I recently finished traveling around the world for more than 13 months. It was an incredible experience, and I saw a lot of places and met a lot of people. Alas, there are still locations that I would like to visit.
That being said, I feel like my desire to see “everywhere” has kind of diminished. After traveling so much, the experience got kind of repetitive after a while and not as exciting. There are still quite a few places I want to visit in Europe, a few places in Africa, some Asian locations, and some places in North America, among other spots. But I would say that most of those are “normal” destinations and not truly adventurous. Not truly bucket-list worthy.
If I had to say what my bucket-list locations are, I suppose it would go as follows:
- Iran
I do like going to places that others wouldn’t exactly consider top-travel destinations. I went to North Korea, and, as an American, I feel that going to Iran would be an interesting experience.
- Submarine or sailing on a ship
I love the idea of traveling in space and would really love to go out of our atmosphere. Unfortunately, it is prohibitively expensive.
Traveling in a submarine is the most equivalent comparison to being in a spaceship, and I think it would be a cool thing to do. Crammed quarters, unable to go outside, using technology to navigate—it’s the most intriguing bad-sounding experience I can think of.
A submarine is highly unlikely, though, as I doubt the US military would let a civilian just hitch a ride. So, traveling for a long stint on a sailboat would be a much more achievable goal that might actually be within reality.
Regardless, I would still love to go into space. With commercial space tourism gaining traction, it could be possible in my lifetime, which leads us to…
- Space
Pretty self-explanatory here. How cool would that be?
- Northern lights and solar eclipse
It’s not quite a destination, but it is still something that one needs to be in the right place at the right time to see. I like astronomy, and both of these phenomena have eluded me my entire life.
- Antarctica
One of the harshest places to stay is where I would like to go. Not too many people get the opportunity to visit the 7th continent, and I would like to go someday. The McMurdo Dry Valleys in particular are a place I would like to walk through. Various conditions ensure that there is no ice or water in the valley, and visiting that on a continent mostly covered by an ice sheet would be spectacular.
Commercial trips there are expensive but could be doable if I was truly dedicated. I looked once, and they were around $10,000. I have many other things that I need to do before I could sensibly do that, though.
However, the numerous scientific bases on the continent require personnel. I have already identified some companies that contract work for the American bases. They need cleaners, cooks, construction workers, and other blue-collar jobs to keep the bases working when the scientists are doing their science stuff. Someday I might apply and try to get a hard job working 6 days a week for 8 months to experience Antarctica for myself.
- Some mountains
I don’t particularly want to do the top 7 of each continent. In particular, climbing Mt. Everest has gotten so commercialized that it’s getting dangerous as it gets too congested with climbers. And I would prefer to climb a mountain under my own means rather than using a Sherpa or porter to do all the heavy work by carrying my stuff for me.
Instead I got the idea of doing at least one mountain in each category of 1000 meters.
I have done plenty of mountains up to 3k, so the challenge starts from there. Coming from Jackson Hole, Grand Teton is in the 4k category. It’s close to my hometown, but I have never gone up it. Mount Elbert in Colorado is also in the 4k category, and I think I would like to go up both someday.
Mount Kilimanjaro is the 5k candidate. I went up Mount Kenya, but I didn’t get to the true top of 5,200 m and instead only got to Lenana Peak, which is at 4,985 m (so close!).
I’m not sure which 6k I would like to do. Aconcagua, in Argentina, is the highest mountain outside of Asia, so that would be cool. Ojos del Salado, on the Chilean-Argentinian border, is the 2nd highest mountain outside of Asia and the highest active volcano in the world, which would be unique. Denali is the highest mountain in North America, and I understood that porters aren’t even allowed, which would be a nice way of seeing if I can ascend such a high peak entirely of my own volition. I think I would prefer Ojos del Salado just because it’s a volcano.
Lenin Peak is the 7k. I saw a picture of some other backpacker at the basecamp, and I was enamored. I would love to visit someday.
Cho Oyu is the 8k and highest mountain I think I want to ascend. There are only 14 mountains higher than 8,000 meters, and Cho Oyu is the 6th highest summit in the world. I’m certain it would still require some assistance, but it isn’t nearly as dangerous for me or the porters as Everest is, and it would still be quite the accomplishment in my book.
We’ll see how many of those I manage to do in the coming years. They are not the easiest things to accomplish, but I’ll try someday, at least for most of them. For now, I need to start working again and saving money.
I believe I won’t be posting very much on this blog anymore. I originally started this blog with the idea that I could become a travel blogger. I realized I don’t like posting the sort of things that gets enough traffic to make it economically feasible. In about 3 years, I have made 54 cents in ad revenue, and with more than $100 per year in hosting costs, it hasn’t turned out to be a profitable venture, haha. That’s fine, as I was still just enjoying writing about my journeys, and I hope you have enjoyed writing them. But lately, this just isn’t really fun for me anymore. I want to return to writing fiction. I will still keep this blog up and might occasionally post something, but for the most part, this site will become dormant. Thank you so much for joining me on my adventures, and I hope I have inspired you to travel to some of the places I have.
I am not sure how often I will post on my other site, but be sure to keep an eye on www.bridgersmusings.com for anything I post. You can follow me through that site either through Facebook, Twitter, or my newsletter if you want to read what I manage to churn up in the future.