Don't fake it, because you won't make it

In mid-December I found my mind coming across an interesting fact: in January, it will have been two years since my feet left American soil. Of course this was unacceptable, so I booked a trip to Spain. These are my antics. Nah. You're going to have to hear a little bit more about my philosophy on travel and money before you get the run down of what happened to a History Geek during two weeks in Spain. For new readers or readers that don't know me in real life, it's a reaching aspiration for me to be paid to travel one day. To a degree my dream is already there with work paying for travel, but I don't mean domestic, large cities, and 80% of my visit in a windowless defense contractor office. I mean pay me to grab my back pack and wander the scenic byways of the world. It's really part of the reason I write this, to hone my craft to even at its root see what kind of travel writer will I be? Will I go to the deepest darkest trenches of the world? Stand on my head at a mountains' peak for a new perspective? Write poetry from strong emotions taken out of viewing architecure? I really do not know. But I do know a few facts that have decided what kind of traveler I am: I have a job but still essentially live pay check to pay check. I'm single and do not have offspring yet, although I know one day I want both of these facts to change. Taking two weeks off from work is bold and is probably the maximum amount of responsible leave I would take at this point. These three facts have lead into today's rambling: what kind of traveler you are. I looked at what my life is and what I want it to develop into, and then I assessed prices and available tours, followed by deciding where I even wanted to go. Note, that the "where I wanted to go" really was a third option in my mind. I am a lonesome traveler. I enjoy taking in what I am seeing and being very internal about my thoughts, taking photographs, living the local culture, and not really sharing my experience with others. My list of approved travel buddies is maybe five people long, and I do not think of myself as a lonely person. I just truly believe that you are not yourself when you travel. Nor should you be, you are there to experience something different. On a random Monday I'm not going to call a friend to check out the Cathedral in Baltimore followed by cracking a dozen crabs and smoking some hookah while slamming back a few Natty Bohs. But on a travel Monday, this is totally me, just replace crabs with local fare, hookah with local activity, and Natty Bohs with a regional wine. However, I know I live in a rather unsafe world so I have come to trust Contiki. Contiki is NOT paying me to write this, but on my two tours with them I have always ended up in a safe hotel and enjoy the flexibility of the day (and night) with the safety net of a group of fellow travelers to fall back on. And if I decide that the "lone wolf" traveler thing isn't for me one day, I can find a new person to go with. After looking at my work schedule I saw that Contiki was offering a few tours during the time I felt comfortable leaving work for such an amount of time. What it finally came down to was flights, and this is how going to Spain for two weeks was finally born. I had started a savings fund for this trip and tax returns were around the corner, so I came up with a financial plan while putting this trip on a credit card.

My itinerary really took me all over Spain and that is for another post, but this is the way to do Spain. I feel Americans think we're special because state boundaries dictate culture. I'm Jersey-raised so I fist pump and Baltimore adopted so I love Old Bay on everything. Spain is so much more diverse. I'm probably going to make one long post on two weeks in Spain because to me it is an experience not to be shortened.