The Thoughtful Travel Podcast

Amanda is constantly amazed how creative and inspired she feels while she's travelling - without even trying, the creativity just seems to well up in her and pour out. The best bit is, it turns out she's not alone. In Episode 52 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast, Amanda starts by chatting with Brooke McAlary about her experience of creativity when she’s on the road. Amanda was expecting her to cite her beloved mountains as a source of inspiration but in fact, the main reason travel sparks her creativity is something quite the opposite. Amanda then chats with Australian novelist Sarah Ridout who has many wise words to say about the creativity that travel seems to encourage - whether that’s creativity to write or to draw or something else entirely. Finally, Natasha Lester speaks about how her creativity process fits with travel when she’s researching her historical fiction novels, and we chat about refilling your creative tank. Links: Giveaway of Sarah’s novel Le Chateau Brooke’s Slow Your Home website Brook

Everyone has experienced culture shock on their travels, but what about reverse culture shock? When Amanda returned back to Australia after six years living in Asia and Europe, reverse culture shock hit her badly, and she's definitely not alone: Episode 51 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast includes chats with three other travellers who’ve had the same experience. 
First up, Amanda chats with Cait Flanders, who suffered from some reverse culture shock after returning to her hometown in Canada after a two-month American road trip. Mike Campbell and his family spent a year housesitting their away around the United States before returning to Australia, and his reverse culture shock is proving life-changing. Amanda's final guest is Matt Treglia and his experience of reverse culture shock is scarily similar to hers. Issues like having nobody who wants to hear about his travels and finding it really hard to fit back into everyday life are common to many of us who’ve spent an extended time abroad. Links: Cait Fland

Sitting in sunny Perth, Western Australia, makes cold weather or illness seem far from Amanda's mind, but they still happen to us on our travels and we still get through it! In Episode 50 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast, Amanda chats with three guests about experiences of adverse weather and health on their travels and it turns out that these generally make for some good stories. First up, Amanda chats with fellow Aussie Brooke McAlary about what they’ve learnt about experiencing really cold weather over the years. When you grow up in a warm country, you’ve got a lot to learn! Jeff Sandquist had a somewhat scary health issue in a plane on the way to Iceland, but they chat about how he made the most of that and about other travels in Scandinavia, too. Martin Bailey was visiting the very other end of the world when he began to have symptoms of what turned out to be a brain tumour on an Antarctic expedition, and they chat about how he dealt with this issue and his recommendations for other travellers. Links:

History can really come alive when you travel to the place where it happened. Episode 49 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast is all about understanding history through travel, and Amanda talks with three history-lovers who have had great experiences learning about history while they travel. Zoë Dawes inherited a love of history from her father, and today when she travels she is always on the lookout for an opportunity to explore some interesting aspects of her destination’s history. Historical novelist Kate Forsyth has a clear need to travel to learn more about the history of the places she sets her books in, and describes her experiences in Venice as a great example. Finally, novelist Sarah Ridout also explains how her experiences living in historically significant places have shaped both her knowledge and how she writes her novels. Links: Zoë’s website The Quirky Traveller - http://www.thequirkytraveller.com Zoë on Twitter - http://www.twitter.com/quirkytraveller Zoë on Instagram - http://www.instagram.com/

It’s been a whole year since The Thoughtful Travel Podcast launched and it has been an immensely fun and rewarding time! Episode 48 is the Grateful Anniversary Episode and Amanda starts off giving plenty of thank yous out to many people connected to this podcast, including Brooke and the fantastic Jackrabbit FM team, the dear old friends who agreed to be interviewed for the show before it even started, and above all, you amazing listeners who leave great reviews and chat with Amanda in the Thoughtful Travellers Facebook group and make all the work worthwhile. Amanda's guests today are all people she has only met because she started The Thoughtful Travel Podcast - and she's so grateful to have got to know all these new friends. First up, Hayden Lee of the Travel Stories Podcast has a great tale to tell about choosing a fork in the road in Vietnam. Amanda then chats with Matt Treglia from Words With Winos about how he made the mammoth decision to give up a conventional career path and travel long-term. Finally

Loathe tours? Amanda knows many thoughtful travellers recoil at the thought of a month-long bus tour of Europe, but there is a time and place for shorter, smaller tours and that’s the topic of Episode 47 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast. First up, novelist Natasha Lester tells tales of the amazing private tours she took through Paris, helping her to research the history of fashion in a way that Google could never do. Another Australian novelist, Rachael Johns, then chats with Amanda about the pros and cons of taking small tours - and gives some great examples of being a tourist in your own town too by joining some local tourist guide experiences. Finally, Emma Mann talks with Amanda about how she’s leaning more towards joining small group tours when she travels solo, largely because it’s a great way to meet some like-minded fellow travellers, and Amanda is all for that! Links: Natasha Lester’s website - http://www.natashalester.com.au/ Natasha’s novel A Kiss from Mr Fitzgerald - http://amzn.to/2kpLuVt Nata

Travelling is a great way to make friends; travelling to meet up with online friends in the real world is another great reason to travel. In Episode 46 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast, Amanda chats with three travellers who have tales to tell about the friends they meet up with around the world. First up, Cait Flanders describes the road trip she went on through the United States which include a large serving of meeting up with people she’d previously only known online - all with great success. After Cait, Amanda speaks with Serena Star-Leonard who has had similarly positive experiences traveling to meet up with people she has first connected with online. Amanda also chats with Emma Mann who describes friends she has made in the real world first while travelling - but of course, the online world makes it possible to keep in touch with them and continue those friendships. Links: Cait Flanders’ website Cait’s Budgets and Cents podcast Serena Star-Leonard’s Retire in 12 Months project Travel Kids Club Emma M

Getting out into nature is a common reason for people to go travelling but everyone chooses to experience nature in their own preferred, different ways. In Episode 45 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast, Amanda chats with three travellers about their experiences with nature and they vary widely. First up, Sarah Ridout explains the amazing Australian outback of Uluru and the national park of Kakadu - places that are completely unique in the world, and she thinks (Amanda agrees) every visitor to Australia should take the chance to see. Brooke McAlary, on the other hand, is all about the mountains. She’s having a love affair with the Canadian Rockies and makes mountain life - and even snow life - sound mighty enticing! Finally, Amanda chats with Zoë Dawes about two phenomenal experiences she has had with wildlife. These are such inspiring tales and have made Amanda go straight online to start looking up how to have similar experiences herself! Links: Sarah Ridout’s website  Sarah’s novel Le Chateau - hard copy

Slow travel is easily one of Amanda's favourite topics - taking your time when you travel instead of rushing around to see all the sights as fast as possible is a much more satisfying way to experience a new place, she thinks. In Episode 44 Amanda chats with three like-minded guests, starting with Brooke McAlary who, as the creator of the Slow Your Home blog and the Slow Home Podcast certainly knows a lot about slowing down, and shares some great thoughts about slow travel. Matt Treglia, Amanda's second guest, is a younger traveller but a smart one: right from the beginning, he had a sixth sense that slow travel is the way to go and Amanda thinks he and his girlfriend are really doing it right. Amanda's final guest in this episode is Cait Flanders and we chat about her plans to spend a couple of months based in one place, getting to know it as the locals do. Links: Brooke’s Slow Your Home website - http://slowyourhome.com/ Brooke’s Slow Home Podcast - https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/the-slow-home-podc

Have you ever read a novel set in a foreign place and wondered just how the author knew how to describe everything in this place? Chances are they took a trip there as part of their research and in Episode 43 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast, Amanda chats with three novelists who have done just that. Natasha Lester is a fellow Perth-ite who writes historical fiction set in such wondrous places as New York City and Paris, and we chat about her experiences of travelling to these cities to do research for her novels. Amanda also chats with Kate Forsyth, author of over 40 novels and veteran of many research trips to places like Venice, Scotland and the south of France, and she surprises Amanda with which part of the writing process she’s at when she takes her research trips. Finally, Sarah Ridout speaks of the wonders of living abroad and how that inspires her writing, and they chat about the many benefits of living outside your own country, for your life in general as well as your novel-writing! Links: Natas

Great Travel Souvenirs What do you bring back from a trip besides photographs and stories? I talked with three Australian travellers about their favourite souvenirs and how important they are as a means for remembering travel experiences. Sarah Ridout lived abroad in France, England and Ireland for over a decade before returning to Australia, and she collected a very smart kind of souvenir so that she’s constantly reminded of those experiences. Following Sarah, I chat with Julie Jones who explained that the kinds of souvenirs she and her family bring home from a trip have changed over the years. Holly Galbraith then chats with me about her aim to have ethically sourced souvenirs from her travels. Links: Sarah Ridout’s website - http://www.sarahridout.com.au Sarah’s novel Le Chateau - hard copy (in Australia) - http://www.booktopia.com.au/le-chateau-sarah-ridout/prod9781760404413.html  Le Chateau in Kindle version - http://amzn.to/2kN8NHF Julie’s blog Have Wheelchair Will Travel - http://havewheelchairwillt

Travelling to countries with different customs and cultures from your own can induce varying kinds of culture shock, and Episode 41 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast looks at a few examples of culture shock across Asia and the Middle East.  Amanda begins by speaking to Matt Treglia about some of his very first travel experiences abroad, and especially the terror that came with trying to cross a busy road in Thailand, and his new-found love of the fact that most places outside of his home country of the United States don’t expect you to tip people! Following Matt, Amanda talks to Diana Edelman more about the cultural differences in Thailand and the various customs Diana had to get used to when she moved to Thailand. There is a lot to learn, and the Thai people don’t want you to lose face by telling you about the mistakes you make, so it’s a tricky road to navigate. Emma Mann then talks to Amanda about the unease she felt travelling as a young woman in the Middle East, when it was made clear to her that she s

Amanda is always looking for great reasons to persuade others to travel more and Episode 40 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast provides quite a few of those. Amanda chats with three guests who each have had interesting experiences teaching them something important on their travels Jeff Ryan, who in previous episodes has taught us the dangers of porcupines eating the rubber parts of your car, returns to chat about how travel can teach us a much more open mindset. Following Jeff, Amanda chats with Chris Christensen who has already learnt that anything bad that happens on your travels is just a good story and not worth otherwise remembering, and he shares a great story about having trouble finding room at the inn when his children were young. Finally, Amanda gets very philosophical with Jeff Sandquist who went on a road trip and figured out some enormous changes he needed to make to his life. Links: Jeff Ryan’s author website Jeff’s book, Appalachian Odyssey Chris Christensen’s site Amateur Traveler Chris’s Am

It’s 2017, everyone’s making plans for a new year, and it’s time to talk about one of the things that sometimes stops up making travel plans: fear. In Episode 39 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast Amanda talks with two great travellers who have had various worries before they’ve embarked on big trips, but they did it anyway, and of course are glad they did. First up, she speaks with Cait Flanders who spent a couple of months on a solo road trip throughout North America last year. She confesses she was freaking out before she left … but of course, everything turned out fine and she learned a lot along the way. Serena Star-Leonard is a traveller Amanda really admires for her seemingly fearless trips to all corners of the globe, and into sometimes challenging situations, but she confesses, too, that she’s not as confident as Amanda might have expected. Links: Cait Flanders’ website Cait’s Budgets and Cents podcast Serena Star-Leonard’s Retire in 12 Months project Travel Kids Club Join our Facebook group  Tweet

Episode 38 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast is the final episode for 2016 so Amanda is talking about New Year’s Eve Travels. Celebrating a new year is fun wherever you are but being somewhere away from home can make it even more exciting and memorable. First up, Kim-Ling of Travel-Ling has a great story to tell about a New Year’s Eve she spent on the island of Ibiza. Let’s just say it’s probably not quite the story you’re expecting to hear! Following Ling, Di Bortoletto of Travelletto talks about a great New Year’s Eve she spent in Tasmania recently. To finish the year, Amanda shares some of the travel resolutions and goals from listeners who are in the Thoughtful Travellers Facebook group - some of their planned trips might make you feel a little envious! Links: Dianne Bortoletto of Travelletto Kim-Ling of Travel-Ling Thoughtful Travellers Facebook group Tweet me @amandakendle Hashtag #thoughtfultravelpod Follow me on Facebook See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Merry Christmas! With Christmas just around the corner, Episode 37 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast turns to travelling at Christmas time and Amanda chats with several travellers who have spent Christmas in far flung parts of the world. First up is Annalicia Lynn who had an interesting Christmas in Taiwan while she was teaching English there. Amanda and Annalicia chat about the cultural differences between many Asian countries and English-speaking nations and she has a very sweet story about how her Taiwanese colleagues tried to create a Christmas atmosphere in the workplace. Emma Mann has recently started a tradition of spending Christmas abroad, and she talks about the difference between spending Christmas in another country where the traditions are strong, versus a place where Christmas generally isn’t celebrated. Finally, Joe Baur from the Without a Path podcast chats about his current experience living in Germany at Christmas time - one of my favourite places to be during this season! Links: Annalici

It’s all about Japan in Episode 36 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast. It’s rare that Amanda chats about a single destination but she's made an exception for Japan, because a bunch of my guests have talked about it and she's just come back from a fabulous week exploring one of her favourite countries in the world. Photographer Martin Bailey moved to Japan 25 years ago to work in a lace factory and has now lived there most of his adult life. He has lots of wisdom to important about all things Japanese and yet they end up talking about toilets! Aggie Lim joins Amanda next to speak about issues of nudity. For a very modest society, Japan is very forward when it comes to bathing with strangers and we Aussies have a hard time adjusting to the onsen way of life. Finally, Joe Baur reminds Amanda of some of the challenges of getting by in Japan without fluent Japanese and we also chat about the amazing transport system. Links: Martin Bailey Martin’s photography tours and workshops God in the Toilet on Wikipedia God

In Episode 35 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast Amanda has a lot of fun chatting about the magic of making friends while you travel. There are so many bonuses of travel they don’t advertise in the brochures and developing friendships with people from all around the world is certainly one of them. Julie Jones joins Amanda to chat about the lifelong friendships she has formed while travelling and they muse on just why it seems easier to make friends when they’re away from home. After Julie, Amanda chats with Holly Galbraith about her many experiences of both making new friends and enhancing existing friendships through her travels. Finally, one of Amanda's all-time favourite guests Jeff Ryan talks about a different kind of friend he made while travelling. You’ll have to listen to find out what “different” means! Links: Julie’s blog Have Wheelchair Will Travel  Have Wheelchair Will Travel Facebook community Holly Galbraith’s website Holly’s Tourism Upgrade podcast Jeff Ryan’s author website Jeff’s book, Appala

Stereotypes of people by nationality are rife in the world, and come up all the time when we travel. In Episode 34 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast, Amanda chats with three people of different nationalities about their experiences with stereotypes on their travels. Jeremy Kloberdanz of The Life Bohemian has an interesting story to tell about an immigrant man he and his wife met while travelling around Italy; a man who wasn’t what he seemed. Lola Akinmade Åkerström, a Nigerian travel photographer living and working in Sweden, has a lot to say about pushing back against stereotypes and has a lot of wisdom to impart about sharing your own culture with others as well as learning about theirs. New Zealander Tom Parson of The Lego Backpacker also has some wise words about stereotypes and speaks about his experiences when working in China in the management of a furniture design factory. Links: Episode 4 on Smashing Stereotypes. Jeremy and Katie Kloberdanz of The Life Bohemian website The Life Bohemian Podcast Lo

You might just be able to get the best of both worlds by travelling around the world and helping people by volunteering. It’s not always that simple, but in Episode 33 of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast Amanda talks with three guests who have volunteered across several continents with a huge variety of organisations. First up, she chats with Serena Star-Leonard who started off a project to create videos of great projects in a school in the slums in northern Colombia - in a place where most taxi drivers refused to take them. Working with animals instead of kids, Amanda then talks to Diana Edelman who spent several years helping out at Elephant Nature Park in Thailand, a place that now gratefully accepts volunteers for short or long stints and does amazing work helping elephants. Finally, Amanda moves to agriculture with Audrey Wanders and her discussion of WWOOFing around the world and her experience of volunteering on organic farms, and wanting to do more. Links: Thoughtful Travellers Facebook Group Serena