100 blog stories later, we’ve come full circle!

We recently stood on the inlaid map of the world next to the Monument to the Discoveries in Lisbon, our shadows pointing from Canada to Portugal. It felt like we’ve come full circle, since we stood on the same spot in September 2019 after retiring to travel the world and launching The Long Road Home blog.

So much has happened in those three-and-a-half years, with many unforeseen detours, changed plans, and forks in the curving road. But even without Covid, our plans may have altered as we ourselves grew and changed during our own voyages of discovery.

We’ve put together a video that celebrates our first 100 blog stories – our voyage of discoveries so far. (Click here to watch it.) To all our loyal readers and subscribers: Obrigada! Thank you! for joining us on the journey.

Writing stories has contributed enormously to our appreciation and understanding of our travel experiences. When we’re visiting certain places – a town, a museum, a park, a monastery, a castle – I get a gut feeling that I’m going to want to write about it. So I start jotting notes, picking up pamphlets, taking photos of information panels, and asking more questions than I otherwise would have.

But that’s just the start.

When I sit down to write a blog story, I do more research and discover even more – about that place and about myself, as a person and a traveler.

Writer Flannery O’Connor said, “I don’t know what I think until I write it down.” That holds true for me. I often discover what a place means to me once I’m writing my blog story about it – long after we’ve left. Writing about it forces me to think more deeply, to consider all the meanings and their impact.

For example, it took a while for me to write about Canada’s slavery and the Underground Railroad because it involved a lot of consideration long after we’d visited southwestern Ontario. I understood the term “guilt trip” in a whole new way. Likewise for my blog stories about Canada’s residential schools for indigenous peoples on Vancouver Island and in Osoyoos, British Columbia.

Other blog stories were just plain fun to write: pet-sitting in Portugal’s central mountains for Lorraine and Martin, who have become friends; romping through the palaces and castles of Sintra, Portugal; overdosing on adorable sloths in Costa Rica; becoming minor local celebrities when we taught English in Argentina with Estela; and experiencing the other side of the language barrier as we learn Portuguese now.

Along the way, we’ve improved our travel skills and shared what we’ve learned: how to navigate lineup culture, how yoga can enhance travels, music to inspire explorations, how to drive in B.C.’s mountains, various portals for armchair travel, and how to take terrible travel photos.

I’ve also realized that writing blog stories has affected my relationship with Bill; my compulsion to collect pamphlets, maps, booklets, ticket stubs, receipts and other paper sources of information irritates him to no end. Even I recognized I needed to develop better paper management skills. I must be ruthless about discarding the excess!

I began cutting up pamphlets and taping the bits I’d need for reference into my journals, thus reducing the volume and weight retained. On our living room bookshelf, I allow myself one small section to keep larger booklets and maps – for future reference when friends and family come to visit, of course! At least, that’s what I tell Bill. It’s a constant battle…

Moving to Portugal has changed the flavour of blog stories, I think, as we experience living in another country, rather than just passing through.

“De onde são?” we are often asked when buying tickets for tourist sights. Understandably, they want to know where we’re from, to track their audiences. At first, we always responded “Canada” but more and more we’re saying “Alcobaça” – the town north of Lisbon where we’ve settled.

The woman in the Fado Museum in Lisbon laughed at Bill’s reply, then asked where we were from before Alcobaça. Can’t fool anyone with our accents! (We have, however, given directions to people who stop us on the street. And in Portuguese too!)

We stumbled upon the Casa da Escrita [Writing House] in Coimbra, Portugal – a happy discovery of writing implements, books and magazines, and escrita-related artwork.

We find ourselves caught between worlds: Canada and Portugal, traveler and resident, English and Portuguese. Strangely, those conflicting feelings were both emphasized and allayed when I was writing blog stories about Portugal’s Christmas and New Year’s traditions. Interviewing new friends here – Teresa and Antonio – helped us better understand their different traditions and realize all that we have in common as well. I never would have interviewed them and learned so much if I didn’t have my travel blog.

At the end of January, we began intensive Portuguese lessons, which will help me with research for blog stories. Already I can better decipher information panels and pamphlets written only in Portuguese. My lofty goal is to interview someone entirely in Portuguese!

Bill’s analysis of our blog’s effects: we ask more questions and concentrate on taking better photos.

“You’ve always collected too many pamphlets, so that hasn’t changed,” he observed.

Hey! I objected to that statement.

“Well,” he conceded, “you are getting better.”

Thank you to all our loyal readers! Here’s to the next 100 stories!

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