Click Here First

Back in the paleotechnic dawn of the 21st century, my mother’s request was understandable.

“Just call me once a week to let me know you’re alive,” she said, as I wandered off across the seas.

A week later the voracious consumption of coins by a payphone meant it was my first and last such call (with five more vagabonding years before I would own a phone myself). Eventually I started a blog, which you have found, and would now be old enough to drive. What started as Proof of Life for family became a venue for sharing my love of travel with anyone, a venue that grew quieter when I professionalized that love of travel into a career as a tour guide.

The last decade has been a bonanza of shared experiences, teaching, and learning, as tour members walked alongside me to create memories in many of the world’s innumerable wonderful places. I hope I have many more such years ahead, but things are changing. Here’s the deal.

Situation:
-Travel is an inestimable source of joy & perspective, regardless/especially if dark clouds loom.
-I’m very good at what I do, helping people enjoy & optimize their trip, hopefully returning home a little different from when they left.
-No one has time to read long posts anymore, they take longer than you’d expect to write, and since guiding well is more exhausting than anyone expects, I need my relaxation time too. And I ain’t gonna use AI. Speaking of which.

Plus:
-AI scraped summaries are replacing content already, and it will only get worse.
-AI will also decimate group tours as people outsource their experiences to algorithms, preferring convenience and phone relationships to authentic human interaction, never mind that rather the point of travel is the other humans (unless it’s a wilderness trip, and gods help those who bring AI out there).

Thus:
-The task is to find the sophisticated travel enthusiasts who want to read a human’s words instead of a bot’s, and the Golden Ones who value a human guide to help them have a unique human experience, instead of consigning their lived time to an algorithm.

Conclusion:
-I plan to resume posting, but they’ll be shorter, relatively meager posts. The assumption & goal is that interested people, you wonderfully human sophisticates, adventurers, and afficionados, will get in touch for more substantial interaction, whether it be travelphillic conversation or tour-taking inquiries.

Make sense?

If you want conversation, comment on any post or send me a message via the “Ask Tim” box here.

If experiencing the world with a fellow human who loves it and can help you make the most of your time appeals to you, check out my tours here. Spoiler alert: the other people who take such tours are often a treasured part of the experience.

Wishing you slow and savored meals, openness to the unexpected, and sufficient tolerance for discomfort to reach the miracles for yourself. The world on screens is pretty. The world in person is divine. Bon voyage!