Where Next? Travel with Kristen and Carol
Where Next? Travel with Kristen and Carol
Digital Nomad and Relocation Expert - Kristin Wilson from "Traveling with Kristin"
Embark with us as we traverse the globe alongside our very special guest, Kristin Wilson from "Traveling with Kristin" ( YouTube and website), a sage of the location independent lifestyle, who brings her tales of surf, soil, and soul-searching to our ears. Her voice, a beacon for wanderers, guides us through the intricate dance of life as a digital nomad. From the rush of catching waves in faraway waters to the entrepreneurial spirit that drove her to establish a relocation company, Kristin's journey is a testament to the allure and practicalities of a borderless existence. She shares her treasure trove of experiences, having set foot in 63 countries, and imparts wisdom on embracing the vibrant tapestry of cultures that has fashioned her path.
Our discussion meanders through the lives of audacious expatriates, who have woven their homes within the rich fabric of unfamiliar cultures. We celebrate the courage and adaptability of those who have opted for the road less traveled, whether a Midwestern family's rebirth in Costa Rica or a tech-savvy wanderer's leap from Austin to Budapest's embrace. By sharing compelling anecdotes of life abroad, we unveil both the challenges and triumphs of establishing roots in distant lands. The concept of slow travel emerges as a golden thread throughout, a narrative of individuals opting for a pace that allows deeper connections and more sustainable living.
We round off our globe-trotting session with a mindful gaze at the footprints we leave behind. Sustainable travel isn't just a buzzword—it's a practice that threads through our discussions, from supporting local entrepreneurs to choosing genuine experiences that echo the heartbeat of a place. As we anticipate embarking on a group voyage through the historic allure of Portugal, we reflect on past escapades and the vision of a life lived across a mosaic of global destinations. With the promise of sharing not only the waves we crave but also the resources for listeners to chart their own courses as digital nomads, this episode is a compass pointing towards a world of discovery and responsible adventure.
You can reach Kristin at:
Traveling with Kristin Website
Traveling with Kristin's Digital Nomad Bootcamp
Digital Nomad Visa Database
Kristin's Digital Nomads Podcast
Digital Nomads for Dummies - by Kristin Wilson
Kristin on Instagram
Mentioned in the show:
THE LAST TOURIST
VisaHQ
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Hosts
Carol Springer: https://www.instagram.com/carol.work.life
Kristen: https://www.instagram.com/team_wake/
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Hi, welcome to our podcast. We're Next Travel with Kristin and Carol. I am Kristin. I am Carol. We're two long-term friends with a passion for travel and adventure.
Carol:Each episode, we interview people around the globe to help us decide where to go next. Welcome, kristin, from Traveling with Kristin. Author of Visual Nomad for Dummies, the host of Badass Digital Nomads. We're very thrilled to have you on our podcast today, so thank you.
Kristen:Thank you, it's a pleasure to be here Carol is a big fan, has followed you for a long time and I with my work and life, I don't get out of there, but actually I get out a lot. I'm out backpacking and surfing. I wake, surf and compete and I do a whole bunch. So I don't spend a lot of time on social media and I saw a little bit of what you did. So for our audience too. They probably may or may not pretty much know you, so I was curious just to share who you are, how you know growing up, what that looked like and what brought you to you know traveling, like you are and what you're doing.
Kristin W:Okay, well, I guess my story starts as far back as I can remember, just really loving to travel and always being very curious and adventurous, climbing trees and running around the neighborhood and always looking at my mom's photo albums of her travel photos and my grandparents who worked for Pan Am in Miami. So I guess I've just always been fascinated with travel from a young age, as many of us are. And going through high school and college I saved all of my money to travel, so I used to surf as well. I would travel to Puerto Rico to go surfing, hawaii for surf contest, california, mexico, and really surfing was my first vehicle to be able to travel, to have a reason to travel, to be able to go with my friends. And then in college I studied abroad twice. So, by the way, in Vero Beach, florida.
Kristen:Okay, I was Southern California, down to beach. Okay, I'm going to surf, actually at the beach. Very often, I barely did. I was a beach bum, of course, and then I started wake surfing behind boats.
Kristin W:Oh yeah, I used to go to the wake surf competitions in Orlando. Oh, they're huge.
Kristen:In the 90s?
Kristin W:Probably those in the 90s, I guess. Yeah, yeah, it would have been the late 90s, early 2000s. For wake surfing yeah, or wake boarding. I think we would go wake surfing behind the boats, but wake boarding was really big. Yeah, you've got them all in the water.
Kristen:Yeah, but the modified surfboard versus the wake boarding. But yeah, wake boarding.
Carol:Yeah.
Kristen:Well, of course, Florida with the great weather. Definitely there's a lot of wake surfers there. And then you've got all over now.
Kristin W:Yeah, I don't go as much now because of the sun I get too much sun. I was a lifeguard as well. I spent basically the first half of my life in the blazing Florida sun. So I took and then in Costa Rica yeah, I guess that's where my lifestyle of living abroad started, with studying abroad in Costa Rica and realizing that that was a thing that I could actually just live in another country or at least travel there for a few months. So I studied Spanish in Costa Rica and then I studied abroad in Australia for a semester and then I just wanted to experience the lifestyle in more countries, maybe not live there forever, but at least go for a few weeks or a few months and see what it was like. And that kind of led to going back to Costa Rica for work, working in real estate there for about eight years. When did you get.
Kristen:What years were you there? I was there for a little bit in 2002.
Kristin W:That was 2002 when I got there 2002. I was there, yeah, 2002, I was there, I was studying abroad, and then I went back in 2005. And then I thought, okay, I'll just go for one year. And then one year turned into eight years and through that time I learned how to live in other countries and help other people do that. And so then I started a relocation company to help people do that and I realized I could do that from anywhere. So then I was doing my relocation company while traveling and after so many years of doing that I decided to start creating content about it, to just share that this lifestyle is possible, that you can do it from 20 years old until 80 or 90 years old, and now it's kind of become its own thing.
Kristen:That is awesome. Okay, so I have to ask 2002, Costa Rica where were you? I was in the Osa Peninsula and I was mostly on the Pacific side.
Kristin W:I was in Osara Well 2002,. I was in Santa Ana, which is in the Central Valley, because my language school was there and I moved to Osara.
Kristen:Okay, I don't know where Osara is. Is it on Pacific?
Kristin W:side it's on, yeah, Pacific Northwest.
Kristen:Northwest. Okay, awesome, I kind of traveled up and down, for it was just a month and it was just a blast. I was totally into corporate America for 20, 24 years at one company, so we had to use a whole bunch of vacations. I had 16 weeks and I took 12 other 16 weeks that year and one of the months was Costa Rica. Oh, nice yeah.
Kristin W:Well, one of my friends, Joy. I met her in Costa Rica because she was on sabbatical from corporate America yeah, working for a company in New York, I think. She got an MBA at Thunderbird and then went to Manhattan and then eventually burnt out, went to Costa Rica, learned how to surf, learned Spanish, met her future husband and father of her children and lives happily ever after.
Carol:So how many countries have you been to total now? Have you been to keep it track? I think it's 63.
Kristen:Wow, how many countries are there?
Kristin W:I believe there's about 200 or 210, including some territories and things.
Kristen:Nice. Do you have a goal in mind or just having fun?
Kristin W:No, at first I did want to see as many countries as I could, but then I realized it doesn't matter. I don't necessarily have to see every single country. Although some people have that goal, I more like to go back to places that I really enjoy. I'll keep adding a few new countries, because there's other places I haven't been yet that I really want to go, but it's not something like that. I have a timeline that I have to see a certain number by a certain time.
Kristen:Yeah, there's a client of mine. He's retired and he wants to get 100 countries and he's close to it. I think he's in the 80s and then he also wanted to be in every body of water. So he just went to Antarctica and dip into that. Oh my gosh.
Kristin W:I would like to go to Antarctica. I'm torn over that because I feel like if travel to Antarctica, it can't be a good thing. Yeah, so I'm on the fence about it, but I even wanted to go. I was considering in the winter. You have to stay there for six months, apparently. I watched a documentary about it.
Carol:Wow.
Kristin W:Wow, that would be so crazy. I mean, it's dark the whole time. It probably wouldn't be fun Dark and freezing, but I thought that would be cool to be stuck in Antarctica for half the year. It would be an experience.
Carol:It would be a spiritual experience.
Kristen:Yeah, very spiritual.
Carol:No, my goodness.
Kristen:One of our guests. Actually, she is bound in a wheelchair and a ventilator and she shared her experience and went to Antarctica and it was really interesting to hear I mean, she wasn't able to really get off and explore and would go on the deck with warm blankets and observe and see that she is a travel bug about traveling by wheelchair, which is kind of interesting.
Kristin W:Oh yeah, I love that. You know, whenever I travel, I always think how difficult it would be if you were in a wheelchair, because a lot of countries don't have the right infrastructure for it.
Kristen:Yes, that's what she does. She helps share the how to travel by wheelchair around the world.
Kristin W:I love that because it's like, yeah, if you put your mind to it, you can do anything. I love hearing that you know somebody knows how to little wood with their feet because they don't have hands. I mean, we could teach ourselves how to do anything and it's so inspiring, totally.
Kristen:I'll send you the link or her name or something afterwards.
Carol:So you also do DJ. So is that just like a small hobby or you're trying to like? Do you try to do that in different countries?
Kristin W:then I have. I've played now in quite a few places in Istanbul, dublin, portugal, amsterdam, london but you visa, so I'm hoping to DJ anywhere that I go and I travel with my DJ equipment and I don't really have a plan, but it just seems like anything I've ever done in life. I've either tried to share it somehow through performances as a dancer, a gymnast, ballerina, played, piano recitals, like I think it's just art, you know. So if you draw something you want to show your mom, or if you paint something, you want to put it in a gallery, and that's kind of how I've been with music. So with DJing, at first I just did it at home for a couple of years, but now I just want to share it wherever I go and maybe it will turn into a career someday.
Kristin W:But I like that music as something you can do your whole life. Like no one can tell you you can't do it anymore. You can just like an online business. Like you can be 95 years old and doing you know whatever you want these days with technology. Like I can be home producing music when I'm 100 or if I live that long. So yeah, we have a lot of options now. You put any of that on YouTube. I have a separate YouTube channel. Actually, this morning I woke up at 5 am and I went down to the waterfront here in Miami and I filmed a DJ set at Sunrise and it was so beautiful and at the moment I was like why am I doing this?
Kristen:Why am I getting up?
Kristin W:so early in the dark with carrying equipment and my table down there, yeah. But then when I was out there playing I was like wow, I'm playing at Sunrise on the waterfront and all these people are walking by like waving and stuff. So it was kind of fun.
Carol:Was this a dance music then, or was it more like welcome to the day or mellow music?
Kristin W:It was more I mean it's electronic music but more deep house and organic house, and actually I didn't really know what I was going to play either. I just put maybe 40 songs on a playlist and I was like seeing how I would feel. But that will go on my DJ YouTube channel, which is close to 1,000 subscribers now.
Kristen:Wow that's so great. There I have a friend. His name is Xander Black and he's a singer and he lives in Joshua Tree. He just got married and he's got these DJs or I don't know if he DJs, but he has that sound table and everything and he's in the middle of the desert with the you know, the junk trees. Oh, that's beautiful. It's really cool. Yeah, I know.
Kristin W:There's so many beautiful places on earth that you can share and put that content online. Luckily, with this new well, this old DJ controller I had that I had in my storage unit and I just took it out. It just works with a USB cord so I can just go with my computer and set it up. But my other equipment I need to get an actual backup battery or I need to have a power source to be able to use it. So it's a bit more complicated.
Kristin W:I can't just set up in the middle of nowhere. But yeah, I think I'll bring this with me on the cruise, I'll bring it to Brazil and maybe just do DJ sets wherever I go. I mean, why not, now that I know how to play music and put the songs together, play the music I like wherever I am and I put a pretty backdrop and yeah.
Kristen:I used to do my own. When I was in high school I was the music cutter and put I was a dancer, cheerleader, song leader.
Kristin W:That's what I did. I made all the cheerleading music.
Kristen:That's what I did. So I'm thinking already. I'm like gosh, that was so fun.
Kristin W:Yeah, I would put explosions, it was a tape deck, it would be like it was hilarious Totally.
Carol:It was so bad, probably in horns and stuff like a siren.
Kristen:Well, the best was. I had this radio and it had the two cassettes right and I'm like trying to.
Kristin W:Yeah, that's what I did. Yeah, on the stereo, the tape deck, exactly, you pause record.
Carol:Yeah, so how many people have you helped move with your travel relocation business?
Kristin W:I quit counting after 1,000 people, so I just say over 1,000. Okay, because it's so fun. Yeah, maybe I should keep counting. Yeah, but I think it Are you the line. At some point I was helping people one on one and now I don't really know how to quantify it, because I've helped people through books, through YouTube videos.
Carol:And.
Kristin W:I have some crazy number of views online, like tens of millions of views. So I'm like how many people have I helped? You know? I don't know.
Carol:I just say over 1,000. Definitely influenced a lot, for sure, right. And then, when people move to these other countries, how long does it stick Terpically? Do people go? Oh gosh, I don't know what I was thinking. Or what's the average state of people before they want to come home, or do a lot of people just never come home? Be so clear.
Kristin W:I feel like most people that get into this lifestyle unless they're doing it for just a job, that they're going temporarily they usually don't come back.
Kristin W:I mean, I did a video about why expats leave Costa Rica and people definitely do leave, like a certain percentage. Wherever you are in the world Mexico, portugal they feel like, ok, this isn't what I signed up for or they don't like it that much. But either way, I don't think it's failing because you still get to experience life in that other country and that changes you forever. Even just the ability to go somewhere for one week or two weeks most people can never even dream, like most of the world population can't even. Probably they don't have passports and they don't have the resources to travel internationally. It's such a small percent. So to be able to voluntarily go and experience life in another country, I think it's just a very positive thing if you're able to do it and it can have a big impact on your life. But I don't know what the stats are as far as what people come back, because most countries don't even track how many people are living abroad.
Kristen:They don't really know, so it's more anecdotal, like you hear of somebody left when I hear mostly from my clients and actually we were talking about this yesterday afternoon I was at a client's and I think he's going on vacation soon but it's about getting back and all the work that piles up and the cost, the expense and just not being able to be unplugged and I think that's kind of unfortunate thing here in the US, although I'm from Sweden well, I'm first generation here and they travel a lot. Of course, they have a month off in July. Everyone takes off, so it's kind of a little different, I think it's a little bit of a quality as well.
Kristen:Right.
Kristin W:Yeah, I mean, a lot of the people that move abroad are retired, so they don't have to work, but they might work for fun. So I think that's something that's more applicable if you're working full time and you're taking time off to travel. That's one thing, and then it's another thing if you're working remotely and you're working while you're traveling. It can just be a lot yeah.
Kristin W:Yeah, it can be exhausting, and that's why I'm such a big advocate of slow travel, whatever that means to you Like just traveling at a pace that you can sustain it and you can get your work done and you can also enjoy your life.
Kristen:My girlfriend. I just had lunch or dinner with her on Saturday night, her and her husband. They have two. Well, they have three houses Sold, one, their main house live in one on a lake like Elminoir, and I just talked with her. She just got back from Italy and they did slow travel and they're working from 5 pm to midnight because of the time difference and she has her own business and he is kind of like CEO but he can do it remotely. It's a transportation company.
Kristen:So they did that in Italy but they cut it a little short. They kind of got. It got really rainy and dark and they were like, ok, we're ready to come back. So they're back until January and then they're actually going to Costa Rica. They were going to move there. We have another friend neighbor that lives there. She's from there, but it's interesting she's now just started slow traveling and sort of listening to her experience and I was curious also from the relocation company that you said a lot of retirees, are there folks that are younger and also any stories. I'm very curious to hear a story or two of like someone who you were like oh, I'm not sure if they'll make it or not and how they were, or if there's a theme through that for our listeners who really are interested in the slow travel and how to really set their life up to do that.
Kristin W:Yeah, there are people of all different ages and when I started I was in my early 20s and my first company was focused on helping online poker players, so most of them were in their 20s and 30s. Yeah, and some of them were going part time or they were going temporarily. There actually was one couple that I am surprised that they're still abroad. They came from somewhere in middle America, I want to say like the Midwest, and very traditional lifestyle, like had never lived abroad, had never really traveled abroad, moved to Costa Rica, had two kids I don't remember if they had the kids there, or maybe they had one and then had the other one there and the last I heard they were still there and I think it's been 10 years and the wife had gotten really active in the community and holding lots of meetups and helping other expats and I really thought they would be there for maybe a year and then go back. But they really adapted well. And likewise, there have been people that I know that lived there for five years, seven years, and then they ended up moving back to the States.
Kristin W:One of my colleagues he's from Atlanta lived in Costa Rica, got married there, had a baby and then they moved back to the US, to Atlanta, this kind of felt like that chapter in his life was over and he got a new job with a different company and went back. But he still cherishes that time there. But now I would say the majority of my clients are I'm retiring abroad, but or they're working remotely. So they're either usually in their 30s through like 70s. Okay, so I had a remote worker from Texas. She moved from Austin to Budapest and then she was just traveling around. Eventually, I don't know where they go after you know, a certain amount of time. I helped them move and then they might stay there or they continue traveling.
Kristin W:So that's an empty nest or some people with kids. Yeah and yeah, some solo travelers. I love helping solo female travelers, because that's what I am.
Kristen:Yeah, customer. Yeah, well, no, I have another girlfriend and they have four kids and they're all like elementary school age and that's what they're doing this year Right now. They're in the middle. I was just texting her Happy Thanksgiving and, like a little before, they're like we miss the US.
Kristen:Oh, really, traveling all over the world right now and I know they're going to go to Strica as well, I remember, because we had both been. She's a wake surfer as well. Yeah, she's, it's you know. I can't wait to see her when she gets back, but I think it's almost at the midpoint end. I think it's towards the end of their year. And then I had another client who at right at COVID. He owns an investment wealth management company in the city and he has two young daughters and they moved to Italy and then the girls went to school there and it was amazing, like their after school activity was for SAGE, for specifying, just for fun with the school, and I thought, wow, that's really, really neat.
Kristin W:Yeah, that's a good field trip for you. Yeah, I went to some cool places. We went to the Kennedy Space Center and the keys Florida keys that's always nice.
Carol:Yeah, that's interesting Because you I mean Florida is such a beautiful place. I mean, what drove me to like first travel I lived in Minnesota was very cold, and so I went to Hawaii and I'm like, oh my gosh, and it just like opened my eyes to the world. There's other ways to live, and that was, seems like. Now I see you spend a lot of time like in in Europe with the colder areas and I'm like, why would she go to the cold that you've been in the heat for so long?
Kristin W:Yeah, I've traveled a lot through the tropics. I spent, you know, a lot of time in Latin America and also Australia, southeast Asia, and I do like it, but like it can be hard to work when it's really hot and in the US we have climate control but a lot of other places don't have central AC. That you know, if there's. When you're working remotely, there's nothing worse than being in like a beautiful place but with no internet or no electricity no electricity.
Kristin W:Wow yeah, I've had the electric go out on me a bunch of times, so like in not in Thailand, but in Thailand. Well, I just remember being in places with super slow internet and it was just really hot, like sweltering hot, and in Bali as well, and it's like it's fine if you're just there to hang out and be on vacation. But I remember bouncing from one coworking space to another and even the coworking spaces didn't have air conditioning, so you're just like hot, they're like fans and it just oh yeah.
Kristin W:I think it was not productive for me, yeah, and I always see other people you know having internet issues in these really remote places. So I mean the internet's getting better and now there's even people that are traveling with them. With what is it? Elon Musk's?
Carol:company Starlink. Starlink yes.
Kristin W:I heard a story of a group of people that were traveling through Africa with no end date, you know, going on safaris and spending a few months in one country and then going to another country, and they just had their starlink with them and they were getting great internet wherever they went. So I have too much luggage to be carrying a satellite around.
Kristen:Wait is it? Is it big? My other friend who just came back from Italy. She has starlink because they have a house on a lake in Lake Elm in Orin. Yeah, Just that it worked. Sign there.
Kristin W:There's a mobile one that you can bring on a boat, you can bring it on an RV, you can carry it and put it on the ground.
Kristen:Yeah, I mean you can't have starlink but I'm not using it. I have to say one quick story. So I take girls backpacking. It's a Girl Scout troop and I take them on there. A couple of weeks in August off and we were literally on a rock doing astronomy lesson in the middle of the night at Kirkwood and it's we're like, you know, 9000 feet up and the stars it's like so bright you can, it looks like you can touch them. And one of the girls I didn't know what starlink was yet One of the girls was like there's moving line of stars coming it looks really cool.
Kristen:I've seen it it was scary and amazing at the same time.
Kristin W:Oh wait, it's the starlink satellites.
Kristen:Yeah, you can see it, it looks like stars and like it was so bright, we were like touch the sky and I could see individual satellite in a line just going.
Kristin W:Oh, I haven't seen that.
Kristen:Oh.
Carol:I wonder if that shows up on Skyview. Skyview is an app that I used to like look at the stars. It always tells you which you know. There's always like a bright planet in the sky, that's Jupiter, that's Venus, and then it has the satellites. You have starlink in there, though.
Kristen:Starwalk doesn't have starlink, but starlink you can Google it and put in your where you're at and it'll show you if it's going to be in your area. And so I hike with my dog all the time right next to my house. It's like five minutes. I've got trails and so it was 912. And I look at night and it says 912, that it's going to come over and I saw it the only time I've seen it was over and it was really dull, but I could see the line. But in the mountains, oh my gosh, it was the most beautiful thing I've seen. It's crazy.
Kristin W:Yeah.
Kristen:Individual satellite, just in this moving line together. But, yeah, starlink, and you can put in your zip code or city and then it'll tell you if it is bright or medium or oh wow, no, and if, and then the time, and right now in my area it's, like you know, 3am, 4am, and I'm not kidding.
Kristin W:But I don't think you can see it in Europe either. Where I've been it's been so cloudy and rainy and just full and miserable. So I do like Europe in the spring, summer, fall, but not in the winter. Yeah.
Carol:No, Do you want to go back to Japan? I know if you spent some time there in the hospital right, yeah, I love Japan.
Kristin W:I love Japan. I could spend a lot of time there.
Kristen:There's a lot of wake surfers there, I can hook you up.
Kristin W:Okay, I don't know if I'll be doing any wake surfing there, but exploring some temples Like the Okinawa side or something.
Kristen:Oh, maybe I haven't been to Okinawa.
Kristin W:It looks like the Caribbean. It does. Yeah, I went snowboarding there. So I do like cold weather, but only if I'm skiing or snowboarding. So I went snowboarding in the northern island of Hokkaido, which I highly recommend. It has the highest snowfall in the world, oh wow, and it's all powder because these storms come off Siberia, hit that I don't know if it's called the Gulf of Japan and then dump snow into Japan.
Carol:What's the area called?
Kristin W:again I'm going to ask yeah, hokkaido, hokkaido, it's the northern island, okay, and then Niseiko is the town that I went to. That's really famous for skiing, but they have tons of ski towns and resorts up there and it's quite affordable. It's just coming back to the US. I don't know if it's just Miami, but I mean the prices are just outlandish right now. I've been gone for a year. I went, I wanted to get a fruit cup this morning and it was $8 for chopped mango. I can buy like five kilos of mangoes, you know, and another one's cute, I'll make you feel better.
Kristen:So I went to check my kids to go see the Jim Gaffigan Jerry Seinfeld comedy show in the city, at where the Warriors play and we've been. They wouldn't allow water in right, and so I went to go buy a water and I think it was $7. It was $7 for water.
Kristin W:So in Miami it's $12 at a club. It's insane.
Kristen:It is insane.
Carol:And it might be a bottle of.
Kristin W:Zephyr Hills. Yeah, you know, you can get like 10 cases for $12. Yeah, it's just ridiculous. I wanted to get sushi last night and an appetizer is $30 for just a sashini appetizer.
Kristen:You know, obviously you're going to be hungry you can't just eat that.
Kristin W:So I'm like, okay, if I get two appetizers, it's $60 without drinking, without tax and tip. I mean I don't know, I don't even want to live here anymore Like if I have to pay I think I paid $16 today for my fruit just because I was in a hurry and I didn't have time to, like, chop up the mangoes and wash the berries and chop them up.
Carol:Yeah, it was known to go shitting.
Kristen:I was in Cuba in 2018 and we went with a group there was 20 of us. We went to go help women entrepreneurs over there and, unfortunately, some of the gals our first night had their passports taken where we were at and so they had to stay back. And so we went and you know it was very organized. You have to do it, you know the country, they were off the trail and so our cost versus their cost was like totally different. So I think it was like a penny for a water. It's like 10 bucks or it wasn't. It was still reasonable, but in Cuba, off you know, because they were traveling alone.
Kristen:Yeah because they had your passports renewed.
Carol:Yeah, oh man. So yes, we get a passports. How's that? What's the best way? I mean, do you do a lot of content? I think? I've seen a little bit about like, if you want to slow travel, like how you can stay different places, is there like a few central websites to go to? Or you just have to, like, you know, just ask an expert like yourself. You know someone wants to go to, you know Poland or Croatia, how long can you stay there? As just to like slow travel and maybe work?
Kristin W:I have a digital Nomad Visa database If you want to fly places long term. So we can link to that in the show notes. It's on digitalnomadbootcampcom and I have a list of all the countries in the world where you can get a digital Nomad Visa. But if you just want to go to travel, you can check a site like visaHQcom and that will tell you how many days you can stay there if you need a visa. If you don't need a visa. But you can also cross reference that with the US embassy in the country that you're going to or just looking at the immigration website of that country. But yeah, there's a few sites like visaHQ now. Oh, that's awesome, okay.
Carol:I think I'm getting a Polish passport because my father was born there. And have you heard people? Is there any cons to doing that, to getting a European?
Kristin W:passport. No, I'm actually doing a video about that right now because I'm trying to get a Romanian passport through my grandfather. There's only an upside that I can call. I mean, you can't unless you give up your US citizenship. You still are a US citizen filing a tax return every year, but you can then live in the EU, which is huge, you don't?
Kristin W:owe that many taxes then you could pay taxes if you move there. But then you can usually deduct those from your US taxes. But there's international accountants that can help with that. But yeah, I mean the ability to live in Europe is very valuable and you could work in Europe. You have social security number, you can opt into the healthcare system. So if you can get a Polish passport, I would do it Okay you can get a Swedish passport for sure. Actually somebody can say this yeah, citizenship by descent.
Kristen:Yeah, my dad has a Swedish passport, my stepmom has an Irish one. My sister's married to a French man, so she has a French one. My brother's a pilot for United. My stepmom worked for American Airlines for Ben.
Kristin W:But your parents are from Sweden. My dad, yeah. You could get a Swedish passport, I think.
Kristen:Yeah, but I know that they have just talked about upside for it, but I haven't dug into it just yet, but I will, yeah there's not a downside.
Kristin W:I think the more passports you have, the better, unless for some reason those countries are taxing you. But most countries don't tax income that's generated outside of the country, so unless you're living and working there, it probably wouldn't be applicable.
Carol:Yeah, and that's one reason we started this podcast. It's really just to kind of explore as we become empty nesters. Where do I want to live and do I want to work and slow travel and stay somewhere for three, six months at a time or just work a bunch and then take three months off? Do you have any advice on that?
Kristin W:I think it's a personal preference. I've taken a couple of shorter sabbaticals like one month here and there, and I definitely see the benefit of just taking time off for a few months. If you need a reset, if you could work part-time, I think that could be good, because working 20 hours a week is not a big deal. You might not even want to be sightseeing the whole time anyway, so it gives you something to do, but you can still spend at least half of your time just having fun.
Kristin W:Yeah it's fine so you might want to mix it up. You could do sometimes just take time off. If you are just taking time off and living on your savings, that can be stressful if you don't know if your savings are going to cover you for the whole time. So I know people that have just gone to the cheapest countries they can because they don't want to work while they're there, but then they're stressing about money the whole time.
Carol:So I think there's a balance, what definitely sounds like the Southeast Asia, which I haven't been to, any of those that sounds like you probably would not want to work, just because the internet issues the heat.
Kristin W:Well, you can now, and you can bring your own Wi-Fi hotspots now. In the past few years, the technology has gotten a lot better. I haven't been to Asia.
Kristin W:I think when I was in Thailand it was 2015, and even in Bangkok the internet was really good, but it was just hot. Biggest reason why I don't live there is the time zone, because I don't want to be working at night. Most of my clients are in North America. I'm doing coaching calls and things. So if you can work from anywhere and you don't have to work certain hours, you could do that. But I knew a guy that was in Japan that was working in the middle of the night because his company was in California and he had the clock in the same time every day. Brutal, yeah yeah, brutal.
Carol:Okay, since you've been to so many countries and you seem very mindful of the local culture, what are some ideas that, when people do go to travel, to really best support the local culture Like I always like not staying in US owned Airbnbs or staying in hostels versus chain hotels are there any kind of key pieces of advice you have to really support locals?
Kristin W:Yeah, there is. I just saw this documentary recently. I even have to look up the name of it, but it was all about sustainable tourism. Let's see if I can find it in my notes. I took a lot of notes on it.
Kristen:Yeah, I think that that's I know. When I was I was going to conferences in Boulder and seeing Carol and I loved when we were walking around and going to like a little local bookshop and buying from there and individual owned oh yeah, definitely using local everything.
Kristin W:local providers is good. For example, in Bali there's a lot of Chinese tourists that book through Chinese providers and none of that money is getting to the locals either. So you know, if you're staying in big corporate international chain hotels, then that's all you know, all going to corporate. So making sure that you stay in locally owned places and go to, like local restaurants is always helpful. There's even websites that you know you can find like locally owned places in in each country and I'll have to find that that list. I was just taking notes. I watched this documentary on the airplane that was all about sustainable tourism. Even just searching sustainable Tourism, yeah, in the destination that you're going to a lot of times and there's, you know, small companies that will have information on that.
Kristen:Yeah, that's what you would. Costa Rica there's a Costa Rican adventures and was when I did that. And then, interesting. So through our podcast, I was taking my daughter's a BTS fan, the Korean pop group, and For we were. I was supposed to take her to a concert April 2020 and it, of course, got cancelled and so I said, when you graduate high school, which was last summer, I'll take you to let's go to South Korea. And she was like, yes, let's go. And so I took my kids to there.
Kristen:But then we did an episode I met through this gal ended up going there, but then she knows ripped curl pro families in Bali. So I went and stayed with them and me and the kids and surfed and it was super fun. But it was really interesting because where they live and he had Little huts and things I guess, where you can you just rent it's like 15 bucks or something to Rent. And then, right around the corner, because he lived pretty close to the beach, it was like, okay, get to this house, make a left, but if you make a right, there's this fruit smoothie bowls and like this frat oh my gosh is incredible. My kids and I would be like breakfast, lunch, let's go nice the ball place and it was just amazing.
Kristen:And then there was this other Resort we stayed at, mubali, and it's owned by this French guy who's had it for 25 years and it was just epic. We ended up and we unfortunately our our Reservation got cancelled and I didn't know about until the day before. So then it was a harsh winter in Australia. I was calling, calling, and someone said, okay, well, if you can share a room, would you do that? More like, yes, we just we're not gonna, we're just sleeping, we're gonna go anyway. The place we stayed, it looked like a Kim Kardashian resort. You open this little wooden door, it looked like from Mexico and it opened to this gorgeous, these grounds with two buildings and we were sharing Fresh breads. Every morning we'll ball a wow, a huge yeah.
Kristin W:Unbelievable. Also, a sustainable tourism is more even about what you don't do. So in Bali and Thailand Especially, as well as Vietnam, louse, there's a lot of tourist attractions that have animals. So you know, avoiding anything where animals are on display is is a huge one.
Carol:So no writing on elephants or oh really, I just saw someone on the Instagram. Oh that looks amazing. That's not good for them.
Kristin W:No, don't get your photo taken with a tiger or a monkey or anything like that, because those animals are, they could be sedated, they could be, you know, abused, and they're just held in captivity under really bad conditions. So if you do want to see elephants, for example, you could go to the elephant nature park in Thailand, which is the sanctuary for rescued animals I've been there.
Kristin W:So they take the babies away from the moms when they're really young and they like train quote-unquote the animals, but they're beating them and it's just really horrible. So then this elephant nature park they rescue those animals and try to give them good quality of life and bring them back to health, and I did. I did find the name of that film I was watching. It's called the last tourist, so we can link to the last tourist film, comms it was. It was a really good and I actually put on my list of goals for the year to Spend more time and thinking about these topics.
Kristin W:You know, as a as a traveler, even though you know, from environmental standpoint, travel doesn't have as big of an impact on emissions as farming. Or you know, for example, cattle Clearing forests for grazing. So that's also something that I've been really conscious of, like dialing back my consumption of animal products, trying to eat more vegetarian and vegan, not consuming Palm oil, for example, where they cut down native trees and rainforest to create palm oil Plantation. So I think this idea of sustainability Through travel. You can find a lot of information there, but also Inspiration for how you can just live on a day-to-day basis. You know I'm like a religiously checking Ingredients for palm oil. It's in everything. It's hard to avoid it.
Carol:But yeah, you'd like to like to cook. Cooking is the key.
Kristin W:Yes, I do like to cook?
Carol:Yeah, and have you heard of this like split in the chat the traveling spoon dot com? I heard about this from someone, I think, when I was interviewing someone from the Philippines and they had mentioned this is so you pick your country and then you can find local people that will host you for a meal. Sounds really cool.
Kristin W:Oh yeah, I yeah, actually I have. I think I have heard of that, but it was a different company. Right but there's another website where you can have meals with people and I think I think meeting the local people is really Important. It can even be very cliche. People are like, yeah, I want to meet the locals, but I know from doing videos where I go up and talk to strangers on the street. It's like it's very awkward, but you end up getting so many interesting Stories and insights from yeah and some of them really the most memorable times of my travels.
Kristin W:We're not at a Ritz Carlton somewhere. It was sitting on a dirt floor and Fiji drinking tea with people that didn't speak English, and hanging out. What we were doing. We're just hanging out sipping tea together and sipping Kava.
Carol:Just the benefit of yeah, benefit of solo travel. I think my view in a group it's harder to like break off and talk to the locals.
Kristin W:Sometimes you need to carve out time for yourself on those group trips to do your own thing a little bit, and even going off with one person, you know, if you don't feel safe just by yourself, it's good.
Kristen:How many percentage of solo travels versus couple travels travelers. Do you have that?
Kristin W:It's pretty even. It's mostly Single or couple. I don't have as many families, I think, just because having kids is hard, and so probably a smaller percentage of families are traveling full-time or living abroad compared to empty Nesters and solo travelers and then women versus men on the solo part. Probably more men for the solo part.
Kristen:Yeah, and are there any specific countries? I know when I was Just going to Costa Rica, they were like oh, you're fine, it's super safe and fine. Are there certain countries that and I'm sure Costa Rica is still the same, but that are more favorable or less favorite? Less favorable, I guess, is a little bit to just kind of not go there alone.
Kristin W:Yes, I would say, and on the whole I I wouldn't say Costa Rica is very safe, but it is safe enough to travel alone as female, you just have to be very aware but mostly Europe and Asia. So I would say northern Europe's, primarily Scandinavia, some of the safest countries in the world. Where I've seen women leave their babies in strollers in Norway and Sweden, like leave their babies on the sidewalk and go into a store. That's a cultural thing. People leaving their laptops on the tables when they go to the bathroom at a cafe I would never, you know, right, like my laptop would be gone when I got back. But in these other countries, I think I just heard that they did a study I think it was in Sweden, where they planted items like purses, wallets, things like that around the city and almost all of them were either left in the place where they left them or they were turned into the police. I think only one of them was stolen. What town assistant? I think it was in Stockholm.
Carol:Oh, I know a hundred percent.
Kristin W:Sure, my life. You do that in Miami and but your stuff would be gone in a second. But Japan as well. Southeast Asia, is Malaysia quite, quite safe? You're looking at northern Europe and Southeast Asia.
Carol:Canada as well. Okay, so we have 10 minutes left and I have a rapid fire questions. Are any other Burning?
Kristen:other question, kristen are I'm sorry, I keep talking.
Carol:Okay, so what country has your is the best breakfast, or what is your favorite breakfast?
Kristin W:Oh, norway or Sweden, I would say Norway.
Carol:What did they have that you?
Kristin W:like the best hotel breakfast. Oh my gosh, it's like they have real honeycomb to get honey for your tea. I mean, everything is so much fruit, yogurt, any breakfast item you can think of is there, and all different kinds of breads, waffles but all high quality, you know, not like the holiday and breakfast, okay, nope, no packaged pastry. It's like a brunch every day at the hotel. Oh wow, norway and Sweden. Also, belgium is pretty good too.
Carol:Okay, all right, it's good stark, so I really probably need to enjoy your breakfast. Is there any holiday tradition that you really love to go to around the world, like you know Diwali or Autorio or just traditional Christmas. Is there any international country holiday that you really enjoy being a part of?
Kristin W:I love the Christmas markets in Europe. That's probably my favorite thing. But I find that when I'm traveling I tend not to really celebrate holidays as much because I don't celebrate the local holidays. You know, I don't get time off work or anything for being a local there and a lot of the US holidays aren't celebrated in other places. But now Christmas obviously is international. Halloween is sort of becoming international, Easter is very international. So some you know nice traditions you can find in all different places. But yeah, I haven't started observing all of the holidays of different countries, but I like to observe other people observing them, like I like to see, okay, what are they doing? They're having bank holidays or they're having holidays for a patron saint in England or in Ireland, and I like to see you know what other interesting holidays they come up with. But one of my favorite things is just, yeah, going to the Christmas markets all over Europe. No market too big or too small, it's just so festive.
Carol:Yeah, fantastic. And then we know you're having your first tour group. What about? Is this your first tour group, the one you're doing in Portugal? Okay, so exciting. Congrats on that. What were some other top countries people picked? I think I saw Croatia.
Kristin W:Yes, if people want to join us. That trip to Portugal is April 15th to the 21st and I can share my link with you. After that, I believe it was Italy, france and Croatia. Okay, were the red mark countries? Spain? They weren't doing tours at the moment there, so that wasn't on the list, but yeah.
Carol:I feel like you would be such a great candidate to make an equivalent to, like House Hunters International, like Slow Travers International. Have you ever aspired to doing something like that? Or did you say that you applied at one point to do something with HGTV? It just seems like you're such a great hostess.
Kristin W:Thank you, I love it. I actually I was on House Hunters International in 2011, and that helped me start my YouTube channel. I wanted to start the YouTube channel a long time ago 2008 or something but going on House Hunters International, I remember thinking I could do this every day, so I did film my own House Hunters International version of a video that's actually coming out in the next week or so on YouTube. Oh, okay, and I filmed that in Bulgaria, so the production quality is not exactly the same, but the structure and the story is the same. So I would like to do more like that in the future, maybe travel hosting for a TV network. That would be amazing.
Carol:Yeah, okay. So last question would you ever live in the US full-time again, and what would it take for you to make that decision?
Kristin W:I just said last night in my relocation coaching call I don't think I could ever live in the US full-time again. I just said that a few hours ago. I would like to live here a couple months per year. I have a lot of friends and family here and I did grow up here, but I just couldn't see myself living here full-time. I tried during the pandemic. I was here for two and a half years in one town, but I don't know, maybe there's something wrong with me.
Carol:Have you been out to the West Coast or New England?
Kristin W:Yeah, I've been going to California since I was 16.
Carol:Okay.
Kristin W:And I've been to Portland and I've been to Seattle, but I haven't explored everything. You know there's a lot of beautiful places in the US, but I don't know if it's even just the US. I think it could be just more my lifestyle that I like to. Ideally I would have three or four houses around the world and just rotate between them.
Kristen:That's what it's like In Maui and here, and then, yeah, that's what I'm doing, yeah.
Kristin W:I would love that, like Europe, the US and then somewhere tropical, yes, perfect, yeah, are you still surfing? Not so much To my brother's dismay. He's a surf photographer, or he used to work for Surfing Magazine and was the photo editor there, and now he works for Vans, but I'm not that often. But I do think I would like to go on a surf trip soon, maybe Porto Vallarta or something.
Carol:Yeah, that would be amazing.
Kristin W:Yeah.
Carol:Ecuador. I heard it's pretty good.
Kristin W:Yeah, panama. I did surf in Norway a few years ago. I had to wear a dry suit. It was so cool. You hit me in the head.
Carol:It's pretty.
Kristin W:It was too much work Putting on the hood and the gloves and the booties.
Kristen:I was like no, I just wanted to be able to pick up my surfboard with bikini on and paddle out.
Kristin W:If Miami had more waves, that would be ideal, because the water is so clear and it's so pretty. I'm looking out at an island right now out my window. I'm in Coconut Grove. I see a dinner key out there, but it's just. It's good for boating, yeah, not so good for surfing. Maybe wake surfing.
Kristen:Yeah, I was surfing Saturday and it was 50 free, so I had gloves and booties and the four three on and yeah, it was a great weekend, though I wake surfed on Saturday and then I forced off road on Sunday.
Kristin W:That's great, that's nice, nice. You could do that in Costa Rica Exactly. It was a fun time.
Carol:Cool. Well, thank you. I want to be respectful of your time. Thank you so much for joining us, kristen, and we'll put those show notes that won with the tourism that was thelasttourismfilmcom, right, ok?
Kristin W:The last touristfilmcom, the last touristfilmcom, and then my digital nomad visa database is digitalnomadbootcampcom. My website's traveling with Kristen with a K and an Icom, and then there's a relocation tab that you can click on if you want to send me an inquiry about help with moving to another country.
Kristen:It was fun. How long do you typically work with someone on the reload and does it maybe vary?
Kristin W:Usually for a few months, but now I have a one-year program. Ok, oh, that's great.
Kristen:I have to say a quick plug for Portugal, because our podcast started and I wanted Costa Rica and Carol wanted Portugal, so you could go. Those are our two.
Carol:Yeah, those are our two tops. You have to go.
Kristen:Oh OK.
Carol:Yeah, no, they're Portugal.
Kristen:Big fan of Portugal and then I had us being a lot to go, I can't make it this spring, but maybe next time around. Yeah, but then I started watching obsessively with the 100-foot wave by Nassaray yeah, yeah, nassaray and I was like, wow, that was really up.
Kristin W:Oh yeah, I don't want to surf there. I mean, maybe in the south, maybe in the Algarve, just a little bit lower than that.
Carol:I'm going to start exploring the Azores. Have you checked that out at all?
Kristin W:I've been to Madeira, but I haven't been to the Azores. Yeah, I would like to go there. It looks like Hawaii from the photo.
Carol:Yes, I've heard it's Hawaii, but a little bit more rugged. So yeah, I'll be looking for your video on it. All right, that's great. All right, nice to meet you, ladies.
Kristen:Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you, your audience as well.
Kristin W:Thanks, for tuning in. All right, thanks, leah. Bye, thank you.
Carol:Bye. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed the podcast, can you please take a second and do a quick follow of the show and rate us in your podcast app, and if you have a minute, we would really appreciate a review. Following and rating is the best way to support us. If you're on Instagram, let's connect. We're at when Next Podcast. Thanks again.
