My wife Jessica and I saved for the last few years and planned to take some time off to take a long journey in a part of the world we had visited only briefly and began planning in mid 2025 to do it. We decided on East Asia, for a few reasons: one, we had a wonderful time in Tokyo in November 2024, and yearned to see more of that part of the world. Two, we really wanted to eat our way through as we became excited about all the food options, and three: it is a long flight(s) to get from the USA to East Asia, so if we were going to go, we didn’t want to go for a short time.
Also, as we get older, we’ve come to realize that travel, especially like this, is not easy on our bodies. Carrying a full backpack each, and one rolling suitcase, is not getting any easier, jet lag takes longer to recover from, and the hassles of travel become less inviting and more frustrating (at best). Lastly, we realize life is a gift, and when the opportunity presents itself to get out and live it to the fullest, one should take advantage.
So we saved as much money as we could, moved out of our apartment in Southern Pines, North Carolina, and all our stuff into a storage unit, and planned for a year(ish) long trip. Sadly, as we prepared to leave for a month traveling around Rajasthan, India, we lost Jessica’s father to cancer, which took him in his 80th year on January 2nd of this year. George Tankersley always expressed his support and happiness for our travels, and he will be missed greatly by all the people’s lives he touched. Here are a couple of my favorite pictures with George, and if you’d like to see more, here is the link to the photo album.
His passing further encouraged us to remember to get busy living, as time is finite for us all. We decided to skip India (to hopefully return next year) to spend a month in Columbia, Missouri with Jessica’s mom, Kathy, to enjoy time and assist her with the next chapter of her life. With George as an inspiration, we pivoted to another destination that we had not originally considered, Seoul, South Korea, as it was a nominal fee to change our flights.
We were lucky enough to visit with my father (and his husband) as he recovered from six weeks of cancer treatments himself before we left the states, and they drove us to Raleigh-Durham, as we prepared to take our next adventure. On the plane, I sat next to a friendly woman and we had a great travel conversation about her travels and our upcoming trip, which I took as a good sign. We had a six-hour plane trip to Seattle, then 12 hours to Seoul, where we learned why it was so inexpensive to change our original flight (it was to be around 32 degrees Fahrenheit on average for our stay).
No one knows what the future holds. I am excited to get to meet new people, hear their stories, share some of my own, and learn about things, people, and places I had never considered. Lucky does not begin to describe how I feel, and I know I am, and for that, I am grateful, especially to all the friends and family who will read these forthcoming tales of adventure. Onward and upward!
Phil's WayPastCool 