And so even if you're going off the beaten path, sign language, you know, like everyone kind of knows the universal, like, "Cluck cluck" for chicken, right? And so, "Choo choo" for train. You know, people want to help you. So you just got to give them that opportunity to just be like, "This is what I need." You know, like, most communication is nonverbal anyway.

So based on, like, your facial expression or, like, how you're miming things or body language, that can really help people figure out what you need. So never be afraid. And, you know, there's always Google Translate now. So, like, worst case scenario, you open your phone and you type in and it kind of gives, like, an okay translation, but probably enough to get your point across to people.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of All The Hacks, a show about upgrading your life, money, and travel. If you're new here, I'm Chris Hutchins. And today, I'm talking with Matt Kepnes, better known as Nomadic Matt. In the early 2000s, he accidentally became one of the OG travel bloggers after saving money, quitting his job, and backpacking around the world.

For almost two decades, he's been traveling, writing about it, and sharing how Traveler is easier, cheaper, and more life-enriching than more people realize. He wrote the New York Times bestselling How to Travel the World on $50 a day. And later, after more than a decade of travels, he wrote a memoir called 10 Years a Nomad.

We're going to talk about why travel doesn't have to cost as much as you think, how travel changes after doing it for as long as Matt has, what to do if you get burnt out on travel. We'll get some of Matt's favorite tactics for travels and discuss whether $50 a day is really enough.

We'll also talk about why travel insurance is one of the most important elements of a good trip, which Matt knows firsthand from a crazy experience he'll share about getting stabbed abroad and a lot more than that. So let's get started right after this. Matt, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me.

As always, it's fun to be here. Well, I have a lot of questions. I'll special shout out All The Hacks member, Alyssa, who sent in a ton of topics to discuss. But I want to just start off asking what you think the biggest misconception people have about travel is.

I mean, I think the obvious answer, at least to me, is that people think it's expensive. I think less so now because so much is on social media and there's so many blogs and it's talked about. But I still think the vast majority of people will say, well, they don't really have time to travel.

But if you did, there's always time. But then they're like, "Oh, I just can't afford it." Because people think, "Oh, plane tickets are expensive. Hotels are being beat." They see all these commercials and this glamorized version of travel on social media. And they just think, "Well, that's pricing. Travel is a luxury item.

It's not a must-have thing. It's something you do to relax, to take a break." And so there's this perception that this is expensive, when it doesn't have to be because you always can go over to wherever you're going and just do the local things and the local things cost a non-touristy price.

And so I think if you ask people, "Well, how much do you spend in your own life?" People have these very way off estimates. They usually have a low... They're on the lower end. But if you get people to record all their expenses, even like, "Oh, I bought a water bottle.

That's a couple bucks." But you don't think about it. People actually spend a lot more than they think they do. And then when you balance that versus the price of travel, it's oftentimes cheaper. I live in the Bay Area. So anywhere in the world I would go has to be probably cheaper except maybe Tokyo or a few cities.

So life other places is cheaper. And I experienced this actually... It was probably almost 15 years ago. We traveled for 8 months, and we rented our place out at home. And we broke even or even came out slightly ahead because it turns out we were spending more to live in the Bay Area than we were spending to travel.

But I want to get into some of those costs, some of the ways you save money, some of the tactics you have. But I want to get started and just ask how travel has changed for you. I know you have been in this industry for longer than many. And by industry, I mean writing and sharing your travels online.

You wrote a memoir about what you've learned after being a nomad for a decade. How have things evolved for you personally and in the industry? I started this when I was 25. I started traveling the world. So I'm 42 this year. And so obviously, my days of cheap meals and 12-bed hostel dorms is long gone.

I like nice food. Since I work when I travel, having a place to work is really important. A lot of good sleep is important. So I tend to get my own room, hotels. I take a lot more paid walking tours or food tours. And so for me, the biggest thing is that my accommodation is a lot nicer.

I take more paid activities. Whereas when I was 25, it was all about the free stuff, the hostel dorms, cooking your own meals. I still consider myself a backpacker budget traveler. I take public transportation. I love street food. I still do parks and local things and go to the markets and all that jazz.

I'm not a resort guy. I don't really do luxury. I mean, it's nice, but it feels very isolating to me. So that's the biggest thing that for me has changed. It's probably been nicer days. And then how has travel changed? I think travel has become a lot more accessible than when I started traveling.

Both the ability to do it and the ability to find information. When I started traveling, the internet was just sort of taking off as a means of finding information in the sense that you had forums and blogs and all these places you can go to ask questions about where do I find this hostel?

How do I do this thing? And so I was still primarily using guidebooks as well as just asking around. But between social media and the advent of so many blogs, there's nothing you can't learn with a quick Google search. There's no hidden restaurant, this hidden town. There are places that are more well-known than anywhere else, but there's no place that's unknown in the age of the internet.

Somebody has been there and they posted an Instagram from there. No matter what little town it is, no matter where it is. And so that is really great because it demystifies a lot of the travel experience. It allows people to become more comfortable with going. It's not so much of like you're going into the unknown.

It's like, "Oh, okay. I've heard of this place. I've heard of this thing. So maybe I'll go there." Even if you're so scared because you're going to a place you've never been, it's no longer like this fog out there. The advent of all these budget airlines and everything has made it just a lot cheaper for people to travel.

Yeah. Sometimes one of the ways that I get inspiration is I'll just search on YouTube and it's, "Okay. Well, what's this place like?" It's like, "Here's a video of a person walking down the street." And you can get a really visceral feeling for what it's like to be there.

And I remember when we first went to South and East Africa, I had this one BRAT travel guide that was from 1998 because it was the only one that was... We were traveling for long enough that I couldn't bring a book for each country. So I was like, "This was the one." You don't get a lot of feeling about what you're about to embark on there.

It was more of a directory. Yeah. Guidebooks, even in the best of times, are usually a year and a half behind what's going on. Yep. I never have used guidebooks as a price guide. Just more of a rough guide. Yes. Yeah, yeah. I think they're great about, "Here's the part of town to look for.

Here are some ideas of how transportation works." But I'm curious, you said now that you've gotten older, have done this a while, your digs have gone up. You wrote the book. People have referenced it in many ways about being the guide for backpacking about traveling the world on $50 a day.

Do you think that still holds both in today's world, inflation, pandemic, and as people age and want to experience travel, not in a hostel with 12 beds? Yes and no. That book is never about the number. A lot of people would get caught up on that like, "Oh, $50.

Good luck doing your way on $50." I mean, you're traveling the world on $50 a day. So it's a daily average. Some places, totally. Especially post-COVID, strong dollar. India is still very cheap. Parts of Central America, Southeast Asia, Eastern Europe, still very cheap. But your average place for a hostel in Western Europe is probably 30 euros an hour a night.

So it's very rare to see dorm beds, 10 euros, 15 euros. They're still out there, but they're harder to find. And they're less common. And the beds are probably going to be like 20 beds. So if I, and I am going to redo this book, probably for a post-COVID, post-inflation world, I'd probably up it to like a $65, $70 a day average.

If you're doing the quintessential round the world trip, going to Europe, Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand, South and Central America. And if you're coming from the US, that's going to be even better because the US dollar is so strong right now. Will that stay? Who knows? When I planned my original trip around the world, I remember it was one US dollar got you $1.30 Australian.

So that's what my budget was based off of. And by the time I got there is one-to-one. So I lost 30% of my budget because of that. So I had to readjust everything. So it's less about the number and more about the style, the tips, the tricks. If you're just looking for ways to travel cheap, forget about the number.

Just use the strategies in the book. Okay. So let's talk about some of those strategies. Because I liked how you actually broke it down. It wasn't just, "There are a bunch of strategies. Go have a great trip." It's, "Here's what you specifically need to know." So how would you walk someone through the high level of planning a trip like this with a goal to do it on a budget?

What are the best? What are the key strategies that people need to follow? I think the biggest thing for people is one, travel slow. The more you can spread out your costs, the better it will be. If you're moving around a lot, you're going to have high transportation costs.

And that really can eat into a lot of people's budgets. But the big thing is just really being flexible. Because if you can wait for that deal to come, then you're not tied into, "I have to get this flight on this day to this destination." And so one of the benefits of long-term travel is that you're in no rush to do anything.

You can wait for that flight deal, that hotel deal, or you can find a flight deal or a hotel deal and be like, "That's where we're going next because that's where it's cheapest." And so big picture, always be flexible. Second big picture thing is to travel like you live.

You in your daily life cook food, you don't eat expensive food all the time, restaurants. You look for free activities, you take public transportation, you go for walks. Do the same when you're traveling. If you really want to get a taste of local life, go to the local farmer's market, go take the train or the bus, go for a walk, sit in a park.

Travel doesn't always have to be about doing things. It can be more about just existing in the place and soaking up the vibe. And so if you travel like you live, you're going to end up doing all the things that locals do. Because what people do in Berlin isn't different than what people do in the Bay Area or Austin.

Everyone gets up and goes to work and takes the train and goes grocery shopping and lives their day-to-day life and then walks and maybe sits by the river. They do something. Sit in the park. So I guess let's pause for a second and go back to a more macro question, which is when it comes to travel, why do you love travel?

What is it about travel that makes it something that you've now, I guess, dedicated your entire professional career to and something you've spent decades of your life doing? I don't like to be bored. I guess that's one reason. When you travel, you're always doing something. I like mastering my own time.

I mean, this is an accidental career. The goal was never to start a company. It was just to keep traveling for as long as possible so that I could have my own time, have my own schedule, do everything I wanted to do, just get out there and go explore and see the world.

The world is a book, right? But the world is also a puzzle. And every place you go to adds one more piece to solve it. It's an unsolvable puzzle. You'll never finish it in your lifetime, but you just keep adding more to it. I just find people interesting. I'm also deeply interested in history and politics.

So going over to places and learning about why they do things is just fascinating to me. It sounds like a lot of those things aren't always the paid tour, the Michelin star meal. So finding the joy of travel that isn't what you saw on Instagram, I think, can often make for the experience.

So I'm curious, when you're trying to find those experiences, when you're trying to meet people, what do you do to connect with people? I think in today's world, people are maybe a little more closed off than they were 20 years ago because they have their phone to distract them at a bar.

It seems harder to meet people. Have you found ways to keep that kind of vibe going, especially now that you're not in the hostel? You might be in your own private room. Well, one of the reasons I still love hostels is even though I'm in my own private world, I'm a hostel.

You still get the vibe, right? So you can still go to the common area. But I think the opposite is actually true. I think the internet has made it easier to meet people. True, people have moved to their phone, especially in the hostel, in a way that wasn't true in 2006 when I started traveling.

But there are so many apps and ways to meet people through Couchsurfing, social media, Instagram, Facebook groups, Bumble BFF, Meetup.com, walking tours, bar crawls. There's lots of ways to meet people. And the internet has actually made it easier to meet people if you're open to it. And I think people are a lot more open to just meeting a stranger online.

It's not weird to like, "Oh, there's this cool meetup happening. I'm just going to walk over to it because I'm new here." Is there any kind of mental checklist or things you do before you're going to a new place to try to connect with people, figure out what to do?

What resources do you use to crowdsource ideas of things that you might spend your time on? I know you do say, "Leave a lot of your time open for serendipity." So maybe the answer is none. But I'm curious what kind of research you do in advance. Very little. Maybe read a couple of blog posts, bookmark a few restaurants.

I try to just go there and see where the day takes me. Instagram, my Twitter feed. But usually if I'm in the mood to meet people, in the sense that I want to actively make sure there's people around me, I'll either stay at a hostel or I'll look at an expat Facebook group or meetup.com or something and see what's going on while I'm there.

Since I travel a lot for work, my travels are about getting the price of food because we have to write a guide to it. It really depends on, "Am I there for research purposes or am I there for fun?" So if I'm there at a destination because we're going to write about it, I have a mission.

I stick to it. Yeah. If I chat up locals and they're like, "Come to this thing." I'm like, "Okay, sure." But my mind isn't like, "I'm gonna go join this group to see if there's a cool event going on." But if I'm there for fun, I most likely will do that.

Any memorable experiences that have come from random joining things that you just found on the internet? Just found on the internet? I joined a couple of couchsurfing groups when I lived in Paris a few years back. And those people became my friends for the entire time I lived there.

Back in the day, during the MySpace era, I met a bunch of people in a Thailand travel group. We ended up traveling around Southeast Asia for like 3 months together. Yeah. Our travels were at a similar time in life. And it was the Lonely Planet Forums, where we would just post, "Hey, we're in South Africa.

We ended up meeting these 2 guys from Sweden. And we ended up renting a car, buying a tent, and all this stuff together. And we basically camped in a tent with them driving around Namibia, Botswana, and South Africa for 3 weeks." So I think that's still possible. It just sounds like you got to find a few different places to find people.

We do events here in Austin. And somebody came to one. "So how long have you been reading the blog?" Because I just threw that comment. So I was there and it's part of our blog thing. And she was like, "I just found this event on Eventbrite. I don't know what this is." And I was like, "That's really cool." She's like, "I'm just passing it through." I was like, "Super.

Well, welcome." I remember after 6 or so months, I was ready for something different. And we were doing some slow travel. I'm curious, you did it for a decade. What did you do to avoid getting burnt out about travel? It's impossible to get burnt out. No, I'm sorry. It's impossible not to get burnt out.

You will get burned out. At some point, you will get tired, you will get burnt out. If you're just doing long-term travel, it becomes your day-to-day life. And eventually, you need a break from that. And so in your day-to-day life, you take a break, you go on vacation. And if travel life, you can just sit in one place and recharge your battery.

Travel is a battery. It's not some unlimited wellspring of energy. You need to rest at some point. Because everywhere you go, you have to relearn how to live, the language, how to get around, where to eat, where to stay, to walk around, local customs, the streets. You're relearning life every day.

And that's mentally very taxing. There's a reason why when you drive to work all the time, you can tune out. It becomes like a routine. Your mind just goes on autopilot. When you're traveling, there is no autopilot because you're relearning everything. And so eventually, you just burn out. You need a break.

And so slow travel can really help that because you're not really rushing yourself a lot. So you're adjusting to new places at a slower pace. But even the slowest of travelers, eventually, they're just like, "I just want to sit." Even short trips, I found, can be a lot. And so sometimes, it feels so counterintuitive to spend an afternoon on a one-week trip, like watching a movie in your hotel room.

But the amount of energy you can recharge by just hanging out and relaxing, I think, is really valuable. And so I think people very often think, "Oh, I'm in this country. I can't afford to not be doing something every second of every day." But sometimes, you start to lose the appreciation for it if it feels like it's painful and it's work.

So don't be afraid, I think, to take a break, even on a week-long trip for an afternoon. Yeah. And if your goal is to go to Italy for a week to soak in Italian culture, spending an afternoon doing nothing is very much a part of Italian culture. Go sit at the piazza and just enjoy a cafe and just sit around and chat.

People watch. You get a real sense of Italy that way. Yeah, you mentioned customs and all the learning of a new place. I've had a few questions from listeners that ask about going to places that are very unfamiliar, whether it's the customs or the language. I'm curious what advice you have to someone.

Maybe they're going somewhere in the Middle East or in Asia, where the customs and the language are all totally foreign to them. What would you tell them to do either in advance or just to help them understand how it might not be as difficult as they might think? Read a book.

You can't really know a place until you've read something about it. So I always find reading up about where you're visiting. A history book, if you can, or even just a current events book, something that just gives you insight into the local culture can be super helpful. Additionally, there's so many blogs out there in the world these days that you can read on any subject you want.

And from local writers too. People that live in destinations are now local bloggers. So that can really help you get a sense of place and understanding. Also, a great way to get food recommendations too. If you find a local food blogger on Instagram, their audience is other locals, not tourists.

So you're going to get all the inside info. Yeah, if you have a VPN, and you can connect to an IP in the country, or maybe you can change your Google search to that country, you might get a different set of results than if you're searching from a US IP or on Google US search.

So I've sometimes found a better set of results when I'm searching for stuff online, if I can anchor myself. Maybe there's a local search engine even. But if you could try to anchor yourself to searching within the country, you get maybe more relevant topics than the kind of travel guide from the foreigners overseas.

But I know one thing that I've heard you talk about maybe more articulately than I can is about communication. And I think so many people might assume that you need to speak a language to go lots of places, especially if you want to go off the beaten path. And so first, I'm going to ask, how many languages do you actually speak, given that I think you've probably been to, if not 100, close to 100 countries, I'm guessing?

I speak pretty good Spanish, decent Thai, and I can understand and read French, though my ability to give a reply is very slow. But that hasn't held you back from going to plenty of countries that don't speak those languages? You know, I mean, English is pretty widely spoken. At least basic English.

And so even if you're going off the beaten path, sign language, you know, like, everyone kind of knows the universal like, "Cluck cluck" for chicken, right? And so, "Choo choo" for train. You know, people want to help you. So you just got to give them that opportunity to just be like, "This is what I need." You know, like, most communication is nonverbal anyway.

So based on like, your facial expression, or like, how you're miming things or body language, that can really help people figure out what you need. So never be afraid. And you know, there's always Google Translate now. So like, worst case scenario, you open your phone and you type in and it kind of gives like an okay translation, but probably enough to get your point across to people.

Does it ever feel like cheating to you a little bit? Having been to the type of travel where you had to rely on so much intuition or kind of hard work to communicate with people that didn't speak the language that now it's like, "Well, I guess I could just pull out my phone and type something and it could be understood by someone that has no common language threads." I don't like it just because I don't like pulling out my phone.

In some parts of the world, that's not always the wisest thing to do. So I'd rather just do it the old-fashioned way. But I'm an old funny daddy. So, you know. I mean, if there was like an earpiece that did it, I would probably get that earpiece. Like, you know, like the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy where they put that slug in his ear and he can understand everything.

That's what I would probably do. I don't like pulling out my phone a lot because then you're always on your phone. It's like back and forth. It slows down conversation. You mentioned earlier that now you like to stay in places by yourself, but you also like to go on a lot more tours that cost money.

How do you find them? How do you make sure you don't get caught up in terrible tours designed for tourists that are maybe not as good as a much better one that you... Are there review sites? How do you think about that? I do mostly day walking tours, or a food tour or something like that.

Very rarely do multi-day trips. But Best Walking Tour in X is really a pretty good search term. I'll read a couple of blog posts. And if the same company appears in a couple, and their tours look good and reasonably priced, I'll probably pick them. You can see star ratings.

So if 17,000 people are TripAdvisor, this is four stars. And then three writers on blogs are like, "I took this tour and it was really good. And I wasn't paid to say that." Okay, maybe it's pretty good. It's always good to look for my unbiased opinion of... I find that to be a helpful search term for almost any product.

You're like, "Unbiased opinion. XYZ mattress." So is there any place you've been where you've actually found that just sign language and English weren't enough? And to be clear, when we say sign language, we're not talking ASL, professional sign communication. We're talking about more hand miming and gestures. But are there places you've found that it's actually been very difficult to get around and communicate?

No, not really. Maybe I haven't been to enough places that are so off the beaten path. But I've always found that miming and sign language gets you far enough. I want to go back to some of the tactics, especially around what you travel with. I know you're a fan of a backpack.

But nowadays, what are the things that you take on every trip that you think... Not the obvious things, right? I'm sure you bring a toothbrush. But what are the things that people might be packing that are different from how you pack? I mean, I honestly don't take much stuff with me.

Because I started in a time where you didn't need a lot. And so if I ever need something, like an umbrella, I'll buy it. Or if I need medicine, I'll pick it up on the way. I definitely take a towel. The Checkers Guide to the Galaxy 101. I always have a towel.

But honestly, I don't take much stuff. I mean, I'm not a photographer. So I just use my phone. But to me, less is more. Like, what do you need to take? A couple clothes, a couple of books, a phone charger, and your phone. I take my computer. I take a notebook, a journal, backup credit cards.

That's really it. I take a flashlight. I think a lot of people underestimate the power of having a flashlight, especially if you're camping a lot or just out in rural areas often. Just having that with you is really good. But other than that, I don't take a lot of gear.

I'm like anti-gear. I'm also anti-app. If you're always like, "What apps do you use?" I'm like, "Google Maps." That's it. And you mentioned backup credit cards. We could go probably for a while about travel hacking. But one area I haven't really talked about is how much do you think about banking and budgeting and that aspect of it for a long-term trip where you're going to need to access money and you need to pay bills?

Do you do anything differently than you would if you were living stateside? So I'm in this unique position where I work in travel. So money comes in and it's all taxed right now for me. So I would say that my recommendation for people is always to have two bank accounts.

If you're an American, you should definitely have the Charles Schwab ATM card. There are no bank fees, no ATM fees. And if you get charged an ATM fee, they will reimburse your ATM fee. So I always have money there. That's my primary card when I travel. And if you lose it, they'll basically FedEx it to you anywhere in the world within 48 hours.

But it's always good to have a backup just in case it's hacked or something happens where you can't get it in 48 hours. So I always carry two credit... I'll carry more than two credit cards just because I'm a travel hacker. But two ATM cards and at least two credit cards.

And you only ever go out with one. I only take my ATM card out very rarely. It's always home. Just the cash out that you need. But that varies by destination. I mean, in Japan, you could walk around with $10 million in your pocket. No one's going to do anything.

So versus like, I wouldn't walk around Columbia with a bunch of money or plastic in my pants. But at least definitely those two. And for the primary account that I have in terms of the Charles Schwab card, I only keep a few thousand dollars in there. So if somebody were to kidnap me and say, "Take all the money out," it's not going to drain everything, right?

There's only a maximum amount they can take. What about passport? Do you bring the passport with you when you're out and about or leave it back in the hotel or hostel? I always leave it in the hotel or hostel. And has that ever caused a problem? I know I've heard varying opinions here, which is like, "You always want to have some form of ID if something happens, if you get in trouble." And then the other is like, "You definitely don't want to have your passport lost, dropped, stolen while you're out." I bring my driver's license with me everywhere I go as a form of ID.

The passport stays inside. The only time I will break that rule is if it's required for a spot check on the train. Sometimes in Europe, if you're on the train, even if you're just going between cities, they'll be like, "Passport." That's like a spot check. But just going out to the bar or a restaurant or walking around, no.

And if I were to ever get stopped by the police, they're like, "Where's your passport?" I'd be like, "It's in my hotel. Come get it. Let's go get it." Really, they'll mostly fine you. I guess if you were in a country that required it and you got stopped and there was a lot of corruption, you may have to pay a bribe.

Nobody wants that paperwork. "Why did you arrest this guy? He didn't have his passport on him." It's a lot of paperwork for nothing. The universal rule is cops never want to do paperwork. Every country has paperwork. At the worst, you'll get a warning. At the worst, you'll get a warning.

At the worst, you'll pay a fine, like a bribe. A fine. With air quotes. Yeah. Have you been in any of those situations where you've had to pay a fine/bribe? Nope. Never. Our only one was a border crossing from Syria into Lebanon. And the taxi driver, funny enough, he was so embarrassed that his country would be the kind of place where you had to pay a fine that he paid the fine out of his own fare because he didn't want us to know about it.

But later, we were in the car for a few hours. We asked about it. He was like, "Yeah, the way this works is if you get to the border and you have foreigners and you don't pay a tip, then they just hold you here for hours. And that causes delays for me and you, and our country's terrible at doing this stuff.

But I'll do it." So I've never had to do it myself. But I know the paperwork issue deeply because my wife was pulled over speeding in Bosnia. And they were sitting here like, "Oh, this is the fine." And she was like, "I don't know." We just waited it out.

And eventually, they're like, "Yeah, you can go because we're not going to try to fill out this paperwork for your international driver's license and everything." Yeah. I always count on nobody wants to do paperwork. Okay. One thing we haven't talked about that I know you have a pretty strong opinion on is travel insurance.

What perspective do you have on travel insurance and its necessity in a day where so many credit cards have lots of forms of insurance baked into them? I still think it's very important just because you get better medical care, like emergency care. It's really the only higher end premium credit cards with $600 a year top end ones where you get really robust travel insurance.

But even then, these aren't travel insurance companies. They're credit cards tapping this on. So they're not really streamlined to process claims in a way that a company whose only purpose is travel insurance. A lot of these credit cards don't really cover good medical evacuation. And so if you just want protection on trip interruption or cancellation or something gets stolen, yeah, the credit card you paid that trip on is probably good enough.

But if you want actual medical insurance in case something goes wrong, you're going to want something to pay extra for. And travel insurance isn't that expensive. So you're not paying like $100 a month, get plans for $50. Are there any providers you've used that or you do use or I guess what do you use when you travel?

Yeah, I use a company called Safetyway. They're really good. World Nomads is also really good for people having more gear. Insure Nomads is really good, but pretty expensive. And then for seniors, I would definitely recommend Insure My Trip because not a lot of plans cover people over 70. Okay.

Have you ever had to use travel insurance? Yeah. I used it in Colombia. I've used it in South Africa when my bag got stolen. It's just in Thailand. So yeah, I used it quite a number of times. It's coming very handy. It's coming handy for friends. I had a friend break their back in the Amazon.

They had to get airlifted out and then sent back to Canada. And travel insurance covers the whole thing. Wow. Yeah. And I think it's so funny. We get caught up in thinking travel insurance is about "My flight got canceled." But it can be about a lot of other things.

And I will say medical... I don't know what kind of medical situations you've ever been in overseas. They don't end up being that expensive unless they're very extreme. And I can assure you that an airlift from South America to Canada is not something you want to have to cover on your own.

That you do not. That you do not. So have you been in a situation where something went wrong? I mean, you mentioned your bag got stolen, you've gotten mugged, something like that. And why didn't that stop you from travel? When I think so many people, that's their fear, that something bad would happen.

And if it does happen, they might not want to travel again. I have to assume it's happened to you. And you've kept going. Yeah. I got stabbed in Colombia. And my mother always sends me every State Department warning about Mexico. But it's like, "Hey, we live in the States.

People get gunned down going to Walmart." There are mass shootings all the time in this country. Bad things happen. It's just part of life. It doesn't matter if you're home or in Mexico or in Thailand or in Paris or in Japan, shit happens. And so you can live in fear and say, "I'm just going to never go anywhere." But then walk across the street to a movie theater and then make it out because of some psychopath.

Or you get hit by a car on your way to work. So it's like, "Are you really going to live in fear?" But what if? If so, then never leave your house. If you're up for it, I'd love to hear the story in Colombia. And maybe from the perspective of...

I think a lot of people don't really plan for that. So they don't know what they would do in that circumstance. And I imagine you're here now. So it all went well. What happened? And how did you know what to do? And where did you end up going? And how did the trip unfold after that?

Yeah, I was in Bogota. And I had my phone out. Long story short, you shouldn't have fancy electronics out. I just forgot to put it back in before I left this cafe. And so I tried to take it and he jerked backwards instead of just going forward. And so we started tussling.

And then yeah, he had a small little knife. I thought he was just punching me. If he had shown the knife, I would have been like, "Don't take the phone." But afterwards, I was like, "Oh, so sorry." And I was just covered in blood. I assume you went to the hospital and everything was fine?

Yeah, the whole thing cost me like 50 bucks. Honestly, the flight home was like 1000 bucks. And I have to reimburse me for that. But the 50 bucks, I was like, "It's not worth the paperwork." I mean, they could have done it for 50 bucks, but I did it for the flight.

Would you go back to Bogota after that? Oh, yeah. 100%. I love, love Bogota. I was really sad to have to go home. Yeah. I've also been to Bogota. And I think, especially... I mean, it's just a great place. I love the country of Colombia. I've been there a few times.

Bogota is close enough and no time zone good enough that I think you could even do it in a long weekend and have a great trip. Not that... I don't want to not do slow travel. But I think for those who don't have the time to do it, it's still a place that you can go in a short period of time because of the proximity.

It's such a phenomenal place. I was there for 6 weeks and I'm gonna stay another 6 weeks. I want to just get some quick thoughts on travel hacking. I've obviously covered this topic a ton. You've thought about it a lot. Are there perspectives you have on it that you think are maybe a little bit contrarian to the average person who plays the points and miles game that would be helpful?

Yeah. I think that people get too caught up in point value. For most people, just get a card, book your flight, that works, and don't spend time doing it. People overcomplicate the simple. For a person who's going on one to two trips a year, one credit card or two credit cards just to optimize spending bonuses, it's going to be more than enough.

People are like, "Oh, well, this is worth 1 cent. So you want to move it here on 2 days?" Yeah, you could really go deep. But for most people, they're taking one trip a year, 2 trips a year. It doesn't really matter that much. Don't spend a lot of time.

What matters more? That it costs $100,000 points in $5 or 70,000 points in $500. I'd rather spend more points than more money. So when people are like, "Oh, I got this great deal. It's only 60,000 points plus $400." It's like, "Well, yeah." For this business class flight, it's like, "Yeah, but you're paying a lot in those fees." To me, that's not worth it.

But some people are like, "No, I did the math out." And it's like that meme of all the numbers. It's like the guy from The Hangover. It's like they're calculating all this point value. It's like, "Aha! I've saved 62 cents." I'm like, "Yeah, but you spent 5 hours to figure it out." So what's your setup for travel hacking?

Do you have a lot of cards, a couple cards? I mean, I have like 30 cards. Okay. Okay. So... Crazy. But I also have this for work too. So it's like really different. And I travel constantly. But my biggest... On my personal stuff, I use Built, which is a card that lets you get points on your rent for free, and they have some good category bonuses that I use.

And then I use the Chase Sapphire. For work, I either use an Amex Gold or a Chase. Any favorite tactics for redeeming? There's a great new website out called Point.me. And you can just connect all your stuff through an API and just search where you want to go and it'll tell you where to transfer your points to get the most value.

That's a really good news website. They're still working on some of the kinks. One of the things I don't like is you can't do a calendar view. You have to search day by day by day. Very frustrating. But it's a new program. So they'll fix it eventually. Yeah. When I talked to Heather, one of the...

Or Tiffany, one of the founders, she basically said, "Don't expect that much because there might be a premium tier that you pay more for if you want to search more dates." So it's not clear that the full calendar view is coming. But I do like Seatspy for that feature.

They give you a 365-day calendar view for a handful of airlines. Before we wrap, I want to go down one path, which is just inspiring people with some of the kind of off the beaten path places you've enjoyed that people might not be considering. I know I get lots of emails of people saying, "Oh, I have a trip coming up to Paris or London or Tokyo." But I think once you've ticked off some of the most common places, you're looking for inspiration, you've done more travel than probably anyone listening.

What are some places you think people need to put on their list to explore? Taiwan, Romania, Bulgaria, Mexico. Not a lot of people... I mean, offbeat Mexico. Get out of Tulum and Playa and all those places. Maybe if you can, spend like, I don't know, a minute on each of the top few and just kind of...

I haven't been to most of these, but I've been to Taiwan and it was fantastic. But a few of the others, I haven't. So I'm dying to know what set them apart from the rest of the world. Taiwan is just like very under-visited, great food, just like clean China.

South Korea also, just great nightlife and food. Bulgaria and Romania, incredible history, ruins, smaller than medieval towns, national parks and mountains and you get the coast and it's just phenomenal and cheap and not a lot of people go there. Mexico is amazing. Everyone's super nice. It's just a vibrancy to life there, plus the food.

So you can see there's a trend. Where in Mexico? I think Mexico might be really easy for a lot of people in the States to start exploring and flights can be pretty cheap. Where would you recommend... Someone's been to Mexico City or Cabo or Cancun. What are the places that you think...

San Miguel, Delende, Oaxaca, Chiapas, Yucatan State, not the Peninsula, Merida, Monterey, just got places that come to mind. It's a huge country, but most travelers stick to a few places. I love Mexico City too, so can't go wrong there. Other places that come to mind, visualize the world. Malaysia, I don't think gets enough attention.

Sri Lanka, Nepal, also just great places, but not a lot of tourists. Basically getting a really unfiltered view of places. Yeah, I think that's something I'm looking for now as we evolve. But one thing that's changed for me, and I'd love your perspective. We did a lot of travel solo, did a lot of travel with my wife, backpacking, and now we have kids.

I know you said you're now in your 40s. How do you think travel for people who are now have a more demanding career, aren't able to work entirely on the road, have kids, have families, how do you think that affects the style of travel you've spent years writing about and living?

And what do you think that looks like for the years ahead for you? Well, I think budget travel is a state of mind more than a style. Like, "Oh, we have to stay in hostels or whatever." So for me, as long as I'm still doing the local thing, to me, that's just budget travel.

I don't think I will change that. I mean, I don't really like cruises. And then whenever I stay at resorts, I'm like, "Everything here is overpriced. I just want to go eat whatever the locals are eating." I don't want to eat at a resort. So I don't really see a lot of change happening in my life.

I think even as a family, things change, of course. But as long as you're doing that local thing, it's really just more about your mindset than it is like, "Oh, anything else." Yeah. I think one thing that I'm going to change is just... And you already highlighted this, but just having less things to do.

It's easy to get three or four things done on your own in a day and still have lots of time for exploration. With a family, it just feels like one. The goal is one thing to accomplish today. And let everything else come to chance. Or maybe let your kids drive.

We just had a great conversation with Derek Sivers, who talked about how he traveled with his son. And it was just let him lead and explore through their eyes, which can be very different from exploring through your own. So I think the big summary for me, reflecting on... This is really reminiscent because I did an eight-month trip where it was just like this.

And my wife and I did a lot of this before kids. It's just recognizing that you're not going to... A lot of what you're going to experience, like your example in Italy, is being in another place, understanding another culture, food, language. And that doesn't require seeing every museum in the town.

It doesn't require ticking off every five-star restaurant. It can be a lot different. And it can be a lot more rewarding to do that. And even more so if you get outside of the cities. Sometimes just where you stay. Maybe don't stay in the most central part of town to force yourself to be around locals.

I agree. I think as you age, you slow down. Especially if you have kids, you slow down. I don't have kids, but I've had a lot of other parents who travel with kids say the same thing. They let their kids just go and their kids will just discover things.

And they then discover things. One thing I'm going to wrap with, is there a place in the world that if someone were going, you have a few recommendations? Maybe it's because you lived there for a while. Maybe it's because it's home. I mean, if you can go to Paris and go to La Dites Vines, that's a great restaurant.

L-E-D-I-T-V-I-N. How would you spend a day in Paris if you only had one? Let's wander and wander and wander. Get some wine, sit on the sand, sit in a park, go to a cafe, and just eat. If people want to stay on top of everything you're writing, traveling, posting, where should they head?

You can find me everywhere at nomadicmap.com and nomadicmap on social media. It's just traveling nomadic map. I'm branded the same thing throughout everything. Awesome. Thanks for being here.