Budget travel ramblings for 09/29/10

While I don’t have much time to read these days, it’s fascinating the amount of travel posts, blogs, and information that are out there.  From travel tips to city guides to various perspectives on travel, reading and stumbling through many of these posts gets me thinking.

Granted, it doesn’t take much for me to analyze and reflect in the wee hours of the morning.  Some people are morning people but I do my best writing, thinking, and reflections on life late at night and into the early hours of the morning.  That schedule doesn’t always work well with a family and a job but I’ve come to embrace that this is me.

Forgive my loquacious introduction as I share some of the things that got me thinking this week and my budget travel ramblings on some great travel writing.

Fall colors right outside my door

1.  Photo Essay: Autumn Leaves – As I have talked about before, Fall is my favorite season of the year.  In this post, Andy Hayes paints a beautiful picture of fall, through words and pictures, of the Autumn leaves.  The colors of Fall are a beautiful thing to see and Andy displays the many colors in a fascinating array of photos.

My ramblings - While California isn’t the best state to observe Fall colors or the changing of the seasons, there are a number of great places to get out and see the leaves change.  Every year I see the leaves change and think how beautiful they are.  Yet, I never take the time to take a drive and take a look at them.

This year, I am inspired and I want to see the leaves change.  It’s little things like this that I don’t take the time to do even though I enjoy doing them.  I also love hiking but until a few weeks ago on my hiking trip to Tahoe, it had been a few years since I had gone.  Why do I let myself get so busy or consumed with doing nothing?  Why do I get set in my patterns and find it hard to break out at times?  Life is meant to be enjoyed and if that means taking the time to enjoy the beautiful colors of the Autumn leaves, then so be it.

As long as I don’t have to rake them.

Kids can remind us to stop and smell the roses

2.  7 Life Lessons My 1-Year-Old Taught Me While Backpacking Abroad – Art of Non-Conformity’s Chris Guillebeau shares a story written by Adam Baker about what he learned as he backpacked around the world with his daughter.  While he expected this trip to be difficult at times and to open his young daughter’s eyes to the world around him, it was she who taught him a few lessons about how to live his life.

My ramblings – Adam showed a lot of courage doing what he did with his wife and young daughter.  Anyone with kids knows that babies can be tough.  I can’t imagine what it was like for them during those difficult times on the road.  My first thoughts on this are ones of admiration for the bravery and courage shown to do this.  I am not sure I have the patience for this with kids this young.  However, as I learned on my recent trip to Apple Hill, Adam is right – kids can teach you a lot.

I can identity with Adam on points 1, 5, and 7.  The other 4 I struggle with.  So  many things that we see in life, we take for granted.  However, when your kids are experiencing things for the first time, it can re-awaken your own senses to these simple pleasures, moments, and things that we have gotten used to.

A huge pet peeve of mine is all the stuff parents give their kids to make them happy.  If there is one thing I have learned in my own life and in traveling, it is that simplicity = satisfaction.  If that can apply to us, then it goes to show kids don’t need all the things we give them to make them happy or help them learn.

As for expressing my emotions, I spent much of my life suppressing them and have been catching up recently.  Feelings are never good or bad.  In learning that, it helps me respond to my children’s needs better.  It also helps me realize that people are just different.  It’s ok to express how we feel and to experience the range of emotions in life.  We don’t have to hide it or pretend things are ok when they are not.  We also don’t need to hide our joy when those moments come either.  I have come to learn I am way more emotional and sensitive that I ever thought myself to be.  And that’s ok.

Writing at all hours (Flickr: recoverling)

3.  Preparing for a Writer’s Retreat – On Travel Writer’s Exchange, Prime Sarmiento shares her 5 steps for planning a writer’s retreat so that you can focus on writing and finish your projects.  While at home, so many things can distract us even when we try and set aside that time to write.  Facebook, email, Twitter, friends, family, and life can get in the way.  Sometimes we need to get away to find our focus once again.

My ramblings – Welcome to my life!  I have so many ideas for writing, projects, and things that I want to get done and half of them I don’t get around to doing.  I can’t tell you the number of emails I need to follow up on or how many things I need to write about at the moment (If I owe you an email or post, my apologies).  It is so easy to get distracted.

Twitter, family, websites, email, work, relaxing, college football – all really good things in my life but I seem to jump from one to another and never really focus on doing everything I want.  I really could use a writer’s retreat and understand the need to focus.  As I write this, I decided to convert my blog over so I’ve set up a new domain name on a host and am now trying to re-write the blog to make it look better.

Unfortunately, I don’t have time to do that much less all the other projects I have.  Honestly, I write anywhere from 10 to 15 posts/articles a week.  I manage my blog and travel writing site.  I do the best I can to keep up with travel and friends on Twitter.  I have a number of other ideas I want to tackle and I owe emails and posts to other people.

A retreat would really be nice.  However, this post reminds me how organized and focused I need to be.  It may take me a while to get there but it’s a first step in getting everything I want to do accomplished.

Want me to ramble about you?

Share your posts and favorite stumbles here.  I love reading about all things related to travel.  So the ones that really peak my interest, I will post them and share my thoughts as well.