I’m on the road again! Today I leave Ushuaia, or as it’s called here, El Fin Del Mundo (the end of the world).  A little city on the tip of Argentina, where I took off for my cruise to Antarctica.  Which, BTW was SOOO AMAZING.  But more to come on that.

This marks the end of almost 2 months of group travel and structured events.  At first, the group dynamic was a change and even kind of hard.  I didn’t want to move with the pack.  But by the end, I think this may have been the most amazing 2 months of my life.  I don’t know, when I say it’s the most, it means it was better than other things and indirectly, other things weren’t as good… which I don’t feel like saying?  When I think back to the first part of the trip, pretty much everyday I think about my yoga friends, want to go scuba diving and think of going back to Thailand, Australia and Japan, and want to explore more of South East Asia.  Ok, so I digress, it’s all been really really really good and these last 2 months have been really really great.  But the point I was trying to make, is that I’ve been with the group, and now I’m free!  All the places I’ve heard about from friends and have been dreaming of going… well I’m back to just roaming where my heart tells me to!

My inbetween events routine, be it in Argentina or Thailand or New Zealand or Australia or Minnesota, goes something like this.  The first day, I just sleep.  Through out these 181 days of adventure, in the planned sections I usually don’t have my own room or a nice bed or my own schedule.  So when I get all 3, I sleep 😊 haha then I start downloading and reflecting and planning.  Going through my pictures to try to get rid of the bad ones and consolidate, finding my new friends on facebook and Instagram, going through bills and emails, thinking of a blog post, writing my Flat Eliza updates, and now researching and planning what’s next.

The good and bad thing about going to amazing places with amazing people is that my head gets filled with all these amazing ideas of what to do next.  Today I’ve looked at ecocamps and refugios in Patagonia.  Both in Torres del Paine in Chile and El Calafate and El Chalten in Argentina.  I’ve looked at Iguazu Falls and Rio de Janiero in Brazil.  I’ve looked at Colonia, Punto del Diablo and Montevideo in Uruguay.  I’ll do some combination of those in the next week or two.  But then my mind wanders and I’m looking at Cuba, the Amazon, the Galapagos, Cartagena and Medellin, scuba diving in Belize, and booking my Spanish school.  These are all things I want to do in Latin America.  Like, realllllllly want to do.  But I also have looked at gorilla trekking in Uganda, hiking Kilimanjaro, Eurorail passes, yoga retreats in India, and overland camping safari tours in Southern Africa.  I’ve looked at what type of certifications are needed to work on an Antarctica expedition ship and prepared my yoga resume for a job teaching at a resort in Egypt.

The good and the bad thing about seeing the world and meeting so many new people, is that it has made me feel even more excited about life and living it to the fullest.  There are so many wonderful and interesting and beautiful things out there and this tiny piece that I’ve seen recently from Inca ruins to million year old glaciers to parades with tubas, silly string and woman doing choreographed dances drinking beer to Minky whales swimming up to my paddleboard and seals up to my kayak to new friends dancing and singing bad karaoke has made me wonder how much more there is to see and do and explore and meet.

But you can’t do it all.  In Antarctica, there were finite times we could go out on expeditions.  On the last trip, I had to decide if I wanted to SUP, kayak or go to land one last time.  I thought we’d have another chance, but we didn’t.  We had a bunch of expeditions canceled because the wind was too strong or the weather too rough.  I had kissed the ground goodbye, literally.  My friend hadn’t.  She was stressed but picked land.  I was stressed but picked standup paddle boarding.  Here’s what I saw.

I was still sad I couldn’t kayak or touch land, but I mean, HOLY SHIT I did not choose wrong.  And that’s what I try to remember and embrace.  Its funny how the decisions with the good outcomes almost stress me out more than the ones with the bad.  Just think how lucky you are when you have one good thing to do.  A good job.  A good partner.  A good friend.  A good meal.  It’s great.  So I try to remember that two good options just means I’m super lucky.  I think one of the thing that I’ve come to embrace even more in my travels is that I’m here to be happy.  Its hedonistic, but being in the moment and following my heart has been just great.  It can be difficult at times to figure out and plan all the logistics of getting from one place to another.  Getting across borders, booking transportations and accomodations.  Finding the things to do that are fun and safe won’t bankrupt me.  But it’s so exhilarating!  Imagine if you had a day off of work, and no responsibilities.  What would you do?  Now what if that’s a week.  Or a month.  Or a year.  I’m still writing the book.  I finished a chapter and it was a fantastic one.  But now  the next page is empty.  How awesome is that?!

I know I’m going to Buenos Aires in 3 hours.  I’m going on a sailing lesson tomorrow afternoon.  It looks like it will be a nice day and I really really liked Buenos Aires.  Life is good.  Very good.

Thanks everyone for the kind words of support and encouragement along the way.  It means a lot to know that people care and are interested in what I’m doing!  And stay tuned, a full Antarctica update is soon on the way.  I just need to think of a few more ways to say AMAZING!!