Random Traveller #18

Posted on 06. Aug, 2010 by Kirsty in Meet A Random Traveller

Welcome to round 18 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 #18

Who are you?
My name is Adam Seper, 32-years-old, and married. I’m not sure what to say my occupation is. I have a degree in Broadcast Journalism, a teacher’s certificate for high school English, a master’s in teaching, yet I do none of those things. I taught high school English (which I actually loved doing and may return to someday) before my wife and I left on our year long RTW late in 2008 (thewanderyear.com was our blog during the trip). I am currently trying to become a travel writer, which is a challenging process which requires lots of patience. My moods and thoughts on whether I am doing the right thing change on a daily basis, sometimes multiple times a day. Today I love my decision.

I currently run www.journeyofatravelwriter.com, which will soon just be my secondary blog where I write more personal things (I’ve been neglecting it over the past month as I’ve been working on the design and content for my other site, the one I’m most excited about, www.worldtravelforcouples.com)

The new site is a work in progress. I have no web design background whatsoever, so designing it seemed like it took forever. But now I’m happy with the look of it, and I’m working on adding content. The only content on there as of right now (August 3) is the About Me and My Travels, 6 Questions about what World Travel for Couples is all About, the South America page, Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, and Chile pages (I should have more up this week-Colombia, then I will start working on the city/activity guides within each country, starting with Peru.

My goal with this site is to provide fun, detailed reviews and information about every single place my wife and I have ever visited. The regions you see at the top will all eventually be filled. That’s what I’ll be focusing my time on in the coming months. I like to describe what you’ll read as a cross between a guidebook and a blog. I’m hoping the information will be more fun and interesting to read than a guidebook, but not as personal as a blog (Not “we did this, we did that”). It’s geared towards couples because that’s how I travel, with my wife, Megan. But there will be plenty of information for any traveler, so even if you’re a solo traveler, there will still be tons for you as well.

I have also written several articles for BootsnAll, and I was a finalist for their their travel writers platform back in May. They just started it again and will be hiring five more writers, and obviously I’m applying again. So hopefully I can get over the hump this time around as I’d LOVE to land that gig. Boots is an awesome site that we used all the time when planning, and everyone I’ve worked with thus far has been great. Getting my foot in the door there would be invaluable to what I’m trying to do.

Adam and Meg outside Cafayate, Argentina

Don’t you have a home to go to?
Yes, we are from St. Louis, right smack in the middle of the US. We were both raised here, and this is where nearly all our family and friends reside. We love it here. This is home. However, something was missing. We liked our lives, we were happy, but there was this unexplainable void. We contemplated moving, but we didn’t think that would do it. Again, we weren’t unhappy with where we were. That’s when Megan came across a blog of a couple who did a year long RTW trip. We were walking our dog one night, and she was telling me about it and said that we should do that. I immediately dismissed her as crazy, as we weren’t rich and didn’t have trust funds, thus making it impossible. She subtly started sending me links to message boards and blogs, and once I found out it was possible for normal, everyday people to take a trip of this magnitude, that was it.

We started planning, saving, got a plan together, and that was that. We never wavered, and it was hands down the best decision of our lives. Now that we have been back for nearly 10 months (UGH!), we are very antsy and trying to plan our next move.

We were lucky enough to live in a house that is a family owned house, so we were living for pretty cheap, and we got a few friends to rent it out while we were gone. We ditched a lot of stuff, but the rest we were able to just move into the basement, so we were really fortunate in those respects. The next time will be more challenging, but that’s OK, we have too much crap anyway.

Hue - Vietnam

Where have you been?
We both got a late start on international travel. I didn’t travel much when I was growing up, just short trips around the region we live in, and that’s it. Megan traveled more than I growing up, but not internationally.

We went to Mexico right out of college, but to a resort town and stayed in a resort, so I’m not sure that even counts. We loved traveling together, and we took road trips all over the US early in our relationship—Maine, New York, Vermont, a trip to the Southwest, New Orleans, Chicago. Megan studied in Madrid for a summer during law school, but I inexplicably didn’t visit. After she graduated from law school, we went to Europe for three weeks and visited Ireland, Amsterdam, Prague, Interlaken, Cinque Terra, and London. We got engaged on that trip, were truly hooked on travel, and within a year of being married, we were planning the RTW.

On that trip we visited 11 countries and nearly 90 cities/towns. We spent about six months in South America (Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, Chile, and Colombia), about 5 weeks in New Zealand in a camper van, 3.5 months in SE Asia (Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia), and 6 weeks in India.

Where are you heading to?
Nothing big planned as of right now. Megan’s back to work as an attorney and I’m trying to get this writing thing off the ground. We talk on a near daily basis about what we’re going to do next, but we just don’t know. We’ll be taking some shorter trips around the US for the time being. We have talked a lot about heading to Turkey and the Middle East on our next big trip, whenever that may be. We have also talked about the possibility of moving somewhere internationally for a while as well, but it would have to be the right situation.

What’s your favorite place so far?
Colombia was our favorite country, with Vietnam a very close second. Both countries are spectacularly beautiful, but the thing that put Colombia over the top was the people. They are the warmest,friendliest I’ve ever met, and their smiles are contagious. It was impossible not to be happy there.

We heard a lot of polarizing views on Vietnam. People either loved it or hated it. We are in the loved it camp. The people were a little rougher around the edges, and it was an intense country, but the energy there was unparalleled. There was just something about it that drew us to it, the intensity, the adventure, the energy, the FOOD, the variety of the landscape. It was just spectacular, and if we would have had more time, we would have gotten another 30 day visa.

Taganga, Colombia

What’s in your bag that you are yet to touch?
You know, packing was something we (mainly I) obsessed about. I’m an organizer, a list maker, and I’m kind of psycho about stuff like that, so I really thought about every single thing we put in our bags.
If I had to pick though, I think our first aid kit was WAY too big. You can buy everything you need anywhere you go, so bringing 50 bandaids was just unnecessary. We also bought ponchos in Peru that we drug around most of South America, while only wearing one time.
I know you didn’t ask this, but while getting our final packing done the morning we left, I impulsively added a pair of jeans that I never once planned on bringing. I wore them more than anything else during our South America and New Zealand leg, then sent them home once we got to SE Asia. Soooo glad I brought them. I know they’re heavy, but that’s what I wear at home when it’s cool out, and the extra weight was well worth it.

Adam.

A big thanks to Adam for agreeing to take part in this. Check him out on Twitter at @aseper

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Tags: Meet a Random Traveller