We arrived uneventfully at the tiny airport in Puerto Natales after 21 hours of travel at approximately 4pm. A short $14 ride from the airport brought us to La Plaza De Armas in the town and we walked to our hostel from there.
Continue reading “Arrival in Puerto Natales”And we’re off…
We are at the airport, and our first flight of three boards in 16 minutes. We got here extra early (which Jess usually hates doing having honed her airport process down to a tight 60 minutes) so we could check our bags. In a strange twist, we each got two free checked bags, but would have had to pay for gate checking if anyone questioned whether our backpacks weighed more than 17.5lbs.
Reason to Go
The news is out that we are leaving our jobs for a year to explore the world together and the response has been overwhelmingly positive. One of Eric’s coworkers told him if anyone tried to talk him out of it, the coworker would punch that person for him. While we don’t think violence is necessary, we appreciate the sentiment. And we don’t think anyone is going to try to talk us out of it. Sure, some people have expressed concern about our safety, our health, and our hygiene, but they aren’t saying, “don’t go”. In fact, many are saying, “I wish I had done that”, which makes us feel even better about this seemingly crazy plan. Continue reading “Reason to Go”
Passport Panic
I had been ignoring a nagging feeling that I should look at my passport to make sure everything was in order. In November, Eric and I visited the Paraguayan embassy in New York to obtain visas and Eric had picked up the newly documented passports three days later. I had no good reason to believe there were any issues; my passport was valid for another four years. Continue reading “Passport Panic”
Preparation Mode
One month before our departure for a year of summer, we are in full preparation mode: packing for the first leg of our trip, gearing up for the bike trip, setting aside clothes for a friend’s wedding and figuring out what is left to put in storage.
Preparation takes many forms beyond packing. On Saturday, we conducted an experiment to find out whether Eric was allergic to the Acetazolamide we were prescribed to prevent or reduce symptoms of altitude sickness. Eric recalled having an anaphylactic reaction to a sulfa drug when he was an infant and has avoided sulfa drugs ever since. The doctor at his travel clinic said, “Acetazolamide isn’t really a sulfa drug. It only has one sulfa ring.” We, of course, have no idea how many sulfa rings are important for an allergic reaction, but she suggested he take two doses in Boston where we would be close to medical care if something went wrong. Apparently, altitude sickness is concerning enough that this experiment is a reasonable idea. Continue reading “Preparation Mode”
WWOOFing
WWOOF stands for Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms. We will be volunteering on farms in exchange for room and board along the way to keep our costs low and experience more of the local culture as we travel.
La Gran Aventura
We realize we haven’t said much about our upcoming adventure, despite our departure date being just over one month away. While we do not want to plot out every place we will be and when we will be there, we do have some broad outlines for our year:
Phase 1: South America – January – May
Phase 2: Biking Maine to Minnesota – June – August
Phase 3: Asia & Australasia – August – December
After this adventure, the only continent we won’t have been to is Antarctica – we’re thinking we’ll save that for a future trip.
We are plotting and planning most for Phase 1 right now, obtaining visas and vaccines and figuring out where we really want to go. South America is a big place and five months is a long time, but also not that long at the same time.
Here We Come A-Wassailing
We did it! Eric and I went to Probate and Family Court and became Wassails. The process was confusing from the moment we walked into the building and realized we had no idea where courtroom 4 was. After asking at the Family Law Information Center, we found courtroom 4 on the fourth floor. When we entered the courtroom, the judge was hearing a case about a woman from Colombia who wanted an annulment. After taking a seat briefly, we realized we needed to check in with the clerk who promptly sent us to Probation Intake on the 1st floor for a CORI check – the database of criminal court appearances in Massachusetts. With our paperwork indicating we did not have violent records in hand, we went back up to courtroom 4 and checked back in with the clerk and then sat down to wait. Continue reading “Here We Come A-Wassailing”
Journey to Wassail
Eric suggested it first: “You know, we could create a portmanteau of our last names… Rudicek… Wasaile.” At first, I thought this was a crazy idea. People don’t make up new last names. Can you even do that? Besides, I liked my last name. Yes, it was annoying to have to spell it over and over again and nobody ever pronounced it correctly, but it was mine and people knew how to find me. Did I really need to change it? Why was it the woman who was supposed to take the man’s name again? On the other hand, maybe it would be nice to have a shared family name. Continue reading “Journey to Wassail”
Jejunity
We first stumbled on the word “jejunity” when we were looking for ‘je’ words for our first line of homebrewed beer as JE Cellars. Jejunity, the quality of being generally vapid or uninteresting, unsophisticated, seemed fitting for our first few batches of beer which we brewed from a kit and then from pre-defined recipes we found at the homebrew store.
At first blush, it seems a somewhat less fitting choice for a blog chronicling our travel adventures, but in the year since our first brew, jejunity has taken on new significance. While looking for a title for our wedding crossword puzzle, Jess noticed that “jejunity”, the answer to 41 down, was a contraction of JE June Unity – which is, of course, exactly what happened at the wedding.
We promise we’ll try not to let our blog live up to the original meaning of its name.