Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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While supposedly camping in Bunol is not allowed for the La Tomatina festival, five of us spent 2 nights camping for the 2010 festival yesterday. We slept in two different spots. The first night we slept down a driveway in a field (take a left at the roundabout at the bottom of the hill and walk about 20 meters). The 2nd night we walked halfway up the main hill toward the train station and set up our tents in the park to the left (if walking up) of the main road. The ground there was extremely hard, but the place was lit and fairly secluded. Whereas the first night, we spent all night listening to raging techno music from a nearby club — the 2nd night was actually quite peaceful with a water fall right next to our camping spot in the park.
So it is possible to stay in Bunol for La Tomatina — you just have to be resourceful and willing to tough it out in the wild. If we had to do it all over again, we would have slept in the park both nights of course, and would have brought more padding to sleep on top of so our backs didn’t ache so bad in the morning. Oh well; live and learn.
Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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Luckily, the Purple Nest where I stayed my first four nights has free WIFI and a nice lounge area to use it from. But aside from that, WIFI in Valencia is sparse from my experience thus far. The only places I’ve found with decent WIFI are McDonald’s and Starbuck’s. The other night, I spent a good three hours at Starbucks doing a YouReach Media Webinar & doing a number of Skype calls — even though you only get a 45 minute access code with the purchase of coffee or food, I went and asked the barista and he gave me 4 more 45 minute codes over the course of the next few hours. There are several Starbucks scattered throughout the city to choose from.
The Drifting Duo and I walked around for several hours today looking for a decent WIFI hotspot — with little success. One place that definitely didn’t work was Cafe & Te – so don’t go there. We connected to their network, but it just has limited access, so we couldn’t actually access anything online. Not sure if their network was down, or if it’s just a ploy to get more people in the door.
We finally ended up with an ice cream sunday and WIFI at McDonald’s, which worked fine on my Macbook Air, but didn’t work on the DriftingDuo’s LG netbook.
On a related note — I feel like someone could make a killing if they started a nice cafe where people could get food and coffee with free WIFI and lounge around in an air conditioned spot for a few hours.
My Valencia WIFI grade: C-
Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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I have to admit – my flight from Dublin to Valencia was my first Ryan Air flight I’ve ever taken. Aside from being a little cramped (I’m 6’3″), tt was actually a great flight to get from point A to B. I have generally taken trains or buses everywhere in Europe on prior trips, but that’s not really possible from Dublin – so Ryan Air it was. I anticipate I’ll be on one or two more Ryan Air flights in the future.
Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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I’ll admit I’m a huge fan of short term traveling (2-3 weeks) through a few countries — I spent 3 weeks in Southeast Asia in 2008, 2 1/2 weeks in Europe this past fall, and 2 weeks in Asia this spring. But, now that I’ve been on an extended travel experience in Santorini for the entire summer with 4 friends, I can say I’m an even bigger fan of long term travel. In reality, I’m a fan of any sort of traveling that I can get — but that’s not the point. Based on my experience living in Santorini this summer, there are four primary reasons I enjoy long term travel:
1. Long term travel allows you to take it easy and get a better feel for the location you’re in. You’re never rushed into feeling you HAVE to go do something just because you’re traveling. Heck, if you don’t go cliff jumping today, just go do it next week — or next month; you’ve got time.
2. Being in Santorini all summer, I got to know many of the locals at the businesses I frequented on a regular basis (such as Atlas, Soul Bar, Beach Bar, Bob’s Bar, and Yazz). When visiting a bar or cafe once or twice in a span of a few days, you just don’t get the local experience. By the end of the summer, the staff at Beach Bar referred to us as “one of them”. If you’re doing short term travel — you’re stuck with, well, the “tourist” experience.
3. One major component to traveling is accommodation, and my friends and I certainly saved an immense amount of money on accommodations due to the fact that we were in one spot the whole summer. We paid 75 Euro per room (split between two people) per week for most of the summer — though we paid 120 Euro a week for the last two weeks during high season. Normal accommodations would have cost 10-15 Euro per person at a minimum.
4. By far, my favorite part of long term traveling thus far is friending the local expat community. I met so many amazing expats from Ireland, New Zealand, Australia, the US, and England this summer in Santorini; people that will be friends for a long time. I went sightseeing with a friend from New Zealand living in the UK while in London, and an Irish friend while in Dublin last week — both of whom I met in Santorini. I’m headed to the La Tomatina festival on Wednesday with the Drifting Duo, 2 Kiwis, and 1 American who were in Perissa Beach some or all of the summer. With short term travel, sure, you’ll sometimes meet a traveler you instantly click with and keep in touch — but it’s no secret that relationships take time to build, and long term travel gives you the time to really get to know people and build lasting friendships.
So yes, I can easily understand why Nomadic Matt has been traveling for 4 years. I don’t know how long I’ll be traveling, but it’s been a fun ride so far and don’t see an end in sight in the near term.
Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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For some reason, I found it difficult to find a good WIFI hotspot in Dublin. I stayed at Barnacles in Temple Bar, so was primarily looking in the surrounding area. There is, of course, several Starbucks nearby — but you have to spend 5 Euro and you only get 2 hours of time. After talking to a few locals last night, I did find a good one — Cafe Sol on Dawson Street (right near Graffton Street). I spent a few hours making Skype calls with great wifi & coffee in a relaxed environment. They had food as well, but I didn’t order any while I was there today.
Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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As some of your know, I’m staying on the travel road for the foreseeable future. I just traveled through London after arriving from Santorini where I had been living since May. Currently, I’m visiting Ireland for a week (been here since August 10th) to see Dublin, Galway, Cliffs of Moher, Dingle Peninsula and Connemara. Then on Wednesday, I fly down to Valencia to meet up with some travelers, including the DriftingDuo, I met this summer on Santorini for the La Tomatina Festival (anyone want to meet up?) on the 25th. I’ll then be lounging around Spain for a month, likely spending a bit of time in Madrid with my friend who is teaching there and maybe a week in Barcelona. After that, my friend Dan and I are meeting up in late September in Kenya to do a month there, a month in Ghana volunteering for Lumana Credit, and a few weeks in South Africa! After that, it’s still a bit up in the air and I don’t want to plan too far ahead so as not to limit our flexibility to see everything we want to see in Africa.
If you are any of the following and reside in or planning to be in one of the above locations, let me know!
Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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Although the article is from 2009 — I totally agree with the premise of Pico Iyer’s “The Joy of Less” in the NYT, and here is a quote that sums up the main point:
I had been lucky enough at that point to stumble into the life I might have dreamed of as a boy: a great job writing on world affairs for Time magazine, an apartment (officially at least) on Park Avenue, enough time and money to take vacations in Burma, Morocco, El Salvador. But every time I went to one of those places, I noticed that the people I met there, mired in difficulty and often warfare, seemed to have more energy and even optimism than the friends I’d grown up with in privileged, peaceful Santa Barbara, Calif., many of whom were on their fourth marriages and seeing a therapist every day. Though I knew that poverty certainly didn’t buy happiness, I wasn’t convinced that money did either.
I actually found this article via an article on AlmostFearless as a result of a Tweet by Steph at 20sTravel. Not sure how she found the article given it’s about a year old — but glad she did because I found both to be good reads.
As some of you know, I’m living quite a nomadic lifestyle right now and happier than I’ve been in a long time. I have many people who ask me “how can I do what you do and work from anywhere?” For starters, it didn’t just happen. I put a lot of time and effort into my role at Zillow.com over the past 4 1/2 years — and I can certainly tell you working virtually for companies back in the states would be a LOT more difficult without the reputation and network I built while working at Zillow. I’m working for 3 people (Jim at Virtual Results & YouReach Media, Justin at Diverse Solutions, and Steve at RealBiz360) who I’ve known for years and built a certain level of trust with. That said — traveling for a living can be done even if you don’t work wirelessly from a laptop like I do. This summer in Santorini, there were at least 15 or 20 expats (probably more) living in Perissa Beach working at restaurants, bars, or hotels in order to fund their stay there.
The real trick is just deciding what makes you truly happy. Once you know what you want to do and where you want to end up, you’ll find a way to make the rest of the pieces fall into place. So, if you think traveling the globe will make you happy, just quit your job and do it — and figure out the details on the way.
Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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Drew Meyers is the co-founder of Horizon & Oh Hey World. He worked for Zillow from September of 2005 to January of 2010 on the marketing team managing Zillow’s API program and various online partnerships. Founder of Geek Estate Blog, a multi-author blog focused on real estate technology for real estate professionals, and myKRO.org, a blog devoted to exploring the world of microfinance. As passionate as you get about travel.
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