49. Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel
Rating: ☆☆☆
Recommended by:
Author: Rolf Potts
Genre: Non-Fiction, Travel
205 pages, published December 24, 2002
Reading Format: Book
Summary
Vagabonding is about taking time off from your normal life, from six weeks to four months to two years, to discover and experience the world on your own terms. In this handbook, veteran travel writer Rolf Potts explains how anyone armed with an independent spirit can achieve the dream of extended overseas travel. Subjects he covers include: determining your destination, paying for your travel time, adjusting to life on the road, working and volunteering overseas, handling travel adversities and re-assimilating back into ordinary life.
Quotes
“The more we associate money with life, the more we convince ourselves that were too poor to buy your freedom.”
“For all the amazing experiences that await you in distant lands, the meaningful part of travel always starts at home, with the personal investment in the wonders to come.”
“Beauty and grace are performed whether or not we sense them. The least we can do is try to be there.” Quoting Annie Dillard in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek.”
“Thus, the question of how and when to start vagabonding is not really a question at all. Vagabonding starts now. Even if the practical reality of travel is still months or years away, vagabonding begins the moment you stop making excuses, start saving money, and begin to look at maps with the narcotic tingle of possibility. From here, the reality of vagabonding comes into sharper focus as you adjust your worldview and begin to embrace the exhilarating uncertainty that true travel promises.”
“The value of your travels does not hinge on how many stamps you have in your passport when you get home — and the slow nuanced experience of a single country is always better than the hurried, superficial experience of forty countries.”
“For first-time vagabonders, this can be one of the hardest travel lessons to grasp, since it will seem that there are so many amazing sights and experiences to squeeze in. You must keep in mind, however, that the whole point of long-term travel is having the time to move deliberately through the world. Vagabonding is about not merely reallotting a portion of your life for travel but rediscovering the entire concept of time. At home, you’re conditioned to get to the point and get things done, to favor goals and efficiency over moment-by-moment distinction. On the road, you learn to improvise your days, take a second look at everything you see, and not obsess over your schedule.”
“In this way, we end up spending (as Thoreau put it) “the best part of one’s life earning money in order to enjoy a questionable liberty during the least valuable part of it.” We’d love to drop all and explore the world outside, we tell ourselves, but the time never seems right. Thus, given an unlimited amount of choices, we make none. Settling into our lives, we get so obsessed with holding on to our domestic certainties that we forget why we desired them in the first place.”
“Money, of course, is still needed to survive, but time is what you need to live. So, save what little money you possess to meet basic survival requirements, but spend your time lavishly in order to create the life values that make the fire worth the candle.”
“The secret of adventure, then, is not to carefully seek it out but to travel in such a way that it finds you. To do this, you first need to overcome the protective habits of home and open yourself up to unpredictability. As you begin to practice this openness, you’ll quickly discover adventure in the simple reality of a world that defies your expectations. More often than not, you’ll discover that “adventure” is a decision after the fact—a way of deciphering an event or an experience that you can’t quite explain.”
“Vagabonding is about using the prosperity and possibility of the information age to increase your personal options instead of your personal possessions.”
“Vagabonding is an attitude—a friendly interest in people, places, and things that makes a person an explorer in the truest, most vivid sense of the word. Vagabonding is not a lifestyle, nor is it a trend. It’s just an uncommon way of looking at life—a value adjustment from which action naturally follows. And, as much as anything, vagabonding is about time—our only real commodity—and how we choose to use it.”
“having an adventure is sometimes just a matter of going out and allowing things to happen in a strange and amazing new environment—not so much a physical challenge as a psychic one.”
My Take
A Vagabond is defined as “a person who wanders from place to place without a home or job.” Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel is all about taking that definition and enhancing it so that long-term travel becomes a spirited adventure. Potts encourages us to both travel extensively and change our attitude while traveling so that it can change both our perspective and our lives. My family and I have always loved traveling, but have been limited (mostly by the school calendar) to short-term trips. Once my husband and I become empty-nesters in 3 ½ years, we are planning to embark on many different travel adventures throughout the world. While it provides some practical information about this type of travel, Vagabonding’s true value is in its inspirational spirit. Reading this book makes you think “why not travel,” rather than focusing on reasons to stay home.
