Bucket List

One of the common questions we get when we tell people about our plans (other than “are you guys nuts?”) is “what are you are you going to do for a year and a half?”  We know that just walking around sight-seeing is going to get a little stale long before the year and a half timeframe is up.  After seeing countless museums, cities, parks, and historic sights, I’m sure they will start to all look the same and not hold as much intrige as they should.  If we rush from one site to the next and not spend time on other activities we will get burned out and we won’t be able to enjoy it in the way we’d like. On the other hand, if we just view the whole trip as just a big long vacation, it would be a waste of an oppurtunity to enrich our lives.

While there will be a lot of “sight-seeing” and “vacationing” moments on this trip, there needs to be more to it than just that.  In a year and a half there are over 500 days.  If, in every one of those days, we get up late, check out a few sites, then sit back and take it easy for the rest of the day, we will come back extremely lazy and unfulfilled.

Some of you have no doubt seen the movie “The Bucket List” starring Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson.   In the movie, these two older men come to the realization that they don’t have much time left, and they decide to make a list of things they still want to do before they “kick the bucket”.   They end up going travelling and visiting a number of places and doing most of the items on their list.  In the process, they become great friends and ultimately discover the joy in life. 

When I watched this movie a few years ago, it inspired me to come up with my own bucket list.  The list has been around for almost three years and in that time I’ve only accomplished one of the items on that list - “get married”.  While that list item was a biggie, there’s still a long list of items that remain undone. The reasons for not getting the other items done are all the typical obstacles: Not enough time, not enough money, laziness, etc.   Doing this trip will hopefully remove most of those obstacles.  We now have a lot of free time on our hands, and it would be a shame not to use it to get a bunch of those items done.  As for the “not enough money” problem, that is still somewhat of an issue, but after selling my house, and saving for a long time, there is now enough to pay for some of the more expensive items. 

After getting engaged, Joh and I discussed the concept of a bucket list and my individual list dissappeared and we started working on a new list together. One of the items that came up right away on both of our lists was to “go travelling”.  So we started to focus on that first.  Going travelling would enable a lot of the other items on the list to get done as well.  We started to change the bucket list into a list of activities and challenges that we could accomplish on our trip.  A lot of the items in the new list are travel-specific, such as; visit Machu Picchu, eat sushi in Tokyo, or hike to the top of a mountain, but others are not.  There are other goals and challenges as well, that don’t really have anything to do with travelling.  There are goals in the areas of: education, faith, fitness, personal development, reading, and a lot more.  A lot of the items from my original bucket list made it onto this list too.

So we’ve accumulated a list of tasks that we will attempt to accomplish on our trip. Similar to the Amazing Race, but without the time constraints, competition, or the million-dollar grand prize.  We fully realize that we won’t be able to accomplish all of the items on the list, but we will try our best.

So without further ado (man that was a lot of ado...) here is our list – in no particular order:

1. Walk up a tall mountain from the very bottom to the absolute top.

2. Go to a professional cricket game.

3. Drive a car in a country where they drive on the wrong side of the road, and the driver's seat is on the right instead of the left.

4. Pull an all-nighter and watch the sun come up over the ocean.

5. Eat meat from an animal that you've never eaten before

6. Go on a long-distance hike - 100km or more.

7. Rent or buy bikes and go on a long-distance bike ride - 300km or more.

8. Pick a random foreign wine we like from the LCBO, and locate and visit the winery where it came from.

9. Learn to surf

10. Swim in all 3 major oceans (Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian)

11. Find an ice hockey rink and join a game of shinny.

12. Learn Spanish

13. Learn a martial art

14. Skinny dip in the ocean

15. Learn a cultural dance

16. Get a job on a farm/winery for at least a day

17. Skydive

18. Learn how to Meditate

19. Volunteer somewhere

20. Rent an apartment in a foreign city for a month and live there.

21. Find a christian church in a foreign language and attend worship services

22. Get invited to a local's home for dinner

23. Go to a train station and hop on a train to a destination that you've never heard of.

24. Scuba Dive or snorkel

25. Stand on the equator

26. Learn to juggle (at least 3 balls)

27. Do 100 pushups

28. Do 200 situps

29. Run for 2 hours without stopping

30. Ride a boat down the amazon

31. See Everest

32. Throw a dart at a map and visit that place

33. Eat sushi in Tokyo

34. Eat curry in India

35. Eat asado (grilled beef) in Argentina

36. Eat pad thai in Thailand

37. Eat pho in Vietnam

38. Drink Yerba Mate in Argentina

39. Spend a night on a deserted island

40. Swing on a vine in the Jungle

41. Get a Thai massage

42. Visit Copacabana beach in Rio

43. Visit Machu Picchu

44. Collect a souvenir spoon for Jack's mom from each country we visit

45. Walk on the great wall of China

46. Ride a horse

47. Draw a portrait of each other

48. Swim in a waterfall

49. Go to a karaoke bar and each sing a song

50. Sleep under the stars

51. Go snowboarding in the Andes or Himalayas

52. Find a traveler that has been to Burlington

53. Go camping at a national park

54. Eat at least 10 fruits we've never had before

55. Take a mud bath

56. Help someone learn English

57. Try 100 different types of beer

58. Try 50 different bottles of wine

59. Walk across an entire country

60. Rent a campervan and take a long distance road trip

61. Read 50 books each

62. Learn and get good at Yoga

63. Completely quit smoking

Aside from the above list we also have a number of other goals that aren’t really specific enough to include in a list of tasks.  These include:

1. Write often in this blog

2. Keep in touch with family and friends back home (not just through this blog)

3. Get better at writing – it takes me forever to write.  I keep on reforming sentences, second-guessing what I want to say, and rambling on when I don’t need to.

4. Read and study the Bible often

5. Meet other Christians and discuss our faith

6. Stay healthy and fit

7. Keep learning – read educational books and the like so that we’re able to be of some use in the business world when we return.

8. Meet and talk to as many locals as possible

9. Try not to be a typical tourist.

10. Develop a more “open-minded” view of the world and it’s people and ideas

11. Help as many people as possible via volunteering oppurtunities

12. Become a better person. I know this is rather vague, but I do recognize shortcomings in myself and I need to improve upon them.

We’ve come up with this list ourselves, but it would be great to get additional challenges from family and friends as well.   Think of some things that you would have on your bucket list and would do if you were in our shoes.  As long as it is realistic, we’ll consider it.

Task rules:

• Each task must be something that can be accomplished somewhere in either South America or Asia.

• Each task should be something that can be completed in a reasonable amount of time.

• Ideally it should be something that can be accomplished on a modest budget.

• Not every task will need to be performed by both of us.  Some will be more suited for only one of us.

After we complete each task, we’ll take a photo as proof of completion, and we’ll write about the story behind it.