While some people daydream about spending weeks island hopping in the Caribbean, it was definitely not at the top of my list of places to go. I’m not a huge fan of beaches or hot weather. As a full-time budget…

Below, you’ll find a detailed breakdown of how I spent two weeks in French Guyana, Suriname, and Guyana. It is a difficult region to get to with very limited flights departing from South America which is why so few travelers…

My week-long trip through Sicily was as unexpected as many of my other trips. Therefore, I didn’t really have a ton of time to plan what I wanted to do there.  All I knew is that I wanted to see…

Algeria is a country that has been on my wish list for nearly a decade. Years ago, I went through the lists of the top destinations to visit there, diligently marking all the great places that I could see on…

In December of 2023, I was lucky enough to visit Iraq for technically the third time. It was a great experience so I have chronicled where I went and the experiences that I had there. Before I get started on…

After years of wanting to visit Syria, I finally made it happen in October of 2023. This was my fourth attempt at visiting after not being able to in the past due to COVID and visa restrictions. Needless to say,…

Arrival in Ashgabat When you arrive at Ashgabat Airport, you will immediately be given a COVID test which you then pay for. From there, you get on a bus and get driven to the arrivals terminal.  As you walk into…

I have to admit, I had zero expectations about this city. When I was here in 2016 on my way to the Galapagos, I stayed in a weird part of town and was kind of afraid to leave my hotel…

There are tons of articles that show you how to do the Galapagos Islands on a budget and we all know that the sky’s the limit when it comes to luxurious vacations.  On my first trip to the Galapagos in…

Last month, I celebrated my second anniversary of being on the road.  When I left Mexico at the end of February 2021, I had no idea where life would take me. I knew that there were a handful of countries…

Like many people, going to Easter Island was something that I had always dreamed of ever since I first saw a picture of one of their towering stone statues. The remoteness of the island and the mystery of the moai…

Day 1 & 2 – Caracas I arrived in Caracas in the late afternoon on a Saturday. Based on everything that I ever heard about the city, I expected it to be a crime-ridden place where very few people ventured…

For the non-extreme travelers out there, there is one thing that I need to make clear before I go much further.  West Africa is hard. Like really, really hard.  This is probably the one region of the world that many…

Every since I first saw a photo of Timbuktu, I dreamt about seeing one of the fabled mud cities of the Sahara. Although the security situation in Mali hasn’t been particularly great, it is still possible to travel there. I…

While there are some places on my travel bucket list that I have been wanting to visit for years, Socotra was actually a relatively new addition to my wish list. I knew virtually nothing about it until about a year…