on food.
- Taken only 4 flights, but lots of trains, a few rental cars, a bus and even a horse drawn carriage.
- We now spend 70%+ of our waking hours outside vs. probably more like 10% before… weather has a much bigger impact on our lives! In general, this seems much healthier.
It’s a lot! Some reflections:
- We are moving so fast and constantly having to plan what’s next that there is very little down time and not a whole lot of time to just sit and reflect. This is good and bad. We are constantly evolving our approach to make sure that we actually have the time and space to enjoy where we are rather than always working on where we are going next… I suppose that’s how life is in general.
- It’s surprisingly easy and relatively inexpensive to do this… booking.com and AirBnB for lodging plus lots of transportation planning apps make it pretty simple to only book a few days in advance at least this time of year. We do spend more time planning than we’d like, but we are getting quite efficient at it. It’s also quite easy to just show up somewhere and use GoogleMaps + Translate + Trip Advisor, etc to quickly get oriented and explore a new place. There is very little overhead.
- I ran the numbers and for the month of April our total spending while travelling was almost identical to our normal credit card spending back at home – actually ~10% lower. So… that means that what we are doing right now is actually cheaper than our normal life and day to day spending in Bellevue. Once you factor in the facts that we are no longer paying utilities there, are collecting significant rent on our house and no longer pay for a nanny, we are actually saving quite a bit of money by doing this… So, it’s somehow cheaper to drift around some of the most incredible parts of Europe only planning a few days in advance, generally staying in 2+ bedroom apartments and eating in restaurants 2-3x per day than it is to just wake up and go to work in Bellevue… hmmm… Not sure if that tells us that we were wildly overspending on stuff in Bellevue or that Europe is surprisingly cheap, but either way, glad we are here. How can this be? I’m not entirely sure…
- The food is definitely much cheaper in Europe. Restaurants here compare favorably to Met Market groceries (we rarely ate out in Bellevue, but we did order DoorDash at least a few times a week). I’d guess we are spending 30% less on food per week and eating way better.
- We don’t do any online shopping, sorry Amazon – this is probably the biggest difference
- Since we aren’t doing much flying, we aren’t spending very much on transportation. Not a comparison to life in Bellevue, but a big difference from a typical vacation to Europe from the US
- The kids have adapted very quickly to being hobos and are doing great. They will walk through foreign cities pretty much all day and seen to enjoy it. Food is sometimes an issue, but they are starting to try new things (Croissants and seafood remain major barriers). They go stir crazy quickly with down time, but if we keep moving, they seem to do well. After seeing us use a little bit of our (now very poor) Spanish skills in Spain, they have gotten excited about learning Italian and are always excited to spend time on Duolingo.
- Speaking of the kids… we used to spend maybe 1-2 hours with them a day – giving them breakfast and taking them to school and then a little bit of time after we finished work and before they went to bed. A lot of that time was spent focusing on tasks (e.g., breakfast, driving, etc.). Now, we spend all day every day together and during that time are exploring the world and encountering all the challenges, triumphs and frustrations associated with that. It really feels like we are doing it together and that’s pretty great.
- We don’t miss Seattle.
- This isn’t anything like a vacation and some days can be pretty rough. We all go through phases of getting burnt out and needing some down time, but generally it’s good. Being homeless means there is nowhere to go back to, so the only direction is forward – I guess that makes it simpler. This is an incredible adventure, but it will be good to have a home base again.
- We are really enjoying many of the places we are visiting, but, if anything, this travel is making all 4 of us even more excited about living in London. At this stage, we definitely feel like we chose the right place to live.
- Different places have very different vibes to them and we are learning just how much those vibes can impact how we feel. Some generalities:
- Spain – Vibrant, alive, energetic, impressive, proud (except the south coast)
- Rome – Exciting, stylish, full of hidden surprises waiting to be discovered
- Cinque Terra – Once amazing, but long since killed by too many tourists
- Provence area of France – Sad and half dead
- Greece – A bit exotic, very welcoming, fun
We’ve also talked a lot about how much weather and time of year can effect the feel of a place. We sort of knew that your environment effects how you feel, but we’ve felt it to a much greater extent with this kind of travel (getting off the 2 hour train from France to Spain was a night and day different feel – felt SO much better). The lesson here, I think, is that if you don’t like how you feel, try going somewhere else (probably not France).
That’s all for now!