‎Travel is little beds and cramped bathrooms. It’s old television sets and slow Internet connections. Travel is extraordinary conversations with ordinary people. It’s waiters, gas station attendants, and housekeepers becoming the most interesting people in the world. It’s churches that are compelling enough to enter. It’s McDonald’s being a luxury. It’s the realization that you may have been born in the wrong country. Travel is a smile that leads to a conversation in broken English. It’s the epiphany that pretty girls smile the same way all over the world. Travel is tipping 10% and being embraced for it. Travel is the same white T-shirt again tomorrow. Travel is accented sex after good wine and too many unfiltered cigarettes. Travel is flowing in the back of a bus with giggly strangers. It’s a street full of bearded backpackers looking down at maps. Travel is wishing for one more bite of whatever that just was. It’s the rediscovery of walking somewhere. It’s sharing a bottle of liquor on an overnight train with a new friend. Travel is ‘Maybe I don’t have to do it that way when I get back home.’

Nick Miller (via crybird)

(Source: past-l-i-f-e)

A collection of strange and funny signs that we came across throughout the trip, the meanings of which not always obvious. Caption challenge?

Things I couldn’t take a picture of:

Dried out rivers in Spain
Hills 360° as we drive from town to town
How the first oyster I ever tried tasted like flowers
Waking up in a different country
The stars, and how the sun steals their light
Sunrise all around me as the road winds
Clouds that are so low they are almost resting on the roofs of the little houses
How the rain felt on my freshly shaven head for the first time
How it rained for days and days and days
How towns and hills disappeared behind the mist
Cherries that were in full bloom one day and like snow on the ground the next
Pollen swarming the city
The heat being too much to sleep in the tent, at 8 in the morning
Getting in a truck in 29 degrees, and getting off in 14
Seeing spring come twice

And so much more… I guess now that I have time and a less annoying editing software, I should finally fulfill the promise of a video doc.

Our very first stop, and very first time ever in Spain, getting off the train to find a sandwich in the warm, humid Irun.

And then boarding the next train to take us all the way to Lisbon, and the strange jungle behind the window as we wake up in the morning.

Here’s to the good old days, and the wonderful, magical times yet ahead.

The Ice Cream we had in Paris.

The Ice Cream we had in Budapest.

The Cakes we had in Naples.

The Chai Masala we had in Riga.

Here’s to all the places we went. And all the places we’ll go. And here’s to me, whispering again and again and again and again: iloveyou.

John Green, An Abundance of Katherines (via sweetheartbeats)

Venice, when we first got there, on our way to Naples. Only a couple of hours, early in the morning, empty streets, Easter…

And Venice, 5 days later, wet, soggy, and full of tourists. I loved it anyway.

The art on the wall at the squat where we stayed in Barcelona. Our host was pretty much a Spanish Sid Vicious, who didn’t come home (to let us in) unil 1am, when we had a train to catch at 6 the following morning. It was brilliant.

Père Lachaise cemetary in Paris, hours of walking around, Jimi Hendrix, Oscar Wilde & Edith Piaf’s graves, not hard to find following other tourists with maps of the place, but then the little things like this as we walk along…

Walked up a hill in Fót, Hungary. I figure it was worth it.

Camera Panasonic DMC-F3
ISO 200	Aperture f/4
Exposure 1/50th	Focal Length 9mm

Camera Panasonic DMC-F3
ISO 200	Aperture f/7.1
Exposure 1/320th	Focal Length 5mm

Camera Panasonic DMC-F3
ISO 80	Aperture f/6.2
Exposure 1/500th	Focal Length 20mm