Backpack Digital

How do you become the traveler you know you can be? What is the first step on the road to travel? Rolf Potts has the answers to these questions in his back pocket, and he’s more than willing to share; in fact, he’s been giving people this advice for years. Rolf is also one of the reasons Hayden himself got into travel, as Rolf and his book, Vagabonding , crystallized what Hayden had been thinking about travel for his whole life until that point. It gave him the push to become the traveler he knew that he could be all along. 

Rolf Potts - travel writer, adventurer, teacher, vagabonder, and legend - is the one you want to be at your side when you need that push into travel. He knows that vital first step to becoming the traveler. 

Rolf Potts revisits us to tell a story about the people you meet when you travel - both those you want to meet, and those you dread meeting. Rolf traveled to Namibia, which he had heard was quite isolated and severe. What was most famous was the sand dunes, of course, but Rolf was intrigued by the Skeleton Coast, also commonly referred to as the Gates of Hell or the Land God Made in Anger. The road basically disappears, so it is pretty much impossible to drive the entire way along the Skeleton Coast to the border, and, as such, Rolf didn’t expect to see many people in this place. The coast is lined with shipwrecks, each of which has its own turnout off the highway. Ruin after ruin, all the way up the coast, giving a haunted, romantic feel to those who view the rotted ships and those very human feelings. Rolf visited one of these particular ships and encountered Namibian guys who wanted to sell him souvenirs, tribesmen who sell polished rocks to tourists to make a living. 

He had a great conversation with a group of them that granted him an even deeper human feeling than the ships had, through the grace of human connection. He had never dreamed of this part of Namibia, this very real village life, until he turned away from the shipwreck and started talking to people. Rolf Potts, Vagabonding, and Saying Yes to Adventures Rolf Potts, author of Vagabonding , the book that helps you along your path, doesn’t want to tell you who to be. Like travel, he doesn’t try to change you; he just wants to help you be a more authentic you. When you’re around people, you’re not your authentic self. If you go somewhere you’ve never been before, however, without anybody you’ve ever met before, you can get out of your comfortable and protective patterns and help reveal your true self as you change over time. Breaking out of typical patterns and thinking about the important parts of who you really are are inevitable results of travel. Saying yes to things can help contribute to this, as well, but you should analyze the reasons you might say no, and use those reasons to see whether yes would be a good idea first. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital

When should one travel? When they are young, while they are unattached and have all the time in the world? When they are middle-aged, and in the thick of their “normal” lives? When they are old, and it seems that all things have passed them by? The answer, of course, is “yes.” An honest “yes” to all of the above, and Mark Wolters knows better than anybody how important it is to be honest. He believes that you should truly travel right now, because you never know what can happen later. If you get a chance, he thinks you should take it. He offers honest and genuine travel advice on his YouTube channel, Wolters World, and assists people as they begin their own travel adventures through the world. “As they say,” Mark reminds us, “you only live once.” 

When Mark Wolters studied abroad in Argentina, his goal was to meet locals. Lucky for him, he did, and almost immediately, when he met two local girls who invited him to a gathering outside of town that weekend. Unfortunately for him, though, he abruptly got very sick that week; he managed to get himself under control long enough to go meet these girls for their party that Saturday, but, maybe, he should have just stayed. Having not gone to the bathroom in four days, Mark Wolters arrives at Saturday night with everything hitting him all at once, affecting him to the point of tears. He manages to get on a train (without a bathroom), reach a station (also without a bathroom), and make it into Buenos Aires (where everything is closed - ipso facto, without a bathroom). Everything is closed up except Mark that Sunday morning in Buenos Aires, so he just decides to take matters into his own hands - with a handful of wax napkins, a hole in the ground, and without any clothes. 

From then on, Mark Wolters made sure to memorize all the maps of a location when he travels, because (in his words): “You never know when you’re gonna have to go.” Mark Wolters’ Travel Soundtrack Mark Wolters made himself into a human guidebook over the course of many years. Like so many travelers, according to Hayden, Mark began with a countercultural attitude. He grew out his long, luxurious hair as an original self-defining statement about himself, gathered a punk-rock attitude that may have contributed to his travel desires, and decided to explore the world in any way that tied into this life. The romantic nature of travel directly ties into the romanticism of rock music, he believes, which leads him to announce that the soundtrack to Mark’s travel life would prominently feature “Why Don't We Get Drunk” by Jimmy Buffett, and “Don’t Stop Believin’” by Journey. 

Mark gives travel advice by being honest, throwing in little extra tidbits, and reassuring others that anything they do will be worthwhile if they make it so. Mark Wolters even manages to give the much-experienced Hayden advice for his ride through Europe later this year, spreading bike-related advice specific to various locations throughout Europe, flavored with anecdotes and jokes from his life and from his friends. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital

What is there awaiting travelers in the desert? What is there out in nature, waiting to reconnect with man? Eric Trules has discovered it, he thinks. That nothingness that means something: a nomadic way of life, a connection to nature, a cooperation with the land, a lack of civilization that means an increase in humanity. Eric Trules has been a professional in the performing, literary, and filmic arts for almost five decades. He’s worked as a dancer, in the theater, as an actor, and even as a clown. In his life outside of his work, he takes what he’s learned in his decades of performance and applies it to his thinking about travel. Trules’ show, “e-travels with e. trules,” contains musical scores, sound effects, and everything in between, and his magnificent voice telling his amazing stories. Living in Echo Park, California, and traveling all over the world, Eric has learned how to make others laugh, how to help life happen, how to parent his nephew, how to make travel his medium, how to make oneself vulnerable, and how to connect people in challenging times reconnect again. Life awaits you in the desert, if you are brave enough to seek it on your camel safari. 

It’s Israel, in May of 1999, and travel is easy. As a result, Eric has the idea to go out into the Sinai Desert, the home of camels, Moses, and the Red Sea, and have the sun bake the life out of him and suck the logic out. The best of Israel comes to the Sinai Desert to escape their day-to-day lives, because the sun, the earth, and the sea will slow you down until time is lost and you have no desire to return to civilization. He went to a camp on the Red Sea and adventured for himself, feeling the desire to walk in the steps of Moses and Joshua and to sleep under an endless starry sky. First, he needed to get enough supplies and camels to make the journey he wanted to take both possible and worthwhile. He composed a team of people willing to uncivilize themselves in the desert, and together they took a camel safari. 

They followed the same path that the Jews followed all those years ago, witnessing the same journey they did, navigating broad spaces, narrow canyons, and the changing day as the sun shifted. Eric found an oasis here. He realized that there is nothing in the desert: no politics, no borders, no religions. There is only a nomadic, respectful, dependent way of life, which requires a cooperation with the land and which has existed for thousands of years. In the desert, modern civilization and its instant conveniences disappear. In the desert, you realize how distant we have grown from nature, and how much we have lost touch with ourselves in the process, and with the very things that make us human. 

You gain independence from nature in civilization, disrespecting and ignoring mother nature and ourselves in doing so, and you lose your sense of awe in the power of the natural universe. Eric experienced a rare perfect moment under the orange desert moon. He remembered there was bloodshed in this land now, and that only hatred and history causes problems like these, nothing inherent. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital

Cultural differences are impossible not to notice once you have traveled as much as Dana Newman has. Language and these differences Dana has found between Germany and America have helped her make a home out of Munich, and to find herself in her surroundings. Dana Newman is an American expatriate, originally from Florida, in the United States, now living in Munich, Germany. Her YouTube channel, Wanted Adventure, explores the cultural differences between the U.S. and Germany and talks about the expat life, moving to a new country, and all that that entails. This conversation from two self-proclaimed chatterboxes covers cultural connections, environmental differences, how Dana got to where she is, and everything in between, as Dana shares pearls of wisdom from Germany. 

After graduating from college, Dana Newman, like a lot of graduates, felt rather lost. She didn’t know what she wanted to do from her life, apart from have an adventure. She felt an invisible rope pulling her towards Europe, and so she packed up two duffel bags, obtained her very first pairs of boots, and bought a one-way ticket to Prague. Once she arrived in Prague, she felt distant, out of touch, and alone - before she took a deep breath and reminded herself that this was all part of the adventure that she wanted to have. She trusted her own process, and yet was still afraid that the Prague of her imagination was too different from the Prague in reality. She had to handle unexpected rooming situations and a topsy-turvy tunnel system, but, even though she wasn’t sure where she was going, she managed to make her way into the city center. 

She knew something good had to exist out in her new world, and she found it - everything that she had been searching for when she came to live in Europe. She knew, deep in her core, that her adventure had brought her to exactly where she was supposed to be in the world in that moment. Dana Newman, Cultural Differences, and Language Barriers 

What is a normal Monday for you? For Dana Newman, it changes, depending on the week. Most of her Monday is spent preparing for her Wednesday, because she dictates her own schedule. Upon moving to Germany, Dana was able to discover that autonomy, and the difference between living somewhere and traveling through that same place. It took three years for Dana to feel at home in Germany, because it took her that long to build up traditions and to know what to expect around the corner. She started to decipher the language, to adjust to the culture. She taught herself the language, which was a difficult adaptation, but conversation was a vital part of living in any new environment. 

When you reach that understanding, you really connect to the people and to that world. Dana may miss the sun in Florida, and the ability to understand her environment entirely, but she’s happy in Germany. She loves the architecture, the ability to walk everywhere, and the home she has made for herself in Europe. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital

Knowing why you want to do something is half the way to achieving that something. Understanding and developing your passion is the drive a person needs to becoming who they truly want to be. Taylor Zajonc, a writer, father, maritime historian, Explorers Club member, and shipwreck explorer who has literally been to the bottom of the ocean and back again, has endless pearls of wisdom just like these. He knows that approaching your own life with an “open heart, a lack of cynicism, and as little ego as you can” will lead to amazing places. What would you be willing to suffer through for an experience? Have you discovered your life’s true passion? What would you find if you played soccer in Kenya? Taylor wants to help you find the answers.

Taylor was involved in a deep sea shipwreck company years ago and took a trip to Africa. On the way back, he and his team stopped in Kenya, residing for the duration of their stay in a small rural camp, in a village where young warriors once trained. Due to this being an authentic slice of rural village life, there was a lot of downtime for Taylor to just sit down and think about what he wanted from himself, from his life, from his own future. There was also time to play soccer with the same little boy who showed up every day at the same time with a soccer ball. This, combined with the feeling of flying down a dirt road in a Land Rover, made Taylor want to be a father, and a writer. He wanted to capture that free feeling, and to make his life all about experiences like that. He decided to try harder to write, to get published, and to be a father. He now has two books out and a fifteen-month-old son, Sammy, all of which he can trace back to that little boy he played soccer with in Kenya. 

Taylor, a native of the Pacific Northwest, is a firm believer in appreciating where you grew up and where you currently are. However, this has not once stopped him from diving to the deepest depths on Earth, a fascination which began at the age of nineteen. His father aided him in boarding a Soviet-era submersible on its trip to the ocean’s floor in the Bermuda Triangle, investigating an old wooden target. This target turned out to be an unexpected historical artifact, over sixteen thousand feet deep, and so, at the age of nineteen, Taylor was able to explore the bottom of the ocean with his own eyes. He had the sudden knowledge that no other human being had experienced what he was experiencing in that moment. He had a realization that changed the trajectory of his life, because he discovered his passion, and was able to understand, develop, and focus on this. When you come back from a journey like his, your overthinking, doubts, and second thoughts no longer matters. 

What matters is your transformation, and your realization of what is truly important to your travels and to you. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital

Kristin Addis trusts the world, and she trusts her truest self, the one who hides inside and waits until she is alone to reveal herself. She knows a great deal about solo female travel, having adventured around the world since 2012, and she believes wholeheartedly in talking to strangers and in taking leaps. She offers support to anyone who will listen: if you don’t feel as though you’re understood, or if you don’t know where to look, there are people all around the world who will offer you opportunities to learn who you really are. Solo travel is the purest opportunity to discover yourself. 

In March 2014, Kristin Addis found herself in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China. The snow was blasting her, filling up the grounds surrounding her with white, and Kristin herself was low on money. She had to hitchhike her way eight or nine hours back to her site, and she was in a small town, so not a lot of people were presenting her with travel opportunities. Being a foreign girl in China, though, does have its advantages, and one particular group pulled over their nice car and buckled her in for a white-knuckled ride. An hour outside the city, they stopped to eat with her, which is typically a normal experience, but this was not the case on that day. Instead, she selected a large, living fish to eat, and experienced an incredibly uncommon waitress. Her dinner was ridiculous, and her leftovers were maybe even a little dangerous. In the end, she was just this random girl from California, hitchhiking in a remote part of the world, who ended up with an unexpected gift or two at the end of the day. 

Kristin Addis Advises: How Do I Know If I'm Ready to Travel? Kristin Addis is currently staying in Berlin before she goes to Africa, as she knew upon setting foot in Berlin that it would be the perfect environment for her new home base. She utilized a freelance visa, one of the many ways that a lot of the world is opening up when it comes to things like travel. The world, Kristin believes, is opening up travel and accessibility and opportunities to a large chunk of the world, which is better than the past circumstances. Kristin’s grandmother, like her, was a traveler, who shared her photo albums with Kristin. She was Kristin’s only traveling family member, and, in being so, she unconsciously inspired Kristin. After she passed away, Kristin and her mother found her journal and embraced her legacy, exploring the world as she saw it, and imparting their own experiences, as well. Any place exists how you experience it, how you document it, and what you get out of it. 

Kristin firmly embraced her travel bug, spending summers abroad, saving her money, burning her bridges and returning to Asia where she felt she belonged. She wanted to learn about different cultures in depth; she moved without support and immersed herself. She stuck it out, and was amazing by her own ability to embrace different experiences and a new way of life. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital

How can I connect with the world around me when I travel? How can I immerse myself in a culture? How can I share my experiences with the world? Yann Ilunga has the answer to each of these questions, and can help guide travelers to their own unique solutions. Yann Ilunga is an entrepreneur, podcaster, consultant, and all-around legendarily cool guy, in Hayden’s own words. He is the person Hayden trusts most with helping start blogs and podcasts, and he visits the Travel Stories Podcast to share his tips, to tell his stories, and to encourages an adventurous lifestyle and a community sharing experience. 

Yann Ilunga has always been interested in adventure. He grew up outdoorsy, playing football (or soccer, if you’re in the States), and mimicking Indiana Jones and Jack Kerouac, his adventurous, traveling heroes. One of the most amazing things that ever happened to Yann was that he was able to live how his heroes lived when he traveled. Traveling by car along the Atlantic coast of the western part of Ireland with nothing but the ocean, but nature, around him was so powerful, not because he pictured himself as a character like the ones he wanted to become, but because these were the moments that he really felt that everything was aligned. He experienced this again traveling in California, creating an incredible experience where he could think absolutely nothing and just be. In moments like these, Yann became his passion. 

He encourages all travelers to reach for this feeling, to belong to that world. The next time you go on a trip, whether it’s by car, by bicycle, by foot, whatever, try to be on the lookout, because in that kind of a moment that Yann experienced, there is nothing but you, the natural elements around you, and feelings of happiness and belonging. How Do I Immerse Myself in a Culture When I Travel? Yann Ilunga encourages you to be genuine and to be authentically yourself when you travel, because that is the foundation on which you can build great relationships when you travel. You can form strong, intense friendships when you travel by putting yourself out there. You have to be vulnerable, to be open, to step outside your comfort zone, in order to connect with amazing people all over the world. 

Yann shares stories of being in Ireland, where, for no particular reason, he changed his plans, got in a car, and went in the opposite direction from what he planned. What he saw and who he met were incredible and unexpected, because it feels amazing to do something unpredictable, and to take a chance on that experience. Yann is in Finland now, and encourages travelers to immerse themselves in a culture in order to get all the tools that you’ll need to learn everything about that place and to become a part of that culture. Six years ago, Yann camped around Europe for two months; he believes camping is a form of travel that allows you to experience a location at a deeper level. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital

Can a person sustain their life on their passions? Can you do what you love and live off of it, too? It’s the perfect road to go down, and one that travelers often find themselves seeking. Juliana Dever has found the path. A travel blogger and an actress from the television series Castle , Juliana has thrown herself into world traveling and drawing experiences from her fears. When she’s not acting, she’s traveling, testing her limits. A self-proclaimed Russophile, Juliana Dever has had a fascination with Russia since childhood. She wants to act and travel, and has found a way to maintain this lifestyle, doing what she truly loves. Keeping that life of travel up is possible, and Juliana can prove it. “If you never meet a stranger,” Juliana says, “then that’s all they’ll ever be to you.” The world is your oyster (and to Juliana, Russia is the pearl). 

The second time Juliana Dever went to Russia, it was as part of a language class. She was given the option to stay with a Russian family, which she took, it being a great opportunity and all. She had visions of laughing around a dinner table, speaking Russian; her reality, though, was a young man who spoke absolutely no English, herself, who spoke very little Russian, and nobody else. Already in a confusing situation, she was with this young man who was very much immersed in that bachelor lifestyle: keeping to himself, leaving out pasta and ketchup for dinner, which was a rocky start to Juliana’s stay. However, the chaos of the experience culminated in her getting locked in her bedroom one day with no way to contact her host. A bit of WiFi, a well-timed email to her friend Rachel, and some frantic Googling helped her survive. 

Why Should I Travel to Russia? Juliana Dever is a self-proclaimed Russophile, and it shows in how she talks about Russia and her time there. Juliana is lived in Russia twice, the first time being for a couple of months in the winter, training with the Moscow Art Theatre. Growing up, Juliana was incredibly and inexplicably attracted to Russia, which didn’t make a ton of sense for her as a little girl growing up in rural Missouri. She considered the idea that she might be a reincarnated member of the Romanov family; after she went to Russia, made peace with it, and released it, she felt as though she was able to move on. For Juliana, Russia was like a painting in her head before she actually went. When she got there, though, all of a sudden, it crystallized into a glowing, beautiful, mythical place that hardly seemed real to her. Russia was what dreams were made of, for her. The smells, the sights, the sounds, the tastes - all are so hard to put into words, but they make up what Juliana loves most about Russia and about travel. How Do You Make a Living Doing What You Love? Juliana Dever believes that travel is about being in the moment. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital

Travel changes a person. Adapting to an entirely new culture and people not only alters the traveler while they live in that culture, but also changes them irrevocably when they return home. Getting used to the world around you is an important travel step, and one Amanda Kendle is intimately familiar with. Amanda lived in three foreign countries during her twenties, and is the master of slow travel. During her lifetime, she’s developed a travel mentality that can be summed up in one word: “thoughtful.” She fosters the more cerebral aspect of travel, using her thoughts to rationalize and relate to her experience. 

Host of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast, Amanda shares her thoughts on reverse culture shock, cultural adaptation, and returning home. Lessons from Japanese Vegetables Amanda once lived in the Kansai region of Japan, and, one day, was given an opportunity to visit this old home again. The only downside, though, was that she was sent with a guide who was to accompany her all week, and she was not the kind of person who liked to travel with others, preferring to do her own thing. As it turned out, her guide was a 68-year-old woman named Mariko who had spent thirty-odd years guiding foreigners around Japan. As such, she had amazing stories to tell, and words of wisdom for everyone. When Mariko and Amanda experienced an earthquake together, and visited the earthquake memorial in Kobe, Amanda learned that Mariko was a survivor. 

She remembers well what she learned from Mariko and her Rincon vegetables that day: “You have to look through to the future, because that’s the only way to get through life.” Slow Travel: Experiencing a New Culture Abroad There is no one utopia in this world; there are good things and bad things about every place you can travel to. Hayden and Amanda talk about the pockets of the world they enjoy traveling to, and how they prefer to look for the reality of a place, beyond the plastic. Hayden enjoys going over to “the other side” for a day. Amanda discusses adapting your travel style to your life, and Hayden shares a well-executed metaphor comparing travel to experiencing a play on stage with the actors. The two of them explore the main differences between passing through somewhere, and living in the place. 

Amanda discusses the reactions of people around her. The longer she lives in a place, the better she understands it, and she believes that spending a longer time in one space lets you better understand the nuances and quirks of a culture. Truly, travel wouldn’t be the same without the trial and error of learning new cultural experiences - learning what’s rude, what’s not, what’s the correct way to act. Getting over those cultural speed bumps is the best way to adapt to the realities of different places, and immerse yourself in a new culture. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital

Can a traveler have a home base? What does stability mean to an adventurer? Is the push-pull siren call of the two different traveling worlds surmountable? Derek Loudermilk, host of The Art of Adventure, answers all of these questions and more, unprompted and in depth. Derek is a father, a digital nomad, and a traveler who believes in the power of dichotomy and travels with his infant son, Axel. An adventurer and a businessman, Derek seeks to help others who have the elusive dream of becoming location-independent. Between the jungles of Bali, his wife’s nesting abilities, and his location independence set of skills, Derek is never far from home. 

Derek Loudermilk’s story takes place in the jungles of central Bali, in one of his favorite regions - in the central highlands, in a place called Bedugul. This space is very primal for him, and he loves to spend time up there to connect with nature, which he believes can make a person more creative, confident, and self-aware. During one afternoon walk in the jungles, Derek experienced a surprising connection with nature: upon entering a clearing with an ancient, massive tree, and placing his hands on the tree, he got an electro-emotional shock. He says the tree was trying to tell him something. When he put his hands on the tree again, it happened a second time, with Derek experiencing a flood of emotions, sweating, and crying. What happened when he was given time alone with the tree would change Derek’s life from thereon out, as well as his work and his further wellbeing. 

The Best of Both Worlds: Travel Edition Hayden met Derek Loudermilk when they both guested on The Budget-Minded Traveler, and Hayden realized how interesting, curious, and unique he was. Derek has lived on four continents, and he values traveling slowly and getting to know the culture. Derek is a wholehearted believer in the power of music. He and Hayden share their stories on the topic, with Derek giving a bit of insight into his father and different ways to make music on the go. In regards to his father and the rest of his family, Derek remembers the time he spent camping and traveling as a child. His family wanted to travel somewhere new every year when he was young, which led to his love of exploration, which he now wishes to pass onto his infant son, Axel, whom he travels with now. 

Axel is a zen child who likes to travel, which leads Hayden and Derek to explore the effects of traveling from infancy on a person. Derek believes in showing Axel the best of both worlds. People’s lives can change in a single moment and take them on a new track in life, a new direction, and traveling can help people discover their own self-identity. 

Get in Touch with Hayden on Instagram: @backpackdigital