“Dad, isn’t that an abandoned building?” Nathan asked with a slight fear in his voice.
The abandoned building had broken doors and windows that were patched with wooden planks or locked up with metal bars and padlocks. The surrounding walkways were overgrown with weeds. The lot was surrounded by fences made of shiny grey aluminum sheets, the type that one normally see at construction sites.
“Why don’t you ever wait when I tell you to wait!” Nathan shouted angrily at me as he kneeled on the wet pasture land at 2500 meters trying to clean his shoes. “Why can’t you wait!”
Unlike just then, Nathan rarely showed his anger. However he stepped accidentally into a mud hole and his shoes and socks were wet and muddy. After trekking up the alpine mountain for 15 kilometers and 7 hours, Nathan was tired, hungry, and had reached his limit.
“A journey is best measured in friends, rather than miles.” – Tim Cahill, an Australian Football Player
“Travelling – it leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller.” – Ibn Battuta, a Moroccan explorer of Berber descent, who is widely recognised as one of the greatest travelers of all time.
(The above quotes were posted in a Couchsurfer host’s profile who is from Kolkata, India)
To our surprise, when we listened to the June 13, 2015 podcast on Amateur Traveler, near the end of the podcast, the podcaster read the email Jonathan sent him about our one year backpacking trip. It was broadcasted one day after we began our one year trip.
