The Reality Of Long-Term Travel

Long-term travel looks like postcards from the outside, but real life on the road includes fatigue, friction, and the occasional “milk” that turns out to be drinkable yogurt. We’re Jim and Rita Santos, and we share the honest reality of long-term travel: the good, the bad, and the unexpected lessons that only show up after weeks and months away from home.

We revisit the travel styles we’ve been exploring, from an extended getaway to part-time roaming, digital nomad life, and full-time roaming. We also talk about why a home base can still matter even if you love living light, including the practical stuff people forget like licenses, voting, and keeping family traditions steady. Then we get into what slow travel really gives you: freedom to move at your own pace, the ability to stay longer when a place surprises you, and a deeper connection to local culture that rushed vacations rarely deliver.

From culture shock in supermarkets to patience when you’re not the priority, we unpack the emotional side of expat life and long trips. We also challenge a common assumption that the United States is automatically best at everything, comparing what we’ve experienced abroad with healthcare, pharmacies, and public transportation. Finally, we talk about reverse culture shock and the biggest mindset shift we’ve learned: travel works best when you’re running toward something, not trying to escape yourself.

If this helps you think differently about long-term travel, slow travel, or finding your own travel style, subscribe for more, share this with a friend who’s dreaming about life on the road, and leave a quick review so more people can find the show.

And if you want to go deeper, you can check out my book, Wherever We May Roam: Finding Your Travel Style, where I walk through all of this in more detail.
If you have any questions, a topic you would like discussed, or would like to be on our show, email us at jim@jimsantosbooks.com .

"Wherever We May Roam: Finding Your Travel Style" is available on audiobook on Amazon, Audible, and other audiobook outlets!

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Transcript

Why Long-Term Travel Hits Different

Jim 0:01

Long-term travel isn't just about where you go, it's about how you live along the way. And that comes with both rewards and challenges. Welcome to Wherever We May Roam, the new phase of Travels with Jim and Rita. This podcast is about discovering your own travel style to explore the world. I'm Jim Santos, and along with my wife Rita, we've spent more than 16 years traveling. Sometimes for a few weeks, sometimes for a few months, and sometimes a whole lot longer. And what we've learned is this there's no right or wrong way to travel. Some people take extended getaways, some roam part-time, some work from the road, and some make travel a full-time lifestyle. This podcast is about helping you figure out what works for you and how to make it happen in the real world. So whether you're planning your next trip or thinking about something bigger, we're glad you're here. Let's get started. Hello everybody, this is Wherever We May Roam. I'm Jim Santos, along with my wife Rita, and welcome to the last episode in a series of 10, where we introduce some of the things you'll find in my latest book, Wherever We May Roam, Finding Your Travel Style. Today we're going to be talking about the reality of long-term travel, the good, the bad, and the unexpected.

Four Travel Styles And Home Base

Jim 1:25

Now, Rita, we broke down in the book really four different types of long-term travel, and we've talked about them in this series. The first, of course, was the getaway, travel extended getaway. The idea is just instead of a one-to-week vacation, you try to stay at least three weeks, even as much as six weeks, and really explore a location. And we talked about how it can actually be more affordable than several vacations.

Rita 1:50

Yes. Yeah, it can be.

Jim 1:52

And then a step up from the extended getaway, of course, is part-time roaming. And we talked about two different ways to part-time roam. One is a digital nomad, and the other just planning two to three month vacation breaks.

Rita 2:04

Aaron Powell I think that kind of suits our lifestyle.

Jim 2:08

Yeah, that's where you maintain a home base, but you're spending an awful lot of your time out on the road, usually more than half of your time out on the road. And then finally there's the full-time roamer, lifestyle that we flirted with a bit.

Rita 2:21

And we almost succeeded at a year.

Jim 2:24

We gave it a good shot. We didn't stop because we weren't enjoying it. It wasn't a good experience for us in any way. We stopped because of a medical problem that came up unexpectedly.

Rita 2:32

Aaron Ross Powell But you know, honestly, I th I think even if we were to continue on doing that, I would have still liked to have had my own base to come back to when you're travel weary.

Jim 2:47

Right. And in the book we also go into some details about why not having a home base can get to be a bit of a problem.

Rita 2:54

Right.

Jim 2:54

With things like maintaining a driver's license, being able to vote in American elections. There's just a lot of things that come up that having a home base is really helpful.

Rita 3:03

Trevor Burrus It is. And and you're disrupting your family's routines like at holidays, like our children like to come for Thanksgiving, and that's always what they've done. And if you're not there, then that's a disruption. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Jim 3:19

Right. If you don't have a home place to hold those events.

Beyond Highlights Freedom And Perspective

Jim 3:22

But now when people think about long-term travel, they're usually just imagining the highlights, you know, the places and the views and the experiences. And we've certainly had those.

Rita 3:32

Oh, absolutely.

Jim 3:33

I mean, from being in the uh Hagia Sophia in Istanbul and walking around the ancient ruins of Greece, uh hiking to Machu Picchu, Galapagos Islands. Uh there's there are a lot of places that we've been to and a lot of really incredible things that we've seen.

Rita 3:47

Aaron Powell And I wouldn't have missed not any of it for the world.

Jim 3:51

Aaron Powell Yep, and those are all real things, but they're not really the whole picture.

Rita 3:55

No. It can be wary.

Jim 3:57

Yeah. I'll start with what draws people to long-term travel and certainly some of the things that drew us to it, is for one thing, the freedom of it, the the ability to stay longer and to move at your own pace and really get to explore beyond the surface. You're not just your typical tourist in and out real quick. You're actually spending time in these places and experiencing things that you normally wouldn't on a rushed vacation. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Rita 4:23

And you know the real beauty when you're talking about the freedom of it, if you get somewhere and maybe you've allocated, I'm going to spend three weeks here to enjoy this location, and you realize there's not three w weeks worth of things that you could find to do there. So you have the freedom to move on and find something else.

Jim 4:45

And uh on the other side of that, if you run into a place that is an unexpected joy, you may end up spending more time there.

Rita 4:51

Yeah, and we've done that many times.

Jim 4:54

But over time, it really changes how you see the world. Seeing all the differences in cultures, the way the different people live, I think we really got a better sense of what matters and what doesn't.

Rita 5:07

Oh, I think so too.

Jim 5:09

One of the biggest benefits, I think, of long-term travel is it gives you perspective. Now we have found that people are pretty much the same wherever we go.

Rita 5:17

Aaron Powell Oh, yes. They want they want to be able to take care of themselves, their families, and to enjoy their life.

Jim 5:24

Aaron Ross Powell Yeah, people are more concerned with what's going on in the local market and not the stock market.

Rita 5:28

Yeah.

Jim 5:29

And they're not necessarily on a 24-hour news cycle like we are in the U.S. Aaron Ross Powell.

Rita 5:34

I don't think they're so obsessed with their income. It seems like most of these cultures that we've engaged in are just enjoying their life.

Jim 5:47

I think in most of the places we've been, what seems to be more important to people is not what they're doing but who they're doing it with.

Rita 5:53

Yes. That's right.

Jim 5:58

Trevor Burrus And we've been in plenty of places. Most of Europe, most of South America, Central America. You can be there for four hours, five hours, and no one's going to try to rush you out.

Rita 6:12

They would never ask you to leave. No.

Jim 6:14

I know actually in Italy in one place we were only there about an hour and a half and we asked for the check and they were almost offended.

Rita 6:21

Yeah. Like, was the food not good?

Jim 6:23

You haven't had an after dinner wine yet. What's the problem here? But yeah, you notice that people spend a lot more time with family and friends.

Rita 6:31

Aaron Ross Powell Right. It seems like that here we're all in such a rush to get through life rather than i living life.

Jim 6:39

Aaron Powell And I think something else that we found, especially traveling in Europe, where you have not only a lot of different cultures, but they're very close together.

Rita 6:48

Aaron Ross Powell They are.

Jim 6:50

I mean if you travel from you know we're here in Tennessee, if you travel to Maine or you travel to Florida, you're definitely going to see some differences in uh people and lifestyles and things. But nothing like the differences you'd see going from Greece to Turkey or Turkey to Vienna.

Rita 7:05

Aaron Ross Powell Oh, that is so true. Yeah.

Jim 7:07

Vienna to Prague. You know, these are all just short flights or short bus rides, but a completely different culture, completely different world. And I think seeing that many places that close together really has to affect you after a while.

Rita 7:20

Aaron Powell

When Travel Starts Feeling Like Work

Rita 7:21

It does.

Jim 7:21

Aaron Powell Now there's a a bad side to it, of course. We didn't really run into a lot of this because we're pretty careful to avoid it. We didn't really try to overstructure things or really overthink our trips, really. But it can get to the point where your travel isn't really your lifestyle anymore. It feels like it's almost a burden. It can stop feeling like a vacation. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Rita 7:42

Yeah. We don't do that. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Jim 7:43

No. Especially No, we know people who do things like they have video blogs and they have articles that they're writing and they have things that they're posting, and they're spending so much time telling about the experience, they're not spending time enjoying the experience.

Rita 7:57

Right.

Jim 7:58

And you know, we've done podcasts on the road before.

Rita 8:01

We have.

Jim 8:02

But for the most part, we're there because we want to be there.

Rita 8:04

Aaron Ross Powell Yeah. And and I notice too that when when we do come home and we regroup and we start looking at all the photos, we we live it again.

Jim 8:13

Aaron Powell Right. It can get to the point, though, where things seem to be inconvenient. The bumpy uh bus ride to the market isn't quite as charming as it was, you know, with the the chickens and the pigs in the aisle is starts to lose that uh that blow.

Rita 8:27

Yeah.

Jim 8:28

Uh you can start to feel tired. You just want things to be easy. For us, I think the only time we had that kind of thing was when we first became expats in Ecuador. I remember a time when you just wanted to get into bed and put the covers over your head and not hear any Spanish for a little while.

Rita 8:44

Well, yeah, because it was such a different culture, and we d I was language challenged to say the least. It was difficult to get much done, like banking or utility set up.

Jim 8:57

Yeah, it seemed like nothing was easy.

Rita 8:59

Yeah. We had a three-day rule. You go the first day and get the lay of the land, you go to the second day and there's nobody there to help you. And the third day you get the job done. That's that was kind of the way it worked. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Jim 9:12

Yeah, and something that people don't always expect when they're traveling is that things are different in other places. And you may not be the priority on their list.

Rita 9:21

Aaron Powell You're not. You're not a member of their family or their community.

Jim 9:27

Yeah, I remember once in Ecuador when we had only been there a few weeks, I had to go to the mall, I was looking for a particular type of computer cable. And I was already dreading trying to explain in my broken Spanish the type of cable that I I wanted or needed. And we were sitting in the food court and I just suddenly became hyper-aware of everybody around me speaking a different language and how far I was from anything that I knew.

Rita 9:52

Yeah, every once in a while you get culture shock. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Jim 9:55

And for a while I just wanted to get in a taxi, go back home.

Rita 9:59

Yeah.

Jim 10:00

And just forget it. But you know, we got over it. We actually did get that computer cable.

Rita 10:04

Yeah.

Jim 10:05

And I think we've mentioned this before, but I think really that experience of living overseas for a few years that broke us of any fear. Aaron Ross Powell Yeah, it broke us of any complaints.

Rita 10:16

Trevor Burrus We Yeah. Well, whatever time it takes to get something done, good, that's the time it takes. And we just get over it.

Jim 10:24

Trevor Burrus Yeah. So these long travels, uh, the problems that you run into, missed buses, canceled rooms, things like that, they don't really bother us anymore.

Rita 10:32

No.

Jim 10:33

And I think that's something that people don't really expect when they set out to travel a lot. And you really have to be prepared for it. And if you're not prepared for it, it can really have a bad effect on not only your travel, but the way you think about the places that you've been.

Rita 10:47

Aaron Ross Powell But you know, we don't schedule any day solid.

Jim 10:52

Trevor Burrus Right. You can't feel like there's a a competition here or something that you have to get this done and you have to get that done. Aaron Ross Powell Now there are also some things that people don't expect when they go out on the road for long periods of time, things they don't anticipate at all.

Culture Shock In Grocery Store Aisles

Jim 11:05

Some of that is that emotional side. Uh you mentioned culture shock, Rita.

Rita 11:09

Right.

Jim 11:09

Uh being away from familiar places sometimes can really get to people. Just walking around sometimes in uh supermarkets in other countries and trying to figure out, you know, why these kind of nuts are in one aisle and another kind of nuts are in another aisle.

Rita 11:24

Yeah.

Jim 11:25

And the milk isn't refrigerated, it's in little plastic pouches on a shelf.

Rita 11:29

Yeah.

Jim 11:29

You know, the eggs sometimes in the dairy case, sometimes they're just in a random row, it seems like picking up spice bottles and trying to figure out what they are in in a different language.

Rita 11:39

Thank God for Google Translate.

Jim 11:41

Yeah, we've even had trouble sometimes just trying to buy a little carton of milk.

Rita 11:45

Yeah. Yeah, we have.

Jim 11:46

Yeah, I remember once we thought we were buying milk and we got home and it was drinkable yogurt.

Rita 11:50

Yeah.

Jim 11:50

Something like that.

Rita 11:52

That was probably Turkey. Yeah.

Jim 11:54

Yeah. And that can really get to you after a while. And if you're constantly adjusting to new environments, like when we went through some of the Eastern Europe countries, Poland, uh, Lithuania, Latvia, they were all fairly similar, but they all had different languages.

Rita 12:09

Aaron Ross Powell They did, and very different.

Jim 12:12

Yeah. And so it was really a challenge keeping up with the different cultures and the different places that you were.

Rita 12:18

Aaron Ross Powell I think the biggest shock was in Eastern Europe there were all of these memorial parks memorializing the horrific World War II and not wanting their children and grandchildren to forget how quickly Nazism took over and never to let it happen again. That was such a mind blower for me. Trevor Burrus Yeah.

Jim 12:43

In this country, I think World War II is just a distant memory. Something you read about in school. Trevor Burrus, Jr. But they live through it. Trevor Burrus, Jr. They live through it. And they're see they see daily reminders. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Rita 12:54

Yeah. And they're so afraid that their children and grandchildren will forget how horrific their lives were.

Jim 13:02

So seeing the different perspective that other people have in the world can really be an unexpected benefit, or it can be something that kind of throws you for a loop.

Rita 13:11

Aaron Powell Yeah, I was shocked.

Travel Will Not Fix You

Jim 13:13

Also, you have to understand that travel doesn't change everything. We've always said that you can enjoy travel if you're running to someplace, not if you're running from something.

Rita 13:24

Trevor Burrus Right.

Jim 13:26

This especially came up when we were expats. We found that the successful expats and the successful travelers are the ones who aren't running away from something. They're running towards something.

Rita 13:36

Trevor Burrus Right.

Jim 13:37

Trevor Burrus You know, they're they're excited about what they are going to see in the future. They're not trying to get away from something that was in their past.

Rita 13:44

Trevor Burrus They treat it like an adventure. Yeah. Trevor Burrus, Yeah.

Jim 13:47

It's that old saying, no matter where you go, there you are. So you know if you're a miserable person you're going to be miserable wherever you are. Trevor Burrus, Jr.: You're going to be miserable there. And we've certainly seen a lot of miserable travelers and miserable expats. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Rita 14:02

Yeah. We have. We just don't have that mindset, just not going to do it.

Jim 14:07

Trevor Burrus Yeah, if you're not going to enjoy a new culture or try to explore something that's outside of your comfort zone, there's really no point in even trying it.

Rita 14:16

Right. And I can't say that we haven't been shocked by things, because I think we have, but we've just learned to roll with it. You're not in the U.S. This is a different country, a different culture. Blend in as best you can.

Myths About The US Abroad

Jim 14:31

Yeah, I think what shocks people sometimes also is you're kind of brought up to believe that everything in the United States is the best, right? It's we have the best transit system, we have the best government, we have the best freedoms, you know. Everything about it is the best. But when you get to other countries, you find out that that's not necessarily true. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Rita 14:50

No. We have had Jim and I both have had surgeries out of the country and Jim's been hospitalized. I've I've been, yeah, I had my gallbladder out, so I was in the hospital a couple days, and and I had wonderful care. You had wonderful care.

Jim 15:05

You've had excellent care and affordable care.

Rita 15:07

Yeah. And and there's nothing like going into South America or or Central America and going to a pharmacy and say, look, this is my symptoms. I don't have a doctor here. And they hand you medication. You know, that we're here. We'd have to make a doctor's appointment. We'd have to stand around, wait to be seen, and then hopefully we'd get our medication, and that would be a couple hundred dollars. And there you would just walk in and pay for your medication and nothing else.

Jim 15:39

Yeah, we've been to plenty of places also where they'll just sell you what you need.

Rita 15:43

Exactly.

Jim 15:44

You don't get a bottle of a hundred pills, they'll sell you like three pills.

Rita 15:47

Right. Whether it's Tylenol or what they call it paracetal.

Jim 15:51

Paracetamol.

Rita 15:52

Yeah, paracetamol. Paracetamol, something like that.

Jim 15:54

I kind of like that.

Rita 15:55

Yeah. Yeah. I don't need a hundred to be carrying a ROM with me, but if I could get some to last me three or four days, I'm good.

Jim 16:02

Aaron Ross Powell And we've certainly seen that, for instance, the train systems in a lot of countries are much better than what we have here. The intercountry transport, the bus systems, the local bus systems in a lot of places are superior to a lot of the cities here in the U.S.

Rita 16:18

Aaron Ross Powell, Jr. The metros. The metro in Vienna in Vienna, that was fabulous.

Jim 16:22

Yeah, it was just spotlessly clean and very easy to use, very convenient.

Rita 16:26

Aaron Ross Powell The sweetest train I think we've been on is the one from Florence to Venice.

Jim 16:31

Yeah, it was a high-speed rail train.

Rita 16:33

Right.

Jim 16:33

It banked a little as it went around curves.

Rita 16:35

Aaron Powell But you didn't really feel it.

Jim 16:36

Trevor Burrus No, because it the car would bank to compensate for it.

Rita 16:40

Trevor Burrus, Yeah. And it's gone like 160, 180 miles an hour, and you have your little wine holder there. Just nothing like what you were commuting into DC on, let me tell you.

Jim 16:54

Trevor Burrus Also, I think what we've seen is that people in other countries are happy. You get this feeling that they all want to be in the U.S. And they're, you know, they if they could leave, they would in a minute. And that's really not true. People are generally pretty happy where they are.

Rita 17:11

I think so, too.

Jim 17:12

And pretty comfortable with their ways of life.

Rita 17:13

Trevor Burrus, Jr. Yep, I think so.

Jim 17:14

Aaron Ross Powell And that's where the real value of long-term travel really shows up because it's not just about seeing places, it's about understanding what kind of life you want and what kind of life other people have. Because once you step outside of your normal routine, you really start to see things differently.

Rita 17:31

Aaron Powell And honestly, we have not been in any country that we could not find products that maybe not exactly the name brand or whatever we were used to using, but products that would work for you.

Jim 17:44

Aaron Powell Yeah, but that is something that that trips people up. I mentioned the grocery stores and trying to figure things out. And a lot of times people are just almost afraid to ask for help.

Rita 17:53

Yeah.

Jim 17:54

Especially if you don't speak the language well. But we've gotten a long way with just pantomiming.

Rita 17:59

Trevor Burrus, Jr. We have.

Jim 18:02

Now we say all the time on the show that we travel not to escape life, but so that life does not escape us. And it may sound trite, but we really think that's true on many levels. All of the things that we've seen, all the places we've been, they're all experiences that have to change you in one way or another. And for some people that becomes a permanent change. And for others, it's might be something they just return to in different ways. But it definitely changes you.

Rita 18:28

Aaron Ross Powell It makes you a lot more accepting.

Jim 18:31

Aaron Ross Powell Yeah, I'd have to say you get a much better sense of we're all in this together.

Rita 18:35

Aaron Powell Exactly.

Jim 18:36

Trevor Burrus You know, we're all citizens of the world, no matter what country you might be in.

Rita 18:40

Right.

Reverse Culture Shock And Final Takeaways

Jim 18:41

Sometimes when you can return also to the States, we mentioned culture shock. Sometimes you can have reverse culture shock.

Rita 18:47

Aaron Powell Oh, we did. When we lived in South America, we definitely did. Aaron Powell Yeah.

Jim 18:51

You come back here and you wonder, you know, why is everybody running around so much? Why are the servings so big in the restaurants? And why are there three hundred types of toothpaste in the store?

Rita 19:02

Yeah, three hundred different types of cereal.

Jim 19:05

Aaron Ross Powell And why is this packed in four different kinds of plastic?

Rita 19:07

Trevor Burrus Right.

Jim 19:09

So it it can really make a big difference. And then there's also this thing where you yourself have changed, and it can affect the way that you see people around you and people see you. You know, we've run into this and we have a granddaughter who spent a year living abroad, and she noticed the same thing. I mean, she had been living in Denmark and she visited a lot of places around Europe, a lot of world capitals, Brussels and Berlin. She was in Paris and Vienna. So she was in all these places and saw all these things, dealt with, you know, getting around on the public transit systems and all these places.

Rita 19:42

At eighteen.

Jim 19:43

At eighteen. And then she comes home and you know, people are talking about what Mary wore to the prom.

Rita 19:50

She's like, really?

Jim 19:52

Yeah. So, you know, not that there's anything wrong with that.

Rita 19:55

There's nothing wrong with it.

Jim 19:56

Trevor Burrus, Jr. But she had her perspective changed.

Rita 19:58

Right.

Jim 19:59

She's recognized that the world is a much larger place than what's going on around you.

Rita 20:03

Right.

Jim 20:04

And frankly, right now that's something that the world, and especially the U.S., could really use a lot of. A little bit of perspective, a little bit of understanding that not everybody is exactly like you, and that's okay. So, really, that's what this whole series has been about. Not one way to travel, not one right answer, but the different ways to make travel work for your life and the way that travel can affect you. Because at the end of the day, it's not how far you go, it's about how you choose to live along the way. Now, if any part of that resonated with you, I hope you'll pick up the book Wherever We May Roam, Finding Your Travel Style. And I'd appreciate it if after you're done, you leave honest review on Amazon and Goodreads, and send us an email here to let us know what we're doing that you like and what we're doing that you don't like. So that's it for this 10-part series. I hope you've enjoyed it. And as always, remember, we travel not to escape life, but so that life does not escape us. If you've been thinking about traveling longer or just traveling better, we hope this episode gave you a few more ideas. Remember, there's no right or wrong way to explore the world. Only the way that works for you. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to follow the podcast, and if you have a moment, leave a quick review. It really helps more people find us. And if you want to go deeper, you can check out my book, Wherever We May Roam, Finding Your Travel Style, where I walk through all of this in more detail. You can search for it on Amazon in Kindle, Paperback, and Audiobook, or just use the link on our podcast page. If you have any questions, a topic you would like discussed, or would like to be on our show, email us at jim at jimsantosbooks.com. Thanks for listening, and as always, safe travels wherever you may roam.