- INTERVIEWED BY USA TODAY, THE NEW YORK TIMES, BLOOMBERG NEWS, BUSINESS INSIDER
- ON RETAINER AS THE ITALY CORRESPONDENT FOR “INTERNATIONAL LIVING” WRITING FEATURE ARTICLES AND PRESENTING AT CONFERENCES WORLDWIDE
- FEATURED ON THE POINTS GUY WEBSITE
- GUEST ON “SHE HIT REFRESH”, “TRAVEL SHIFTERS”, “A CREATIVE LIFE”, ‘THE AGE OF POSSIBILITY”, THE RADIO VAGABOND,” “THRIVE SOLO!” and THE UK’S KAYE ADAMS PODCASTS!
- YOUTUBE INTERVIEW WITH “ADVENTURE FREAKSSS!”
- PANELIST FOR DIGITAL NOMADS OVER 50 VIRTUAL SUMMIT
- GUEST SPEAKER ON INTERNATIONAL LIVING’S “HOW TO MOVE OUT OF THE US” LIVE PRESENTATION
- 50 COUNTRIES SO FAR!!! Woot woot!!!
Hola. Bonjour. Ciao. Namaste. Welcome to my blog – thanks for joining me on my travels! I hope you learn, laugh, and more importantly – go do stuff after reading this.
You’re probably wondering how this crazy life of full-time travel began…
In 2016, I took a leave of absence from my awesome job in Colorado as a national software and sales trainer and joined two friends to backpack an incredibly gorgeous and rugged 130-mile hike in Ireland – The Kerry Way. My very first through-hike! After that, I stayed in Europe for 3 more months and visited the Amalfi Coast and Greece with friends, then traveled solo (at age 55 for the first time EVER!!) to Portugal, Morocco, and Spain, staying in hostels (for the first time EVER!!) and meeting people from all over the world.
I was a changed person… I returned to my job in Denver but couldn’t get the travel bug to stop biting. So…I planned and planned…and quit my job, left my husband of 32 years, and headed out the door with my trusty backpack in December of 2017 to continue traveling. I spent 4 months living out of a backpack exploring Southeast Asia: Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore, Nepal, and Bali. After my week-long trek in Nepal, I stopped in Pokhara, Nepal, turned on my Tinder app, and met the best travel partner a girl could want! “The Frenchman,” Piu and I have been an item since early 2018, traveling together as well as separately. We’ve explored over 20 countries on 6 continents, often paragliding there, as he’s a professional paraglider working summers in the Dordogne Valley in France.
That same summer of 2018, I got my first house-sitting gig – a two-month caretaker position in Tuscany at a haunted 15th-century villa.
When that ended, I continued traveling – I kayaked in Croatia, hiked in Montenegro, floated in a hot air balloon at dawn in Cappadocia, paraglided over ancient burial sites in Madagascar, volunteered in an orphanage in Nepal, walked the Portuguese Camino, housesat in Australia on the Sunshine Coast, worked in a vineyard in New Zealand – and then…Covid.
I refused to let a pandemic stop me, so in the summer of 2020 I bought a VW campervan and headed east by myself, driving along the coast to Maine. I (safely and carefully) visited friends and family, drove along the Blue Ridge Highway, saw the Liberty Bell, frolicked with the wild swimming ponies of Chincoteague, did wine tastings at the vineyards in the Finger Lakes region in Upstate New York, and stayed in Maine for a month, celebrating my 59th birthday in Acadia National Park.
In the fall, I headed south of the border for warmer climes and met the Frenchman in Mexico. We enjoyed exploring Oaxaca, Taxco, Cuernavaca, Puerto Escondido, Guanajuato and Mexico City, and after he headed home, I rented a tiny studio apartment in Coyoacan – Frida Kahlo’s neighborhood -for a month. After that, I headed to South America for the first time: to Columbia. In Medellin I spent 3 weeks in a Spanish immersion school and then adventured around for another month or so with The Frenchman to Bogotá, Jardin, Salento, Jericó and more!
In the summer of 2021, I dusted off the VW van (her name is Tilly) and drove 7,000 miles/11,000+ km on my own from Colorado through New Mexico and Arizona and up the West Coast to California, Oregon and Washington, thoroughly loving the Olympic and Hoh rain forests, the redwoods, Big Sur and so much more, and crossed by ferry to the San Juan Islands where I camped for a few nights.
Next came a month with Piu (the Frenchman) in the very interesting, delicious and welcoming country of Georgia, and from there, a month in wonderful Cyprus on my own exploring archaeological ruins, beaches and villages in the mountains; off to Portugal for another visit – this time, to scout areas in Porto for finding an apartment… and to begin living there in October 2022. 🇵🇹
After living and loving and exploring the heck out of Portugal for almost a year and (finally!!) obtaining residency through their D7 visa, I learned I could apply for Italian citizenship recognition through ancestry while living in Italy, so I pivoted…I packed up my apartment in Porto to travel full-time for a few more months – to Sweden, Denmark, Scotland, Czechia, Poland, the Galapagos Islands and Ecuador.
After that, I moved to Umbria, Italy in January 2024 and spent 5 months living in a tiny hilltop medieval village, waiting for my Italian citizenship to be recognized …and FINALLY got the coveted maroon EU passport!!
Wow! The things I’ve seen, experiences I’ve had, the people I’ve met and places I’ve been these past 8+ years of full-time travel have been amazing, educational, awe-inspiring, humbling and magical.
Join me as I learn, hike, drink wine, get lost, figure it out, drink some more wine, explore, take amazing photos, and get lost again a few more times (it’s what I do!)
I’m a HUGE proponent of solo travel and think it’s something everyone should do at least once. It fosters creativity, independence, resilience, self-sufficiency – and you meet so many people when traveling alone!
I’d love for you to follow me on Instagram and Facebook.
I post there pretty regularly – lots of pix and inspirational quotes to get ya out the door!
Thanks so much for finding me, following me, and hopefully picking up some valuable travel hacks on where to stay and how to save money, great ideas on where to go and how to make it happen!
Obrigada, merci beaucoup, madloba, dhan’yavada, grazie mille…
Cindy
🌎 🍷 🥾 🎒 🚐 📸 🚂 🪂 🍷 ✈️ 🌍
“For once you have traveled, the voyage never ends.” ~ Pat Conroy
