I've Made A Decision About My Future

Sometimes the most epic adventures leave us with the biggest longing for home. Just like Bilbo Baggins was swept away on his unexpected journey, seeing things most hobbits couldn't even imagine and collecting stories and treasures on the way, he never stopped dreaming of home. The cozy softness of the shire with its familiar corners, rolling green hills And I found myself feeling similarly. After traversing the mountains, valleys and rainforests of Patagonia, I could sense that my journey here was coming to a close. If you're new here, I'm Jessica and I've been living nomadically, travelling full time for the last three years. Normally in my campervan in Europe and recently here at the bottom of the world. Join me for this journey back home where I return a little bit changed and grow roots in the wild. Good morning friends, today is my last day in Patagonia and I'm actually flying back to Buenos Aires later today. It is very stormy today so I really really hope that my flight won't be impacted. But yeah, I've been staying in this tiny apartment for the last few days and it's been really lovely to decompress and have my own space after a few weeks of non-stop travel. I'm actually flying back to Europe a few days earlier than expected because I've just had to realise that it was very taxing on my mind and body to be constantly moving around. I'm not used to the pace of backpacking travel as opposed to the way I do van life which is a lot slower and I also have more control over my routines and my environment. So yeah, lots of new experiences. I had a really great time but I think the combination of the different style of travel, the different pace of travel and also travelling with other people and not having my own space when usually I'm travelling alone just meant that I reached my limit after a few weeks and I was feeling quite tired. So I'm a van believer in leaving an experience while you're still having a good time and it also worked quite well with my friend's plans because they also had other stuff going on. So yeah, I decided to rebook my flights and travel back early. I'm also really missing my van and my dog so really looking forward to that. I do feel a little bit mixed about returning to van life and I think I'm gonna have to work on some changes in my life and I'm gonna go more into this later in the video when I've had some time to process and kind of order my thoughts. But yeah, this trip definitely left me a little bit changed as many big adventures do and yeah, I'm looking forward to sharing this journey with you. For now hopefully I will make it to Buenos Aires later today and then Madrid tomorrow and then London and then eventually the Welsh hills. Although here in the south of the world autumn is swiftly approaching, over in Europe spring is in full swing and as I end my trip here in Patagonia I'm already starting to think about my plans for summer. As part of my big road trip this year I'm continuing to learn Italian and I'm also brushing up on my Norwegian and for both of these languages I'm using Babbel who are the sponsor of today's video. What I really like about Babbel is that the lessons are short enough to fill into small gaps in my day so it's easy to build back into a routine without it feeling like a big commitment. The lessons are made by over 650 real language experts so from the very start you're learning phrases you'll actually use in real life in conversations about travel, directions, ordering food, all the things that make you feel like you're actually experiencing the local culture. Babbel is scientifically proven to help you learn a new language in just three weeks and with summer travel not far off now is a really good time to start. You can get up to 55% off your subscription via the link in the video description or the QR code and you're also backed by Babbel's 14-day money-back guarantee. A big thank you to Babbel for sponsoring this episode and for helping me feel more at home wherever I end up next. The reason I very rarely venture beyond Europe is that I always feel strangely displaced after stepping on a plane. I'm so used to travelling by road, crossing borders slowly and seeing the landscapes change gradually in each country I pass through that whenever I skip that step I never feel like I'm truly there and that feeling never quite goes away. Maybe that's why I felt so drawn to being back on familiar ground and after three flights and four trains I finally arrived where it all started, here in the west of Wales. I really like that period of time after a grand adventure where I allow a bit of routine and normalcy into my life, going on the same walks every day rather than exploring a new place all the time, running into a friend in town and grabbing lunch from my favourite cafe and with this being my last time that I spend time in this part of Wales, which I used to call home, I try to soak up the smell of the sea, the meandering rivers and the windswept valleys as much as possible. I've been back for a few days now and the van is still a mess. I still haven't unpacked properly to be honest because I've been resting and recovering from my jet lag but I do have a busy week next week. I'm doing a bunch of maintenance on the van and just need to make sure that everything is in working order before my next big trip so I stocked up on cleaning supplies and did my laundry in town and now I've driven into the mountains and I will camp by this lake for the next couple of days and just have a bit of a spring reset and tidy up the van properly. I need to deep clean, I need to swap out my battery. There was nothing wrong with my old battery but Ressie needed one for his van because he's finishing his masters soon and his will need to be a bit more off-grid ready for the summer so I got one which is essentially the same as before but it's smaller so it frees up some extra storage space which I need for my camera gear. I also have some linen mattress covers which were made by a family friend so I need to put those on my sofa bed and I need to find a home for all of the things I picked up in Patagonia. I did say I wasn't going to buy any souvenirs because I have very little space in the van, all of my worldly possessions are in here but pretty much all of the things I bought have a and I know you guys enjoy seeing a haul on the rare occasion that I buy stuff so I'm going to make sure to show you everything as well. If I'm completely honest with you guys the van wasn't even dirty because Ressie had been van sitting for me but I always find that a good deep clean does wonders for resetting my nervous system and getting back into good habits and being out here by the lake with no sound but the water and the wind it felt like my whole body was exhaling. I had missed camping in the van a lot and with every hour that passed here I felt a little happier. Even after all the incredible places I stayed at recently I am happiest in my tiny cabin on wheels making lunch in my outdoor kitchen and sitting on the sofa reading a book with the sun on my face. Although many people might associate the travelling lifestyle with constant adventure and action for me it's really about these quiet and simple moments that fill my days and as a wise hobbit once said it is no bad thing to celebrate a simple life. So I spent the last couple of days deep cleaning the van and making it cozy and comfortable again for my next big trip. I am so happy to be back in the van in my little sanctuary. I was a little bit the first couple of days were like oh I gotta empty the toilet again and worry about where I'm gonna sleep tonight which are things you don't have to worry so much when you're backpacking and yeah I did struggle with other aspects of backpacking like the constant overstimulation and the fact that you tend to travel at a faster pace but yeah now that I've settled back in I am so happy to be back in Frodo. I've also had some time to turn things over in my head a little bit about the thing I mentioned earlier with van life having an expiration date and I think this year is going to be the year where I seriously start saving up for a deposit to buy a piece of land. Now it's always been the distant dream and the end goal the reason Rissi and I started van life in the first place because now our living expenses are so much lower and for the first time in my life I'm actually able to save money rather than having nothing left at the end of the month. I hope you can still hear me over the storm that is raging outside but essentially in the last couple of years we have been focusing on building the vans and Rissi has been saving up for his sailboat and I've been putting all of my spare money into my filmmaking business and I still need to buy a new editing laptop because my laptop is for office work and I really struggle editing these videos every week but once that is out of the way I will put every penny into the deposit and some of you may be thinking that buying land is really crazy in this economy but the kind of land we're looking for is not very suitable for agriculture or businesses. We're looking at very remote places in the mountains and that kind of land tends to be a lot cheaper because not many people want it and it's often in areas that are very depopulated and also buying in Europe is a lot cheaper than buying in the UK so that makes it a lot more realistic for us. In recent months I've been feeling more of a pull to not settle down but have a bit of a home base. I will still want to travel once we have land but I want to have a place, a more permanent place to call home that would be really nice and especially when I was staying at the permaculture farm in Chile in Patagonia I really enjoyed just harvesting some fruit and veg from the garden there and it really made me feel like I want to have my own garden. I want to have a herb garden, a vegetable garden, a fruit orchard and I want to be building stuff you know. I want to build a cabin, I want to build a hobbit house, a tree house. I have all of these plans and the only thing standing in the way is saving up that money to buy land so that's something I want to start working towards and I'm also a firm believer in ending an experience when you still have a good time so while I still absolutely love van life, I still really love traveling full-time, I know that in a couple of years I will be ready to have more of a home base and in the next five years or so I'm probably going to be ready to stop traveling full-time and focus more on you know the other things I want to do like building cabins and farming and all of that stuff. For now the van isn't going anywhere and I think even once we have land the van won't be going anywhere because I will still want to go on trips and solo trips in this van because I love it so much but it's really nice to have something on the horizon you know and have like a direction that my life is heading in because the last few years for us were very much figuring out what we wanted to do in life and doing so with less financial pressure and pressure to survive from paycheck to paycheck which has been really nice but yeah now we have a better idea of where we want to be in five years and we're going to start working towards that and I really hope that you guys will join us on this journey. Today is the moment of truth I'm about to drive to the mechanic and figure out what repairs my van needs before I leave on my next big trip. I know there's something wrong with the steering it started feeling weird when I was in Greece and obviously I've driven a few thousand miles since then so that will need fixing and then I'm also going to do a full service on the van which I try and do before every big trip and the country I'm traveling to this summer is quite expensive so I don't want to risk anything breaking while I'm in an expensive country so any work the van needs done I have to get it done now and I guess what the mechanic says will determine how soon I can leave on my next trip so wish me luck and I will keep you guys posted. I hope this video wasn't too all over the place. I always struggle to document these kind of in times between my trips because I'm very much in making things happen mode and I often don't remember to pick up the camera but I know you guys are interested in that aspect of van life as well so I'm gonna try and get better at just documenting that as well and sharing that with you all. Alright I'll see you all next week and hopefully I'll have good news to share with you until then take good care of yourselves guys lots of love bye