faqs

You have questions. We have answers. 

Who? 
We’re Andrew and Maggie Hall, a software developer and a YA writer originally from Albuquerque, New Mexico. We’ve been married almost four years, and travel as much as we can!

What? 
Six months (to a year?) of travel around the world. 

Where? 
We left home with solid plans to spend a little time in the US, a month in Paris, and end up on a beach in Thailand. From there, we’ll go wherever strikes our fancy. 

When? 
We officially left home on June 24, 2013, and after the first couple months of planned travel, we’re taking it a day at a time until we feel like coming home.

Why? 
…Why not? We love travel, and both of us have done quite a bit of it over the years. Most of our travel, though, has been separate. Now we’re doing it together. 

How? 
No, we’re not filthy rich, and no, we didn’t win the lottery. The simple answer is that 
1. Long-term travel isn’t as expensive as you think. Since we’ll be spending most of our time in inexpensive countries, we’ll actually be *saving* money over living in the USA for that amount of time, even after plane tickets.  
2. We’re working on the road. We’re fortunate to be in a place right now where we can both work from anywhere we have computers, and we’re taking advantage of it. 

A few more of the usual (and unusual) questions people have asked us:

How much stuff are you taking?
We each have a backpack, and we have one messenger bag to carry day-to-day. We’re not taking much. Look out for a post with more specifics soon.

Aren’t you a little old for this? (In other words, shouldn’t you be settling down and buying a house and having babies and generally being adults?)
Yeah, probably. Here’s the thing. Yes, most people do this kind of thing straight out of college, but that wasn’t in the cards for us. And now it is. We have the rest of our lives to be adults, and we subscribe to the philosophy that Tim Ferris explains nicely in The Four-Hour Workweek: don’t defer your life. So many people spend from age 22-62 in jobs they hate in hopes that they'll be able to enjoy life once they retire. What kind of way is that to live? (I know not everyone hates their job—worst case scenario here!) Though we are careful to be realistic (we would never put a trip like this on credit thinking we could pay it back later, for example!), we do spend less time than some people our age doing grown-up things like investing in property, etc. We understand that you're concerned. 

What do your parents think about this?
Our parents are wonderfully supportive. We know they worry about us, and that they miss us when we’re gone, but over the years, they’ve gotten used to us doing weird things, and they seem to have accepted it (especially when we promise them we will eventually settle down and give them grandchildren!). (Hi, guys! :))

Which of you writes the blog?
We both do. We take turns. Or one of us writes a post and the other adds to it. Or whatever. (In all honesty, Andrew will probably do more of the post writing, because if it was left to Maggie, there would only be a post every couple months. Maggie is bad at blogging. But she likes designing blogs, so if you see things changing on the blog all the time, it's because it's fun.)

Will you send me pictures? 
It's your lucky day! This blog will be our go-to place for displaying pictures and telling you guys about our travels. 

2 comments:

  1. Well we have enjoyed your blog. Of course we're your parents (Andrew's at least). Keep the photos and the stories coming.

    ReplyDelete