May 18, 2025 • 52 mins
In this episode, we meet with Maryann Walters who navigates life as a true digital nomad, exploring Europe with her husband, their dog, and their bicycles.
Maryann's journey began with determination in 2020, when she specifically sought out remote work that would accommodate a travel lifestyle. After securing a remote position and spending three years renovating their Reno home to make it rental-ready, she and her husband embarked on their European adventure, starting in Belgium.
Their time in Belgium revealed a cycling paradise where the sport is revered like football in America. But their journey was shaped by visa constraints – as Americans, they could only stay in the European Union for three months without special documentation.
This limitation led them to creative solutions, including stays in non-EU countries like Andorra (a tiny nation between France and Spain) and Bosnia to "reset" their visa clock. Each location brought unique challenges and rewards and stark differences in infrastructure and environment across countries.
Through it all, Maryann has maintained her professional commitments while forming deep connections to places they lived for months at a time – a depth of experience inaccessible to typical tourists. Her story reveals both the extraordinary freedom of the digital nomad lifestyle and its very real challenges, offering valuable insights for anyone dreaming of breaking free from geographical constraints.
Ready to reimagine what's possible with remote work and international living? Follow us on Instagram @wherenext_podcast for more inspiration and practical advice from travelers who've taken the leap into location independence.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
Hi, welcome to our podcast, Where Next?
Travel with Kristen and Carol.
I am Kristen.
(00:20):
And I am Carol.
And we're two long-term friendswith a passion for travel and
adventure.
Each episode, we interviewpeople around the globe to help
us decide where to go next.
In today's episode, we aremeeting with Marianne, a true
digital nomad, where shediscusses her travels through
Europe with her husband, dog,and bicycles while navigating
(00:44):
remote work challenges andcountry hopping to manage these
limitations.
She tells about her stays inPoland and Dora, which is a tiny
nation between France and Spain,which we just learned about.
Also, we cover Portugal, Bosnia,and Belgium, the country she
fell in love with.
Enjoy.
Welcome, Marianne, and you are adear friend of Kristen's, and I
(01:08):
understand you travel the world,so we're excited to hear what
you're going to share today.
Yes.
Thanks so much, Marianne, forbeing here.
So I've known Marianne since,what, 2015 or something.
We met in our companies and justhit it off, and I've always
enjoyed our conversations.
We haven't talked in a littlewhile, and then we talked, and
you were...
(01:28):
over in Europe, Central Europe,traveling and with your husband
and your dog and your bikes andgoing and sending me these
amazing, gorgeous pictures ofall over.
And this podcast we started,what, four years ago.
And it was a lot about, youknow, traveling and living
anywhere in the world, digitalnomad.
And you embody that more thanactually a lot of the that we've
(01:52):
talked about.
And so I was so thrilled to haveyou on this just because I'd
love to see you and catch up andeverything and we'll have to
catch up afterwards, but alsoabout your amazing journey and
when it started and where you'reat.
I know you're here locally rightnow or actually in Reno, I think
right now.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(02:12):
For a couple more days.
Yeah.
In Reno.
Okay.
That's convenient.
Okay.
Yeah.
For this podcast.
Like a little Lyft driver askedme from the airport, you know,
Like, oh, so where do you live?
And I was like, nowhere.
You know, he was like, hecouldn't get his head around
this.
He was like, no, no, no, no, no.
You live somewhere.
And I'm like, no, I don't liveanywhere.
(02:35):
Well, you do have a house.
I do, but I don't live there.
I have people living there.
Correct.
Exactly.
Happy there and do not wish tohave me hanging around.
Exactly.
And before we start into youramazing adventure, because I
know right now you're herelocally, you're interviewing for
a job, a remote job, and thenyou'll go back and or you maybe
(02:58):
coming, which I thought possiblypotentially to Oakland, which
would be amazing because then Iwould see you and that would be
fun.
But that you start beginning inyour journey when you and I had
talked about renting out yourhouse because of what you were
doing and the anticipation evenyears before about that journey.
And just so our audience can getan idea if they want to do that,
(03:22):
you know, how did you set thatup and make that work for you?
Yeah, that's a good question.
So this actually started, Ithink it started seriously in
2020, where I actively soughtout a job that would allow me to
travel.
And so that was the first step.
And your husband was on boardwith you, and he's retired.
(03:42):
Yep, he's a retired bicycleracer and bike mechanic.
He does a good job kind of youknow, leading the home
renovations and taking care ofall of the stuff that doesn't
include, you know, working at acorporate job.
So that includes all of ourfour-legged children.
And how many four-leggedchildren do you have?
(04:03):
Right now, just one dog inEurope with us.
Yes.
We left our cat behind, but assoon as we land and we know
where we're going to be livingfor more than a month at a time,
we plan to reclaim the cat.
But as soon as we find a placeto land, like I said, we hope to
acquire more animals.
UNKNOWN (04:19):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (04:19):
So, OK, so it started with looking
specifically for a job because Iknew that, you know, the current
job that I had, it was very U.S.
based.
There was no chance not only ofthere was no chance of being
able to work for one of theinternational divisions or an
office and no chance of beingable to go overseas for more
than the time you take onvacation.
(04:40):
And being Americans, we never goon vacation except for Kristen,
who gets to go hiking with GirlScouts in August.
And I'm incredibly jealous.
I try.
One of these days, I'm goingwith you.
SPEAKER_01 (04:51):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (04:53):
So we started with that.
So I started actively seeking ajob that was remote only and was
okay with travel.
And at the same time, we gotreally serious about our house
renovations.
So that took exactly three yearsfrom that point on.
I did manage to get a job with aremote company in August of
(05:13):
2021.
And the house was ready to go byAugust of 2023.
You know, the process of, youknow, filling an entire house
and God knows how many storageunits with all of our stuff and
my husband's stuff and myfamily's stuff, because somehow
every book my family has everowned is for some reason with
(05:36):
me.
I have a question, Marianne.
So you're saying that the reasonyou renovated the house was
because you were going to startworking remote and you want to
rent it out?
So you want to get it in primeshape.
Okay, got it.
We installed air conditioningand a heat pump in it.
And that was part of theexercise as well as actually
installing installation on ahouse that was built in 1937
that had, sorry, insulation, hadno insulation whatsoever.
(05:58):
Okay, gotcha.
And getting air conditioning ina house in Reno, Nevada, it's
kind of pretty essential thesedays.
I don't think it used to be, butit is now.
And it's really unusual for theold houses nowadays.
in the Midtown District in Renoto have air conditioning.
And so we thought this is howwe're going to differentiate
ourselves.
You know, this will be a placewhere people can live and, you
(06:21):
know, not have to huddle in aroom somewhere, you know, like
trying to get the little mobileunit working.
Well, and it's really a nicecentral location.
I feel like I met you therewhile we were going to
restaurant or something.
Probably.
You can walk everywhere.
It's right downtown, right?
Yeah, it's super walkable.
SPEAKER_01 (06:40):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (06:40):
It's a great place to live.
It really is.
Especially if you're not worriedtoo much about the kind of stuff
that my friends with youngchildren worry about, which is
like what school they're goingto go to and all this stuff.
If you don't really worry aboutthat, it's a wonderful place to
live.
Oh, okay.
I've never considered Reno.
Yeah, and it's really close toLake Tahoe.
(07:02):
I mean, it's a lot of outdooractivities that...
come with living where you'reat.
It's far enough removed soyou're not totally in the snow,
but I think you probably stillget some snow.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And if you ever get tired ofwinter, you just have to drive
over the mountains and go toCalifornia.
Right.
(07:22):
Exactly.
Just a couple hours.
You don't get the same kind ofseasonal depression that you do
if you, like, say, live in NewEngland or, you know,
Pennsylvania.
Yeah.
Once it gets cold and dark, itstays that way, you know, until
April, maybe.
Absolutely.
So then we're in your August2023.
You've got your house renovated.
(07:43):
You have a job that's remote.
And was it at that point whereyou said, OK, let's start
planning and you took offshortly after that?
Or what was that like?
So we went to Belgium in thebeginning of September 2023.
And we stayed there for threemonths, which is as long as you
(08:04):
are allowed to stay legallywithout doing any other
paperwork as an American rightnow in Europe.
I have heard that the rules aregoing to change, but they're not
going to change for at leastanother six months.
So for now, that's still thedeal.
Well, that's not that bad,because if I'm remembering
correctly, that was quite apivotal trip and a very
beautiful biking community,which you and your husband are
(08:28):
very involved in.
Yeah.
And, you know, we were out thereevery single day riding our
bicycles, even though itliterally rained every single
day from October 15th to likethe day I left on December 1st.
Oh, wow.
We didn't care.
(08:48):
We were still out there ridingour bicycles.
Just absolutely so thrilled tobe there.
You know, I mean.
from real winter it was likeit's not that cold it's 45
degrees out and it's pouringrain it's fine and everyone else
tough cookies also uh dideveryone else bike in the rain
only the pros everyone i saw waslike a world tour pro if i saw
(09:10):
another woman you know i'd belike oh i wonder who that is
looking on strava just seeingwho would pass me you know it
was very um humbling in manyways, to be around those kinds
of cyclists.
And we ran into them in Andorra,too.
Oh, wow.
Where's Andorra?
It's in the Pyrenees.
It's a tiny country betweenFrance and Spain, and it is not
(09:32):
part of the EU.
Oh, that's interesting.
I'll get there in a secondbecause it's kind of part of the
second part of our trip, whichis while I was over there in
Belgium, I was actually laid offfrom my job.
And I agreed to stay on and dosome extra work for the same
company for a little while justto see, you know, what else
would come up and help them outwith some transitions in the
(09:55):
compliance team space that theywere working with.
And so when we came back to theUnited States, you know, we
thought we'd rent like anapartment for six months or
something like that.
And we just found that it wasjust impossibly expensive
compared to Wow.
(10:31):
It's so great to just thinkdifferently and save money.
And then I'm sure you guys couldgo different places.
The only way you can live inthis part of the world for like
$1,200 a month and live thatcomfortably.
Wow.
You know, stay at a state park.
And some of them you have tomove on every two weeks, but you
can kind of cycle around.
And we stayed at a place kind ofhalfway between Reno and Tahoe
(10:54):
for a great part of the year.
That was an RV park.
It was really nice.
Oh, nice.
You guys have an RV?
We sold it before we went backto Europe.
Okay.
We ran that thing into theground.
Nice.
It was like not really seaworthyanymore.
Yeah.
So now give it to the BurningMan people.
That's close by, right?
(11:15):
Right, right.
We ended up selling it for like$2,000.
I can't believe somebody evengave us$2,000 for it.
It was literally like worthnothing.
Well, it's a roof over yourhead.
It doesn't have to move.
Yeah.
I mean, my side of the bedleaked, but you know.
We figured it out.
To be serious, in Belgium, I wasin the biking community, and you
(11:37):
mentioned and just kind ofhinted at the pros.
What has the pros?
I know we talked offline alittle bit, but figured just to
share it here.
What makes the pros go toBelgium?
What was so special aboutBelgium?
Why did you love it?
And if I'm rememberingcorrectly, that was the place
that you really want to go backto, you and your husband.
Yeah, absolutely.
(11:57):
And part of it is because wespent a lot of time there and it
really takes like three monthsto get to know a place.
And so we had the benefit ofbeing there for three months in
the fall.
So by the time we came back inMay, you know, we immediately
like, you know, started makingreally, really good friends and
kind of knew all the places wewanted to be and where we wanted
(12:18):
to ride and kind of getting allthat out of our system, you
know, finding the goodrestaurants, etc., finding the
good places.
good houses to live in, meetingpeople who might like, for
example, have like a place tostay, you know, in like the barn
in the back of their propertyinstead of having to go through
Airbnb.
Oh, nice.
So, yeah.
So part of what made it sowonderful for us was just
(12:40):
spending a lot of time there.
Yeah.
But also is that, you know, inBelgium, cycling is like
football in America.
SPEAKER_01 (12:47):
And,
SPEAKER_00 (12:49):
yeah.
Cycling in America is likecycling in America.
I mean, it's the national sport.
It's not just commuting bybicycle like in the Netherlands
or Germany, but like actuallyracing bicycles.
And so we didn't see a whole lotof it when we were there in the
(13:10):
fall, but...
When we eventually found our wayto the right place in Flanders,
in the Flemish Ardennes, it'swhere all the very famous hill
climbs are from the Tour ofFlanders.
And they're all cobbled.
They're made of cobblestones.
And they're absolutely,incredibly difficult and steep.
There's one that I still cannotget up on my gravel bike.
(13:31):
It's like, yeah, it's 24% grade.
I'm like super cobbled.
And it goes on for just like...
Very cool.
(14:01):
So it's just, it embodies thesport, not just for road, but
also for cyclocross, which is abicycle sport that I think is
practically dead in the UnitedStates.
As far as I can tell, all peoplein the United States ever want
to do is do triathlons.
Boring.
Scrabble noises.
And that's what I do, but it'sall good.
UNKNOWN (14:23):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:25):
I just can't.
Triathlons are fun, but it's notthe same thing as bike racing.
No, no, not at all.
It's so cool.
Exercise.
What's that?
It's exercise.
Exercise is really good and Ilove exercise.
Yes.
So what's your passion aboutbicycling that you love so much?
(14:47):
I mean, because you get toexplore and travel for so long.
Well, there's two kinds.
There's bike riding, right?
And then there's racing.
And bike racing is a craft.
It is a finely tuned sport.
Those that are really good at itare performing works of art when
they're out there.
(15:07):
Yeah.
That's as a fan.
Okay, yeah.
As a cyclist, I mean, it'swonderful to ride your bicycle
everywhere.
To see the city in a way thatyou never get, you know, or just
the countryside in a way thatyou don't see from a car and you
can't see when you're walkingbecause, you know, you don't
really want to walk for 18miles, you know, but you could
easily like go for an 18 milebike ride and get to see.
Yeah, I've heard of some ofthese like cruise, like river
(15:29):
cruises in Europe where you bikein the day and then the cruise
goes along and holds on to allyour stuff and then you sleep in
the cruise ship.
Oh, that's absolutely At night.
And so you're hitting town bytown, but then you're, you're
biking.
So you don't have to like doloops or anything.
You just keep going.
I like that.
I think would be amazing.
And we got really good at it.
(15:50):
Like, um, my husband, part of itis cause he's not really afraid
of anything.
Uh, And that helps a lot becauseI'll be like, I don't want, I'm
going to get lost, you know, andwe went for a bike ride from a
campground in Milan and we had agreat time and we found fine
roads to ride on in the middleof that, you know, crowded,
crazy European city.
(16:11):
But yeah, it's just, it's a,it's a very special place.
And like, you know, It's amazingto just be in a country where
every single person you see on abicycle, whether they're like,
you know, eight year olds thathave better bike handling skills
than like any women in theamateur racing field in
California have.
(16:31):
Or you see an old woman goingriding her bicycle to the store,
you know, to get this enormousvat of mayonnaise, which she has
like strapped to the back of herrack, you know, on her bike.
All of their bikes fit themperfectly.
And you just know, you know,cause you notice like people
just on bikes, you know, ridingaround, whether it's like DUI
people or just people in theUnited States.
(16:52):
And like, everyone's riding abike.
It's not the right size forthem, you know?
And that's one thing you noticein Belgium is they're all, their
seat heights are all perfect andthey'll have absolute perfect
cycling form, you know?
And it just comes from acountry.
Oh my God.
Genetically in them.
Yeah.
There's a lot of genetics goingon.
The, the, the current, um, Well,he lost the world championship
(17:14):
to the Slovenian kid, but thecurrent great out there is a guy
named Mathieu van der Poel.
And his father was named Adrianvan der Poel, which is also the
name of our dog, Audrey.
And his mother, I don't rememberthe name of his mother, but it's
like literally like he's gotlike, he's like the grandson of
this one, like most famouscyclist that ever lived.
(17:37):
He's Dutch, but he grew up inBelgium.
And, like, his father.
And, like, it's the same, like,pattern that they look for in
racing horses.
Where they're like, this horseis going to win.
You know, he's got, like, thatheritage and that genetics.
And, you know, he's one of thestrongest guys in the world.
Wow.
That's amazing.
(17:58):
And it just comes from thistradition of, you know, Belgian
and Dutch families.
Yeah.
And the women, too.
Like, the fastest women in theworld are also from Belgium.
Oh, interesting.
So do they get it from theBelgian chocolate?
Super Viking powers.
There's something
SPEAKER_01 (18:16):
about that?
Can we eat
SPEAKER_00 (18:18):
that?
Well, and it's funny, too,because when I say it, it's like
football.
Like, even people who aresitting there, like, drinking,
like...
unbelievable amounts of beer atthese bike races and smoking
cigarettes.
They love to smoke.
You know, they're also hugecycling fans.
And some of our best friends inBelgium are not cyclists.
(18:38):
They're people that smoke thatwe met because we like to sit
outside and you know, ourfavorite like cafe and at the
same time as us.
And one day they sat next to usand they were like, what's your
story?
And we're like, oh, we'reAmerican.
And they were like, what?
What are you doing in this tinyvillage in Belgium?
You know, what was the villageyou were in?
It was called Flobeck.
(19:00):
And it has a local name.
The locals call it Flobiza.
Is that the one that's the homeof Eddie Burks?
Or is that a different...
No, Eddie Merckx is...
Actually, I'm not sure wherehe's from.
I think he might even be fromWallonia.
Is it Eddie Merckx or Burks, yousaid?
I should know that, and I'mgoing to bicycle hell for not
knowing the town.
(19:21):
What's his name?
Merckx or Burks?
Merckx.
Merckx with an M.
M-E-R-C-Y-X.
Oh, I was not that close.
Okay.
That sounds incredible.
But I do know that Greg LeMondlived in Kortryk, which is
pretty close to...
So is your travel very bikemotivated?
(19:45):
You want to go explore thisplace on a bike or that place on
a bike, or you just go explore?
And of course you can bring yourbikes just because that's what
you do.
No, well, it was a first, right?
I mean, we ended up hanging outlong enough in Belgium just to
realize that this part of theworld is like, this is where we
want to be.
This is where our hearts are.
This is home for us.
(20:06):
Oh, okay.
And then we ran into visaconstraints.
So initially I was there.
I was going to get a job workingfor the same company.
It would be an on-site job inPortugal, but it didn't work
out.
SPEAKER_01 (20:22):
Oh,
SPEAKER_00 (20:23):
okay.
And so when the companybasically confirmed like, no,
no, like we can't actuallysponsor your visa.
The plan had always been like,oh yeah, let's go live in
Portugal until we're EUcitizens.
And then we'll just go back toBelgium.
And then I'll be able to find ajob, no problem, because I'll be
an EU citizen and no one willhave to give me visa
sponsorship.
(20:43):
But that didn't work out.
And so I actually ended upeventually quitting my job.
What kind of work were youdoing?
I'm a supply chain operationsprocurement.
Oh, okay.
All right.
So it's not like...
Professional.
I was working in legaloperations.
Oh, okay.
Oyster.
She's very modest.
(21:03):
She's a pretty skilled job.
Yeah.
Yeah, she's very skilled.
Unbelievable.
Has done so much for so manyvery large companies and anyone
that ever gets her is extremelylucky.
I said, what would do and buildwas incredible.
The way her detail and what sheknows, unbelievable.
(21:24):
Awesome.
It was really impressive.
So she's very modest, but yes,she kicks butt.
Let's just say that.
Yes.
Yes.
So at that point, you know, wewere going to Portugal and we
just kept running into these.
We still have a European bankaccount that we can't really
access because like we've neverbeen able to get like the PIN
(21:45):
number working.
I mean, there's the bureaucracyand troubles of like not really
having an address that peoplecan send stuff to you is like
it's it's really a part of thestruggle of being a digital
nomad.
You know, a lot of places you'llstay, you won't be able to
receive packages or mail becauseyou're in like the back of
someone's apartment or you're insome weird building.
(22:06):
Oh, I never thought about that.
Okay.
Got to buy local then, I guess.
Yeah.
And when we lived in Andorra,nothing could get shipped to
you.
Nothing.
Because they would derail it andalways open it up for customs
purposes and try to see ifpeople were trying to get around
the rules of a tax haven bybringing in cheap goods without
(22:29):
paying the duties.
Can you tell me about Portugal?
Is it easy to become a citizenin Portugal?
That was your plan?
No.
Oh, okay.
Well, just not yet an EUcitizen.
I have a feeling that's going tohappen for sure.
The path to citizenship inPortugal that I had to take was
something that they call,sometimes they call it the
(22:50):
retirement visa.
But what it is, is that you haveto have an income separate from
It can't just be one lump sum ofmoney.
You have to have a recurringincome of not very much money,
only€850 a month.
And then if there's two of you,half of that.
So I think maybe it was€1,250 or€1,200.
(23:12):
I mean, they're close to thesame right now.
Euros are a little moreexpensive.
But you had to have that justkind of coming in.
So that's why so many people inPortugal are retired.
That's pretty easy.
And we were able to show that wehad that in terms of our rental
income.
net level yeah quite on thegross level and so we ran into
(23:34):
problems with our visa that wayand plus like it was all tied
into me doing this job that ijust i didn't really want to do
at that point you know i i'dtaken a job um a little a couple
notches lower than my capabilityum Because, you know, I thought
it would be worth it to live inEurope and get the opportunity,
(23:55):
but it didn't seem stable and itdidn't seem like something that
was going to be around for fiveyears.
And it just didn't seem like theright opportunity for me.
So, yeah.
So when I found out howincredibly difficult it was to
get the visa and spend all thattime in Portugal for a job I
didn't necessarily know that Ireally wanted, you know, to live
(24:16):
in a place that we didn't reallynecessarily want to live in.
I
SPEAKER_01 (24:18):
mean,
SPEAKER_00 (24:19):
not for a long period of time.
It just seemed to make sense toabandon that entire process.
And we did after we were prettyfar in.
I still have national tax IDsand bank accounts in Portugal.
Wow, that's crazy.
So did you spend some time inAndorra?
Yeah, so we thought that once weapplied for the visas in
(24:40):
Portugal, we'd be able to stayin Portugal.
I had like five people tell methat that was the case.
But...
And maybe it would have beenbetter not to ask the lawyers,
but the lawyers said that is notthe case.
You cannot take her.
And so we were getting ready tobe done with our three-month
period in the EU, which Portugalis part of.
(25:00):
And it was so confusing becausethey wanted you to have a house
with a lease to get the visa.
But how are you supposed to finda house or a lease to a place to
stay that you want to stay inunless you're allowed to stay
there and find a place to live.
Yeah.
Catch 22.
Airbnb and like rent a placethat way and then show that.
(25:22):
Sure.
But we'd already been in Belgiumfor a month and a half, you
know, buying the car and takingcare of other business.
Yeah.
Headed to Portugal.
And so it was around then werealized that we were going to
run out of our time at the endof August and there was just no
way this visa was going tohappen before then.
So that's when we went toAndorra.
UNKNOWN (25:42):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:43):
I'm looking at a map here.
How did you hear?
I can't believe I've never heardof this.
We've done France a coupletimes.
We've been in the south ofFrance.
We've done Europe.
We've done the Santiago.
I've never heard anyone mentionAndorra.
Or maybe I didn't realize it wasa country.
That's crazy.
I've heard of it, but I don'tknow much about it.
It's mostly like it's a huge skiresort.
(26:04):
It's like right between Franceand Spain.
It almost looks like it's on theborder between the two of them.
It is.
Yeah.
And is it France or is it Spain?
It's Andorra.
It's its own country.
SPEAKER_01 (26:17):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (26:18):
You know why?
Because as I look closer,there's a little circle, a tiny
little circle with an arrowright on Andorra.
So it is its own country.
So it's like Lake Tahoe is itsown country almost probably.
Kind of like a little ski resortarea.
No, this is a little bit morelike Guam, I would say.
(26:38):
Oh, okay.
And it's not part of the EU.
Oh, so you can go in the EU forthree months, but then you have
to leave and then come back.
And so you went to Andorra.
How long did you have to staythere for then?
Well, you can stay in Andorrafor up to 90 days, three months
as an American without a visa.
But the rules in Europe havechanged a little bit.
You have to go for longer thanthree months now when you leave
(27:00):
the EU before you can come backagain.
SPEAKER_01 (27:02):
Oh,
SPEAKER_00 (27:04):
okay.
And it's different in everycountry.
We kind of got different rulesin all the different places.
But we tried in general to notstay too long in a European
country.
We would have liked to havestayed longer in, say, Portugal.
We would have liked to staylonger in Croatia and Slovenia.
They were all part of the EU.
So we really were pushingagainst that time limit.
(27:25):
So we went to Andorra.
And the reason why we didn'tleave, why we left Andorra, was
not because we were in danger ofour visas expiring.
It's because the snow wascoming.
Oh, okay.
UNKNOWN (27:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (27:39):
And we were not there for a ski vacation.
And we lived at 7,500 feet.
It would basically be likebeing, you know, living at a ski
resort.
Oh, okay.
With that much snow.
Not so great for biking, eventhough I'm sure you guys would
bike in it.
Yeah, again, all the world'sworst roads were in Andorra.
(27:59):
Never saw a normal person on abicycle the whole time I was
there.
F.
SPEAKER_01 (28:05):
Really?
SPEAKER_00 (28:05):
Yeah, it was like August.
And yeah, everyone was therebetween the Tour de France and
the Vuelta to España, which forthe first time in like ever in
the last 80 years didn't go toAndorra.
I was so disappointed.
Oh, wow.
Yeah.
So which countries are the bestfor biking?
(28:25):
You know, I'm probably most ofthe listeners are not at the pro
racing level.
Is there...
big advantage is for the normallayperson to bike in specific
countries?
I would definitely recommend thenormal layperson ride a bicycle
in Belgium.
Okay.
Yeah.
The only reason why we alwayssaw pros out there is because it
was winter.
Okay.
In spring and summer, there'sjust vast hordes of like group
(28:47):
rides everywhere, like groups ofcyclists with 100, 200 people in
them just riding.
And they're on the roads or theydo like a lot of off-road, like
mountain biking?
They like mountain biking there,but they're also, the roads are
set up.
Every single road has a bikelane.
Oh, really?
Okay.
How about Slovenia?
That's my heritage.
I haven't been there yet.
I'm really dying to go.
Did you spend much time there?
(29:07):
No.
Oh, okay.
It's a beautiful campground thatwe stayed at.
Oh, it's a campground.
Okay.
Did you guys have like a van oryou actually camp camped?
We bought a cheap tent atDecathlon, which is like the
European REI.
Okay.
And we had our car and wepitched a tent.
Okay.
Awesome.
(29:29):
So you had a car throughoutEurope or did you train
somewhere?
We bought the car in Belgium.
We ran into a lot of red tape.
We managed to get it registeredeventually in Andorra.
Yeah.
Oh, wow.
And then what'd you do afteryour time was up?
So we left Andorra.
And at that point, you know, interms of the question of what
(29:49):
was driving us, I was justapplying for jobs at that point.
I, you know, I no longer had anyincome coming in.
SPEAKER_01 (29:56):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (29:58):
except for a little bit from our rental property.
So we just decided to live ascheaply as we could outside the
Europe in a place we could driveto.
So that's what led us to Bosnia.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
Yeah.
First we thought, you know, likewe were kind of joking about
Bosnia and we talked a lotabout, you know, Albania and
Montenegro, which are slightly,I think, places where tourists
(30:19):
go a little bit more frequently.
And, you know, we startedlooking at Bosnia and we found
this like amazing apartment for$500 a month.
And we were like, oh, let's justgo there and check it out.
And then we started seeing allthese, like, YouTube videos
about all these people who,like, clearly put absolutely
zero attention to politics.
Like, being like, this is thebest place ever.
(30:41):
Yay! This is our favorite newtourist destination.
Turbinia, Bosnia.
And it wasn't, you know, if youweren't a tourist that was there
in the summer, it was actually alittle hard living there.
Why is that?
Is it language or?
The language is difficult.
The culture there, people arenot naturally friendly.
(31:04):
Okay.
I mean, they're not really inthe Netherlands or Belgium
either, but if you're there forlong enough, they eventually,
you know, you can weasel yourway in once they figure out
you're not a tourist.
But, you know, we reallystruggled in Bosnia.
We spent most of our time inRepublic Srpska, which is the
Serbian section of Bosnia.
(31:25):
Okay.
We did go to Sarajevo.
There were just like smallthings about it not being part
of the EU that were verynoticeable.
I would say the big trash andthe trash, like the trash
everywhere.
And then the field dogs andcats.
I mean, anyone who's been toLatin America probably has a
little more experience withthose too.
(31:45):
It's very India-like almost.
Yeah, it's a little, it's prettyheartbreaking if you're a dog
person because the dogs are,they're not like, you know, in
America, like...
Or even in Portugal, like allthe stray dogs were like the
same breed, you know, and theywere just clearly some kind of
like super mutt, you know, thatis accustomed to living on the
(32:05):
streets.
Or, you know, in America,they're all pit bulls and stuff.
You know, they were really nicebreeds of dogs, you know, like
in many cases, like purebreddogs.
You're not used to seeing like agolden retriever living on the
street, you know.
Yeah.
Oh, wow.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Labradoodles.
(32:25):
Yeah, like friendly, beautifuldogs.
You know, big ones.
I mean, mostly big.
I didn't see many little ones.
Okay.
And the cats, too.
Cats were so friendly.
It was really hard to not takethem with us.
Oh, I can imagine.
I would want to.
And then also the pollution,too.
(32:45):
You know, everyone in Bosnia isdriving a 1984 Volkswagen with a
diesel engine.
And even though we were on theMediterranean, sometimes, I
mean, it usually wasn't thatbad, but sometimes it could be
really, really bad.
The further you go into themountains, which is the entire
country, the more the pollutionhangs in the valleys.
I mean, it smells like sulfur.
(33:06):
Okay.
It's bad.
It's really bad.
It's like something that youdon't ever smell in America.
Okay.
What about Croatia?
Croatia was gorgeous.
Okay.
Part of the EU.
We could ride our bicycles wherewe lived in Bosnia.
We could ride our bicycles tothe border of Croatia.
We could see the Adriatic Seaand Dubrovnik and have coffee
(33:28):
looking at the ocean.
Oh, nice.
We didn't actually ride ourbikes through customs that much
because every now and then theygive you a hard time and wanted
to see a passport and we didn'twant to burn any days in the EU.
Oh, I see.
Oh, smart.
Okay.
You're not in there if yourpassport's not stamped.
(33:48):
Oh, okay.
Very good.
And from then we went toMontenegro.
Oh, yeah.
I don't really think, butthat's, is that kind of near
Croatia?
Yeah.
Yeah.
It needs to do it.
Also a former Yugoslav.
Right.
Yeah.
I'm Yugoslavian by descent.
And so now it's like, I thinkwe're mainly from Slovenia, but
(34:09):
you know, there's Croatia andwhat else did you say it was?
The Serbs.
The Serbs, yeah.
Yeah.
The Serbs live in a lot ofdifferent countries.
Like Montenegrins, they'reethnically Serbs.
UNKNOWN (34:23):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (34:24):
And of course, Serbia is mostly Serbs.
And then Croatia is mostlyCroatians because they kicked
out or killed all the Serbs.
Oh, okay.
Then all the Serbs in Bosniahave been killing the Bosniaks
who are the Bosnian Muslims.
Okay.
He's joined in that as well.
I need to read some history.
It got pretty ugly.
And you can really tell.
(34:45):
Like, I spent only a couple daysin Belgrade, in Serbia.
And Serbia itself is not a placewhere, you know, people hold on
to the past.
I think it's really, you know,it's a pretty modern, pretty
friendly place.
That's not the feeling you getnecessarily all the time.
(35:07):
When you're in Bosnia, youreally feel the tensions, the
ethnic tensions still betweenthe groups.
Oh, okay.
Wow.
So, did you...
Oh, sorry.
Go ahead.
I was just going to say, I thinkMontenegro, if I'm remembering
correctly, was one of yourfavorites.
Yeah.
(35:27):
Yeah, we did love it.
We lived in Sotinje.
And actually, this is crazy.
A week after we left, there waslike a mass killing with a gun
in Satinia.
This is like a tiny village.
We were like, we could notbelieve it when we read it in
the news.
Did they say why?
He was some ex-army guy.
Wow, so not just in America,huh?
(35:49):
I was going to say, was he incahoots with the guy from...
What, in front of the TrumpTower with the...
No.
And then in the New Orleans?
Maybe there was a trifecta orsomething going on.
It was an isolated incident.
I didn't even know that theywere allowed to have guns in
Montenegro.
I mean, I never saw any.
Yeah, maybe they weren't.
(36:10):
How long were you in Montenegrofor then?
We were there for a month and acouple months.
Oh, wow.
We would have stayed longer,except we decided that...
Things were kind of coming to ahead with my job applications.
I decided that we should move onto Ukraine if we truly wanted to
volunteer in Ukraine before Iwas going to end up having to
start working for a company.
Wow.
(36:31):
What kind of volunteer work didyou do?
Well, I never made it.
I got arrested on thePolish-Ukrainian border by the
Polish police.
What was that?
I got arrested at thePoland-Ukrainian border by the
Polish police.
because I did not have aninternational driver's permit,
which I had no idea I needed,which had not come up for
(36:55):
driving this time.
What did that look like?
What happened?
The police were really nice.
Even they thought it was ashakedown.
A bunch of the women on thepolice force kept riding in the
back with me in the car, so Iwouldn't feel like I was getting
arrested.
Oh, gosh.
That's my other half.
I'm Polish.
(37:17):
Oh, yeah.
Well, in fact, my husband'sstill there.
He's not going to Ukraine untilhe's going to Ukraine on Sunday.
Because when I came to America,I got him his international
driver's permit, which is the BScardboard permit.
document with like a poorlytrimmed passport photo taped to
it.
I mean, it's so ridiculous that,I mean, there's no like, there's
(37:39):
nothing behind it.
Oh my gosh.
That's hilarious.
You get from AAA.
Oh, I think I've heard aboutthat before.
Yeah.
It costs 20 bucks, 12 if youget, let them take your passport
photos.
Okay.
So any big consequence ofgetting arrested?
You just, they like slapped yourwrist?
interrogation for my punishment.
(38:00):
And I was like kind of gigglingat the police's English, you
know, and they were justkidding.
Now we will conduct yourinterrogation for your
punishment.
And then I actually saw thedocument and it really said on
it.
She was reading it?
They gave me an English copy,English version of this
document.
It's great.
I'm going to frame it.
That is an awesome story.
(38:21):
That's so cool.
I mean, I'm sure you're a littlenervous at the time, but.
I had to write a letter to thejudge.
They're either going to give mea fine.
Actually, I haven't gotten theletter back yet.
They're either going to give mea fine or they're going to ban
me from driving in Poland forsix months or some combination
thereof, or they could throw thewhole thing out.
(38:42):
And they didn't even know if Ihad to, like, I was trying to
figure out if I had to go tocourt.
And they're like, well, we'venever really done this before,
so we don't know.
Yeah.
Someone just on a whim decidedto press you.
Yeah, just on a whim.
It wasn't really the police'sfault.
As soon as the charges had beenclear that I was driving without
(39:05):
an irrational driver's permit inPoland, I guess the police had
no choice.
So then we stuck in Poland overChristmas.
Oh, my goodness.
Oh, just like a month ago?
Yeah, I just got back.
Oh, you just got back?
Oh, my gosh.
She's here just interviewing,and then she's, are you going to
go back?
It all depends.
(39:26):
Yeah.
Yeah, so if I don't get a job,I'm going to go back to Europe
and join him, and we'll getanother three months in Belgium.
Keep applying for places.
And if I do get a job, thenhopefully it's a remote job, and
I'll be able to go over thereand hang out with him and work.
But if I get a job that's not aremote job, then I'll probably
(39:48):
just go out there for a coupleof weeks, take vacation and help
them move, move home.
And we'll be moving somewhere inthe United States.
Okay.
Very open ended right now.
Oh, that's so exciting.
I love that.
So living in Belgium, do yourent then by the month?
How do you like, how do you doyour housing?
So we boarded with a family.
(40:11):
Oh, okay.
For a significant time we werethere and we paid by the month.
Okay.
And Airbnb is hard to find inthe villages there and it's kind
of expensive.
Okay.
Short-term leases tend to belike three to six months.
Right.
Those are in Brussels and theytend to be for like, you know,
diplomats and people working forthe government.
(40:32):
Okay.
Those are very accessible inBrussels, but in the village,
it's hard to find places.
You might have to find like aoverly expensive Airbnb until
you kind of meet people andfigure out.
Okay.
You got to get the lay of theland.
Someone knows someone.
Exactly.
Once you start meeting people,you know, they're like, oh, my
parents are renting out thishouse, you know.
(40:54):
Okay.
And they would never do Airbnb.
Yeah.
Okay.
And then as far as like tryingto find a remote job, our
audience might be interested inthis.
So are there certain remote jobsthat, yeah, they're remote, but
no, as long as you're in theUnited States, are there certain
remote jobs that only will letyou be remote internationally?
Um, so I am technically anAmerican working in America with
(41:18):
an American tax address, whichis here in Nevada.
It's a UPS store.
And so therefore I can, when Iwork remotely, I can only go to
Europe for within those sameconstraints, three months at a
time.
Okay.
To do, to work somewhere whereyou can live longer than that,
you have to obtain, um, you haveto obtain a visa.
(41:39):
No, no.
I was thinking, I'm wondering ifthe, the employee visa, cares if
you're in the United States orif they're worried about like
security and on the internet ina different country?
That's a good question.
Usually what they care about aretaxes and taxes and breaking
visa regulations, which is why Iwent there.
(42:01):
But I think most companies haveadvanced VPNs.
Oh, okay.
As long as you can get on that.
And they wrap up the security.
Yeah.
Okay, that makes sense.
In fact, for me, having the VPNmade it really difficult to do
things like basically doanything online when I was in
Montenegro or Bosnia.
I kept on getting like, yourbank does not, you know, allow
(42:23):
this location.
Oh, right.
Because you're, yeah, it sayslike you're in America and
they're like, why wouldAmericans be hacking into our
accounts here?
All companies are going to wantto make sure that you've got all
of the VPNs and the two-factorauthentication on anything
you're using for work for yourmobile devices.
SPEAKER_01 (42:41):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (42:42):
Got it.
For sure.
SPEAKER_01 (42:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (42:45):
How was it with the internet and trying to work and,
you know, if it was tricky ornot tricky?
It was tricky.
And I'm sure it's like, well, Iguess I'm just not going to be
able to work here for a coupledays or a week or a month or
something like that.
It was tricky.
There were a couple of placesthat said they had internet and
(43:05):
they didn't.
And so what I had to do was inboth locations, I was able to
find a co-working space thatwasn't more than like 40 minutes
away, drive away.
And so that's what I always did.
Yeah, it was really hard inplaces in Portugal.
Oh, okay.
(43:26):
I have Portugal's like digitalnomad haven.
Well, because of that, therewere a lot of co-working places.
You know, if you were anywherenear a big city, which again, if
you're willing to drive 45minutes, it's a small country.
Yeah.
So you can find those places.
Every time it rained really hardin Montenegro, which was pretty
much all the time we were there.
(43:47):
Like the sun would come out liketwice a week.
We'd be like, get on your bikes,go, go, go.
We'd lose power and like not beable to get into our apartment
building and like our...
You know, our Airbnb host waslike, no, no, no, it runs on
battery.
It still lets you in when poweris out.
We're like, we're telling youthat we can't get into our own
apartment building.
(44:08):
That was kind of stressful.
And I had a whole bunch ofinterviews, you know, and it
would always be like, oh my God,is it going to rain?
Is it not going to rain?
And the rain, I mean, like youcouldn't, like one of them I had
to reschedule.
I had to reschedule an interviewbecause the rain was so bad that
I couldn't even drive.
I couldn't even drive on thehighway.
There was standing water thatwas feet deep everywhere.
(44:31):
The rain was insane.
I guess that's just winterweather for the Mediterranean.
What do you call that?
The Dalmatian coast?
Because Montenegro is next toCroatia, so it's like the next
little loop in the coastlinethere.
But I was not expecting that atall.
UNKNOWN (44:52):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (44:52):
Absolutely.
It is really stressful.
It's really stressful whenyou're somewhere and you can't
work and you need to be working.
Yes.
That's why I'm always like, do Iwant to try to work remotely?
I'm like, I'm thinking maybemore.
I'm going to try to get myselfset up so I can take three
months off at a time or evenjust a month off and then go
somewhere, come back and thenplan another trip for one or two
(45:14):
months.
Especially in Asia, I think withthe time difference and
everything, I definitely think Iwant to just take a break and
rather than trying to workremotely.
Well, and even when I wasn'tworking, I teach English to
Ukrainians online.
Oh, okay.
And so I always felt like therewas always something I needed to
do and needed to be online for,whether it was like networking
(45:35):
calls or webinars or teachingEnglish or job interviews.
I never really felt like I couldtruly be off the grid.
SPEAKER_01 (45:43):
Yeah,
SPEAKER_00 (45:44):
I could see that.
It does make it stressful.
Yeah.
How did you get the teachingjobs in English?
That sounds kind of fun.
We were looking at all thevolunteering in Ukraine.
I think that's the name of thewebsite.
Although my husband, he'svolunteering with the Ukrainian
Bicycle Project, which actuallyhe found through a different
route online.
He just sent him an email andwas like, hey, I'm a bike
(46:04):
mechanic.
Can I help you build bikes?
They're like, yes.
Because volunteering in Ukraine,it had all kinds of options and
some of them were remote.
And that's how I found it.
And I signed up and I gottrained and I love it.
I have three students.
They're all women in their 40s.
I have an economist, a computerscience teacher and an attorney.
(46:26):
And they're learning English sothey can find a job outside
Ukraine as refugees.
Wow.
Oh, my gosh.
Good for you.
That's awesome.
It's amazingly more helpful thanI thought it would be, you know,
to help them.
That's very neat.
That's incredible.
What would you say are yourthree favorite places and why?
(46:48):
My first favorite place isBelgium.
My second favorite place isMontenegro.
And my third favorite place isPoland.
Is Poland?
Yeah.
What was your three favoritefoods?
There's a food that they eat in,we call it Serbia land.
Because, you know, it doesn'treally matter what country
(47:09):
you're in.
Like the ethnicity of a lot ofthese same people are Serbs.
They have something called Ivar,which is ground bell peppers and
eggplant.
And sometimes they put spicypeppers in it.
And it is just absolutely.
How do you spell that?
In the Romantic alphabet.
Or just like Ivar, like withVictor, the I-V-A-R?
(47:31):
V-A-J-V-A-R.
UNKNOWN (47:34):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (47:35):
Okay, that sounds right.
Ground peppers and eggplant.
That sounds like something Iwould love.
I've never heard of that before.
So incredible.
And then, you know, just all thelittle farmer's markets in
Montenegro, like the littlevegetable mongers, there was
like, you know, like one of themevery city block, basically,
just with like all these amazingfresh vegetables.
(47:55):
The peppers, especially in thatpart of the world, were just
incredible.
Yeah.
Mild?
And spicy, the whole gamut.
Okay.
Yep, everything in between.
And, of course, you could get,like, persimmons for, like, you
know, pennies, you know, for,like, a massive, huge bag of
them.
Those are so good.
I love those.
(48:16):
And then I really like theSpanish food.
I love any place.
And Portuguese, too.
I love any place where you sitdown and they give you a bowl of
olives, you know, as soon as yousit down.
SPEAKER_01 (48:25):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (48:27):
And I really, really like the fish that they have in
Portugal.
Yeah.
The famous fish dishes.
I know that that whole region ofthe world is famous for like
their Iberian ham.
And I certainly ate a lot ofthat stuff, like all their
smoked sausage and everything.
We lived in Andorra.
But, you know, we really startedto just crave like fresh food,
(48:47):
you know, amazing fresh fish.
SPEAKER_01 (48:51):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (48:51):
All of them are incredible.
They just came off someone'stree.
And then also, you know, Thething I love the most about
Europe, and it doesn't matterwhere you go in Europe, you're
going to find it, is just thebread.
Oh, okay.
So good.
And I don't mean the whitebread.
I mean like the brown, wholegrain bread.
Uh-huh.
(49:12):
So fresh.
So fresh.
And it's cheap.
And what was your favoritedessert from what country?
If you had to pick one dessert,what would that be?
Oh.
That's a tough one because Idon't eat a lot of dessert.
I usually have to choose betweendessert and beer.
(49:33):
What's your favorite beer then?
What was your favorite beer ifyou had to pick one?
Oh, well, you know, I'm a hugedevotee.
My Belgian friends would scoffat me, but I think Leffe, the
Belgian beer, which is one ofthe few kinds you can get over
here in the United States.
And we actually found some inlike a French store.
grocery store at Andorra.
We were so happy.
You know, it was like Spanish,Portuguese, Italian beer.
(49:56):
It's all like very light, youknow, beer.
It's all really light.
And so we're really happy everytime we can find a left.
And I also had a rule that Icouldn't drink any Belgian beer
where I hadn't been to theactual town, usually the
cathedral and been to left.
My second one was Iname,E-N-A-M-E, which was also a
cathedral town.
And that was from Flanderswhere, where we lived.
UNKNOWN (50:18):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (50:19):
Oh, sounds good.
It's all the same.
It's all Belgian blondes.
You know, it's all very strong,like 6.6.
Yeah.
It's all so, so, so good.
And then I just, I love theBelgian chocolate too.
Coffee or tea?
Nini coffee?
Coffee.
Coffee.
Nice.
That's awesome.
(50:39):
Well, thank you so much,Marianne.
This was so much fun.
Oh, my gosh.
We could talk forever.
I have so many questions.
I mean, it just opens yourpeople who are listening's mind
of just a different type ofadventure because a lot of
people will talk about onecountry, but someone who's
actually really doing it, whichI want to do as well, along with
(51:01):
taking you backpacking,obviously.
It's happening.
Oh, it will happen.
I'll have to tell my newemployers, you know, like, look,
I got a problem with August, youknow.
Exactly.
For sure.
But thank you so much, Marianne,for just this wonderful
discussion about your adventuresand exploring with you, your
(51:21):
husband, your dog, and yourbikes, right?
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
I'm honored that you'reinterested in my stories.
Yes, for sure.
Well, have a great weekend, andI'm sure we'll be talking very
soon.
Nice to meet you, Marianne.
Take care.
SPEAKER_01 (51:37):
Bye.
Bye.
SPEAKER_00 (51:38):
Thanks for listening.
If you enjoyed the podcast, Canyou please take a second and do
a quick follow of the show andrate us in your podcast app?
And if you have a minute, wewould really appreciate a
review.
Following and rating is the bestway to support us.
If you're on Instagram, let'sconnect.
We're at where next podcast.
(51:58):
Thanks again.
Hi, welcome to our podcast, Where Next?
Travel with Kristen and Carol.
I am Kristen.
(00:20):
And I am Carol.
And we're two long-term friendswith a passion for travel and
adventure.
Each episode, we interviewpeople around the globe to help
us decide where to go next.
In today's episode, we aremeeting with Marianne, a true
digital nomad, where shediscusses her travels through
Europe with her husband, dog,and bicycles while navigating
(00:44):
remote work challenges andcountry hopping to manage these
limitations.
She tells about her stays inPoland and Dora, which is a tiny
nation between France and Spain,which we just learned about.
Also, we cover Portugal, Bosnia,and Belgium, the country she
fell in love with.
Enjoy.
Welcome, Marianne, and you are adear friend of Kristen's, and I
(01:08):
understand you travel the world,so we're excited to hear what
you're going to share today.
Yes.
Thanks so much, Marianne, forbeing here.
So I've known Marianne since,what, 2015 or something.
We met in our companies and justhit it off, and I've always
enjoyed our conversations.
We haven't talked in a littlewhile, and then we talked, and
you were...
(01:28):
over in Europe, Central Europe,traveling and with your husband
and your dog and your bikes andgoing and sending me these
amazing, gorgeous pictures ofall over.
And this podcast we started,what, four years ago.
And it was a lot about, youknow, traveling and living
anywhere in the world, digitalnomad.
And you embody that more thanactually a lot of the that we've
(01:52):
talked about.
And so I was so thrilled to haveyou on this just because I'd
love to see you and catch up andeverything and we'll have to
catch up afterwards, but alsoabout your amazing journey and
when it started and where you'reat.
I know you're here locally rightnow or actually in Reno, I think
right now.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(02:12):
For a couple more days.
Yeah.
In Reno.
Okay.
That's convenient.
Okay.
Yeah.
For this podcast.
Like a little Lyft driver askedme from the airport, you know,
Like, oh, so where do you live?
And I was like, nowhere.
You know, he was like, hecouldn't get his head around
this.
He was like, no, no, no, no, no.
You live somewhere.
And I'm like, no, I don't liveanywhere.
(02:35):
Well, you do have a house.
I do, but I don't live there.
I have people living there.
Correct.
Exactly.
Happy there and do not wish tohave me hanging around.
Exactly.
And before we start into youramazing adventure, because I
know right now you're herelocally, you're interviewing for
a job, a remote job, and thenyou'll go back and or you maybe
(02:58):
coming, which I thought possiblypotentially to Oakland, which
would be amazing because then Iwould see you and that would be
fun.
But that you start beginning inyour journey when you and I had
talked about renting out yourhouse because of what you were
doing and the anticipation evenyears before about that journey.
And just so our audience can getan idea if they want to do that,
(03:22):
you know, how did you set thatup and make that work for you?
Yeah, that's a good question.
So this actually started, Ithink it started seriously in
2020, where I actively soughtout a job that would allow me to
travel.
And so that was the first step.
And your husband was on boardwith you, and he's retired.
(03:42):
Yep, he's a retired bicycleracer and bike mechanic.
He does a good job kind of youknow, leading the home
renovations and taking care ofall of the stuff that doesn't
include, you know, working at acorporate job.
So that includes all of ourfour-legged children.
And how many four-leggedchildren do you have?
(04:03):
Right now, just one dog inEurope with us.
Yes.
We left our cat behind, but assoon as we land and we know
where we're going to be livingfor more than a month at a time,
we plan to reclaim the cat.
But as soon as we find a placeto land, like I said, we hope to
acquire more animals.
UNKNOWN (04:19):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (04:19):
So, OK, so it started with looking
specifically for a job because Iknew that, you know, the current
job that I had, it was very U.S.
based.
There was no chance not only ofthere was no chance of being
able to work for one of theinternational divisions or an
office and no chance of beingable to go overseas for more
than the time you take onvacation.
(04:40):
And being Americans, we never goon vacation except for Kristen,
who gets to go hiking with GirlScouts in August.
And I'm incredibly jealous.
I try.
One of these days, I'm goingwith you.
SPEAKER_01 (04:51):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (04:53):
So we started with that.
So I started actively seeking ajob that was remote only and was
okay with travel.
And at the same time, we gotreally serious about our house
renovations.
So that took exactly three yearsfrom that point on.
I did manage to get a job with aremote company in August of
(05:13):
2021.
And the house was ready to go byAugust of 2023.
You know, the process of, youknow, filling an entire house
and God knows how many storageunits with all of our stuff and
my husband's stuff and myfamily's stuff, because somehow
every book my family has everowned is for some reason with
(05:36):
me.
I have a question, Marianne.
So you're saying that the reasonyou renovated the house was
because you were going to startworking remote and you want to
rent it out?
So you want to get it in primeshape.
Okay, got it.
We installed air conditioningand a heat pump in it.
And that was part of theexercise as well as actually
installing installation on ahouse that was built in 1937
that had, sorry, insulation, hadno insulation whatsoever.
(05:58):
Okay, gotcha.
And getting air conditioning ina house in Reno, Nevada, it's
kind of pretty essential thesedays.
I don't think it used to be, butit is now.
And it's really unusual for theold houses nowadays.
in the Midtown District in Renoto have air conditioning.
And so we thought this is howwe're going to differentiate
ourselves.
You know, this will be a placewhere people can live and, you
(06:21):
know, not have to huddle in aroom somewhere, you know, like
trying to get the little mobileunit working.
Well, and it's really a nicecentral location.
I feel like I met you therewhile we were going to
restaurant or something.
Probably.
You can walk everywhere.
It's right downtown, right?
Yeah, it's super walkable.
SPEAKER_01 (06:40):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (06:40):
It's a great place to live.
It really is.
Especially if you're not worriedtoo much about the kind of stuff
that my friends with youngchildren worry about, which is
like what school they're goingto go to and all this stuff.
If you don't really worry aboutthat, it's a wonderful place to
live.
Oh, okay.
I've never considered Reno.
Yeah, and it's really close toLake Tahoe.
(07:02):
I mean, it's a lot of outdooractivities that...
come with living where you'reat.
It's far enough removed soyou're not totally in the snow,
but I think you probably stillget some snow.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And if you ever get tired ofwinter, you just have to drive
over the mountains and go toCalifornia.
Right.
(07:22):
Exactly.
Just a couple hours.
You don't get the same kind ofseasonal depression that you do
if you, like, say, live in NewEngland or, you know,
Pennsylvania.
Yeah.
Once it gets cold and dark, itstays that way, you know, until
April, maybe.
Absolutely.
So then we're in your August2023.
You've got your house renovated.
(07:43):
You have a job that's remote.
And was it at that point whereyou said, OK, let's start
planning and you took offshortly after that?
Or what was that like?
So we went to Belgium in thebeginning of September 2023.
And we stayed there for threemonths, which is as long as you
(08:04):
are allowed to stay legallywithout doing any other
paperwork as an American rightnow in Europe.
I have heard that the rules aregoing to change, but they're not
going to change for at leastanother six months.
So for now, that's still thedeal.
Well, that's not that bad,because if I'm remembering
correctly, that was quite apivotal trip and a very
beautiful biking community,which you and your husband are
(08:28):
very involved in.
Yeah.
And, you know, we were out thereevery single day riding our
bicycles, even though itliterally rained every single
day from October 15th to likethe day I left on December 1st.
Oh, wow.
We didn't care.
(08:48):
We were still out there ridingour bicycles.
Just absolutely so thrilled tobe there.
You know, I mean.
from real winter it was likeit's not that cold it's 45
degrees out and it's pouringrain it's fine and everyone else
tough cookies also uh dideveryone else bike in the rain
only the pros everyone i saw waslike a world tour pro if i saw
(09:10):
another woman you know i'd belike oh i wonder who that is
looking on strava just seeingwho would pass me you know it
was very um humbling in manyways, to be around those kinds
of cyclists.
And we ran into them in Andorra,too.
Oh, wow.
Where's Andorra?
It's in the Pyrenees.
It's a tiny country betweenFrance and Spain, and it is not
(09:32):
part of the EU.
Oh, that's interesting.
I'll get there in a secondbecause it's kind of part of the
second part of our trip, whichis while I was over there in
Belgium, I was actually laid offfrom my job.
And I agreed to stay on and dosome extra work for the same
company for a little while justto see, you know, what else
would come up and help them outwith some transitions in the
(09:55):
compliance team space that theywere working with.
And so when we came back to theUnited States, you know, we
thought we'd rent like anapartment for six months or
something like that.
And we just found that it wasjust impossibly expensive
compared to Wow.
(10:31):
It's so great to just thinkdifferently and save money.
And then I'm sure you guys couldgo different places.
The only way you can live inthis part of the world for like
$1,200 a month and live thatcomfortably.
Wow.
You know, stay at a state park.
And some of them you have tomove on every two weeks, but you
can kind of cycle around.
And we stayed at a place kind ofhalfway between Reno and Tahoe
(10:54):
for a great part of the year.
That was an RV park.
It was really nice.
Oh, nice.
You guys have an RV?
We sold it before we went backto Europe.
Okay.
We ran that thing into theground.
Nice.
It was like not really seaworthyanymore.
Yeah.
So now give it to the BurningMan people.
That's close by, right?
(11:15):
Right, right.
We ended up selling it for like$2,000.
I can't believe somebody evengave us$2,000 for it.
It was literally like worthnothing.
Well, it's a roof over yourhead.
It doesn't have to move.
Yeah.
I mean, my side of the bedleaked, but you know.
We figured it out.
To be serious, in Belgium, I wasin the biking community, and you
(11:37):
mentioned and just kind ofhinted at the pros.
What has the pros?
I know we talked offline alittle bit, but figured just to
share it here.
What makes the pros go toBelgium?
What was so special aboutBelgium?
Why did you love it?
And if I'm rememberingcorrectly, that was the place
that you really want to go backto, you and your husband.
Yeah, absolutely.
(11:57):
And part of it is because wespent a lot of time there and it
really takes like three monthsto get to know a place.
And so we had the benefit ofbeing there for three months in
the fall.
So by the time we came back inMay, you know, we immediately
like, you know, started makingreally, really good friends and
kind of knew all the places wewanted to be and where we wanted
(12:18):
to ride and kind of getting allthat out of our system, you
know, finding the goodrestaurants, etc., finding the
good places.
good houses to live in, meetingpeople who might like, for
example, have like a place tostay, you know, in like the barn
in the back of their propertyinstead of having to go through
Airbnb.
Oh, nice.
So, yeah.
So part of what made it sowonderful for us was just
(12:40):
spending a lot of time there.
Yeah.
But also is that, you know, inBelgium, cycling is like
football in America.
SPEAKER_01 (12:47):
And,
SPEAKER_00 (12:49):
yeah.
Cycling in America is likecycling in America.
I mean, it's the national sport.
It's not just commuting bybicycle like in the Netherlands
or Germany, but like actuallyracing bicycles.
And so we didn't see a whole lotof it when we were there in the
(13:10):
fall, but...
When we eventually found our wayto the right place in Flanders,
in the Flemish Ardennes, it'swhere all the very famous hill
climbs are from the Tour ofFlanders.
And they're all cobbled.
They're made of cobblestones.
And they're absolutely,incredibly difficult and steep.
There's one that I still cannotget up on my gravel bike.
(13:31):
It's like, yeah, it's 24% grade.
I'm like super cobbled.
And it goes on for just like...
Very cool.
(14:01):
So it's just, it embodies thesport, not just for road, but
also for cyclocross, which is abicycle sport that I think is
practically dead in the UnitedStates.
As far as I can tell, all peoplein the United States ever want
to do is do triathlons.
Boring.
Scrabble noises.
And that's what I do, but it'sall good.
UNKNOWN (14:23):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:25):
I just can't.
Triathlons are fun, but it's notthe same thing as bike racing.
No, no, not at all.
It's so cool.
Exercise.
What's that?
It's exercise.
Exercise is really good and Ilove exercise.
Yes.
So what's your passion aboutbicycling that you love so much?
(14:47):
I mean, because you get toexplore and travel for so long.
Well, there's two kinds.
There's bike riding, right?
And then there's racing.
And bike racing is a craft.
It is a finely tuned sport.
Those that are really good at itare performing works of art when
they're out there.
(15:07):
Yeah.
That's as a fan.
Okay, yeah.
As a cyclist, I mean, it'swonderful to ride your bicycle
everywhere.
To see the city in a way thatyou never get, you know, or just
the countryside in a way thatyou don't see from a car and you
can't see when you're walkingbecause, you know, you don't
really want to walk for 18miles, you know, but you could
easily like go for an 18 milebike ride and get to see.
Yeah, I've heard of some ofthese like cruise, like river
(15:29):
cruises in Europe where you bikein the day and then the cruise
goes along and holds on to allyour stuff and then you sleep in
the cruise ship.
Oh, that's absolutely At night.
And so you're hitting town bytown, but then you're, you're
biking.
So you don't have to like doloops or anything.
You just keep going.
I like that.
I think would be amazing.
And we got really good at it.
(15:50):
Like, um, my husband, part of itis cause he's not really afraid
of anything.
Uh, And that helps a lot becauseI'll be like, I don't want, I'm
going to get lost, you know, andwe went for a bike ride from a
campground in Milan and we had agreat time and we found fine
roads to ride on in the middleof that, you know, crowded,
crazy European city.
(16:11):
But yeah, it's just, it's a,it's a very special place.
And like, you know, It's amazingto just be in a country where
every single person you see on abicycle, whether they're like,
you know, eight year olds thathave better bike handling skills
than like any women in theamateur racing field in
California have.
(16:31):
Or you see an old woman goingriding her bicycle to the store,
you know, to get this enormousvat of mayonnaise, which she has
like strapped to the back of herrack, you know, on her bike.
All of their bikes fit themperfectly.
And you just know, you know,cause you notice like people
just on bikes, you know, ridingaround, whether it's like DUI
people or just people in theUnited States.
(16:52):
And like, everyone's riding abike.
It's not the right size forthem, you know?
And that's one thing you noticein Belgium is they're all, their
seat heights are all perfect andthey'll have absolute perfect
cycling form, you know?
And it just comes from acountry.
Oh my God.
Genetically in them.
Yeah.
There's a lot of genetics goingon.
The, the, the current, um, Well,he lost the world championship
(17:14):
to the Slovenian kid, but thecurrent great out there is a guy
named Mathieu van der Poel.
And his father was named Adrianvan der Poel, which is also the
name of our dog, Audrey.
And his mother, I don't rememberthe name of his mother, but it's
like literally like he's gotlike, he's like the grandson of
this one, like most famouscyclist that ever lived.
(17:37):
He's Dutch, but he grew up inBelgium.
And, like, his father.
And, like, it's the same, like,pattern that they look for in
racing horses.
Where they're like, this horseis going to win.
You know, he's got, like, thatheritage and that genetics.
And, you know, he's one of thestrongest guys in the world.
Wow.
That's amazing.
(17:58):
And it just comes from thistradition of, you know, Belgian
and Dutch families.
Yeah.
And the women, too.
Like, the fastest women in theworld are also from Belgium.
Oh, interesting.
So do they get it from theBelgian chocolate?
Super Viking powers.
There's something
SPEAKER_01 (18:16):
about that?
Can we eat
SPEAKER_00 (18:18):
that?
Well, and it's funny, too,because when I say it, it's like
football.
Like, even people who aresitting there, like, drinking,
like...
unbelievable amounts of beer atthese bike races and smoking
cigarettes.
They love to smoke.
You know, they're also hugecycling fans.
And some of our best friends inBelgium are not cyclists.
(18:38):
They're people that smoke thatwe met because we like to sit
outside and you know, ourfavorite like cafe and at the
same time as us.
And one day they sat next to usand they were like, what's your
story?
And we're like, oh, we'reAmerican.
And they were like, what?
What are you doing in this tinyvillage in Belgium?
You know, what was the villageyou were in?
It was called Flobeck.
(19:00):
And it has a local name.
The locals call it Flobiza.
Is that the one that's the homeof Eddie Burks?
Or is that a different...
No, Eddie Merckx is...
Actually, I'm not sure wherehe's from.
I think he might even be fromWallonia.
Is it Eddie Merckx or Burks, yousaid?
I should know that, and I'mgoing to bicycle hell for not
knowing the town.
(19:21):
What's his name?
Merckx or Burks?
Merckx.
Merckx with an M.
M-E-R-C-Y-X.
Oh, I was not that close.
Okay.
That sounds incredible.
But I do know that Greg LeMondlived in Kortryk, which is
pretty close to...
So is your travel very bikemotivated?
(19:45):
You want to go explore thisplace on a bike or that place on
a bike, or you just go explore?
And of course you can bring yourbikes just because that's what
you do.
No, well, it was a first, right?
I mean, we ended up hanging outlong enough in Belgium just to
realize that this part of theworld is like, this is where we
want to be.
This is where our hearts are.
This is home for us.
(20:06):
Oh, okay.
And then we ran into visaconstraints.
So initially I was there.
I was going to get a job workingfor the same company.
It would be an on-site job inPortugal, but it didn't work
out.
SPEAKER_01 (20:22):
Oh,
SPEAKER_00 (20:23):
okay.
And so when the companybasically confirmed like, no,
no, like we can't actuallysponsor your visa.
The plan had always been like,oh yeah, let's go live in
Portugal until we're EUcitizens.
And then we'll just go back toBelgium.
And then I'll be able to find ajob, no problem, because I'll be
an EU citizen and no one willhave to give me visa
sponsorship.
(20:43):
But that didn't work out.
And so I actually ended upeventually quitting my job.
What kind of work were youdoing?
I'm a supply chain operationsprocurement.
Oh, okay.
All right.
So it's not like...
Professional.
I was working in legaloperations.
Oh, okay.
Oyster.
She's very modest.
(21:03):
She's a pretty skilled job.
Yeah.
Yeah, she's very skilled.
Unbelievable.
Has done so much for so manyvery large companies and anyone
that ever gets her is extremelylucky.
I said, what would do and buildwas incredible.
The way her detail and what sheknows, unbelievable.
(21:24):
Awesome.
It was really impressive.
So she's very modest, but yes,she kicks butt.
Let's just say that.
Yes.
Yes.
So at that point, you know, wewere going to Portugal and we
just kept running into these.
We still have a European bankaccount that we can't really
access because like we've neverbeen able to get like the PIN
(21:45):
number working.
I mean, there's the bureaucracyand troubles of like not really
having an address that peoplecan send stuff to you is like
it's it's really a part of thestruggle of being a digital
nomad.
You know, a lot of places you'llstay, you won't be able to
receive packages or mail becauseyou're in like the back of
someone's apartment or you're insome weird building.
(22:06):
Oh, I never thought about that.
Okay.
Got to buy local then, I guess.
Yeah.
And when we lived in Andorra,nothing could get shipped to
you.
Nothing.
Because they would derail it andalways open it up for customs
purposes and try to see ifpeople were trying to get around
the rules of a tax haven bybringing in cheap goods without
(22:29):
paying the duties.
Can you tell me about Portugal?
Is it easy to become a citizenin Portugal?
That was your plan?
No.
Oh, okay.
Well, just not yet an EUcitizen.
I have a feeling that's going tohappen for sure.
The path to citizenship inPortugal that I had to take was
something that they call,sometimes they call it the
(22:50):
retirement visa.
But what it is, is that you haveto have an income separate from
It can't just be one lump sum ofmoney.
You have to have a recurringincome of not very much money,
only€850 a month.
And then if there's two of you,half of that.
So I think maybe it was€1,250 or€1,200.
(23:12):
I mean, they're close to thesame right now.
Euros are a little moreexpensive.
But you had to have that justkind of coming in.
So that's why so many people inPortugal are retired.
That's pretty easy.
And we were able to show that wehad that in terms of our rental
income.
net level yeah quite on thegross level and so we ran into
(23:34):
problems with our visa that wayand plus like it was all tied
into me doing this job that ijust i didn't really want to do
at that point you know i i'dtaken a job um a little a couple
notches lower than my capabilityum Because, you know, I thought
it would be worth it to live inEurope and get the opportunity,
(23:55):
but it didn't seem stable and itdidn't seem like something that
was going to be around for fiveyears.
And it just didn't seem like theright opportunity for me.
So, yeah.
So when I found out howincredibly difficult it was to
get the visa and spend all thattime in Portugal for a job I
didn't necessarily know that Ireally wanted, you know, to live
(24:16):
in a place that we didn't reallynecessarily want to live in.
I
SPEAKER_01 (24:18):
mean,
SPEAKER_00 (24:19):
not for a long period of time.
It just seemed to make sense toabandon that entire process.
And we did after we were prettyfar in.
I still have national tax IDsand bank accounts in Portugal.
Wow, that's crazy.
So did you spend some time inAndorra?
Yeah, so we thought that once weapplied for the visas in
(24:40):
Portugal, we'd be able to stayin Portugal.
I had like five people tell methat that was the case.
But...
And maybe it would have beenbetter not to ask the lawyers,
but the lawyers said that is notthe case.
You cannot take her.
And so we were getting ready tobe done with our three-month
period in the EU, which Portugalis part of.
(25:00):
And it was so confusing becausethey wanted you to have a house
with a lease to get the visa.
But how are you supposed to finda house or a lease to a place to
stay that you want to stay inunless you're allowed to stay
there and find a place to live.
Yeah.
Catch 22.
Airbnb and like rent a placethat way and then show that.
(25:22):
Sure.
But we'd already been in Belgiumfor a month and a half, you
know, buying the car and takingcare of other business.
Yeah.
Headed to Portugal.
And so it was around then werealized that we were going to
run out of our time at the endof August and there was just no
way this visa was going tohappen before then.
So that's when we went toAndorra.
UNKNOWN (25:42):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:43):
I'm looking at a map here.
How did you hear?
I can't believe I've never heardof this.
We've done France a coupletimes.
We've been in the south ofFrance.
We've done Europe.
We've done the Santiago.
I've never heard anyone mentionAndorra.
Or maybe I didn't realize it wasa country.
That's crazy.
I've heard of it, but I don'tknow much about it.
It's mostly like it's a huge skiresort.
(26:04):
It's like right between Franceand Spain.
It almost looks like it's on theborder between the two of them.
It is.
Yeah.
And is it France or is it Spain?
It's Andorra.
It's its own country.
SPEAKER_01 (26:17):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (26:18):
You know why?
Because as I look closer,there's a little circle, a tiny
little circle with an arrowright on Andorra.
So it is its own country.
So it's like Lake Tahoe is itsown country almost probably.
Kind of like a little ski resortarea.
No, this is a little bit morelike Guam, I would say.
(26:38):
Oh, okay.
And it's not part of the EU.
Oh, so you can go in the EU forthree months, but then you have
to leave and then come back.
And so you went to Andorra.
How long did you have to staythere for then?
Well, you can stay in Andorrafor up to 90 days, three months
as an American without a visa.
But the rules in Europe havechanged a little bit.
You have to go for longer thanthree months now when you leave
(27:00):
the EU before you can come backagain.
SPEAKER_01 (27:02):
Oh,
SPEAKER_00 (27:04):
okay.
And it's different in everycountry.
We kind of got different rulesin all the different places.
But we tried in general to notstay too long in a European
country.
We would have liked to havestayed longer in, say, Portugal.
We would have liked to staylonger in Croatia and Slovenia.
They were all part of the EU.
So we really were pushingagainst that time limit.
(27:25):
So we went to Andorra.
And the reason why we didn'tleave, why we left Andorra, was
not because we were in danger ofour visas expiring.
It's because the snow wascoming.
Oh, okay.
UNKNOWN (27:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (27:39):
And we were not there for a ski vacation.
And we lived at 7,500 feet.
It would basically be likebeing, you know, living at a ski
resort.
Oh, okay.
With that much snow.
Not so great for biking, eventhough I'm sure you guys would
bike in it.
Yeah, again, all the world'sworst roads were in Andorra.
(27:59):
Never saw a normal person on abicycle the whole time I was
there.
F.
SPEAKER_01 (28:05):
Really?
SPEAKER_00 (28:05):
Yeah, it was like August.
And yeah, everyone was therebetween the Tour de France and
the Vuelta to España, which forthe first time in like ever in
the last 80 years didn't go toAndorra.
I was so disappointed.
Oh, wow.
Yeah.
So which countries are the bestfor biking?
(28:25):
You know, I'm probably most ofthe listeners are not at the pro
racing level.
Is there...
big advantage is for the normallayperson to bike in specific
countries?
I would definitely recommend thenormal layperson ride a bicycle
in Belgium.
Okay.
Yeah.
The only reason why we alwayssaw pros out there is because it
was winter.
Okay.
In spring and summer, there'sjust vast hordes of like group
(28:47):
rides everywhere, like groups ofcyclists with 100, 200 people in
them just riding.
And they're on the roads or theydo like a lot of off-road, like
mountain biking?
They like mountain biking there,but they're also, the roads are
set up.
Every single road has a bikelane.
Oh, really?
Okay.
How about Slovenia?
That's my heritage.
I haven't been there yet.
I'm really dying to go.
Did you spend much time there?
(29:07):
No.
Oh, okay.
It's a beautiful campground thatwe stayed at.
Oh, it's a campground.
Okay.
Did you guys have like a van oryou actually camp camped?
We bought a cheap tent atDecathlon, which is like the
European REI.
Okay.
And we had our car and wepitched a tent.
Okay.
Awesome.
(29:29):
So you had a car throughoutEurope or did you train
somewhere?
We bought the car in Belgium.
We ran into a lot of red tape.
We managed to get it registeredeventually in Andorra.
Yeah.
Oh, wow.
And then what'd you do afteryour time was up?
So we left Andorra.
And at that point, you know, interms of the question of what
(29:49):
was driving us, I was justapplying for jobs at that point.
I, you know, I no longer had anyincome coming in.
SPEAKER_01 (29:56):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (29:58):
except for a little bit from our rental property.
So we just decided to live ascheaply as we could outside the
Europe in a place we could driveto.
So that's what led us to Bosnia.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
Yeah.
First we thought, you know, likewe were kind of joking about
Bosnia and we talked a lotabout, you know, Albania and
Montenegro, which are slightly,I think, places where tourists
(30:19):
go a little bit more frequently.
And, you know, we startedlooking at Bosnia and we found
this like amazing apartment for$500 a month.
And we were like, oh, let's justgo there and check it out.
And then we started seeing allthese, like, YouTube videos
about all these people who,like, clearly put absolutely
zero attention to politics.
Like, being like, this is thebest place ever.
(30:41):
Yay! This is our favorite newtourist destination.
Turbinia, Bosnia.
And it wasn't, you know, if youweren't a tourist that was there
in the summer, it was actually alittle hard living there.
Why is that?
Is it language or?
The language is difficult.
The culture there, people arenot naturally friendly.
(31:04):
Okay.
I mean, they're not really inthe Netherlands or Belgium
either, but if you're there forlong enough, they eventually,
you know, you can weasel yourway in once they figure out
you're not a tourist.
But, you know, we reallystruggled in Bosnia.
We spent most of our time inRepublic Srpska, which is the
Serbian section of Bosnia.
(31:25):
Okay.
We did go to Sarajevo.
There were just like smallthings about it not being part
of the EU that were verynoticeable.
I would say the big trash andthe trash, like the trash
everywhere.
And then the field dogs andcats.
I mean, anyone who's been toLatin America probably has a
little more experience withthose too.
(31:45):
It's very India-like almost.
Yeah, it's a little, it's prettyheartbreaking if you're a dog
person because the dogs are,they're not like, you know, in
America, like...
Or even in Portugal, like allthe stray dogs were like the
same breed, you know, and theywere just clearly some kind of
like super mutt, you know, thatis accustomed to living on the
(32:05):
streets.
Or, you know, in America,they're all pit bulls and stuff.
You know, they were really nicebreeds of dogs, you know, like
in many cases, like purebreddogs.
You're not used to seeing like agolden retriever living on the
street, you know.
Yeah.
Oh, wow.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Labradoodles.
(32:25):
Yeah, like friendly, beautifuldogs.
You know, big ones.
I mean, mostly big.
I didn't see many little ones.
Okay.
And the cats, too.
Cats were so friendly.
It was really hard to not takethem with us.
Oh, I can imagine.
I would want to.
And then also the pollution,too.
(32:45):
You know, everyone in Bosnia isdriving a 1984 Volkswagen with a
diesel engine.
And even though we were on theMediterranean, sometimes, I
mean, it usually wasn't thatbad, but sometimes it could be
really, really bad.
The further you go into themountains, which is the entire
country, the more the pollutionhangs in the valleys.
I mean, it smells like sulfur.
(33:06):
Okay.
It's bad.
It's really bad.
It's like something that youdon't ever smell in America.
Okay.
What about Croatia?
Croatia was gorgeous.
Okay.
Part of the EU.
We could ride our bicycles wherewe lived in Bosnia.
We could ride our bicycles tothe border of Croatia.
We could see the Adriatic Seaand Dubrovnik and have coffee
(33:28):
looking at the ocean.
Oh, nice.
We didn't actually ride ourbikes through customs that much
because every now and then theygive you a hard time and wanted
to see a passport and we didn'twant to burn any days in the EU.
Oh, I see.
Oh, smart.
Okay.
You're not in there if yourpassport's not stamped.
(33:48):
Oh, okay.
Very good.
And from then we went toMontenegro.
Oh, yeah.
I don't really think, butthat's, is that kind of near
Croatia?
Yeah.
Yeah.
It needs to do it.
Also a former Yugoslav.
Right.
Yeah.
I'm Yugoslavian by descent.
And so now it's like, I thinkwe're mainly from Slovenia, but
(34:09):
you know, there's Croatia andwhat else did you say it was?
The Serbs.
The Serbs, yeah.
Yeah.
The Serbs live in a lot ofdifferent countries.
Like Montenegrins, they'reethnically Serbs.
UNKNOWN (34:23):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (34:24):
And of course, Serbia is mostly Serbs.
And then Croatia is mostlyCroatians because they kicked
out or killed all the Serbs.
Oh, okay.
Then all the Serbs in Bosniahave been killing the Bosniaks
who are the Bosnian Muslims.
Okay.
He's joined in that as well.
I need to read some history.
It got pretty ugly.
And you can really tell.
(34:45):
Like, I spent only a couple daysin Belgrade, in Serbia.
And Serbia itself is not a placewhere, you know, people hold on
to the past.
I think it's really, you know,it's a pretty modern, pretty
friendly place.
That's not the feeling you getnecessarily all the time.
(35:07):
When you're in Bosnia, youreally feel the tensions, the
ethnic tensions still betweenthe groups.
Oh, okay.
Wow.
So, did you...
Oh, sorry.
Go ahead.
I was just going to say, I thinkMontenegro, if I'm remembering
correctly, was one of yourfavorites.
Yeah.
(35:27):
Yeah, we did love it.
We lived in Sotinje.
And actually, this is crazy.
A week after we left, there waslike a mass killing with a gun
in Satinia.
This is like a tiny village.
We were like, we could notbelieve it when we read it in
the news.
Did they say why?
He was some ex-army guy.
Wow, so not just in America,huh?
(35:49):
I was going to say, was he incahoots with the guy from...
What, in front of the TrumpTower with the...
No.
And then in the New Orleans?
Maybe there was a trifecta orsomething going on.
It was an isolated incident.
I didn't even know that theywere allowed to have guns in
Montenegro.
I mean, I never saw any.
Yeah, maybe they weren't.
(36:10):
How long were you in Montenegrofor then?
We were there for a month and acouple months.
Oh, wow.
We would have stayed longer,except we decided that...
Things were kind of coming to ahead with my job applications.
I decided that we should move onto Ukraine if we truly wanted to
volunteer in Ukraine before Iwas going to end up having to
start working for a company.
Wow.
(36:31):
What kind of volunteer work didyou do?
Well, I never made it.
I got arrested on thePolish-Ukrainian border by the
Polish police.
What was that?
I got arrested at thePoland-Ukrainian border by the
Polish police.
because I did not have aninternational driver's permit,
which I had no idea I needed,which had not come up for
(36:55):
driving this time.
What did that look like?
What happened?
The police were really nice.
Even they thought it was ashakedown.
A bunch of the women on thepolice force kept riding in the
back with me in the car, so Iwouldn't feel like I was getting
arrested.
Oh, gosh.
That's my other half.
I'm Polish.
(37:17):
Oh, yeah.
Well, in fact, my husband'sstill there.
He's not going to Ukraine untilhe's going to Ukraine on Sunday.
Because when I came to America,I got him his international
driver's permit, which is the BScardboard permit.
document with like a poorlytrimmed passport photo taped to
it.
I mean, it's so ridiculous that,I mean, there's no like, there's
(37:39):
nothing behind it.
Oh my gosh.
That's hilarious.
You get from AAA.
Oh, I think I've heard aboutthat before.
Yeah.
It costs 20 bucks, 12 if youget, let them take your passport
photos.
Okay.
So any big consequence ofgetting arrested?
You just, they like slapped yourwrist?
interrogation for my punishment.
(38:00):
And I was like kind of gigglingat the police's English, you
know, and they were justkidding.
Now we will conduct yourinterrogation for your
punishment.
And then I actually saw thedocument and it really said on
it.
She was reading it?
They gave me an English copy,English version of this
document.
It's great.
I'm going to frame it.
That is an awesome story.
(38:21):
That's so cool.
I mean, I'm sure you're a littlenervous at the time, but.
I had to write a letter to thejudge.
They're either going to give mea fine.
Actually, I haven't gotten theletter back yet.
They're either going to give mea fine or they're going to ban
me from driving in Poland forsix months or some combination
thereof, or they could throw thewhole thing out.
(38:42):
And they didn't even know if Ihad to, like, I was trying to
figure out if I had to go tocourt.
And they're like, well, we'venever really done this before,
so we don't know.
Yeah.
Someone just on a whim decidedto press you.
Yeah, just on a whim.
It wasn't really the police'sfault.
As soon as the charges had beenclear that I was driving without
(39:05):
an irrational driver's permit inPoland, I guess the police had
no choice.
So then we stuck in Poland overChristmas.
Oh, my goodness.
Oh, just like a month ago?
Yeah, I just got back.
Oh, you just got back?
Oh, my gosh.
She's here just interviewing,and then she's, are you going to
go back?
It all depends.
(39:26):
Yeah.
Yeah, so if I don't get a job,I'm going to go back to Europe
and join him, and we'll getanother three months in Belgium.
Keep applying for places.
And if I do get a job, thenhopefully it's a remote job, and
I'll be able to go over thereand hang out with him and work.
But if I get a job that's not aremote job, then I'll probably
(39:48):
just go out there for a coupleof weeks, take vacation and help
them move, move home.
And we'll be moving somewhere inthe United States.
Okay.
Very open ended right now.
Oh, that's so exciting.
I love that.
So living in Belgium, do yourent then by the month?
How do you like, how do you doyour housing?
So we boarded with a family.
(40:11):
Oh, okay.
For a significant time we werethere and we paid by the month.
Okay.
And Airbnb is hard to find inthe villages there and it's kind
of expensive.
Okay.
Short-term leases tend to belike three to six months.
Right.
Those are in Brussels and theytend to be for like, you know,
diplomats and people working forthe government.
(40:32):
Okay.
Those are very accessible inBrussels, but in the village,
it's hard to find places.
You might have to find like aoverly expensive Airbnb until
you kind of meet people andfigure out.
Okay.
You got to get the lay of theland.
Someone knows someone.
Exactly.
Once you start meeting people,you know, they're like, oh, my
parents are renting out thishouse, you know.
(40:54):
Okay.
And they would never do Airbnb.
Yeah.
Okay.
And then as far as like tryingto find a remote job, our
audience might be interested inthis.
So are there certain remote jobsthat, yeah, they're remote, but
no, as long as you're in theUnited States, are there certain
remote jobs that only will letyou be remote internationally?
Um, so I am technically anAmerican working in America with
(41:18):
an American tax address, whichis here in Nevada.
It's a UPS store.
And so therefore I can, when Iwork remotely, I can only go to
Europe for within those sameconstraints, three months at a
time.
Okay.
To do, to work somewhere whereyou can live longer than that,
you have to obtain, um, you haveto obtain a visa.
(41:39):
No, no.
I was thinking, I'm wondering ifthe, the employee visa, cares if
you're in the United States orif they're worried about like
security and on the internet ina different country?
That's a good question.
Usually what they care about aretaxes and taxes and breaking
visa regulations, which is why Iwent there.
(42:01):
But I think most companies haveadvanced VPNs.
Oh, okay.
As long as you can get on that.
And they wrap up the security.
Yeah.
Okay, that makes sense.
In fact, for me, having the VPNmade it really difficult to do
things like basically doanything online when I was in
Montenegro or Bosnia.
I kept on getting like, yourbank does not, you know, allow
(42:23):
this location.
Oh, right.
Because you're, yeah, it sayslike you're in America and
they're like, why wouldAmericans be hacking into our
accounts here?
All companies are going to wantto make sure that you've got all
of the VPNs and the two-factorauthentication on anything
you're using for work for yourmobile devices.
SPEAKER_01 (42:41):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (42:42):
Got it.
For sure.
SPEAKER_01 (42:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (42:45):
How was it with the internet and trying to work and,
you know, if it was tricky ornot tricky?
It was tricky.
And I'm sure it's like, well, Iguess I'm just not going to be
able to work here for a coupledays or a week or a month or
something like that.
It was tricky.
There were a couple of placesthat said they had internet and
(43:05):
they didn't.
And so what I had to do was inboth locations, I was able to
find a co-working space thatwasn't more than like 40 minutes
away, drive away.
And so that's what I always did.
Yeah, it was really hard inplaces in Portugal.
Oh, okay.
(43:26):
I have Portugal's like digitalnomad haven.
Well, because of that, therewere a lot of co-working places.
You know, if you were anywherenear a big city, which again, if
you're willing to drive 45minutes, it's a small country.
Yeah.
So you can find those places.
Every time it rained really hardin Montenegro, which was pretty
much all the time we were there.
(43:47):
Like the sun would come out liketwice a week.
We'd be like, get on your bikes,go, go, go.
We'd lose power and like not beable to get into our apartment
building and like our...
You know, our Airbnb host waslike, no, no, no, it runs on
battery.
It still lets you in when poweris out.
We're like, we're telling youthat we can't get into our own
apartment building.
(44:08):
That was kind of stressful.
And I had a whole bunch ofinterviews, you know, and it
would always be like, oh my God,is it going to rain?
Is it not going to rain?
And the rain, I mean, like youcouldn't, like one of them I had
to reschedule.
I had to reschedule an interviewbecause the rain was so bad that
I couldn't even drive.
I couldn't even drive on thehighway.
There was standing water thatwas feet deep everywhere.
(44:31):
The rain was insane.
I guess that's just winterweather for the Mediterranean.
What do you call that?
The Dalmatian coast?
Because Montenegro is next toCroatia, so it's like the next
little loop in the coastlinethere.
But I was not expecting that atall.
UNKNOWN (44:52):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (44:52):
Absolutely.
It is really stressful.
It's really stressful whenyou're somewhere and you can't
work and you need to be working.
Yes.
That's why I'm always like, do Iwant to try to work remotely?
I'm like, I'm thinking maybemore.
I'm going to try to get myselfset up so I can take three
months off at a time or evenjust a month off and then go
somewhere, come back and thenplan another trip for one or two
(45:14):
months.
Especially in Asia, I think withthe time difference and
everything, I definitely think Iwant to just take a break and
rather than trying to workremotely.
Well, and even when I wasn'tworking, I teach English to
Ukrainians online.
Oh, okay.
And so I always felt like therewas always something I needed to
do and needed to be online for,whether it was like networking
(45:35):
calls or webinars or teachingEnglish or job interviews.
I never really felt like I couldtruly be off the grid.
SPEAKER_01 (45:43):
Yeah,
SPEAKER_00 (45:44):
I could see that.
It does make it stressful.
Yeah.
How did you get the teachingjobs in English?
That sounds kind of fun.
We were looking at all thevolunteering in Ukraine.
I think that's the name of thewebsite.
Although my husband, he'svolunteering with the Ukrainian
Bicycle Project, which actuallyhe found through a different
route online.
He just sent him an email andwas like, hey, I'm a bike
(46:04):
mechanic.
Can I help you build bikes?
They're like, yes.
Because volunteering in Ukraine,it had all kinds of options and
some of them were remote.
And that's how I found it.
And I signed up and I gottrained and I love it.
I have three students.
They're all women in their 40s.
I have an economist, a computerscience teacher and an attorney.
(46:26):
And they're learning English sothey can find a job outside
Ukraine as refugees.
Wow.
Oh, my gosh.
Good for you.
That's awesome.
It's amazingly more helpful thanI thought it would be, you know,
to help them.
That's very neat.
That's incredible.
What would you say are yourthree favorite places and why?
(46:48):
My first favorite place isBelgium.
My second favorite place isMontenegro.
And my third favorite place isPoland.
Is Poland?
Yeah.
What was your three favoritefoods?
There's a food that they eat in,we call it Serbia land.
Because, you know, it doesn'treally matter what country
(47:09):
you're in.
Like the ethnicity of a lot ofthese same people are Serbs.
They have something called Ivar,which is ground bell peppers and
eggplant.
And sometimes they put spicypeppers in it.
And it is just absolutely.
How do you spell that?
In the Romantic alphabet.
Or just like Ivar, like withVictor, the I-V-A-R?
(47:31):
V-A-J-V-A-R.
UNKNOWN (47:34):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (47:35):
Okay, that sounds right.
Ground peppers and eggplant.
That sounds like something Iwould love.
I've never heard of that before.
So incredible.
And then, you know, just all thelittle farmer's markets in
Montenegro, like the littlevegetable mongers, there was
like, you know, like one of themevery city block, basically,
just with like all these amazingfresh vegetables.
(47:55):
The peppers, especially in thatpart of the world, were just
incredible.
Yeah.
Mild?
And spicy, the whole gamut.
Okay.
Yep, everything in between.
And, of course, you could get,like, persimmons for, like, you
know, pennies, you know, for,like, a massive, huge bag of
them.
Those are so good.
I love those.
(48:16):
And then I really like theSpanish food.
I love any place.
And Portuguese, too.
I love any place where you sitdown and they give you a bowl of
olives, you know, as soon as yousit down.
SPEAKER_01 (48:25):
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00 (48:27):
And I really, really like the fish that they have in
Portugal.
Yeah.
The famous fish dishes.
I know that that whole region ofthe world is famous for like
their Iberian ham.
And I certainly ate a lot ofthat stuff, like all their
smoked sausage and everything.
We lived in Andorra.
But, you know, we really startedto just crave like fresh food,
(48:47):
you know, amazing fresh fish.
SPEAKER_01 (48:51):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (48:51):
All of them are incredible.
They just came off someone'stree.
And then also, you know, Thething I love the most about
Europe, and it doesn't matterwhere you go in Europe, you're
going to find it, is just thebread.
Oh, okay.
So good.
And I don't mean the whitebread.
I mean like the brown, wholegrain bread.
Uh-huh.
(49:12):
So fresh.
So fresh.
And it's cheap.
And what was your favoritedessert from what country?
If you had to pick one dessert,what would that be?
Oh.
That's a tough one because Idon't eat a lot of dessert.
I usually have to choose betweendessert and beer.
(49:33):
What's your favorite beer then?
What was your favorite beer ifyou had to pick one?
Oh, well, you know, I'm a hugedevotee.
My Belgian friends would scoffat me, but I think Leffe, the
Belgian beer, which is one ofthe few kinds you can get over
here in the United States.
And we actually found some inlike a French store.
grocery store at Andorra.
We were so happy.
You know, it was like Spanish,Portuguese, Italian beer.
(49:56):
It's all like very light, youknow, beer.
It's all really light.
And so we're really happy everytime we can find a left.
And I also had a rule that Icouldn't drink any Belgian beer
where I hadn't been to theactual town, usually the
cathedral and been to left.
My second one was Iname,E-N-A-M-E, which was also a
cathedral town.
And that was from Flanderswhere, where we lived.
UNKNOWN (50:18):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (50:19):
Oh, sounds good.
It's all the same.
It's all Belgian blondes.
You know, it's all very strong,like 6.6.
Yeah.
It's all so, so, so good.
And then I just, I love theBelgian chocolate too.
Coffee or tea?
Nini coffee?
Coffee.
Coffee.
Nice.
That's awesome.
(50:39):
Well, thank you so much,Marianne.
This was so much fun.
Oh, my gosh.
We could talk forever.
I have so many questions.
I mean, it just opens yourpeople who are listening's mind
of just a different type ofadventure because a lot of
people will talk about onecountry, but someone who's
actually really doing it, whichI want to do as well, along with
(51:01):
taking you backpacking,obviously.
It's happening.
Oh, it will happen.
I'll have to tell my newemployers, you know, like, look,
I got a problem with August, youknow.
Exactly.
For sure.
But thank you so much, Marianne,for just this wonderful
discussion about your adventuresand exploring with you, your
(51:21):
husband, your dog, and yourbikes, right?
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
I'm honored that you'reinterested in my stories.
Yes, for sure.
Well, have a great weekend, andI'm sure we'll be talking very
soon.
Nice to meet you, Marianne.
Take care.
SPEAKER_01 (51:37):
Bye.
Bye.
SPEAKER_00 (51:38):
Thanks for listening.
If you enjoyed the podcast, Canyou please take a second and do
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