Sometime between July and September 2009, Anjel and I are putting all business on hold, selling or storing all our possessions and fleeing the country to travel the globe for a year (*UPDATE*: The departure date has been changed to early August. We’ll be starting the trip with a partial trip across the country: Bonneville Speed Week, Utah, Colorado, Kansas, Chicago). We’re putting out a call to every family member, friend and client that we can think of, looking for help! (For an explanation of what actually lead to this decision, please read our “about us” page)
Our goal is to plan enough of the trip that we don’t show up to a border crossing only to find that we really needed to sign up for a Visa 6 months ago – but besides a rough plan, we are leaving ourselves 100% open to detours and side trips. We’re also planning on signing up for several volunteer opportunities on our trip. Anjel has already lined up a project working with rescue elephants in Thailand for 3 weeks. With any luck with will have one or two more stops along the way.
In order to stretch our travel dollar as far as possible, we’ll be backpacking most of the way, leaning towards budget travel and accommodation (with the occasional splurge). What we’re looking for at this point is… pretty much any help people are able to provide! Places to stay and people to visit are definitely at the top of that list. Whenever possible we’re going to be staying with friends and friends-of-friends to not only save money, but hopefully get a more genuine and immersive experience.
Where are we going?
Our kitchen-sink list of possible destinations is:
- New Zealand
- Australia
- Malaysia
- Philippines
- Vietnam
- Cambodia
- Thailand
- Burma
- India
- Nepal
- Tibet
- China
- South Korea
- Japan
- Mongolia
- Russia
- Czech Republic
- Germany
- Amsterdam
- France
- United Kingdom
- Ireland
- Italy
- Greece
- Turkey
- Tunisia
- Algeria
- Morocco
Some of these are definite stops for us where we may stay for days or weeks, others we may miss or simply travel through. In all likelihood there will be other stops we didn’t plan on. In anycase we would love the following:
Places to stay / People to visit: This is really the biggie for us. We’d like to think that we’re responsible and trustworthy enough to stay in someone’s family vacation home and flexible enough to just crash on someone’s couch for a night. Even if lodging isn’t part of the equation, a friend we might hit it off with or someone you know who’s a great local guide would be just as good. You probably know us well enough to know what kind of guests we’d be (the answer is “great ones”), but incase you wanted to refer us to your own friends or family, we’ll be creating a page with a little about us as potential lodgers (short answer: we’re clean, responsible, happy to help out & anjel loves to cook).
Places to visit: There are a million guide books out there, and we’re doing plenty of research, but any suggestions of secret spots, great tours, epic train rides. etc… are welcome.
Tips: Any lessons you learned the hard way? We’re more than happy to learn from your mistakes. 
Finally, if you do have any suggestions, please send us an email to:
connal {at} adangerousbusiness {dot} com
or
anjel {at} adangerousbusiness {dot} com
(don’t use the comment section below – unless you just want to leave a note).
Thanks!
Connal + Anjel
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