Meet a Random Traveller #20

Posted on 20. Aug, 2010 by Kirsty in Meet A Random Traveller

Welcome to round 20 of ‘Meet a Random Traveller’. Once we hit the road this section will be dedicated to the people we meet along the way but, until then, we shall meet some of the guys and gals who have beat us to it and are already out their doing their thing.

Random Traveller #20

Who are you?
We are Dani and Jess, a German-American couple who set off to travel the world in April 2010. We have been on the road now for four months, travelling and working as we go. Jess, a freelance writer, was able to take her work on the road, while Dani is pursuing her dream of becoming a travel photographer after escaping her London cubicle. Although this is our first round-the-world trip, both of us have always been passionate travellers and between us we’ve lived in seven countries -Germany, United States, Spain, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Austria and England.

We have a website – http://globetrottergirls.com – where we bring together travel writing and photography and share our travel stories, advice, and travel-technology and product reviews for our fellow travellers and those interested in travel. We also have a Facebook page and you can find us on Twitter

Globetrottergirls in Garden of Casa Azul

Don’t you have a home to go to?
Actually, this is something we joke about all the time. We don’t have a home to go to. We packed up our London flat where we spent the last three years and have no idea if we will end up back in London or maybe fall in love with a yet-to-be-visited city somewhere along the way.  It’s not unlikely that we might end up running a B&B somewhere in South East Asia or on a beach in Brazil.

Where have you been?
We decided at the outset that we would travel slowly rather than rushing through the typical backpacker trail. This slower pace also helps Jess to work nearly full-time for her clients.  In our four months, we have only been to two countries – 70 days in the U.S. and so far 40 in Mexico. In the States we did two road trips, one up the Pacific Coast Highway from Los Angeles to San Francisco, and one through the wild west of Northern Arizona, broken up by a three-week house and dog sit in Tucson, Arizona. We flew from L.A. to Mexico City, and have been working our way south – Puebla, Oaxaca, the tiny pacific coast beach village of Mazunte to San Cristobal de las Casas, before heading east to the Yucatan to Merida.

Globetrottergirls at the Grand Canyon

Where are you heading to?
After travelling through the Yucatan, will cross over into Belize before heading to Guatemala, where Jess lived for two years (and she’s excited!!). Since we’ve adopted a travel/work lifestyle, we have no rush and no specific time frame for our travels, and will be renting apartments and doing housesits as the opportunity arises, which means we can’t completely control where we will be and when. We know roughly that we will travel all of Central and South America by early 2011, we want to head to Australia and New Zealand after that and finally do some long-term travelling throughout all of Asia.

What’s your favorite place so far?
This is a really hard question, as we have already seen so many incredible places. We officially chose San Francisco as our favorite city in our 100 Days On the Road post (http://globetrottergirls.com/2010/08/tops-and-flops-of-first-100-days/), but since then have also been charmed by San Cristobal de las Casas in Chiapas, Mexico. Also, we have loved all the canyons we have visited, from the obvious Grand Canyon to Antelope Canyon and Canyon de Chelly in Arizona and the river tour through the 1,000m-high walls of Sumidero Canyon in Chiapas.

Rather than having a favourite place, we tend to have favourite moments, like a boat ride on the canals in Xochimilco and watching the Voladores in Parque Chapultapec in Mexico City, going to Lucha Libre in Puebla, or watching the San Diego Padres play.

Jess on the Pyramid of the Moon

What’s in your bag that you are yet to touch?
We’ve been pretty lucky so far with our hostel choices, so we have yet to use our sleeping bags. They are just sheets that you crawl into to avoid the icky hostel beds.  Both of us have over 100 malaria pills that we have yet to take – though this is coming soon.

Our Lonely Planet South America on a Shoestring book – which we can’t wait to use once finish our travels through Central America.

On our road trip through the States we had a rent-a-car the whole time, so we didn’t mind what extra or unnecessary items we had with us. Luckily, right before we headed to Mexico City we met a friend in Las Vegas and gave her an entire sports duffel bag filled with extra clothes and souveniers. After that mini-Spring cleaning, we are travelling with just the basics!

A big thanks to Dani and Jess for agreeing to take part in this. Check them out on Twitter at @travelworklive

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Tags: Meet a Random Traveller