South American Itinerary

So our first two months look like this:

Antigua, Guatemala - Staying with host family and serving with www.godschild.org  We will also likely take spanish lessons and soak in as much of this amazing city as we can. We will be in Antigua about two weeks.

El Paredon - This is a small village on the coast. Here we are staying a surf camp and will take surfing lessons (maybe more spanish lessons) and also spend some time serving with http://www.lachozachula.org/  Current plan is ride the "chicken buses" out to the coast which will be an adventure all by itself.

San Pedros - here we are renting a house (airbnb) around Lake Atitlan which is considered one of the most beautiful lakes in the world. All around the lake are small quaint villages offering an array of culture and excitement. We dont have a lot of time here and my guess is that we will wish we had more.

From there we fly to Quito, Ecuador where we are renting an apartment (airbnb) and hoping to catch up on schooling and experience Ecuador. No other plans here yet but in talks with a few different groups. Though R&R may be needed at this point.

Galapagos - a bucket list sort of journey for sure. Spending a week on a boat with a guide and other families and learning about this place which is unlike any other on Earth. Our oldest child will be thrilled here for sure as this is "one place" he'd pick to go and has been for years.

Iquitos, Peru - here we will spend time helping http://www.skcperu.com/ and learning about the Amazon in this amazing place.

Cuzco, Peru - Our last stop on this leg, we have set up another airbnb place with a local family who prides themselves on their culture and sharing it. We have a week here, during which one of our closest friends will join us and then we will do the Inca Trek up to Machu Picchu, which has been one of my bucket list items since I first saw a picture who knows how many years ago.

So that is our first two month itinerary. Probably busier than we initially hoped but that is how it came together. We desire to move slow but also hope to see so much. Reconciling those two competing theories is proving difficult.

Lodging Booked

A few nights ago I booked another Airbnb place for our stay in Cuzco. It's with a local family who likes to share culture and has great reviews from previous stays. And only $60 a night for all of us. Finding lodging for 6 is not always easy when on a budget but Airbnb is proving to be just as cheap or cheaper than hostels and provide us with more space, sometimes laundry and a kitchen.

Today we got a confirm on our contact in Iquitos. We will be serving with an organization that some friends of ours are tied to and this is an exciting step for a few reasons. 1- this organization does some very cool work. 2- this is the last lodging piece of our first two months which we have plane tickets booked. 3 - we can stay for the whole week for only $100 total. Iquitos is the largest city in the world that you cannot drive to as plane or boat are the only ways to get there. It's way up in northern Peru in the Amazon and we are excited to experience it.

Conversations done

Today I finished my conversations with co-workers. Like I previously said, most of them went quite well and were encouraging. It is a huge relief to have that behind me. How the next few months go is yet to be determined but I suppose we can only do one step at a time.

Lots of research and choices to make over the next few months.

Roller Coaster Emotions

Well the high of our first plane ticket purchase burned off quickly with a less than fun day at work. Some just have a hard time understanding, which is not surprising.

It was a hard day emotionally and the highs of being home, researching places and chatting with the kids being dampened by the workday. But when push comes to shove, I know we have to pursue what we feel called to do. I am working through telling everyone at work personally and they are, for the most part, very encouraging about our plans but like anything "out of the box", sometimes it gets hard.

Plane Tickets!

Just finalized the first legs of our trip. Real money on the line now. This was a big day for our family! We used miles for the first two legs, which saved us quite a bit and adds flexibility because I can change frequent flier tickets with no penalties. All the remaining legs were booked with Airtreks (www.airtreks.com). They are a great company specializing in these sorts of trips. Every time I compared one of their estimates to other multi-leg booking services they were cheaper. Their agents are knowledgable and have traveled extensively so they offered great advice.

So here are our first stops. We fly from Minneapolis to Guatemala (connecting through Atlanta) to Quito, Ecuador (connecting through Mexico City - yes, this is odd, but it was a free ticket) to Galapagos to Iquitos, Peru (connecting through Guayaquil, Ecuador) to Cusco, Peru (connecting through Lima) and then back to Los Angeles (connecting through Lima). PHEW!   That is a lot of flights and seat bookings but we are booked. We get back on October 2nd then and from there the plan will be to go to New Zealand but that will part of the next package so we have a little time to figure that out. 

While in Cusco, we friend will join us to do the Inca Trail which we had to book in a hurry because the permits are going fast. This government runs a website where you can see, real-time, how many are available on given days. If curious, you can access here.

While in Galapagos we will do a cruise sort of tour with a guide to learn as much as possible about that amazing part of the world. Real world science to say the least. We have put a down payment down on that portion as well.

Lastly, there is insurance to worry about. One of the great benefits of AirTreks is that they include 6 months of insurance with you package for free but in our case they would not have started until our first ticket booked though them. This left us in a pinch for the inital 6 weeks. In addition to that their coverage lacked a few things that I would like to have. So we took a safer route and purchased a one year plan through World Nomads. They have very comprehensive packages and are the go place for this sort of thing we have decided via our research.

Big day indeed!

Whats Our Why?

This post could be a chapter. Our desire to do this trip, in some ways, stems all the way back to our first date, getting engaged, traveling Europe together after college and desire to raise our kids overseas for a stint. As life choices progressed, that option was never a reality. That was over 16 years ago - time does fly! But the more recent list of our whys includes the following:

• Shape our kid's worldview:
  • Our job is not swoop in and "save the day" as so many try to do but rather cultivate long term relationships. Working along side another culture and assisting them in the way they request allows for worldviews to collide and this is how real transformation can occur.
  • The church and body of Christ is at work and on the move constantly and we all have a role to play
  •  Learn to effectively bless the people we meet - this is harder than it sounds 
  • Short term service is just one piece of a larger undertaking
   
• Show the kids the world beyond our suburbs - the ability to travel the globe so easily now creates a responsibility for those with the means to do so for both us and them.
• Simply because it is possible
• Spend time together
• We know we will regret not doing it and now is our window of opportunity. Walking by the window is just not an option
• Love of adventures
• To teach the kids first hand that joy is not found in our stuff and accumulation but rather family and experiences and memories
• See new cultures and learn that our way is not the only way. 
• Goal here is to soften hearts and open minds to accept others for who they are as opposed to rejecting them for their differences.
• Truly connect with our kids
• Learn that places, faces, food may be different but our God is the same and loves all people
• Experience true service as we seek out opportunities not being tied to busy schedules
• Unplug from the treadmill that is American life - almost everyone we know identifies with this on some level.
• Cultivate long term relationships that we can we hope we can maintain for years to come. We obviously cant do this everywhere we go, but we hope to make a few lasting connections along the way. 
• Truly gain hands-on education. One thing to read about history in a book and a whole different experience to be physically present and see it while learning first hand.

Reasons to NOT go

A short post to contemplate all the reasons some say to not do this:

• Fear? - lots of them
• injury while traveling
• job to return to
• giving up my dream job
• being able to provide for my family
• losing connections with friends
• Expensive - It will cost money.
• Exhausting - this is real one. This is will not be a one year vacation and will be, at times, really hard. 
• Accommodations - We will not be staying in places like we are accustomed to.
• Food - We will not be eating like we are used to.
• Kids sports - they will fall behind, miss out, lose spots on teams (some people really think this is important). 
• Responsibility?  It has been posed to me that I have some responsibility to my co-workers. I do believe this but I have also believe I have a higher level of responsibility to my family and ultimately to pursuing what God places on our hearts. I hope that my kids learn this lesson first hand (someday) as a result of this trip.

Ultimately, personally, I look at this list and it does not sway me too much. Worth contemplating for sure but enough to give up a dream - no.  At some point will post a list of reasons to do this.