Travel Wisdom Podcast -travel and learn languages for success and money

Jonny and Elsie got married a few years ago and instead of having a normal wedding they decided to use their experience with events in Belize to put together an amazing wedding! Their wedding ended up being a week with their 75 guests with many cool activities such as cooking classes, chocolate making, and of course trips to a private island.

They asked their guests to pay the costs and in this way they were able to have amazing offers for the wedding which lasted a whole week! They also talk about how some of the guests had to get passports for their first trip out of the US. However, in the end, they absolutely loved the time in a foreign country.

They are putting together a course and a book about this topic so be sure to check it out at No More Boring Weddings if you are interested!

I then talk about my idea for a wedding: a kind of music festival in Prague where it is all you can eat and all you can drink with many cool bands for 100 euros for the weekend. You're invited!

Hayden Lee is the creator of the popular Travel Stories Podcast which takes some of the best stories from popular travellers and sets these short stories to an orchestral score and sound effects. The concept is really cool and it must be incredibly time-consuming!

We also find out that we are pretty much the same person: looking very similar, born in the same month of the same year, language lovers, and of course hosts of travel podcasts!

Jellis reached out to me some time back but only now were able to talk. After a bit of research, I realized we were completely kindred spirits! He also thinks that a formal education is not nearly as useful as life experiences. Because of this he has started Inner Picture Stories which talks about how to gain wisdom through travel...sound familiar?

We also talk about his experience with his travel photography and the crazy stuff that it got him into.

On my second trip to Georgia I met with what ended up being an incredibly interesting couchsurfer, Guram! He turned out to be a kind of minor celebrity in Georgia with a very popular blog and he used to be on many morning TV programs. During an interesting night I decided to interview him and learn more about him and how he got to the place where he is.

He talks about how he juggles and prioritizes all of his projects. He has his work, his university teaching, TV interviews, and his blogging. To be able to handle of this at once is quite interesting!

We also talk about how someone else could become famous like him, not for taking your clothes off, but for your ideas and contribution.

In this episode I talk about how I went to the country of Georgia to kill some time before a conference I was going to. Georgia is my favorite country out of the 90+ that I have travelled to! The combination of alcohol that flows like water, beautiful scenery, great food, great people, cheap prices, great hospitality, unique language, unique culture and many more things make it amazing!

I was a bit nervous to go back and possibly to discover it wasn't so great but that wasn't the case! I checked out other areas and it was even more spectacular than I remember!

In the end I also had a reunion with a random guy I met 7 years ago! I found him in a city of about 100k residence and we were able to eat, drink and reminisce about that time and the 7 years since then.

I highly recommend travelling to Georgia!

In this episode I talk to Sue Bedford who is the author of Its Only the Himalayas: And Other Tales of Miscalculation from an Overconfident Backpacker. This is the book that I should have written or, more correctly, that I no longer have to write since this exists! In this interview, we talk about Sue's year-long adventure around the world. She talks about the less glamorous side of backpacking that all those Instagram photos don't show! She also mentioned a few other stories that have happened since she wrote the book, obviously the travel hasn't ended!

Filled with personal stories of triumph, sickness, sex and disappointment, this is the travel book which I think best represents the reality of long-term travel (granted, I don't read many travel books). Presented in a hilarious way that actually makes you laugh out loud, this is the book I will recommend to anyone thinking about making that first trips around the world.

In this episode, I talk about my final leg of my 3 month trip after being deported from Germany.

After finishing my meeting with my mom in Mongolia I went back to finish off the rest of Russia. Through Chita where I was on a TV news program, to the frozen swampland of Yakutsk, to the Alaskan-sister region of Kamchatka, and finally to Vladivostok. I also talk about my epic 164 hour (7 day) Trans-Siberian train ride all the way across Russia.

It has been a good trip and although it might be too long for others to manage, I highly recommend it.

In this episode I am joined by my mom who I met in Mongolia and travelled together for 3 weeks. We talk about our experiences, our likes, our dislikes, and some of our takeaways from this trip.

We talk about the Xhovsgul lake stay in the north, our trip to the Gobi desert, and of course our 3 day horse trip.

We had a great time and it can easily rank as one of the most interesting and adventurous trips we have been on.

This is my report about my first half of my Russian travels. Coming into Sochi and working my way through Kazan, Krasnoyarsk, Lake Baikal and finally off to Mongolia. This was an interesting trip full of 36 hour train rides, hiking, and almost watching somebody die.

I finally put together my itinerary and was able to sacrifice spontaneity for a well organized plan. I saw some of the most interesting places including the paradise of Sochi, the incredible architecture of Kazan, the outdoor activities of Krasnoyarsk, and of course the spiritual Lake Baikal.

Prinestrovia / Transnistra is a weird little country that is unrecognized. Since it is officially part of Moldova but doesn't like Moldova's western attitudes, it has been its own Soviet-leaning country for over 20 years now. More or less it consists of the main city of Tiraspol and that's about it.

It has issued its own money (some of which is plastic) and has its own border even though only 2 other countries in the world recognize it as autonomous. It was exactly my kind of place to celebrate my birthday!

It is a very cool place although you can imagine it has some headaches associated with this status