NGS asked: How did you plan all this? Fiscally? The route? I have a post here about the route planning. As far as fiscally, if someone wants me to write a long post about this, I can, but the TLDR is that I have been saving and investing for years in order to be able to be financially independent. I have a monthly budget and this year is a bit of a test to see how much I will actually spend (you can see posts here about how much I have spent so far).
What is your goal with this trip? What do you want to learn about yourself? Or see? Or do? Like most travel, my goal is to see and learn about any and all new things. For the biking specifically, aside from seeing new places, I did want to challenge myself physically and mentally to see if I could do it. I thought that I could, but it is always interesting to see what hidden strengths you have.
Give me all the bike specs. What bike? What wheels/tires? My bike is a Marin Bobcat Trail 3 (hence the name Bob) aluminum hardtail mountain bike and I am riding with 29" 2.4" wide tires.
What sort of emergency repair kit do you have with you? How are you packing it? What are your supplies? I covered this here.
Bob goes to Niagara Falls
Nicole asked: How old are you? Have you always been a swinging single girl? I answered that here.
Do you have a favorite European spot? How about Asian? I hate this question, but only because it's like picking a favorite kid. Each place I go has something that I like and some things that I don't. I love France, Greece and Italy for the food, Austria and Switzerland (and Italy and France) for the mountains, and Albania for the hidden gem aspect (beaches, mountains, food, people!). However, I think if you are looking for an all-in-one, Slovenia is a great place to go. As for Asia, I have a soft spot for Thailand, as it was my first foray into that part of the world and the food, beaches, culture and people are lovely! But seriously, I can find something I love about every place I have been to (even India, which had a few struggles for sure).
Venice
Hong Kong
Stephany asked: Do you know what your enneagram number is? I think it is one, but I have only ever taken one free test and they wanted me to pay for more info, and I didn't want to. However, I do think one describes me pretty well. The Rational, Idealistic Type: Principled, Purposeful, Self-Controlled, and Perfectionistic. Um, yup. If you know me and you read this, you will be nodding your head a lot!
If you were to describe yourself in 3 words, what would they be? I think that the enneagram one described me pretty well. But seriously I would say I am adventurous, organized and impatient. :)
What's one of your unpopular opinions? I like to type words out in texts and don't really love it when people type "c u" for "see you" or "l8" for "late" or don't capitalize or use punctuation. I also don't use acronyms or emojis very much. I like words, whole words, spelled properly. I won't hate you if you do it, but personally, I just don't do it very much. (As a side note, I was told by a millenial once that if you put a period at the end of your sentence in a text, it is seen as aggressive. Ha! I guess I am really aggressive then!)
I also don't like being expected to respond right away. I had a boss who would call me two minutes after an email came through asking me to opine, and it would be something that would require thought or complex calcuations and/or a thoughtful answer! He also would text or send a chat to me in the evening (after work hours) and expect an instant response. I actually started purposefully waiting until the next day, or a few hours later to answer (PS I am not totally passive aggressive; I had already talked to him several times about managing his expectations).
Do you have any fears about your trip? Even though it is now nearly over, I would say that I did not have any fears going in. I was a bit wary of having to figure out routes all the time, but was not afraid that I would not be able to do it. I know that I can do anything I put my mind to, even if it may not be fun sometimes.
I think that is enough for now! Stay tuned for the next one!
Your turn! What is your enneagram number and do you think it describes you well? What is your favorite European/Asian destination and why? What is is one of your unpopular opinions?
If you haven't already, you can fill out this form with any questions you want answered for my next ask me anything post!!
This post is part of NaBloPoMo. You can find the rest of my posts for this challenge here. You can find the list of participants and their information here.
