Travel Plans

My upcoming travel plans for 2018… but also a healthy dose of honesty regarding how I’ve been feeling for the past two years.

Dream big, that’s what I like to say! Here’s all of the places I’d love to visit in 2018, from Namibia to Nauru to NYC.

I am all about writing lists. I love making lists of things to do, places to go, books to read, blog posts to write. Whether or not I actually accomplish everything on those lists is another matter all together, but hey, it’s the thought that counts, right? Actually, don’t answer that.

Anyway, last year I wrote a list of my 2016 travel goals. I knew, when writing it, that there was no way I would actually be able to visit every single place on that list, because, as I said then, I’m not a millionaire, and I’m also not a full-time traveller. Although I have spent quite a bit of time on the road, even spending a couple of years travelling continuously, at the moment I am happily based in London and I travel abroad once or twice a month. I did actually accomplish some of the travel goals I had from last year… and so, without further ado, here are my 2017 travel goals.

Because I’ve also been fortunate enough to stay in London a bit longer, I’m seeing this as an opportunity to see more of the UK and of Europe in general. It is incredibly cheap to fly to many European countries from London; with airlines like RyanAir and Easy Jet, it’s possible to fly to some European cities for less money than my weekly Oyster card update to travel around London. I don’t know what the future holds after those couple years in London, so I thought I should take advantage of the proximity to Europe as much as possible in the upcoming year. While I’ve visited a lot of the major cities around the continent, there are a lot of smaller cities and towns I haven’t seen yet. More than that, there are experiences I’d really love to have if I can.

London is a city that gets a bad reputation from time to time. It’s crowded. It’s expensive. It rains a lot. I get it – and sometimes I feel it so strongly, this weight of the city.

But most of the time, nearly all of the time? I love it. It’s a city that speaks to me, that excites me, that motivates me. In London I’ve found a fulfilling career, a lovely flat, and a great group of friends; in London I’ve found a home. Over the past few months, after going through a bit of a period of stress, I have made a conscious effort to enjoy every single day in London, and to fill my time here with as many museums, cafés, parks, shows, and outings with friends as possible. I’ve been very open about my love for London, writing a post about why it deserves all of that love and even why I felt strongly about settling here permanently.

And then something happened: my master’s program finished.

Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia The lovely Oneika the Traveller recently did a post about the 5 places she’s never been to and why she’d like to visit them one day. I thought this was…