The Last Sit

Carlisle
Our final Sit brought us to Carlisle, England and in some ways it was the perfect conclusion to the first part of our adventure. We arrived by train and our host, Peter, picked us up and drove us 10 minutes to their home providing an informative narrative. Peter and Lindsey had an immaculate and comfortable home tastefully decorated and they had a friendly cat name Fliss.

Fliss

The bus stop was minutes from their door making visits to Carlisle convenient. Carlisle has a population of about 70,000 with comfortable shops and restaurants and ample energy. Lindsey prepared a delicious dinner. Afterward we talked while drinking wine. Their home was as comfortable as any place we stayed during our six months and Fliss perfectly behaved. Upon their return from holiday, we shared some coffee and tea and they told us about their holiday of dancing and we conveyed our pleasure of living in their home, experiencing Carlisle and caring for Fliss. We all hugged while they thanked us for taking care of their home and Fliss, while we encouraged them to visit us if they ever come to the States.






Some thoughts on the Sits.
 What a wonderful way to see the world! As the Sit part of our journey has ended, it's nice to reflect back on those Sits.

John: 

Our Adventure began as an idea to live outside of the US and evolved into taking care of homes and pets in Western Europe for six months, travel back to the States for a wedding and rent an apartment in Eastern Europe and travel Eastern and Central Europe until our tenants’ lease expired on May 1^st. We were excited to see places in Europe, place ourselves in situations we had never been and meet some wonderful people.

The Pet Sitting process involves buying a subscription to websites where pet owners post opportunities to stay in their home to take care of their pets while they are on holiday or away for business. The Sits can be for a few days to a few months. Some are posted days in advance of their departure while others are months in the future. Barb was able to reserve about 45 days of the 180 available before our flight to London. Our intention was to have Sits for as many of the days as possible to minimize hotel costs but learned quickly to allow adequate time between Sits for travel. Getting from our second Sit in Ward End England to meet with our Edinburgh host taught us a lesson. The time constraints were too tight traveling from Ward End, England with a departure time of 3:30AM flying to Edinburgh, Scotland to meet our host by noon, the same day.

France

While we were well prepared for the eight hours on a sleepless flight from Orlando, FL to London we had some difficulties moving from city to city using multiple forms of mass transit on average every four to five days over the course of six months. But we made commitments to our hosts and knew the end date was November 29^th, the date of our flight back for the wedding, so we persevered and the experiences in the cities and towns and the meeting of our hosts will be remembered for a very long time, especially our hosts. By the time we reached our final Sit in Carlyisle, Barb had secured Sits for 147 days of the 180, on average we traveled every 4 to 5 days, we had been to a dozen cities with populations from 4,300 to 8.8 million, we were entrusted to mostly cats but almost a dozen dogs and two chickens. Two of our Sits were in homes over 400 years old and one was a new, modern condo. 

We learned we preferred traveling by train over flying. The train stations were busy places during the day ranging from futuristic type malls to waiting rooms with small shops and vending machines. But each had display boards of the schedule of trains for the next several hours. The infrequent travelers all seemed to gather around the displays gazing or giving periodic glances to find their connection location and details. We almost always had time before boarding our next connection and enjoyed buying sandwiches and snacks for the next section of the trip and share a meal or a coffee with my lovely partner. Only once was there a security check to board a train. This greatly reduced the hassles of traveling by train compared to flying.

Bus travel is usually the least expensive and as comfortable as trains and with none of the flying hassles. The downside of bus travel is because of traffic, travel time is at risk of being extended. The other negative is some of the destinations are bus stops as opposed to stations. Think about the sometimes random places you see a bus stop sign and imagine not speaking the language, hungry and needing to get to a hotel or make another connection. One of our bus stops in Biarritz, France was in a housing development with only a pizza place and houses. We asked a pizza worker for a taxi company number, preferably English speaking. We didn’t have to travel far but there was a minimum $15 charge to get in the vehicle, so it cost about $30 to travel a few miles. But if you don’t encounter traffic delays and you end at a bus station, as opposed to a stop, the seats are comfortable and the views from the bus are the best.

Bakewell UK

While still in the states, after securing our first Sit, during the interview with our host, we agreed to come the day before their departure. We would have dinner together and stay overnight in their spare bedroom. After the interview, while discussing what we each understood, we both expressed hesitation and some angst about accepting the kindness of strangers before ever doing anything to earn it. We both agreed we would approach it as a learning experience. While it was mildly uncomfortable, our lovely hosts, Michaela and David, were warm, friendly and so genuine we were both at ease instantly and glad to be spending time with them. For the next 12 or so Sits, that approach was, by far, the preferred process and, as it turns out, allowed us to meet some wonderful people with delightful interactions that will be some of our fondest memories. While I usually felt slight angst planning to meet our next hosts, I was able to reassure myself recollecting prior meetings and the moment I started talking to our new host I was enjoying myself. I noticed how I felt just prior to our first Sits compared to the disappointment when our London Sit arrangements did not allow us to meet our host. 

Barb: When I first read about pet sitting, I thought "Yeah, sure. It's one of those things that you read about but very few people actually get do it. It sounds too good to be true." A little research told me it was doable. Do your homework, prepare and go after it. There are legit websites and real people that would love for you to come and pet sit for them.

Bear in Munich

13 Sits. So many wonderful memories. Sure there were issues from time to time but the majority of our time was wonderful. Amazing countries, amazing homes but the best part were our hosts. As we previously said in our blog post "New Friends" we have been lucky to meet some really fantastic people. They were welcoming, accommodating and respectful. They loved their pets and only wanted someone to care and love them while they were away. They were open minded enough to open their home to strangers and trust that we were everything we said we were.

The Sits got us to Europe. We have learned so much since landing in London back in May. If we decided to do it again, there are some things we would tweak but I think we did really well our first time out. 83% of our time for our first 6 months was spent doing Sits. When our journey ends in April, we want to look at pet sitting in the States. It's a wonderful way to see the world!


(If anyone would like more information on pet sitting, please message us privately and we would be glad to share what we know)

Cheers!
Barb and John

Berlin

John-The Meeting:

We were looking forward to our Berlin Sit because our hosts have two cats, Oskar and Lucy, and our host, Ellie, seemed very nice during the Skype interview and in all communications. We did spend a night in Berlin while traveling from Gdansk to Munich. While we only saw the train station and our hotel, it was all impressive and Ellie said their home was in the “cool” section.

Lucy

We flew into the Berlin Schonefeld Airport in the afternoon and walked out into a beautiful sunny day. The signage indicated the train we needed was close, just down a pathway. We passed the “Mama Burrito” food truck and stopped for a beer at a beer garden. The train took us to the tram that dropped us off just in front of our hotel Ellie had suggested. Barb told Ellie we arrived and the hotel was nice. Ellie said she and Ben would meet us in front of the hotel at 7 for a short walking tour of their neighborhood and back to their home for a review of our responsibilities and to meet Oskar and Lucy.

At about 10 minutes to seven we went down to the lobby. It was busy with guests checking in and out and waiting for the remaining members of their group to go out to see Berlin. After a few minutes I went outside to look for our hosts. I was entertaining myself by balancing on the curb looking for a car with two young people thinking they should recognize me because I was certain to look just like the person Barb would be married to. Across the street from the trams and further down our street toward Alexanderplatz I saw people, sitting, standing and walking through and around the chairs and tables in the lights from the businesses and street lamps. If I didn’t have plans I would have ventured to either street to see what the people were doing. Within minutes I noticed two people approaching slowly and felt they were looking at me. My first thought was, “Don’t make eye contact for fear of provoking an altercation!” so I avoided eye contact, it is a city of over 3.5 million. Luckily, they had more sense than me because the woman asked if I was John and then I realized it was Ellie and Ben. Not a good first impression on my part. I partially regrouped, greeted them both with only a handshake and said, “I will get Barb.”

Barb came out with her huge warm smile and outstretched arms providing each of our hosts with a comforting hug. Ben and Ellie must have been relieved Barb was accompanying me. They walked us across the street explaining their home was on the other side of the busy street divided by the Tram tracks. The street we were walking on was wide with trees and people enjoying the gorgeous night. Ben and Ellie explained they didn’t frequent this side because there are so many places to enjoy in the area around their home. The roads were not busy with cars as I’d expected in an area at the heart of a city of that size but we saw later that the trams, trains and buses were very popular. Berlin is also been ranked tenth most friendly bike city in the world, another reason for the noticeable absence of vehicles. Ellie had just explained the distinction of bike lane paths from the pedestrian walkways as we started walking toward the street. I looked at the sidewalk and saw the bike lanes were red pavers, a clear demarcation from the sidewalk. At that moment I felt a polite tug on my arm prompting me to move quickly in that direction. It was Ellie directing me out of the path of an oncoming cyclist. Slick second impression, oblivious.

Great neighborhood food!

After crossing the street, we walked up and down several blocks with Ellie and Ben pointing out places of interest. The streets were wide with tall trees toward the street and tall clean buildings with attractive architecture and some color differentiating one from the other. There were restaurants, bars, late night convenient stores, grocery stores, pharmacies, a cake decorating shop, “Cake Ville -- Bake, Rattle and Roll”, with ample people and good energy. At one point, Ben said he hoped we will enjoy our stay in Berlin. At that moment Ben motioned toward a wine shop. He talked to the clerk and they selected a bottle of wine.



We then thought it was a good time to meet Oskar and Lucy. They live in a two story home. Both cats were friendly and playful. We knew they were going to be good hosts while Ben and Ellie were on holiday. I say hosts because we knew if we abided by Oskar and Lucy’s rules everything would go smoothly. Ben and Ellie showed us their place pointing out the automatic cat food feeder and watering bowl, along with other items to make our stay more pleasant. Since none of us had eaten Ellie had a Nepalese restaurant deliver some food. We said they could order anything because we will eat any food. We talked over a glass of wine about Berlin, politics, cats and we coaxed Ben to show us the video he made of their year of house sitting in and around Australia. He said when they returned home many people asked them what they did for a year so they thought it would be easiest to describe it through a video. They paused the video when the food was delivered. There was antipasto, a calzone type food, and two small pizza like foods with a light airy crust with cheese, sauce and, one had whole olives. I enjoyed it all but loved the antipasto probably because I had seen that on menus all my life and never knew what it was. After watching the video, Barb and I were ready to look for Sit opportunities in Australia.

The conversation tripped and flowed from subject to subject while drinking a couple additional glasses of wine. Barb and I wanted to open the next bottle of wine but, begrudgingly, suggested we go because we expected they had to prepare for their trip. I have been told it is a good practice to leave the dinner table slightly hungry. I suppose that allows you to feel you’ve earned the right to your next meal. Well, we left that night wanting to spend more time with our hosts and maybe we will see them before we leave Berlin or during another adventure we may be on.
My response to Ben’s hope we enjoyed our stay should have been, “I don’t see how we couldn’t!”, because we loved it!

Barb – The Stay:

Ben and Ellie’s neighborhood was great! We found great restaurants, a nice pub, a grocery store nearby as well as the tram being very convenient.

We took a tour of the city one day by taking 2 different public buses that pretty much circled the city.

We went to the Berlin Wall. There are many areas of the Wall left and we choose the East Side Gallery area. Many artists have left their mark on the wall and this section spans about a mile.

You can see more of my photos of the Berlin Wall. Just CLICK HERE.

Ben and Ellie had an amazing Espresso machine and John took full advantage of it (with a little help from Lucy)

Ellie had told us about the Festival of Lights that would be happening during our stay. It sounded nice but we had no idea how amazing it would be! Every year, Berlin turns into a world full of light art. International artists present glowing light projections, 3D video mappings and light installations, transporting their messages, themes and contents. These artistic projections on landmarks, monuments, buildings, streets and neighborhoods. We had never seen anything like it! Live music accompanied some of the light shows and I captured part of one.

You can view the video of the light show. CLICK HERE.

You can see more photos from the light show. Just CLICK HERE.

Oskar

And of course there was Lucy and Oskar, our “hosts”. They were entertaining, adorable and loads of fun! It was a great Sit and we were so happy to be able to have lunch with Ben and Ellie when they returned home.








If you would like to see more of my photos of Berlin, just CLICK HERE.

Cheers!
Barb and John

New Friends

John: The idea of this trip was very appealing to us but as Barb and I discussed the required tasks before we would be able to get on the plane to anywhere, there was some work and research to do. But, as usual, whenever I discuss things with Barb things seem manageable and I know they will get done. While trip logistics consumed its fair share of our effort and conversations, I enjoyed discussing the positive things we each hoped the adventure would provide us, positive attitude and behavior changes, new and exciting places to experience, hanging out in English pubs, drinking German beer, tasting different foods and meeting people with different perspectives. I especially enjoyed Barb’s hope, “I want to meet people and develop a bond of friendship so that they visit us in our home town.” While I liked the idea I had my doubts of its probability of happening.

I enjoyed thinking of the idea of visiting Europe, talking with people and seeing their city through their filters. We would meet their friends, learn some of their customs, create an international web of friendship. In turn, when appropriate, we would tell them about our home. After we learned about some of their preferences we could match those up with comparable activities or things our home town offers, enticing them to visit Weaverville. We would take them to music shows, breweries, have an international party and invite our neighbors and friends to show them how wonderful our town is and the people are.

Barb: I loved the idea of meeting new friends abroad but loving the idea of it and actually going out and meeting new people? Well, for introverts that is not always an easy thing to do.

John: But how and where would we meet our new foreign friends?

Back home in Asheville we met almost all of our friends, since moving there, as a direct result of our time spent at the Root Bar. So, why not meet new international friends at a local pub? Maybe, since we would be staying in someone’s house or apartment we could meet the neighbors, while I was mowing the yard. We could meet them in the produce section of the grocery store, we wouldn’t be dining out for every meal.

Maybe I would take a glass of lemonade out to my neighbor when I heard him mowing his lawn. After I said something clumsy in French he and I would laugh and I would work up the courage to invite him and “la monque”, the misses, for dinner sometime. We would either attempt escargot with chard, a local dish, or, if they preferred, an American staple, 22 ounces of prime cut USDA steak and a pounder-pound baked potato with all the toppings. After they thoroughly enjoyed their meal they would make us promise to let them give us a tour of their city to see the sites and visit their favorite pubs and meeting places. Then, after the tour and several fun outings together we would befriend each other on Facebook. When the time arrives and we have to move to our next Sit our new friends would have a mini-party where we all promised to stay in touch through social media. As time passed and we were following them, not to be misconstrued as creeping, we notice they are planning a trip to the States and it corresponds with our return! They accept our invitation and then you are all invited to meet Pierre and Amandine Macron from Banniers-Charente France at our house party. It could happen!

What about the village square? You know, the center of those European towns. The ones with the 500 year old functioning fountain, with granite steps on four sides where all the people of the area go every night to drink wine, eat local tapas and talk about current events. I would love doing that and the prospect of meeting a future transatlantic friend would be possible. The only problem is we haven’t seen such a place.

Barb: Yep, I had some of those ideas too. I wasn’t sure how we would make new friends, I just knew I wanted to. I wanted to introduce my new European friends to my Asheville friends. I wanted to stay in touch. I wanted to meet new people and then see them again down the road.

John: While almost every friend Barb and I have met since moving to Asheville could be directly linked to the Root Bar we also realize it didn’t happen in the first month from when we started going there. So, going to a local version of the Root Bar in Munich Germany meeting a couple with similar dispositions and attitudes was a low probability option. We did, however, meet a couple at a beer garden in Munich.

The beer garden was set up in a way that was conducive to meeting people. It was outside under a huge chestnut tree surrounded by outdoor vendors selling cheese, charcuterie, beer and prepared food. There were picnic tables lined up in 25 rows of 20 tables with the benches touching each other, to maximize the seating per square foot. We had been there mid-week and on the weekend and it was always busy with people and seats were at a premium. We walked around and saw a table that definitely wasn’t full and asked if we could squeeze in to sit. I would venture out to decide on the food and get a couple of pints of beer. The picnic tables were full of people eating from plastic containers, enjoying a pretzel or had trays of food from one of the vendors and most of the people had a pint or liter of beer. It had great energy and people were talking and laughing. The beer garden in Munich we frequented was in the Marienplatz and called Viktualienmarkt, One night we met a couple,a little older than us, sitting next to us. Barb struck up a conversation with them and before you know it the four of us were chatting away. After a couple of hours they invited us to visit a wine party across the Marienplatz. We made our way there but there wasn’t much energy so they suggested we all take a bus to another drinking place on a river. There was a local band playing mostly German songs. We opted for the first table with four seats and it was just in front of the stage next to group of young people thoroughly enjoying the music, food and beer. They were having a fun time singing raucously to all the tunes they knew. We stayed there until about 11p and the couple rode with us on the bus and walked us to our train to be sure we make it back safely. They were a nice couple and we enjoyed ourselves. But I don’t anticipate we will every hear from them again, mainly because we didn’t exchange digits and they did not give any indication they were social media types.

When I considered what our interaction with our hosts would involve, I didn’t think it presented much opportunity to bond into a friendship. Since we were strangers and would only be together for a few hours it didn’t seem like we could bond to the level of friendship that takes months or years to cultivate. Before our first Sit I assumed it would be a business type meeting. We would meet our hosts, discuss their expectations of us for the animals and the house and we would learn whatever we needed to know that was not included in the welcome kit provided during the hiring process. They would go off on their trip and we may or may not meet them when they returned. But the actual process was a little different for some of our hosts. They usually picked us up from a bus, train or airport terminal. After arriving at their home we and they did discuss responsibilities and ask questions and we got a quick tour of the house and property. The level of detail was different for each set of hosts. After that it was different for some of our Sits. Some hosts asked us to arrive the day before their departure and stay overnight. At first, I felt a little uncomfortable at the thought of staying in a house with strangers and accepting their undeserved hospitality. But, I wanted to challenge some of my unnecessary hang-ups and it did save us a hotel expense, so we stayed.

Barb: That was an uneasy feeling for me too. So we go to a stranger’s house and we have to spend a whole evening with them. What do we talk about? What do we do? Should we go to bed early? Stay out of their way? What if it gets awkward because we just don’t hit it off with them? To say I was nervous about that part of the Sits is an understatement.

John: More than half our sits asked us to arrive the day before they departed. In each situation, our hosts either took us out to dinner or prepared a meal for us, each picked us up when we arrived in town. Each of the dinners included liberal drinking and the conversation flowed effortlessly, talking about the weather, American and English politics, and almost any other topic. Each of the dinner celebrations lasted for a couple of hours and carried on into late night drinks at their homes and in each case Barb and I felt a connection with them. We were intrigued by some of our conversations about our country and they told us they found Americans to be friendly, which we were pleasantly surprised to hear.

Barb: We made friends! All our hosts have been so welcoming and accommodating. Whether it was leaving us train cards, flowers, wine, coffee and jams, we always felt appreciated. But the hosts that we got to spend time with, whether it was staying overnight or meeting beforehand and seeing them after they got back from their trip, have kept in touch with us. With them we shared drinks and conversations, had dinners and breakfasts and walks together. Memories we will treasure. We have met new friends, friends of our hosts, that were so friendly and sweet to the American pet sitters who like sparkling wine or wanted to see an English garden. And of course there is Mou, the one who fed us and introduced us to the best Bangladesh cuisine.

Of all the experiences we have had here in Europe, meeting our new friends are the best.

John: While I wasn’t confident we would make transatlantic friends on this adventure and believed the limited time with our hosts precluded that possibility, I admit I was wrong. Considering the people we’ve met I would not be surprised if we maintain a distant relationship or, possibly, another face to face visit. Of course, we will invite all of you to meet them.


Cheers!
John and Barb

What We’ve Done, What We’ve Learned

While the overarching idea, rent our home in the states and stay rent free traveling Europe and elsewhere by Pet Sitting for a year was very appealing and financially sound, we still had to overcome some obstacles - physically moving all of our belongings from place to place, coordinating schedules for Sits while identifying and organizing the different modes of transportation, balancing our budget and finally, enjoying the experiences of our lives.

Etta in France

A critical component for us to be able to travel six months in Europe is Pet Sitting. Pet or House Sitting is when homeowners, going on holiday (vacation) or a business trip for days or weeks, open their home, rent free, in exchange for feeding and attending to their pet’s needs. So, for feeding and playing with animals, we live, temporarily, in homes located in towns and cities throughout Europe meeting some wonderful people and experience things we never thought we would. Since the animals are not on life support requiring 24/7 care and we are not trained veterinarians, we are able to venture out in the area for hours at a time while our furry friends sleep, oblivious to our brief absence. Fantastic! Although the Sits with our new furry friends has been rewarding and memorable, the purpose of our trip was to experience people, places and things.

Since we are in our 50’s, with me closer to 60, moving our 40 pounds of luggage between the six Sits (so far) and four additional stops, almost always via multiple transportation modes in three months has been challenging. Luckily, Barb is a determined person and devoted partner and does her fair share of the physical moving and I have been able to provide any extra muscle when needed. We learned to shift as much weight to our backpacks for the ground transportation since there is no size restrictions and distribute it into our handbags when flying. This has helped tremendously. We realized the difficulty of moving our luggage as we made our way to our first hotel in London but the impetus for change happened boarding our plane on Flybe airlines. I still recall the feeling of angst as I entered our plane’s fuselage, each with our 20 pound backpacks and seeing the overhead not much bigger than a bread box realizing they would never fit. During our next Sit we worked on a solution. Just recently we received our collapsible handcart that should help even more.

The coordination of the dozen or so Sits we will probably need for the six months in Europe have been handled perfectly by Barb. She applies for Sits, always mindful of available time slots in our schedule, arranges interviews and makes sure I look somewhat presentable when we have a Skype call. As far as the travel arrangements, Barb must have travel planning in her DNA or blood because she has always done that in our relationship and has been fantastic on this Adventure. I’ve watched her sit in front of our laptop with her eyes glazing, toggling between many different screens for schedules for trains, buses, airlines, hotels and their cancellation policies, Google maps for walking distances from terminal to terminal to hotel, and other websites. It’s too much for me to comprehend and since she enjoys it and skilled my input would just muddle things.

We did learn a valuable lesson on over committing to our hosts. Between our second and third Sit we had to leave at 3:30AM in Ward End, England to meet our third host in Edinburgh, Scotland by noon. We took a taxi to the airport, flew to Edinburgh, caught a tram into the city to get the keys for our AirBnB, then a taxi to meet our host and finally an Uber to our AirBnB. That was a grind but we did it and since then we make realistic commitments with adequate time between Sits.




After three months of traveling we are reasonably satisfied with our expenses relative to our budget. We still need to be aware of our budgetary constraints but also want to enjoy these experiences. Since we travel to locations based on the Sits we have been to places we never heard of so we never considered them as a place we would want to go. Our third Sit, Edinburgh Scotland, was such a place. After reading a travel book and doing a little internet research the city size was adequate, it had mass transportation, we could easily walk to places and their temperatures would be a high of 75 degrees. We stayed there for one month and saw a good portion of the city and it far exceeded our expectations and we would love to return. Another time we had four days before our Munich Sit so we selected Gdansk Poland because it was exotic, for us, and the flight was reasonable. Our research indicated the temperatures and cost of living was reasonable. Since it has a population of 450K we knew there would be activities we enjoy. We loved it! We could just as easily traveled to popular locations and had fun but I can’t imagine they would be more memorable than Gdansk. We knew the budget could be doomed by rationalizing expensive travel and hotels to popular but out of the way places by the phrase, “We should spend the money. We deserve it and this is a once in a lifetime opportunity!”

Pintxos 

I think people, friends, bloggers, writers, recommend places because they enjoyed them, of course, but they probably don’t have the same expectations of places or the same interest as us. Those suggestions are a good place to start but a decision should only be made after some introspection and research. Also, books or the internet should be taken as generally accurate. For instance, Barb found a blog that described a city in northern Spain having a style of eating and drinking that appealed to us, bars giving a free tapas with the purchase of a glass of wine. We enjoy eating small plates of food, going to bars and drinking wine or beer so we planned a trip to Bilbao, Spain. Well, the city was fantastic and we loved it but we didn’t get any free tapas. My point is if we had expected free food we would have been disappointed. We did expect bars to serve small plates and they did and we thoroughly enjoyed our meals and experience.



Sometimes we like to take the “On-Off Tours” of cities. It’s a way to see some of the city and identify sections that we would like to see. We took one of those tours in Munich Germany with the plan to stay on the bus for a complete route identifying stops we would like to go back to on the second time around route. I used the map provided to make note of interesting places. While listening to the guide and seeing the areas I filled the map with notes and asterisks on stops that were places we think would be worth going to. So, we finished the route and decided to go for lunch and discuss what we saw. There were several places on my map I made notes about and two with asterisks. As we read the tour bus brochure we realized we paid for the three different tours so we agreed to try one more tour after lunch. By the time we approached our last stop on that second tour I had made notes on five stops with asterisks next to three. Then we saw the Marienplatz, looked at each other and agreed this is the place to go. Well, two weeks in Munich and we went back to the Marienplatz every time we took the train into the city. Barb and I had a great time in all of our visits to the city but we can’t say we saw anything but one small section. I think most people judge their experiences on cities they visit based on what they have done, makes sense. So, if I tell a person Munich is a great city and we had fun I am actually describing one small section. The converse could also be true if a person tells us a city isn’t worth seeing. My point is if you adhere to limited guidelines based on your desires and a city meets them, it’s probably a place to explore.

I think seeing most of the world class and popular cities would be a great experience but I question if it is worth spending the extra money when you can go to a place you may never have heard of for far less and have a comparable or more memorable experience. Also, cities are not monolithic and are made up of several or many sections each possibly providing different experiences so unless your wants and needs match the personality of the person doing the recommending, you should do you own research and decide if you want to visit.

A minor point and possibly contradictory, is when you are considering saving a euro or two by taking a sleeper train through Madrid, Spain to a destination to avoid a hotel cost. We had that very situation and quickly decided to pay the additional euros for the hotel in Madrid even though we would only be there for part of day. Since we would be going through Madrid anyways why would we not want to see Madrid! This decision to spend the additional money in a city we didn’t research as opposed to sleeping on a train through a world class city was a wise one. (Note: That trip planned through Madrid fell through when we landed a Sit in Amsterdam Netherlands!)

Cheers!
John


Note from Barb: John expressed really well the thought process of how we have been traveling these last 3 months, our expectations, challenges and logistics of meeting every Sit. I am truly lucky to have such a wonderful partner to share this journey with. It can be stressful at times and it was a LOT of work just getting to the point of boarding the plane to Europe but we have said over and over and over again, it was worth it. We have met incredible people which we hope to stay in touch with and maybe host at our home, visited places I never dreamed of and have collected so many wonderful memories.

Birmingham

We just finished two weeks in the Birmingham UK area pet sitting Zac and Winnie.

Zac

Winnie

Both are Staffordshire Terriers. Zac is 8 years old and Winnie is an 11 month old puppy. Winnie was the loving, always needed to be near you puppy. She was definitely a character! Zac is a bruiser, reserved but with obsessive passion for an orange ball.

When not taking care of Zac and Winnie, we would head down to The Hornet for a pint.

The Hornet

We went quite often and would see the same faces there. Not a pub I had pictured when I thought of English pubs, there were no seats at the bar. You walked up, ordered a drink and sat at one of the many tables. Interestingly, The Hornet opened at 8AM and served breakfast. We never got there quite that early.

"So very nice to see you here"

As we had written about before, Purbobagh was the highlight of our time in Birmingham. After our initial visit, we went back just about every night. Every night Mou, the owner, was always there to greet us and provide outstanding service, always making sure we enjoyed what we ordered and providing extras to try. We will never forget our experiences there.

THE Curry House

We did venture into downtown Birmingham. We stayed at a great Airbnb when we first arrived by train from Bakewell. The next morning we had a wonderful tradition English breakfast before taking off for our sit. During our time, we took the bus into downtown to see some of the sites.

Water feature with poem by PolarBear and Simon Turner.

Open Market

Selfridges Building

We have now finished our stay and are looking forward to our next sit in Edinburgh with Phillip the cat!

Cheers from the UK!
Barb

Hello World!

So here we go. Our first blog post. It is now 2 days before we start our journey!

This crazy idea started over 5 months ago. Both John and I are semi-retired and in our mid 50’s. We had part time jobs working at home for various internet companies and even did some Mystery Shopping. John asked me one day if I ever thought of living overseas. My answer? No. We talked, mostly over coffee in the mornings and I started to get comfortable with the idea. The more we talked the more I realized that this was an incredible opportunity. We had no full time jobs, no children or pets at home and had saved up some money from our part time jobs. If we didn’t do this, would I regret it? Would we ever have this opportunity again?

We decided to give it serious thought. One concern was our health and healthcare. We ain’t no spring chickens!  Being our age, issues come up but if we did run into any problems, well, let’s face it, healthcare overseas will be as good and probably better than what we have here in the states. Our insurance will cover certain situations. We know our limits. We won’t be hiking the Swiss Alps but we can trek through Munich and Edinburgh, walk dogs in England and hop trains in Norway.

So the research started. We gave ourselves a month to research traveling, renting our house, expenses, etc. At the end of January, we knew this was something we could do. In fact, we realized that it would actually be cheaper to travel for 1 year than to live at home! In February, we told our family and friends about this journey. By mid March, we had a signed 1 year lease for our house. We sold 1 car, bought backpacks, sold a camera and bought a new one, bought sneakers, got a new credit card and checking account, applied and received our passports, researched phone plans, packed up the house and moved it all into the basement. By the beginning of May, we had moved out of our house and into our good friends Bob and Marcy’s house where we had our first dog sit of our adventure, staying with Addie while Bob and Marcy took a trip to Florida.

The adventure idea started off as moving to another country, but we love where we live too much and decided to rent the house. Then we thought we would live in 1 country for a year. Costa Rica was the first choice. Somewhere in our internet search, we discovered house sitting. That opened up the world! We have done house/pet sitting before and along with fostering for our local shelter, it was a perfect fit for us. We take our jobs seriously so we got our background checks, joined 4 different house sitting websites and created a website showcasing our experience with house/pet sitting. Once we had the signed lease for our home, we started applying for house sits. We had no idea where we were going other than we would start in either Europe or Central/South America. Our first confirmed sit came in and it was Europe!

We currently have 7 confirmed sits. We will be traveling to England, Scotland, Germany, France and Ireland. We have scheduled a week in Gdansk Poland in between sits. We have close to 7 weeks that we still would like to schedule for sits. We will be spending a week in Norway before we fly out of Oslo back to the states so John can officiate a wedding for the daughter of my dear friend Gayle. Yes, John also officiates weddings on the side! After that, we think we will go to either Central/South America or Asia.

We hope you follow us along our journey. We’d love to read your comments. Both John and I will write about our experiences and every once in a while we will include what we learned while planning this adventure, such as where to begin your research, picking or not picking phone plans and SIM cards, how we chose our backpacks and much more. I’m sure there are others out there planning their own adventure or just wondering if it is possible for them to pack up and travel. Information is power and we would love to share what we learned.

Cheers from beautiful Asheville NC!

Barb