Before hitting the North Pole

My final plane home

8:10am. Gentle waves meeting the shore set a rhythmic ambience to the room. A cruise ship sounding its horn complements the coastal soundscape. The horn becomes more frequent. Faster it echoes, bringing a sense of urgency. It becomes louder. Louder still. The waves are gone, the horn is morphing into a buzzer. It has become a nightmare. Oh, no, its just my alarm. The last morning-alarm that I will be hearing on a different continent for some time.

Yep that’s it, the end date of my trip has arrived. I’m currently getting a little sauced somewhere over the North Pole and so many people are sleeping through this free booze train plane, while I’m taking advantage while I can. I even see Santa boozing down below. So I thought it would be a good time to write a post.

I didn’t know what to expect before venturing on this trip. That’s not totally true, I had expectations but the majority of them were proven wrong which I’m stoked on. I overuse strong descriptor words as well as its hard to put it into a sentence how much I enjoyed this trip, but I’ll try. At first I didn’t really see how travelling/backpacking could be addicting, I was enjoying it at first, no doubt, but after a bit it really clicked with me. Its like the lifestyle of post-secondary but on the road. You are constantly meeting new people, are always doing something new and gaining (I think anyway) a bit of an education along the way.

Near the start of the trip I came to the conclusion that for me I can really see amazing sights: landscapes, buildings, cities, museums, etc. But its the people you meet that really makes the trip. I never got tired of hearing about people’s stories, what their goals are, their passions, their fears, their reasons for traveling — quite the opposite actually, I would really look forward to them. Its talking about me that I would want to quickly get through. I know that’s a shock that me, a perfect and humble man would get tired of hearing awe and admiration over myself but no its true, I did.

Things I’d recommend:

Go out on the first night when you arrive at a hostel. Best way to meet people and have some good stories for the next day. You can sleep when you’re on the road or during official siesta time (highly recommended)

Put yourself out there. Do it.

Try not to beat yourself up when you’re overtired, stressed and went on the wrong bus to who knows where. Its all part of the adventure.

Over-budget for the trip. I’m normally pretty frugal and save lots at home *cough*cheapass blame the Scottish genes*cough* but you’ll have less worries if you can treat yourself more often.

Write a journal or at least do what I did which was half a dozen point notes on what I did, where, who, food, etc.

If tired of taking pics/video, continue to take pics/video. A shitty shot of something is better than an imaginary amazing shot of something. Hot damn I’m deep.

Pack light. I JUST barely had to use my small day pack as checked luggage along with my big pack.

Things I wouldve done differently:

Write a less shitty blog. Haah! I think its lack of redeeming qualities makes it charming.

Only pack one pair of grandpa pants. These non-wrinkle, non-stain slacks are comfortable but paired with sneakers they make me feel like that weird kid on the playground that would just run around by himself, longing for friendship and acceptance but only receiving glares and cringes. Please someone play with me..
Oh uh, and replace one with another pair of jeans. I picked another pair up a couple days ago and I feel normal again. But oh sweet goodness my backpack is full.

Brought a low profile decent looking shoe. Depending on space this was a hard one to cut out.

And for next time:

Stay longer in some places. I felt like this is a common trend among friends and people I’ve met, for the first big trip to do a whirlwind tour (which I’m very happy I did) and next time I will spend more time in less places. I loved learning phrases in different languages especially since I was in the slavic speaking Balkans for so long, that I would love to do even longer in a single country and learn a bit more!

So where’s next? Maybe UK and Baltics or just the Baltics – Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania? Or maybe Baltics and Scandivialand? Somewhere around there is what I’m feeling. But that may change, it’ll be a while before I hit the skies again. At leeeast until January 1. 😉

I plan to post photos and more indepth advice on cities/countries for those that are interested in visiting the same places in the coming weeks, since I find some online resources completely false, like the language guides especially. Made me look a fool a couple of times. Which isn’t too different from normally, but if I can avoid it I try to.

I hope this blog was mildly interesting over the last couple months, it was a good basket for me to throw in a shallow overview of what I did in a place pretty easily so I can look at it later, and if it entertained then all the better. I’m excited to look through all of my photos from my camera, its been a while since I’ve seen some of them.

A video dripping in Rocky-esque montage inspiration will come shortly as well. Back home tonight on Friday (double party night!?) and then back into the swing of things on Monday which I’m excited for!

May the road always rise to meet you fellow travellers and friends 🙂 its been a fun few months.