Is Traveling to Every Country in the World Worth It? Less Crowded Destinations to Visit and the Joys of Unorthodox Road Trips with Ric Gazarian

Welcome

Jason: Hey, it’s Jason here with ZeroToTravel.com. Thanks for letting me bring a little travel into your ears today, and welcome to the show. As you heard at the top, we’ve got Ric Gazarian here. You can check out his work at GlobalGaz.com. Of course, he’s got ExtraordinaryTravelFest.com, where you can learn more about that event, which is coming up, and we’ll link up to everything else in the show notes. Before we dive in, a quick reminder: we have a newsletter over at zerototravel.com/newsletter. And if you stick around on the back end of this one, I’ll leave you with a fun challenge based on something that I heard in this conversation. I thought this would be a fun travel challenge if anybody wants to take me up on it. Just a little food for thought coming out of this one. Let’s get into it. Without further ado, thanks for listening, and I’ll see you on the other side, my friend. Cheers.

The Quest to Visit Every Country in the World

Jason: Ric Gazarian, welcome to the Zero to Travel podcast, my friend. How you doing?

Ric: Jason, thanks so much for having me on. I’ve been listening for years, so great to be joining you today.

Jason: Really? Wow. Okay. Thank you. That’s awesome. You have a wonderful podcast of your own that I should mention right here at the top, Counting Countries, where you interview some of the most traveled people on the planet and talk about some of the challenges they faced and some of the lessons learned. I’m actually going to ask you about some of those lessons later in this show. But I want to hear a bit more about your journey, because you’re well on your way to traveling to every country in the world. I guess we’re turning the tables here a bit. This is usually the conversation you have on your show. But what drives it? What keeps driving it, I should say? What has a goal like this taught you about persistence, or just about yourself and pursuing something so big?

Ric: Persistence is a perfect word. I’m part of that community of individuals who are trying to go to every country in the world. I’m defining that as 193 UN member countries. It’s not a straightforward thing. It’s not an easy thing. It takes so much of your time and treasure. And there’s plenty of opportunities to give up, get diverted, try another pursuit, try another hobby. But you’ve got to keep at it. You’ve got to keep going.

Jason: That brings up a question of when do you know when to quit? I say community because really this whole going to every country in the world thing, if you haven’t explored it, is sort of a sub-niche or niche, however you want to use that word, of travel. And I know people congregate in some of the communities there, and there are a lot of discussions going on, certain challenges that are common that people tackle together, like getting visas to certain countries and some of the really hard parts logistically. And also some of the more difficult countries to visit, which we’ll talk about. But I’m sure you’ve seen people drop off. Some people, I’m sure, drop off because maybe it gets too hard or it gets too expensive. Maybe for others, it’s just like, you know what? I don’t think this is for me anymore. What have you seen in that community? When should you quit something like this, or this specifically, I guess?

Ric: Well, of course, that’s everybody’s personal decision. And I have seen people drop out. A lot of them are for the reasons you would imagine. It could be financial. It could be something a little bit more uplifting, like marriage and children. It could be a job. It could be a health issue. But one other category, I would say, is it’s just not worth it anymore. So you could see someone on the quest, maybe they’ve been to 50, 80, 100 countries, and then they’re starting to look down that list, and those countries are not that alluring. They’re not that attractive. I’m not trying to pick on anybody, but let’s say they’ve only dipped their toe in Africa, and then they’re looking, well, I need to go visit West Africa. West Africa can be so challenging, time-wise, visa-wise, infrastructure-wise, safety-wise. And some people say the squeeze is not really worth it. You’re not getting the value out of your investment, potentially, for some of those categories. And someone might say, I’m only going to go to 100, and now I’m just going to go back to my favorites over and over.

Jason: That’s interesting you use the word investment, because obviously from a financial standpoint, travel is an investment. And it’s one of the few investments, I can’t remember where I heard this, but I think it was a great idea, that you invest, but you don’t really know what you’re getting in return. You might be getting a plane ticket, but you’re investing in an experience, right? It’s not like you’re investing in real estate and you’re like, I give you this amount of money, I get this house in return. It’s just kind of a different thing. Why haven’t you been one of those people that’s just been like, yeah, there’s places I want to go back to, I don’t really need to hit every country? What keeps you going? Why are you driven to do this?

Ric: I think it’s as simple as Eye of the Tiger. You’ve created a quest, you’ve created an objective, and you want to finish it. You want that sense of accomplishment, to power through and to be able to say you’ve done something. Now, there’s a lot of statistics. This is actually a really unique or elite club. There’s over 8 billion people on Earth. Approximately 500 people have been to every country in the world, and 700 people have been to outer space. So there’s this added extra motivation, I think, of being able to accomplish something that so few people on Earth have been able to do.

Jason: Sorry, you can’t help but get the soundtrack in your head. I come from the Philly area, so when you said that song, I got all the images of the sweatpants and the punching the meat thing. And we’re talking about Rocky, by the way, for those younger listeners out there.

What Counts as a Visit?

Jason: This whole pursuit, I would say, doesn’t come without controversy, like anything else, right? There are probably some things that you’ve seen that you don’t necessarily personally agree with. Obviously, to each their own when it comes to travel. There’s some obvious things, like, oh, should we be doing this, environmental impact and things like that. There’s other things like, if somebody has a lot of wealth and they’re just paying for a guided tour through every single place they go, obviously it counts. It’s a personal thing. I’m not trying to nitpick or give the community a hard time. I’m just curious what your thoughts are on some of those types of things that come up, I’m sure, in the discussion boards and things like that, where somebody was in a country for half a day. Were they really there? Did they experience anything? Did they meet anybody? How do you think about all this stuff from a wide perspective?

Ric: Very fair question. Don’t feel bad about asking it, because we as a community debate this endlessly. And you probably just keyed in on one of the biggest questions, debates, arguments. Grab a beer, sit down, let’s talk about this. And that’s what counts as a visit. And this runs the gamut. First of all, there’s a couple of clubs or organizations, everything from Guinness World Records, Travelers’ Century Club, MTP, NomadMania. And each one of these clubs has their own rules. But no one is universally in all these clubs. It’s voluntary. It’s not like you’re governed by the law of one of these sovereign clubs. You either join or you don’t, and then you can make up your own rules. So back to eye of the beholder, it really comes down to what you want and what you feel comfortable with. And it could be something like, okay, I want a visa stamp. I want to sleep overnight. I want to have a great local experience in the country. And in each one of those categories you bring up, you can have a counterargument. So if you use the visa, I think we all know, in short, if you go into the Schengen, you’re going to get one stamp when you enter, or possibly no stamp at all. So that rule, for instance, doesn’t make sense.

Jason: So what counts for you personally as a visit? What do you call a visit for yourself?

Ric: My general rule I’ve used is airports don’t count. And of course, the example would be, let’s say I go to Monaco. I didn’t sleep overnight in Monaco. I did a day trip from Nice. I felt like I visited that country. Conversely, I slept over in Luxembourg. I slept over in Andorra. Vatican, I did not sleep over, like most people. There’s also some guilt involved. So a number of years ago, I went to Macedonia, and it was during a long road trip. And I went to Macedonia to get a new muffler. I was only in the country three hours. Now, it’s hard to say I haven’t been there. I hung out at a garage. I met some mechanics. I made a transaction. I got a great new muffler. I even stopped for gas somewhere later, made friends with the cashier, bought some food. But regardless, I actually wanted to see that country. I didn’t want to shortchange it. So last year I went back for a week or 10 days or so.

Jason: Yeah, okay. That makes sense. It’s a very personal kind of thing. And when it’s so subjective in that way, I’m sure that’s where the sit down, grab a beer and debate it type of thing happens.

The Extraordinary Travel Festival

Jason: And you see this on the ground, because you run, I should mention, and we’ll mention all the stuff at the end, the Extraordinary Travel Fest, where you bring a lot of these people together in person. And you’re hearing those conversations right there. It’s not like you’re just looking at them on message boards. You guys are out there talking about it. When all those people come together, what makes this community unique? What do you love about running that event?

Ric: Yeah, so you’re referring to the Extraordinary Travel Festival. I call it the largest gathering of the top travel people. And I think some of those characteristics, which I mentioned earlier, come into play. This is a real quirky group at some level, because of course we know a ton of travelers, Jason. But in general, I always go, think of your friends from high school. How many of your friends from high school or college are planning a trip, their next vacation, to Afghanistan? I would guess none of them. But in my little community, when you are sitting down for that coffee or beer, the question might not really be, have you been to Afghanistan? It’s, what part of Afghanistan did you visit last? Or did you have tea at this tea house? Or did you watch the sport buzkashi? So in some ways, you could sort of argue that we’re socially isolated. And these gatherings, like the ETF, are a platform to gather up very like-minded people who speak the same talk as you do. And you have this great community to share notes with, share experiences, find a new travel friend, see an old travel friend you met randomly somewhere on the road a year ago, five years ago, in Yemen or an airport in Ivory Coast.

Jason: I love that. I’m sure it’s so rewarding, too, to be the one to bring everybody together in person and see those conversations unfold, as the creator of the container, if you will, for those conversations to happen. Has it been rewarding for you to run the event? I know it’s a lot of work to run an event.

Ric: You summed it up perfectly. You’ve got both attributes. One, it is a ton of work. It’s exhausting. I think the event, let’s say, ends on Sunday at 5 p.m., when the last keynote speaker gets off that stage. There’s just a giant wave of relief that the event has finished. Hopefully, fingers crossed, it will be another successful finish. And for those two minutes, you bathe in that applause and you are so happy. The event’s over. Everybody had an amazing time. So many new friendships are made and rekindled. And it is kind of a gift that I’m able to be involved with that and be associated with building all these awesome relationships that I’ve seen really develop or flourish over the last five years since I produced the first one.

Jason: That’s awesome, Ric. Somebody’s got to take the bull by the horns and lead the charge and bring people together. That’s cool that you’re doing that. I know we have some mutual friends through just being in this world. Our friend Gunnar lives here in Oslo. You’ve heard him on the podcast before. He’s been to every country in the world twice. He met his wife there at your event.

Ric: Yeah, I don’t want to brag, Jason.

Jason: You’re even getting people hitched out there.

Ric: I don’t want to brag, but we do have a side hustle matchmaking business.

Jason: Do you?

Ric: No. It’s been suggested. It’s been suggested that we set something up. So the first event was in Yerevan, in Armenia, in 2022. And Gunnar Garfors, amazing Norwegian traveler, and Jackie Kunz, American, who’s also another gangster traveler, were both speakers at my event in Armenia. And I don’t know all the details, but one thing led to another, and a wedding did come out of that meeting in Yerevan. So I always joke about that, and I’m a little bit proud that that happened at the event. And, knock on wood, I’ve been hearing through the grapevine there is another potential engagement or marriage. We’ll see what happens there.

Life in Bangkok and the Gospel of Father Joe

Jason: Well, what about you? Why do you live in Bangkok? Do you have a partner there, or what’s the story?

Ric: Yeah, I am married to a Thai woman, but that’s not what brought me over here originally. I was living in Chicago, Jason, and as you know, it’s not warm in the winter. And I was working remotely, and I had just finished this book. It’s called The Gospel of Father Joe, and it’s a nonfiction account of a priest who moves to Bangkok in the 1970s, and he moves into one of the toughest slums of Bangkok. And when I say moves in, he’s getting TB, he’s getting dysentery, he’s living in a shack with open sewers going by. And fast forward 40, 50 years, he has this incredibly established outreach program for that slum, Bangkok, and far beyond. So I read that book, and I said, Jason, what am I doing here in Chicago? I went over to Bangkok, and I ended up volunteering for him. So that’s kind of what got me the first longer commitment to spending some more time in Bangkok. It was because of Father Joe.

Jason: What was that experience like when you got there? Reading it in the book and then being there, that’s completely different, of course. But how cool that you were so inspired by a book that you actually physically did something about it. You went there and volunteered. What was that like?

Ric: Yeah, again, I’m technically the one giving back, but it’s really me who was rewarded during this experience. And I just found the author of that book on Facebook. I emailed him a couple of months ago, really to thank him and go, hey, that book changed at least one person’s life. I’m going to try and tell this really quickly. It wasn’t a straight line, and at some level, it’s kind of comical. So I went over to meet the folks at Mercy Centre. I went back home to get ready to pack, and the Mercy Centre went dark on me. They stopped responding to all of my messages. I’m like, hey, I’ll be back in two weeks. I’ll be back in three weeks. And they were not responding. And I said, okay, I’m not going to let this stop me. So I ended up moving to Phuket, and I volunteered at an orphanage in Phuket. The next year I came back, I volunteered in Bangkok at a blind school. And then I came back the third year and volunteered at a teenage homeless shelter. When I was volunteering at the teenage homeless shelter, I was in this big Bangkok Facebook group for expats, and a gentleman in that group goes, we’re looking for volunteer teachers at the Mercy Centre. I emailed him right away. So it was actually four years after the fact of me reading that book that I actually volunteered at the Mercy Centre. And for two winters, I was a volunteer teacher at two of their kindergartens in the Klong Toey neighborhood of Bangkok.

Jason: That’s crazy. So you completed the circle four years later.

Ric: Exactly. And to be honest, Jason, that makes the story 10 times better. It all worked out.

Jason: Yeah. How did you meet your wife? At what point did that happen?

Ric: Okay, so this is also a somewhat ironic, crazy story. At one point, I was living in Chicago. At one point, my wife was living in Chicago. But even though we were living there at the same time, we never met in Chicago. But we had mutual friends in Chicago. I was in Bangkok. I get a call from my Chicago guy friend. He’s like, are you in Bangkok by any chance? I’m like, yeah, I’m here. He’s like, awesome. Me and my wife are here. Meet us for dinner tomorrow in Bangkok at this restaurant. His wife, who’s also Thai, called her friend, who happened to be my wife. So we met through mutual friends in Chicago, but in Bangkok. So kind of a cool story.

Thailand Today: Visas, Overtourism, and Hidden Islands

Jason: That’s awesome, man. How do you like life in Thailand? I know right now they’re being pretty proactive in trying to decrease the amount of people visiting and staying for extended periods of time. I know there’s some pushback on some of the overtourism stuff. What’s the vibe like? You can share a little bit about your life there, but also any advice for people coming to visit, places to see. I’m guessing tourists are still welcome, but the nomad crowd, I know, is getting some pushback. What’s going on in Thailand?

Ric: Jason, some other great questions on your end. Thailand is one of the top touristed countries in the world, 35 million or so, I think, tourist arrivals last year. And as an outsider, or a person always kind of looking at the situation, there’s always this push-pull, I think, between the Thai government, the Thai people, and tourism. Of course, they want tourism, because it powers, give or take, 15% of the GDP. That’s a big number. But at some level, Thailand does not want expats living in the country, and they don’t want tourists overstaying. Their dream is Bhutan, I think, being high-spending, high-quality tourists. The reality is Thailand gets the entire spectrum, the backpackers at the extreme low end to people spending $500, $1,000 a day on the luxury side. And as you said, they’re getting really strict about the visas. In the old, old days, I’ll call that 10 years ago, you could get the 30-day stamp when you arrived. You could go to Cambodia for the day, walk back in, get 30 more days, and you could do that over and over and over again. That is a thing of the past. My understanding is you can do that maybe two or three times. The third time you’re at the border of Cambodia trying to get back to your house, your apartment in Thailand, they will literally not let you back in. So they’re trying to push everybody into more deliberate visas, whether that’s a retirement visa or a marriage visa. The one I’m guessing you might have heard of is called the DTV. That’s a five-year visa for 400 bucks, and that kind of fits the digital nomad bucket. And I think that’s an amazing solution. It allows you to stay 90, 180 days at a time. And I think $400 is unbelievably reasonable for five years. So to all of our friends in Chiang Mai or the islands who are nomads, I would definitely look at the DTV visa for stability and safety.

Jason: What are some of the places in Thailand that you would say people should go, the hidden gems, if you will, some of the places that are a little bit less discovered, let’s say?

Ric: At this point, many things are already discovered. I did have a situation during COVID. Usually, I only spend several months a year in Thailand. During COVID, I spent 12 months straight. And after the first couple of months, the country opened up and I was able to travel around. And that was this really awesome opportunity. I got to visit some places I normally don’t have time for, and there were virtually no other foreigners here. One example during that time period is an island called Koh Mak. There’s three big islands in Thailand: Phuket, Koh Samui, and, near the Cambodian border, Koh Chang. Next to Koh Chang are two other islands. One of them is Koh Mak. I love this place. And the best way to describe it, for those who like off the beaten path travel: one, there is no 7-Eleven on this island. Two, there is sometimes one working ATM on the island. And if you know Thailand, there’s literally a 7-Eleven every 50 or 100 meters, sometimes across the street from each other. This island, no development. Only 2,000 people live on this island, and they’ve really done an amazing job at not having any serious type of real estate development. Not a party island, as you’d imagine. Beautiful beaches, snorkeling, chilling, relaxing, reading a book, renting a motorbike. It’s fantastic.

Jason: That sounds amazing. I was in Thailand, and this is going to date me, but it was ’99 or something. And at that point, Koh Chang was a bit like you described. It wasn’t a party place, really. There was not that much going on. It sounds like it’s pretty much developed now. That’s the way of the world, I guess. So you have to just go to the next island. I always find that as a general travel tip. If you always just go a little bit further, you get something special. Or you can get something special, I should say.

Ric: A good rule of thumb. Take that extra turn, that one extra turn.

Myanmar, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan

Jason: What are some of the experiences that you still carry with you from your travels? And they could be something as mundane as… When we think about travel, we think about, oh, I’m going to see the Taj Mahal. That’s sort of what you see in the brochures, right? But it’s often just like, oh, I sat down and had tea with that local, or whatever. That’s the thing that you carry. When I think about Thailand, I think about meeting a monk on the street and then spending two hours talking with him, just randomly, stuff like that that happens. What are some of the experiences that you still carry with you that still impact your life today?

Ric: I’ll give you a pairing. In April, I was in Myanmar, Burma, one of my favorite countries. I went back for my sixth visit and spent about two and a half weeks there. It is an awful, tragic situation: COVID, civil war, and now the war in Iran affecting them quite a bit economically through the gas prices. There is virtually no tourism in this country. I would see two to five tourists a day, where in the quote-unquote old days, you might see 100 or 200. One of the most special places on Earth, in my opinion, is Bagan. It is this open plain with roughly 2,000 Buddhist stupas and temples. And I think it’s difficult to find another gem like this on Earth that rivals that place. I love photography. I love going there. You rent an e-bike, you drive around nonstop. Part two of that story is I stopped in for lunch at this tiny little open-air restaurant, and I’m the only person there. And this lovely woman comes out. She speaks really good English. She’s Burmese. Next thing I know, her daughter comes out. She’s 10 years old. They sit down with me. We’re joking around. We’re laughing. I go back the next day. She’s ecstatic to see me. I’m happy to see her. This time I meet her husband. And then I come back for a third day, and I bring this guide I hired for the day, and I’m introducing the Burmese guide to this lovely family. And I’m also encouraging the guide, like, make sure you start bringing your clients here. We need to help great businesspeople like this who are also good people. So yeah, I’ve already been to Bagan five times, and I hope to go back. I love that place. But I’m always going to remember this family in this little restaurant. I’ve got it on my Google Map. I’ve told several people, please go there, go support them.

Jason: Nice. What are two other places like that that really resonate with you that more people should know about?

Ric: Big list, I think, I would say. One of my other favorite countries, where I just did another visit, is Uzbekistan. I think this is my favorite country in Central Asia. It’s got great infrastructure. It’s great value. There’s so much to see. Friendly people, good food. It’s really now kind of a straightforward, simple place to visit. And there’s three towns on the Silk Road: Khiva, Samarkand, Bukhara. And for any of us, in travel or not in travel, to be so fortunate, so lucky enough to go visit these areas, to go back in time a thousand years, to get a sense of the Silk Road and see these magnificent historical structures, buildings, mosques, madrasas, it is an unbelievable gift. It’s just so stunning and beautiful.

Jason: You got one more for us?

Ric: I’m going to go with Palau. Oh, no. I’m going to go with Tajikistan.

Jason: Okay. Why Tajikistan?

Ric: Tajikistan is in Central Asia, but I’m going to choose it for the opposite reason. Uzbekistan, I was choosing for the mosques and the madrasas. Tajikistan, I’m going to choose for the nature. And probably the best road trip I’ve ever been on in my life. It’s called the Pamir Highway. And this is a multi-day road trip, give or take seven days, 10 days, if you’re going at a good clip. You trace the borders of Kyrgyzstan, China, and Afghanistan. You start in the capital of Tajikistan, Dushanbe, and end in Osh, Kyrgyzstan. And Jason, these are the most stunning, stunning landscapes I think I’ve ever seen. It’s mountains, it’s rivers, it’s forest, it’s snow-capped mountains. And there’s not a lot of tourists out there. There’s not a lot of infrastructure. So you’re not staying in hotels, per se. Every day, you’re usually finding a guesthouse. They’re rolling out a bed mat. You’re sleeping on the floor. You’re using an outhouse. So in other words, the benefit: there’s no bus driving by with 80 tourists. It’s a low-touristed, amazing, unique, special, beautiful road trip.

Jason: Wow. That sounds epic.

Ric: I’m keeping it in the ‘Stans.

Jason: I love it. Yes. The man with the plan in the ‘Stans.

Tuk-Tuk and Rickshaw Road Trips

Jason: Speaking of road trips, you’ve done some pretty interesting ones. You did a very long tuk-tuk ride in Cambodia, over 1,600 kilometers. You did a rickshaw race for over 2,000 kilometers. Both turned into films. What were those experiences like?

Ric: Again, just unbelievably memorable, so rich, so rewarding, so fun, and at times so brutal. I’ll choose the India one. Again, this is almost like a sub-niche of travel. It’s the rally, getting from point A to point B. It could be in a mini motorcycle. It could be a tuk-tuk. It could be a 30-year-old Soviet Lada.

Jason: Is it officially called the rally?

Ric: Well, I think they all have their different names. So the one I went on was called the Mumbai Xpress, and it’s run by a company called the Travel Scientists, and they run multiple ventures in India and around the world. And in short, everybody meets at point A. That happened to be Mumbai. And everybody, in two weeks, had to get to point B, which was Chennai. That was 2,000 kilometers. And kind of like what you were getting at a moment ago, Jason, it’s not really the things that you see. It’s those memories you create on the way. It could be filling up the tuk-tuk with gas and you end up there for 30 minutes, or stopping by and talking to a local food seller, and you start eating some naan bread and you’re there for 45 minutes. So a combination of meeting amazing people, doing something that’s extremely challenging, and dealing with a lot of challenges along the way makes it really one of the best experiences to have really genuine interactions and to really see the country over a couple of weeks.

Jason: And it is a race, right? You’re racing against other people, but it’s not intense, right?

Ric: This is why I’m using the word rally. I think there’s a handful of companies in this space which are organizing events, and in general, they don’t want to use the word race, because that means driving as fast as possible and getting into an accident, potentially having a legal situation. A lot of these companies are almost making it like The Amazing Race. And what I mean by that is they put in daily challenges, and with these challenges, you earn points. And that’s how, in some cases, they determine the winner: those who garner the most points, not those who are necessarily the fastest.

Jason: Okay. But it’s really just about having an experience, right? In the end, there’s no big prize waiting at the end, is there?

Ric: No, no. You’re not winning 500,000 bucks. I think a lot of us in travel, we speak about, oh, I love talking with locals. Oh, I really like real experiences, or genuine experiences. And what I’ve seen is sometimes it helps to have a catalyst. What do I mean by that? I have two speakers coming to my event. One, Ross, plays the bagpipe. He’s played the bagpipe in 130 countries. Guess who has amazing conversations with locals? He walks into a park. He’s wearing a kilt. He pulls out a bagpipe. He starts playing a song. There’s 10, 20, 30 people who want to meet him. Someone wants to have tea. Someone invites him to dinner. Someone says, come to my house for the weekend. And this tuk-tuk, the auto rickshaw, to me, falls in the same category. This is like riding a riding lawnmower. It’s seven horsepower. The sides are open. You’re touching the people as you drive, the motorbike riders on either side of you. You are having so many conversations at every single point in the day because, one, you’re sticking out like a sore thumb. White foreigners are not driving rickshaws, as a general rule, in India. So right there, you have this sense of wonderment from your neighbor you’re driving by. Two, the vehicle’s open air. Three, you’re always breaking down or running out of gas. Who are you talking to? You’re talking to a mechanic, or someone who can help you drive to the gas station to fill up your gas can. And what do you get? You get all these real, genuine interactions with great, ordinary people from all around India.

Jason: I love it. And just to pull something out of that, I mentioned the idea of creating a container before in regards to your Extraordinary Travel Fest. You’re creating that container for conversations. This is another type of container. You’re having this adventure, but like you said, it’s a catalyst for these conversations and for these local experiences that you’re basically going to be forced into just by participating. And I just wanted to highlight it again, because if you want to go do something like that that’s organized, you can look first, of course, at the small group tours. There’s all these options in travel, right? But there’s also things like this. It’s not for everybody, but I’m bringing that up as an idea for anybody listening that’s game planning their next adventure down the road and thinking, hmm, what could be interesting to do? There are other offerings like this out there in the travel world that can be compelling in a different way. It’s not for everybody to be broken down on the side of the road. That’s a certain type of person. But I just wanted to highlight that these are cool experiences that are out there that you can participate in as a group, and it’s not your traditional, standard group thing, if you will.

Ric: You can also look at it this way. There’s so many different ways to do this. You could go on a road trip in a $120,000 Range Rover. The windows are up. The AC is blasting. The car is brand new. It’s never going to break down. Are you going to have an amazing, epic road trip? I bet you are. But it might not be as good as the one in the $1,000 tuk-tuk that’s breaking down on a frequent basis.

Jason: Cut to somebody listening, sitting on the side of the road in India, sweating, like, damn you, Ric. There’s no gas within 50 kilometers of this place.

Ric: You will have those moments as well. For sure.

Getting Comfortable With Less Visited Places

Jason: The less visited places you mentioned earlier, where there’s not as much information. You talked about Afghanistan, some of the countries like that. What is your best advice for people getting comfortable going to those less visited places? Even if it’s not the Afghanistans, even if you’re talking about Uzbekistan or someplace like that. For somebody listening, it’s all relative. What’s one person’s comfort zone? The people at your event are way different from the average traveler, I want to say, who has been to some of the main places but has yet to venture into some of the countries where fewer people are visiting, sort of less mainstream tourism, let’s call it. What is your best advice for people getting comfortable going to places like that?

Ric: Sure. I have a couple of different thoughts. One, I think, is simply education and reading and talking to people. And if we use Uzbekistan as a counter to, let’s say, France, someone can fact-check us later, but I bet if we Googled it, the safety and crime record is probably worse in France. So there might be this perception of Uzbekistan, a country you’ve never heard of or barely heard of, that’s so far away, that’s not familiar. You’ve had a thousand friends that go to France. You might be safer in Uzbekistan. So that’s number one. Read up to get comfortable with the real, actual facts. Number two, I think it’s a game of pushing your comfort zone. Okay, let’s say you’re American and you’ve never left the US. You’ve got to dip your toe in the water at some point if you’re interested in travel. And maybe Uzbekistan isn’t your first choice, but you work your way up. So that would be number two: push your comfort zone, work your way up. And then number three, I guess, would be, okay, you go with a tour guide, you go on a group tour. Or if you don’t do that, you go with a friend or two friends, and maybe you don’t make it a solo trip. And I think that’s how you can build up your comfort level, using those three ideas.

Staying Safe on the Road

Jason: Yeah, that’s great advice. You mentioned safety. I know you’ve gotten robbed in the Central African Republic. You’ve been pickpocketed. Things happen. What’s some of your advice around safety? I think it’s related to the topic we just covered, because that’s probably the primary concern, right? There’s some element of fear that something’s going to happen.

Ric: I know. I’ve had 500 people on my podcast who’ve said people are people. 99.9% of people are friendly and to be trusted, and I also am a believer in that. But of course, everybody has to be aware of the 0.01%. I think it’s just like if you and I get in a car, there’s going to be, whatever it is, a 0.01% chance you’re going to get in an accident that day. Statistically, that happens all the time. So there has to be some sort of reality, whether it’s France and you’re getting pickpocketed on the metro, or you’re in Bangui, Central African Republic, and you might get robbed there as well. I can tell you all the things. I have locks on my bag. I have secret pockets sewn into my shorts. I have redundancy, meaning I have a set of credit cards in my wallet and another set hidden in my bag. I then scan all those cards and put those scans on Dropbox, so I’m able to access them. I have a fake shaving kit in my toiletry bag with some money. So I have all these systems of redundancy to be safe. Then it’s everything from don’t walk around at night, or walk around with a friend. You can try and mitigate as much risk as possible. And I’ll give a shout-out to Every Passport Stamp. That’s a big group on Facebook with people like us, and this, to me, is the trading exchange for people chasing 193. So when I went to Central African Republic and I was concerned, I said, who’s been to Central African Republic in the last six months? Give me a status report of what’s going on in that country. Don’t go to this area. Don’t go to this region. Don’t use this guide. This hotel’s sketchy. And you build up kind of an intelligence dossier as best as you can. And then you use all those other general lessons we all know as travelers, whether you’re in Amsterdam or Kabul.

Jason: Do you ever come across a big bill, like one of those that you hid, and you’re like, I forgot I hid this money here?

Ric: I’ve forgotten money stashed in so many places. That’s always a treat. Well, I’m a little embarrassed. I was in the Dominican Republic, and in my toiletry bag, I have a fake shaving cream bottle. In that shaving cream bottle, the bottom screws out, and I hid $100 in there. And I left the DR. I flew to Jamaica. I left my toiletry bag in the Dominican Republic. So someone got some great toothpaste, a toothbrush, and hopefully $100 in my bag.

Jason: I found a bunch of money under a mattress once, in a Ziploc bag. And I was like, oh, no. Thankfully, we worked it out. Right then, the person came back. They were frantic. I was like, oh, this must be them. And they got their money back. But yeah, those things can happen. Don’t forget where you hide your money.

Balancing Big Travel Goals and Relationships

Jason: I’m going to ask you about the relationship, because you’re doing all this traveling. I don’t know if your wife does it with you. Do you have any advice on tackling big travel goals in tandem with managing a relationship and a partnership?

Ric: It’s kind of a generic type of lesson, but it is as simple as you have to figure out what works for you. As you mentioned, on my podcast, I talk to a lot of people who are traveling to 193. Some people are single, some people are married, some people have kids, some are divorced, and everybody has to work out their own system. So my wife’s been to about 75 countries, probably 70 of them with me. So that’s a lot of travel together. We don’t travel to every single country together, but we do make travel part of our life, and we do all these amazing, fun trips. Then I think it’s as simple as, when I’m traveling solo without her, we have kind of a system to speak multiple times a day. So it’s a FaceTime call. Could be a minute, could be five minutes, could be once a day, could be five times a day. But again, you need to find something that works for you. I can think of a friend of mine I was traveling with. He was married, and he texted his wife once a day. And I was a little surprised about that, that they were good with such a little amount of communication. But that’s the system that worked for them.

Jason: Yeah, I have a similar system. I think my wife’s just tired. I’m like, hey, do you want to talk? No. It’s good. I’m away. She’s like, okay. We’re taking a break. Not like that. She doesn’t need as much communication. I think I need it more, in a way, which is funny. But yeah, that’s good advice. I think it’s communication, like any relationship thing. But it’s not always easy when you’re physically removing yourself from the relationship. It can be a bigger type of conversation than, oh, should we get a dog? Which is also a big commitment.

From Financial Services to a Life of Travel

Jason: What were you doing before all this, Ric? I went on your LinkedIn, and I see all the travel stuff, and you have the blog and everything like that, but there’s nothing really about what you were doing before this life of travel. Or were you always traveling like this? Tell me. You’re a mysterious man.

Ric: I’m mysterious because I actually got my LinkedIn account hacked two years ago. I just got a new one two months ago, so I’m in the process of recreating it, and I didn’t put in the information from my old, real life.

Jason: What’s your old real life?

Ric: Yeah, so I’m a Northeast guy like you. I grew up in Boston. I went to Boston College. I started working in financial services. And in ’08, everything changed for me. That was the Great Recession. I got a call from my boss saying, oh, we’ve scheduled a call with you at 2 p.m. It’s going to be the SVP of HR and the CEO. I was in New York on a trip. I walk into a Korean deli. I pick up my phone. It’s the two of them. They’re like, well, we’re sorry. We’re letting 40% of the people go due to the financial crisis in ’08, and we’re providing you a little package. And I secretly cheered. I was happy. And I started planning my 12-month trip in ’09 right after that phone call.

Jason: Okay. So before that, had you done a lot of traveling?

Ric: Yes and no, in fits and spurts. And what I mean by that is I did two really meaningful trips with my parents in junior high and high school. We had a family friend who was from the Philippines, and this family invited myself and my parents to Manila twice for Christmas. And when I went with my parents, one time we added on Hong Kong, the other time we added on Tokyo. So that was, again, junior high and high school. And no one I knew back then was going to Asia. That was a really big deal. I knew nobody going to Asia in high school or junior high. And something that still has an impact on me today is my memories of being in Hong Kong at night, standing on the Kowloon side, waiting for the Star Ferry, and seeing the amazing island of Hong Kong lit up with the mountain right behind it. That was a memory that stuck with me. In fact, when I graduated from Boston College, I actually moved to Hong Kong for four months, and I was trying to live there and get a job. It didn’t really work out. I only lasted four months. I didn’t really get a livable job. And I ended up coming home and then getting a nine-to-five job in financial services.

Jason: Okay. Interesting. But you gave it a go. That’s cool. And it sounds like those early trips really had a massive impact on you, as they tend to do sometimes. I know we’re coming up towards the end here, but I’m going to get one more travel recommendation from you. You’ve been to too many places. I can’t not get one more travel recommendation from you. We’ll do a little quick hit thing. But thinking about your situation, the position you were in coming out of the job, you had sort of a severance package type of thing, and you said you started planning your trip. But you could have just been like, well, I don’t know, this is too overwhelming. Am I going to ruin my career? How am I ever going to get back into financial services? All that kind of stuff. I know you can only speak from your personal experience, but I’m fishing for some advice for somebody who’s in a career and perhaps they have an opportunity to get out, or they’re just thinking about getting out and doing a year-long trip or something like what you were considering at the time. How do you make that next step to do that and turn your back on everything that you had built to that point?

Ric: I guess I’ll break it down into two. At some level, you need some sort of inner confidence that you are able to pull it off. You made this great point. I think we all know when you have that gap in your resume, you wonder, am I going to be able to get a job when I come back in six or 12 months? And through preparation, education, and networking, you have to build up your confidence to where you are able to say, you know what? I can do this. I’m going to go away for 12 months. I’m going to keep up with my network during those 12 months. I’m going to keep educated by reading about my industry, et cetera, et cetera. So I think that’s part of it. And the second part is the other side of the planning, and it’s more difficult. Are you married? Do you have kids? Are you single? Are you renting? Do you own a house? There’s a lot of different variables that take a lot of other sizable planning. But it’s as simple as, okay, I’m going to go away for 12 months. How am I going to financially take care of this? What are my other responsibilities? So you need to make a secondary plan to cover your bases during the time you are traveling overseas. So I think it’s that one-two combination.

Jason: You went on a year-long trip, I’m guessing. Did you get back into financial services after that? Are you financially independent? How do you make a living? How have you made a living?

Ric: Yeah, during that trip, one, I was having such an amazing time traveling, just unbelievably great experiences stacked up on top of each other. And my last job was financially quite strong, quite good. But from a rewarding standpoint, it was drudgery, something I did not really look forward to every day. So the money was good, but I did not enjoy going to work. During that year of traveling, I said, I have to figure something else out. I don’t want to go back. And when I came back from that adventure, in short, in 2010, I started two businesses. One was a failure. One worked out. The one that worked out was investing in real estate in Chicago. And I was quite lucky, quite fortunate. I set it up in a way where I could, from that point on, be remote.

Jason: Yeah, nice. Well, you were fortunate, but you also prioritized travel. That’s one of the things that we talk a lot about on the show. You’re going to make everything else fit into travel, not the other way around. You’re not going to make the travel fit into your life. It’s that much of a priority for you. That’s amazing. Kudos. I have another follow-up question, and then we’ll get to these destination questions and let you go. That position where you’re traveling the world, you’re going around for a year, and you said you’re having these incredible experiences stacked upon each other, just flying high. Balancing that with this nagging, I’ve got to figure out what I’m going to do next. That can be another challenge, trying to enjoy the present moment versus I have to get something else going. How did you handle that mentally? Did you compartmentalize and just deal with that later? Was it always working in the background? Any advice around that?

Ric: Well, I’m going to take you back a couple of years before that. I was working in financial services in ’05, and I got laid off then. And at that point, I took a four-month trip around the world. During that trip, I knew I was coming back, and I knew I had to get a job. That trip was a little different, because on the 2010 trip, I think I knew in the back of my mind, even in the beginning, I wasn’t going back. The ’05 trip was different, because I’m like, I’ve got to get back. Even though this trip is awesome and I want it to last forever, reality’s calling. I’ve got to get back to work and make money. I was definitely compartmentalizing, because I still had an amazing time on that trip. But at the back of my mind, I’m thinking, in four months, I’ve got to get back and figure out some solution within a short period of time to get back into my career at somewhat of the same level. And that did weigh on me. That’s something I thought about. And I did some of those things, like trying to stay in touch with my network and my industry back then, so I could hit the ground running when I got back.

Armenia, the US, and a Surprise in Haiti

Jason: A couple of questions. What is a place that you’ve visited that you always love to come back to?

Ric: I won’t give you the same answer twice. I would have said Myanmar, but I’m going to switch that country to Armenia. I am ethnically Armenian. I’ve been there over 20 times over the last 20 or so years. I feel like I have three homes. One is the US, one is Thailand, and my third one is Armenia, where I’ve spent a considerable amount of time since 2003.

Jason: Okay. So, definitely recommend it, I guess.

Ric: Yeah, 100%. This is one of those other countries, Jason. When a person’s making their list, it’s going to be Paris and Amsterdam, and Armenia is not necessarily falling into that category. But it should be, almost like Uzbekistan, because Armenia is very safe. It’s very secure. It’s got great infrastructure, and there’s so much to see and so much to do. It just doesn’t roll off the tongue like Rome.

Jason: What about your home country, the US? Have you traveled around there a lot, and what are some places you like there?

Ric: I have. I’ve done probably about 45 states. A lot of them were done in my twenties. I had a job that was full of travel, so I was traveling all around the US, and I took advantage of it, but not as much as I should have. I should have been doing more touristic things. I was mainly focusing on visiting friends when I was traveling and doing more social things. So I’ve seen a lot of the US, but not enough. And when I finish my journey, the 193, I think part of that will be spending a little bit more time in the US doing a proper road trip of national parks, for instance, which I’ve seen a handful of, but not that many.

Jason: Nice. Last one. I always like this question. It brings a series of images to my mind, anyway. It’s a place that you showed up to with maybe no expectations or no real thought about it. You were just like, yeah, I’m just going to be here. I’m passing through, maybe, or maybe you were visiting but weren’t thinking that much about it. And it completely knocked your socks off, surprised and delighted you to no end, kind of in a sucker punch way. All of a sudden, you were like, well, I didn’t expect this. Oh, this place is crazy. This is awesome. I didn’t even think about this place. Do you have one or two that come to mind?

Ric: I have a story that fits pretty well with that question. Not perfectly, but I think it has the same sentiment. Earlier this year, I went to Haiti. That was my last country in the Caribbean. And honestly, Jason, I was not looking forward to going at all. I was a bit nervous, a bit, what am I going to do there? Haiti, at some level, some might describe as a failed state. Parts of the country are run by gangs. The government in some places is nonexistent. It’s a scary place if you’re consuming the media. I ended up going in February to the second biggest city, which, from my research and from my community, was the place to go. It’s safer. It’s more secure. It’s called Cap-Haïtien. I spent four days there, and it truly surprised me on the upside, in such a good way, where I was really happy and thankful that the country was as delightful as it was.

Parting Words of Wisdom

Jason: Nice. That’s a great one. Okay, we’ve got a whole slew of links. I don’t want to send people in too many directions. You’ve got ExtraordinaryTravelFest.com for the Extraordinary Travel Fest we mentioned. And your blog. Is that the home for everything, like the link to the Counting Countries podcast? Would GlobalGaz.com be the place for people to go, or where do you want people to connect with you?

Ric: GlobalGaz has my blog, which I really don’t update that often, and my podcast. The Extraordinary Travel Fest, which is this October in Bangkok, is a separate website. You can use the amazing code ZERO to save $100 on your ticket.

Jason: Okay, perfect. Thanks, Ric. I’m glad we finally got to do this. Do you have some parting words of wisdom for anybody listening that’s chasing a big quest, like going to every country in the world, or travel or otherwise? Any parting words of wisdom?

Ric: I’ll give two little pieces of advice that have been helpful to me. One, we kind of touched on a couple of times. The first one is you have to push yourself out of the comfort zone. And that could be in small amounts or big leaps, and that can be in a couple of different ways. It can be going to a country that you would not typically visit. That’s number one. Or number two, maybe you’ve grown up in five-star hotels. Well, you know what? You’re going to have to push yourself out of your comfort zone into some discomfort. You might have to sleep in a tent. You might have to sleep in a hostel. You might not be in a very nice car. You might be on a 12-hour bus ride. But all of these things, whether that’s comfort zone A or B, are pushing you into a different area, and you will be rewarded, in most cases, with richer and better experiences. And then the second thing, which I think I’ve realized over the last several years, is don’t be embarrassed. Don’t have shame is what I’m getting at. And that’s in a couple of different ways. One, when you’re speaking the local language. I am a horrible linguist. I pronounce everything incorrectly, badly, often misunderstood, even in English. But I don’t care. I’m not embarrassed when I say something totally incorrectly and they laugh at me. The more I try, the more times I’ll get it right, but the more time I’m also having interactions with people. And then the second part of not being embarrassed or not having shame is talk to everybody, smile at everybody, walk into that restaurant, wave your hands, say hello. This is going to open doors. So those are my two little thoughts to add in there.

Jason: I love it. It’s a great way to wrap it up. Thank you so much for your time, Ric. I look forward to crossing paths and meeting in person at some point.

Ric: I’ll be waiting for you in Bangkok, Jason. Cheers.

An Alternative Road Trip Challenge

Jason: There you have it. Thank you to Ric. I’m so glad we got to connect. What a great guy, and I loved that conversation. Hope you enjoyed it as well. A couple of things before we get out of here. I mentioned at the top I would give you a little challenge coming out of this one, a little travel challenge, if you will. Those are fun. Before I do that, a quick reminder of two things. Number one, zerototravel.com/newsletter, where you can sign up for the free newsletter and keep in touch off the pod. And number two, we are now part of the Airwave Media Network. If you want to check out some of their other great shows, just go to airwavemedia.com and you can see some of the other awesome shows they have going on over there. It’s a great network.

Okay, I’ll leave you with a quote in a second. First, this challenge. The tuk-tuk and rickshaw races he did really inspired me and got me thinking about this idea of taking an alternative road trip. It doesn’t necessarily have to be in a different type of vehicle. That’s quite a big expense, and we can’t all go out and buy a new vehicle to try it that way. But you could build a road trip around something else that you’ve never done before, whether it’s a certain sport or outdoor activity, or perhaps it’s food-based. You’re going to go to every cafe in every small town between point A and point B, or whatever the case is. I think combining some kind of alternative road trip idea with perhaps even a quest could be an interesting way to think about your next trip, if you want to shake things up with your travels and try something different. I thought I would just leave you with that little food for thought: taking this idea of an alternative road trip, building a road trip around something that you’ve never built a road trip around before. It could be a fun thing. It’s got me thinking about what that would look like. What would I choose? What would I do? And how would that go? To me, travel’s always fresh, but if you want to freshen it up or just try something different, it can be a cool thing.

I’m going to leave you with this quote now from Norman Cousins, who said, “The eternal quest of the individual human being is to shatter his loneliness.” Thanks for listening, and I’ll see you next time. Peace and love to you and yours. Cheers.