1000 Days of Travel: Reflections

Last Updated on February 22, 2021

10 sets of 100 days. 33 months. 95 days shy of three years. 

1,000 days and we’re still making this life of travel work? We never, ever thought more than a year would be possible. Now we know that not only is it possible to maintain such a lifestyle, but we can do it independently. Thank goodness we didn’t quit way back in 2010, when we had a bit of a crisis. Writing for GlobetrotterGirls was taking up quite a bit of time. We both had freelance work for our employers back in England and this website seemed like a bit of a distraction from the traveling. One of us even considered letting it go entirely. Was our travel blog really that important?

A look back at the first look of Globetrottergirls.com

Well, GlobetrotterGirls.com has since become our passion and our lives. Rather than give it up, we grew this site, and now we have a lot of dedicated readers who read our posts (some are even brave enough to comment – we wish you’d do that more!), use our advice, also share travel tips with us, and follow along with our journey.  Through our website we have been able to meet other like-minded people we could have never met and we have even inspired readers to believe that this kind of freedom, even if just for a few weeks or months, could also be an option for them. Every time we receive emails from readers who tell us how much our site has helped them plan their trip we are glad that we didn’t call it quits. And over time, this blog has become a pretty big income source for us, which is another reason why are happy that we stuck to it, since it allowed us to cut back on those freelance projects we didn’t truly enjoy.

We never could have imagined this kind of connection with people when we set off on 30 April, flying from London to Las Vegas. But that was a long time ago.

1,000 days ago, Rihanna’s Rude Boy was knocked off the charts by Nothin’ on You by B.o.B. and Bruno Mars. Sex and the City 2 and Iron Man 2 were in theaters. The Help and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets Nest were on the New York Times Best Sellers list, and it was still world free of 50 Shades of Gray and The Hunger Games. Adele was still in the studio writing her sophomore album, 21, yet to release the goose bump-inducing ‘Someone Like You’. Smartphones hadn’t taken over the whole world yet, there were no iPads and Instagram was just an idea, yet to be launched.

And 1,000 days ago, Dani and I were completely different people. 

Exploring England before we ever even thought about taking an extended trip.

This much freedom changes you inside. We have traveled to North, Central and now South America, South East Asia, India, Europe, learning lessons and experiencing countless different ways of being human, of viewing the world, of determining what is necessary and what isn’t in life. We have housesat on four continents, allowing us to live as locals and spend time experiencing in an intimate way (we are living in their homes, after all) how people live their lives. Meeting these homeowners and hundreds of others who have taken their lives into their own hands, we now dare to believe we can make our own lives work without sitting at gray desks making phone calls in an open plan office ever again.

In the last one thousand days, we have become self-sufficient, and though we are far from rich, we are also not afraid of seeking out a living doing what we love. In this time, we have become professional bloggers and also became authors, penning our first ever book, Break Free – The Ultimate Guide to Housesitting. A passion project of ours from the start, we want to contribute publicly and thoroughly (hence it being ‘The Ultimate Guide to Housesitting’) to the idea that we are all much more free than we believe.

What happens to your relationship after 1,000 days trapped in small hotel rooms, walking hungrily through cities in search of something to eat, pretty gross sicknesses, cow-rammings and the like?

There is the occasional blow up, as to be expected, but Dani and I are in a better place now than ever before and far better than we could have thought possible. Part of this stems from the fact that we have gotten to know ourselves much better, as constant travel reveals your true nature. Combine that with living the life you really want and there is room for a very happy relationship to blossom.

We are both more excited about travel than ever before, mouths constantly watering at every travel photo of places which still remain on our ever-expanding itinerary. Our wanderlust is currently on overdrive, since after over six months of a lot of long stints in Arizona, Mexico, Costa Rica, Buenos Aires and now Santiago, we are more ready than ever to get traveling: next stop Patagonia…which is exactly where we said we would be writing you from today in our 900 Days Reflections post.

We predicted that we would live in Buenos Aires for a month and then travel down through Patagonia and up through Chile. Instead we extended our stay to six weeks in Buenos Aires and accepted a housesit in Santiago for seven weeks, which has been great for us. After spending days 801-900 living exclusively on the beach in Mexico and then Costa Rica, we concluded we are really city people and getting back to our urban lives has meant jam-packed days of culture, food, street art and sculptures.

Thanks to the free accommodation here in Santiago, our bank accounts are now nicely padded for the very expensive journey through the rest of Chile and Argentina in the month to come, allowing us to work less and travel more. As for our future plans, we expect to be writing you from Bolivia the next time we reflect, having traveled Patagonia to the tip of the continent, flying to Montevideo, Uruguay where we plan to travel for three weeks before heading up to Iguazu Falls, over to Salta, Argentina, then up to Lake Titicaca and four incredible days in the salt flats of Salar de Uyuni. In theory, at Day 1,100, we should be gearing up for our hike up the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu.

But who knows. One of our biggest lessons in the last 1,000 days has been that our plans always change, and that going with the flow brings incredible travel experiences every time.

Can you help?

To bring this to a close, we have a huge favor to ask you. Okay, it’s not huge for you, but it will be for us. Heading into 2013, we want to know two things from you guys. First, what do you enjoy about GlobetrotterGirls.com? In other words, what keeps you coming back for more?

Second, what do you wish we did more of? Do you want more detailed travel information, like city guides, or are there topics you wish we would cover that we don’t? Is there something you think we should do here like write more books, make more videos or podcasts, etc?  If you are a bit comment-shy, no worries, you can email us your ideas to info @ globetrottergirls dot com (or just hit reply if you get this post delivered in your inbox).

To the next 1000 days!

We can’t wait to hear your suggestions and advice for 2013 and the next 1,000 days!

Related posts:

Tops and Flops of 1000 Days of Travel: Days 901-1000 800 days of travel: Reflections on the last 100 days 600 days of travel: Reflections on the last 100 days 900 days of travel: Reflections