Europe – nomaderwhere

2020-05-052020-05-05

Global Pandemic as Nomads?

In case you’ve wondered how this pandemic has influenced this nomad family to alter our travel plans and slow down to shelter and rest our bones.

First off, our hearts have gone out to the affected areas – some of which we are lucky enough to have visited. We were in Venice weeks before breakout, traveled through Northern Italy days before breakout and spent considerable time in France and then Spain while watching the confirmed virus counts spread. Seeing the numbers rise and rise and the death count mounting has been horrific. We’ve loved the people we’ve come to know and befriend in these areas that have been hit so hard. Our heart goes out to them and the tragedies they are experiencing. We also honor those serving in the medical field and are grateful for them as well as the other community leaders that are taking things seriously!

As we’ve travelled we’ve had the consistent debate regarding the optimal duration of our stops in any particular place. What is long enough or too long. We’ve done multi-month stays as well as multiple moves in a single month. There is a certain burn out you reach as you are moving over and over. To meet this burnout head one, we’ve been thinking to settle down somewhere for a while. Plus our travel plans always included some longer stops in places that would suit us. There was always a balance to finding places to stay to keep things interesting as well as keeping our own sanity at packing up and moving too much! Combined with coming back to the states this summer for a wedding in the family, we had been planning on heading to Mexico for an extended period – to stay put somewhere for long enough that we could settle in for a few seasons.

But, as you’re aware, we’re in the middle of a global pandemic due to COVID-19. We ended up cutting our travels short. We evacuated Spain to return “home” to shelter in place and wait things out. We have been very sad to leave our scheduled time in Andalusia as well as going through Morocco and then Utah. But we got home to Georgia for a 2 week self-quarantine. Just as we reached the end of self-quarantine, the state of Georgia issued a shelter-in-place order. Anyways, you know the rest of the story because you’ve lived something similar wherever you are in the world.

So rather than just coming to the states to spend the summer, we decided to make a year of it. We’ve now rented a house not far from our old house. We’ll be there for at least a year. We’re diving into the community and even public school! We figure a break from travel and stable place to call home lends itself to the kids getting to revisit school and enjoy the social atmosphere and social education from public school.

We don’t know enough about the world to know what we’ll be able to do next. We may set out again. We may move to Mexico, or anywhere else for that matter. We may enjoy the new slow home rhythm and settle in even longer. Time will tell and we’re open. Even though this shelter-in-place is rough on a nomadic soul and wanderlust. We want to do our part for now to “flatten the curve”. Ultimately, for us, it felt irresponsible and almost pointless to continue our nomad travel during this global pandemic.

We’re looking forward to sitting down a while and patching our bones before we get back to truckin’ on – nomadder what form that takes.

You’re sick of hangin’ around and you’d like to travel
Get tired of travelin’, you want to settle down
I guess they can’t revoke your soul for tryin’
Get out of the door and light out and look all around
Sometimes the light’s all shinin’ on me
Other times, I can barely see
Lately, it occurs to me
What a long, strange trip it’s been
Truckin’, I’m a goin’ home
Whoa, whoa, baby, back where I belong
Back home, sit down and patch my bones
And get back truckin’ on
Truckin’ by Grateful Dead

2019-10-232019-10-23

1066 Reenactment – The Battle of Hastings

We were fortunate enough to have an open weekend for the biggest medieval reenactment in England. The date everyone in history class here learns and remembers is 1066 (while in the states we learn more about 1776). A little refresher: it’s when William, the Duke of Normandy, came to claim his right to the crown from the Anglo-Saxon King Harold Godwinson. King Harold had just claimed the throne after the death of the childless, King Edward the Confessor. Then Harold rushed north to defend the crown from the invading Norwegian King Harald Hardrada (who also thought he was the rightful heir) and defeated the viking army at the Battle of Stamford Bridge. He then immediately rushed south to Hastings to defend against the Norman army, and (spoiler alert) lost his life in the battle. Legend has it he was killed by an arrow to the eye during the battle. The Normans, led by William (now known as William the Conqueror) ruled over the saxon people for half a century, until the next succession crisis known as the Anarchy period. His rule established the feudal system in England and left a permanent mark on the culture and language on England. Things like all the french origin words in the English language are because of this mixing and having the Lords and governing class using french over the peasant class who spoke old english. Words like cow and pig vs beef and pork among others.

The reenactment included a camp for Normans and Anglo-Saxons too, so much hands on learning. Here’s a video put together (see if you can find our cameo appearance) to recap the weekend in Battle!

History is fascinating in that it helps us understand how the world we live in was set up and became to be. Understanding where we came from is a prerequisite to understanding where and who we are.

We are thoroughly enjoying our time in England and learning about the history of the region. We’ve noticed that in our travels we’ve mainly been in the commonwealth and places that at least at one time were part of the British Empire. Australia, New Zealand, Canada and even Fiji and of course the United States. Very interesting to now be in the place that started all the colonization and conquest (for better and worse). Very sad to learn about the cultures and people who were exploited along the way. But, it is uplifting to be in a world that is beginning to value the diversity and cultures that were (and in most cases still are): Aboriginal cultures of Australia, Maori in New Zealand, Native Fijians and other Polynesian cultures along with Native American (Indians) and First Nation peoples of Canada. I know each culture has it’s value and honor as well as its own issues, but I also find that all these so called “barbaric” or “savage” cultures had much meaning and validity – and dare I say more so than the more “powerful” civilized conquerors, especially when considering the values of equality, peace and sustainability.

Very interesting to see the “conquerors” later on in the historical timeline, be the conquered in 1066. What goes around comes around. Hopefully we can move past the conquering and exploiting and more towards a global family of diversity.

Cheering on the underdog Saxons as well as the inevitable champs the Normans. There’s always next year, Saxons!

2019-10-072019-10-23

500 Days as a Nomad Family

It’s been an even 500 days since we became homeless nomads. We sold the house and nearly everything we owned. We left home in the van only to sell the van as we hopped on a plane to Fiji en route to Australia and New Zealand for a string of housesits. We continue our homeschooling with a worldschool mindset and continue working remotely on a distributed team.

The Stats

We do our best to “be here now” and avoid treating travel like a checklist, but here are some stats on our 500 days.

We’ve hit 6 countries (Fiji, Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, Canada, England)
11 housesits (all 5 star reviews from our hosts) for 350 days housesitting
28 short term rent/hotel/airbnb/campsites or other paid accommodations for 120 days
30 days staying with family & friends
Cared for around 145 pets and animals as trusted sitters
- 18 Dogs
- 13 Cats
- 11 Sheep
- 34 Chickens
- 9 Cows
- 16 Birds
- 2 Rabbits
- 1 Turtle
- 5 Fish
- 1 Hamster
- 4 Possums
- 31 Kangaroo (4 infant joeys, 3 toddlers and the rest adults)
Vehicles:
- 10 Rented Cars, Vans or people movers
- 1 purchased (and sold) van in Canada
- 1 purchased minivan in the UK (not sold yet)
22 Airplanes
55430 Miles traveled

Around the same total expenses for the nomad beds & planes & cars vs the same amount of time at home paying the mortgage and bills and usual life expenses. It’s been quite an adventure and incredibly educational for the whole family.

Who knows if we’ll go another 500 days, but no regrets here on where we are now and where we’ve been the past 500 days!