Blog Archives
When I First Started Travelling
Managing the Bucket List: Vol I follows your post-retirement “Travel Big Year” across glaciers, cathedrals, rainforests, pilgrimage routes, and historic cities as you discover that bucket-list travel is about letting the world revise how we understand it. Why was this an important book for you to write?
When I first started traveling, I didn’t envision a book but by the third trip, Italy, I realized that the trips are very informative and I wanted to capture the information and experience, so I started a journal. I left space to write about the previous two trips from memory. Within one or two of the next trips, I decided that an overview of the trip and my perspective may be something that book readers would be interested in. So, I really started thinking about how to structure the book to be most readable and effective. Although at first, it was about a book for the first year, I quickly realized that I would pursue multiple travel years and therefore multiple books. Specifically, why is it important for me to write? Because I feel that my background adds a certain comprehensive lens to my knowledge gained and experience encountered that can help others to understand the world better, people and environment.
Of all the places you visited in this volume, which destination changed your perspective the most, and why?
That is a tough question because I learned many new things with every trip and location. But if I have to pick one, I think that the trips to Patagonia and Alaska to see the glaciers really conveyed the effects of climate change. Seeing firsthand how far Mendenhall Galcier had receded in Alaska. Most of the glaciers in Patagonia had also significantly receded except for Perito Moreno Glacier in Los Glaciares National Park in Argentina which is growing. Everyone hears about the impact of climate change on the environment. However, when one sees the impacts in nature’s setting, there is an emotional connection that is difficult to encounter when reading about or viewing on television. Documentaries do a great job of providing the information, but the emotional connection requires seeing first-hand.
How has visiting UNESCO sites, religious landmarks, and natural wonders affected the way you think about preservation and global responsibility?
I have become much more appreciative of the efforts that have been made to preserve history whether man-made or nature-made through UNESCO recognition, cultural or religious landmarks, and natural wonders. In some cases, these sites are hidden pieces to understanding a historical evolution that can shed light on potential future challenges. In other words, understanding our past can help us to be better prepared for our future. Once these treasures are gone, they are gone forever. Bamiyan comes to mind and the Buddhist statues destroyed by the Taliban during their first reign in Afghanistan. Having spent time in Iraq too, war-torn countries have lost many of these historic sites over centuries, but hopefully there are means to protect what is left. Iraq has so much history with the iconic city of Babylon in its borders. It would be a travesty for any ruins left to be destroyed by twenty-first century war.
What advice would you give to retirees or lifelong learners who want to create a meaningful bucket list but feel overwhelmed by the planning?
First, put a little effort into thinking about where one would like to go and what one would like to do. For some people that might be easy because they have acquired insight for some period of time on preparing a bucket list. They may have been building that list since their early twenties of the places and activities they want to do when they finally have the time. For others, do a little research. Quite a bit of my list has been from friends that have described places and activities that they have done. One friend’s parents traveled the continental United States visiting national parks largely staying in a tent after they retired. Through their experience, she built her own list, accomplishing some with her children while they were growing up. I feel like I missed the boat not doing that more with my children. Now, I am trying to catch up with family trips to these places for my granddaughter to experience the value of nature at a very early age. I have a family trip planned to the Great Smoky Mountains in Tennessee for a few days and then Asheville, North Carolina to visit Biltmore Estates. I’ve been to both places with a friend, but the family engagement makes the trip a special memory. My two sons are doing falconry at Biltmore, an activity one son has dreamed about since he was a child.
Author Links: Amazon | GoodReads
Using a country assessment index, I evaluate the stability of the nations that I have visited. Reading this book, one gains a better understanding of the world. This better understanding promotes a philosophy of respecting cultural differences while recognizing that we share many of the same core human elements: rights, desires, and challenges. One should embrace our similarities while celebrating our differences. The year encompassed travel to Portugal; Argentina and Chile’s Patagonia; Italy; Seattle, Washington, United States; Switzerland; France; Australia; Alaska, United States; Spain; Hungary; Slovenia; Austria; Germany; Czech Republic; and Costa Rica. This grouping of countries is just the first of a multi-year endeavor; the quest for learning and understanding is an iterative approach. This book is to inspire readers to travel to gain better understanding of the world, its land and people, through bucket list natural wonders and man-made accomplishments. For those challenged to travel for a number of reasons, my journey provides a literary approach to experience the world.
The intent of this book is a literary journey traveling the globe to gain a better understanding of international relations and geopolitics and share my knowledge to entice others to be intellectual travelers too.
Traveling Solo Later in Life
Traveling Solo Later in Life, by Mary Strobbe, is part travel guide, part memoir, and part warm hand on the shoulder for anyone who’s wondered whether they’re too old, too nervous, too tired, or too alone to go see the world. Strobbe writes especially for older solo travelers, with a strong awareness of women’s safety and independence, but the book stretches beyond that audience. She moves through the practical machinery of travel, insurance, passports, lodging, money, food, cruises, transportation, accessibility, health, packing, and mental wellness, while threading it all with lived stories: a friend’s painful fall at Teotihuacan, a near-miss on a dim Milan street, a curse in Cuba, a lost phone in Copenhagen, a robbery in Jamaica, and the quiet triumph of dining alone without apologizing for it.
What I liked most is that Strobbe doesn’t romanticize solo travel into something glossy and weightless. She knows the world can be generous, strange, exhausting, funny, and occasionally frightening, and she lets all of that sit on the page together. The writing has an appealing conversational ease. I found myself especially drawn to the way she treats mishaps as a kind of travel currency. The Grand Bazaar jacket episode, where the “gift” feels more like a trap than a kindness, says more about instinct than a whole lecture on safety could. Likewise, her story of throwing fruit into the ocean after upsetting a Santería altar is funny, yes, but also tenderly human. Who among us hasn’t performed some small irrational ritual just to feel a little steadier in an unknowable world?
The book’s ideas are practical, but underneath them is a deeper argument about agency. Strobbe is really saying that later life doesn’t have to narrow. It can widen. I appreciated how seriously she takes fear without letting it become the final authority. Her chapters on anxiety and depression surprised me in the best way because they acknowledge that travel doesn’t magically cure loneliness or inner weather. Sometimes you’re in a beautiful place and still feel fragile. That honesty gives the book emotional weight. The prose can lean into punchlines and exclamatory travel-guide rhythms. Still, the voice is so candid, seasoned, and companionable that its exuberance feels earned.
Traveling Solo Later in Life is a book about train tickets, hotel cards, compression socks, street food, passports, and packing cubes, but it’s also about trusting yourself in motion. Strobbe makes travel feel less like a performance of bravery and more like a practice, one built through wrong turns, better questions, lighter luggage, and a willingness to begin again. I’d recommend it to older women considering their first solo trip, seasoned travelers who enjoy reflective travel writing with a practical backbone, and anyone who needs a kind, witty reminder that independence can still bloom beautifully in the second half of life.
Pages: 202 | ASIN : B0FFNFRPDR
In Madagascar, History is found on the plate.
In A Taste of Madagascar: Culinary Riches of the Red Island, you describe Madagascar’s cuisine as a mosaic woven from migration and cultural exchange. How does the food tell a history that more conventional historical accounts might miss or flatten?
In Madagascar, History is found on the plate. People’s migrations and trade are reflected in the food around the island.
Take rice, for example. To most, it is a simple staple, but in Madagascar, it is an anchor that connects the present to the voyagers of the past. When I look at a bowl of fragrant rice, I don’t just see a crop; I see a history of survival and agricultural adaptation that traveled across the Indian Ocean and eventually reached the Carolinas. It is a record of how people carried their lives and their tastes with them through exploration, trade, and even forced migration.
Then there is vanilla. A history book might cite Madagascar as the source of 80 percent of the world’s vanilla beans. A statistic that strips away the soul of the ingredient. But when I stood in the lush hills of the SAVA region and watched a farmer perform the “marriage”—hand-pollinating a single orchid blossom with a wooden needle—I saw the heritage of extreme patience and craft. That moment of pollination is a tactile memory of how traditions are passed down hand to hand across generations, transforming a delicate orchid into a core part of Malagasy identity. It reveals a depth of human labor and devotion that a “commodity” label could never capture.
Even at the dining table in the capital, history is being reimagined. At Chef Lalaina’s restaurant, Marais, I have tasted dishes like foie gras ravioles with vanilla and cocoa. It is a tapestry of diversity where French techniques, Asian inspirations, and local ingredients entwine to create something entirely unique. It tells a story of cultural exchange that is harmonious and evolving, rather than one of mere historical collision. While conventional accounts might focus on the isolation of an island, the food tells a story of resilience, renewal, and a shared global future.
The book’s central method is using ingredients as entry points into work, history, ecology, and identity. Which ingredient opened the most unexpected door, and which took the longest to understand beyond its flavor?
If I were to trace the paths of my journey, the most unexpected door was opened by caviar. Arriving with a mind full of rainforests, vanilla, and the heat of wild pepper, finding one of the world’s most coveted delicacies being produced in the highlands of Madagascar felt like a beautiful contradiction.
I remember sitting at Marais, Chef Lalaina’s restaurant in Antananarivo, and realizing that this sturgeon roe was a testament to the Red Island’s future. It opened a door into a world where Malagasy effort and innovation were redefining a global industry. It taught me that Madagascar is not just a source of raw materials, but a place of sophisticated creation and visionary entrepreneurs.
As for the ingredient that took me the longest to understand beyond its flavor, it is undoubtedly **vanilla**. Having spent decades in the flavor industry, I knew vanilla through the cold precision of statistics—80 percent of global production, market prices, and chemical profiles. For thirty years, it was a familiar commodity in my professional life, yet I had only scratched its surface.
The shift happened when I stood in the humid hills along the Ankara River. I was no longer a writer or a flavor expert; I was just a student with a wooden needle in my hand, attempting the “marriage” of the vanilla orchid. That tactile memory of hand-pollinating a single flower, a task that requires immense patience, finally stripped away the commodity label. I realized then that vanilla isn’t just a flavor; it is a story of human labor and traditions passed hand to hand across generations. It took a lifetime in the industry and a trek into the forest to truly “see” the bean for what it is: a fragile link between the land and the lives of those who nurture it.
You weave deforestation, biodiversity loss, and climate pressure into the culinary narrative as lived realities rather than abstract concerns. How do you keep the environmental stakes present without letting them overwhelm the food story?
I believe that to separate the flavor from the forest is to tell only half the story. I keep the environmental stakes present by treating the landscape not as a background, but as a primary ingredient. When I write about the culinary riches of Madagascar, the ecology isn’t an abstract concern; it is the very thing that makes the flavor possible.
I often use the wild pepper, or voatsiperifery, as a bridge to this reality. I remember standing on a curve of the RN2 with Olivier Rama, who shared the “bittersweet story” of this endemic spice. The pepper grows only on vines in the high canopy of the primary forest. However, the stakes become visceral when you realize that some harvesters, driven by immediate need, cut down the entire tree to reach the berries, a practice that threatens the very sustainability of the spice. If we lose the forest, we lose this extraordinary flavor forever.
I take a similar approach with honey. When I visited the rural yards near Ambanja or the mangroves of Antsohihy, I saw how bees turn blossoms into farmers’ survival, one golden drop at a time. Each variety, whether it’s the tangy mokarana or the smoky Menabe forest hone, is tied to a specific, fragile ecosystem. The stakes remain present because they are rooted in the survival of the people and the rituals I describe.
Ultimately, I want the reader to feel that “A Taste of Madagascar” is a story of resilience. By centering the narrative on the *farmers and visionary entrepreneurs who are “giving back to local communities,” I frame conservation as an act of creation rather than just a struggle against loss. The environmental stakes are there in every bite, every scent, and every human encounter, making the “hidden cost of culinary bounty” something we can all understand through the language of food.
The book repeatedly suggests that flavor itself carries memory and history. Do you think cuisine can preserve cultural identity in ways archives sometimes cannot?
I believe that while an archive can store a fact, only a kitchen can keep a culture truly alive. An archive is a collection of static records, but cuisine is a “living thread” that pulls the past directly into the present, allowing us to taste the very survival and spirit of those who came before us.
I saw this most clearly in the work of the late Mariette Andrianjaka. She was a true cultural ambassador who acted as a bridge between the old world and the new. Her legacy wasn’t found in dusty ledgers, but in her “remarkable ability to salvage recipes and techniques” that were on the very verge of being forgotten. When she prepared a dish incorporating dried fish into a vegetable stew, she wasn’t just following a recipe; she was meticulously documenting the diverse heritage of Madagascar, the waves of migration from Austronesian peoples to Arab and European traders. A history book might list those migrations, but Mariette allowed you to experience the “complex layers of flavor” they left behind.
Then there is the story of rice. To an archivist, rice might be a commodity to be tracked along trade routes. But to me, this fragrant rice is a record of an “intricate web of migration, trade, and survival”. It carries the memory of people who moved through exploration and even forced migration, carrying their seeds and their tastes with them across continents. When you sit at a table with a bowl of this aromatic grain, you are connecting to an “anchor of Malagasy daily life” that ties the fields to the table and the past to the present in a way no document ever could.
Even the zebu, the Madagascar hunchback cattle, tells a story that transcends the written word. I remember a defining meal with Chef Henintsoa Moretti, where she served *manaramo-lotra*—a slow-cooked confit of zebu tail, tongue, tripe, and ribeye. In that single dish, she captured the “essence” of the Malagasy culinary soul. It was a timeless homage to a culture where food is ritual and renewal. These flavors leave a “permanent imprint” on us, transforming history from something we study into something we breathe and embody.
THE ROAD TO BELONGING: My Journey to Punta Gorda, Belize
The Road to Belonging is, to me, a memoir about retirement that refuses to behave like a quiet sunset book. It starts with Francis Mandewah in the United States, restless after decades of work and still haunted, shaped, and guided by the long arc of his life from Sierra Leone to America. From there, it becomes a search for home, leading him toward Belize, and more specifically, Punta Gorda, where history, diaspora, faith, language, and community begin to converge in ways that feel personal rather than abstract. The book moves through practical decisions, emotional reckonings, cultural discovery, and the literal adventure of driving an aging Hyundai through Mexico, all while returning again and again to one central question: where does a person truly belong?
What I liked most is that the book is deeply sincere. It wears its heart on its sleeve, and honestly, that worked on me. Mandewah doesn’t present belonging as a slogan or a theory. He presents it as something fragile, hard-won, and almost miraculous. The early scene where he helps an older Cambodian woman get home in St. Louis sets the tone beautifully, because it shows how the memoir thinks: belonging is built through acts of care, risk, and recognition. Later, when he meets people in Belize who immediately connect Sierra Leone to Belizean Creole and Garifuna history, the emotional payoff is real. I could feel his relief, his surprise, even his joy. The repeated idea that “God works through people” could’ve become repetitive in weaker hands, but here it becomes the book’s pulse. It links Tom Johnson, Kathleen Lelinski, Sister Rosanne, the Garifuna community, and others into one moral chain of grace. I found that moving.
The prose is often direct, earnest, and unembarrassed by emotion. When it lands, it does so because it’s so unguarded. The details about thrift-store books, the obsessive apartment cleaning to recover a deposit, the church goodbyes, the sense of wonder on that first trip to Punta Gorda, and the warm welcome from the Garifuna parish all give the memoir texture and humanity. I also appreciated the cultural and historical sections on Kriol, Garifuna, East Indian, and Mennonite communities, because they make the book feel bigger than one man’s relocation story. I think the book could’ve benefited from tighter shaping in places. It sometimes circles the same themes, and the explanatory passages can slow the momentum. But even there, I wasn’t bored so much as aware that the book values testimony over polish. It wants to witness. It wants to honor people. It wants to connect dots across continents. I respect that a lot, and by the end, I felt the memoir’s generosity mattered.
I found The Road to Belonging affecting, thoughtful, and unexpectedly expansive. It’s a memoir about migration, but also about aging, gratitude, Black diaspora identity, cultural preservation, and the strange, beautiful way a person can arrive somewhere new and feel an ancient recognition stirring. I came away feeling warmed by it, and more than anything, impressed by its openness and moral clarity. This is a heartfelt book about finding home after a lifetime of surviving. I’d especially recommend it to readers who enjoy memoirs of resilience, faith-centered life writing, immigrant narratives, and books that care as much about community and cultural memory as they do about plot.
Pages: 176 | ASIN : B0FZMXN98H
A Fusion of Essays and Photos
Meanwhile, Here in Austin is a seasonal portrait of a city becoming home, blending intimate essays and photography to capture the quiet beauty, chaos, and heart of everyday life in Austin. Did you begin this project knowing it would become a book, or did it grow organically?
It grew organically. When we first moved to Austin, every weekend felt like a vacation. I’d grab my camera and head out to explore our new home. Over the years, I built up a large collection of photos, but I eventually wanted to do more with them than let them sit in an online gallery. My first thought was a photography book. But some of the images needed context. A line or two didn’t seem to be enough.
The first time I started writing longer pieces was after a storm, when I realized a single photo couldn’t capture its intensity. We had previously lived in Los Angeles, where unplugging devices during a storm never even crossed my mind. In Austin, though, after hearing a few horror stories about fried electronics, I decided to play it safe. That experience needed explanation beyond the image itself.
Then came the winter storm. Photos of icicles alone couldn’t accurately explain what we went through. The images needed my experience alongside them so readers could understand what photographing those icicles really meant and how they fit into the larger context.
As a result, the book expanded to become a fusion of essays and photos. But I still wanted to “lead” with photos and have the essays serve as a larger explanation. I think the only instance where I wrote an essay purely for the sake of written content was when a shooting occurred at our favorite slushie café. This was part of my discovery of Austin, and it felt necessary to include it.
What does photography allow you to express that writing alone cannot?
For me, photography is purely about feeling and capturing a mood. While it’s true that I can describe those feelings with words, photos are more universal. You don’t need language, a translator, or an explanation of cultural differences. You see it, you feel it, you get it… within seconds. Photography allows me to share what I saw and exactly how I felt in that moment with a much wider audience.
Many of the book’s most powerful moments come from everyday scenes—storms, deer, swimming holes. Why do small moments matter so much to you?
That’s a two-part answer, I guess. From a photography perspective, I usually notice the larger elements first: the people, the architecture, and the landscape. But when I return to the same place a second or third time, I start to see the smaller moments. Those details matter because photographers are always searching for a unique way to capture a scene. You have to train your eye to find new angles or fresh perspectives. That process teaches you to notice everything, because you’re always looking for that something that will make your photos feel different.
The second part of that answer is that a city’s character, or even a neighborhood’s character, is often defined by smaller moments. It’s the subtle cultural differences that stand out. When comparing what makes Austin unique versus a larger city like L.A. or New York, it comes down to the people, of course, and what I usually call “the little things,” or those small details that give the city its character.
What aspects of the city surprised you most once you started paying close attention?
How much Austin is changing right before my eyes. It’s a lot like raising children. When you see them every day, the changes aren’t obvious. It’s only when a friend visits after a couple of years and says, “Your kid has changed so much!” that it really hits you, because you didn’t notice it happening.
Austin feels the same way. I didn’t truly see the changes until I started comparing my downtown cityscape photos. That’s when it became clear just how quickly the city is expanding and evolving. It’s going through real growing pains.
Author Links: GoodReads | Website | Amazon
The Healing Powers of Travel & Connection
Belonging to the World is an inspirational travel memoir that shares your journey of healing after the tragic loss of your wife and your mission to travel to all 193 countries on earth, and the personal transformation you experience. Why was this an important book for you to write?
I did not start out traveling to write a book, but rather as a means of escape. It was one year into my journey, after a compelling trip to Afghanistan only a year after the Taliban takeover, that I realized that I was really “living” again, learning and, most of all, collecting stories. At that point, I realized that there was an evolving story that I needed to tell. It was about the healing powers of travel and connection.
What were some ideas that were important for you to share in this book?
Sure, other than specific profound connections with people from everyday life in countries all over the world, below are some themes and ideas that kept coming to the surface:
Ø The unexpected and transformative power of grief
Ø Letting go of control brings unexpected peak experiences around the world
Ø Finding awe and wonder in the world’s places considered some of the world’s most dangerous
Ø The best things in life can happen by chance if you let them
Ø Reconciling a world that feels deeply divided yet profoundly interconnected
Ø How do we honor the past yet be ready to step into what may come next
Ø How the world can change you if you let it
What was the most challenging part of writing your memoir, and what was the most rewarding?
It took me a while in my journey to understand that I wasn’t simply seeking new countries, but the people within them. With that came the anticipation of finding the one story in each place that resonated with me, my story, shaped by my own impressions and by the mystery of how and when it would reveal itself. Somehow, it always did.
I found that profoundly moving: the realization that if you seek people and their wisdom with an open heart and genuine respect, you will find it.
How has writing your memoir impacted or changed your life?
I am sure for many writers, the release of a book is the end of a big project. For me it is end of a significant entire chapter of my life, of devastating loss, of being lost, of leaning into grief and going on a amazing journey. That journey completely rewired my brain and changed the way I see the world and my place in it.
Author Links: GoodReads | Instagram | Website
Some journeys we choose. Others choose us.
In the aftermath of tragedy, Barry Hoffner wanted to feel the pulse of the world again. The whole world.
When Barry Hoffner lost his wife and travel partner, Jackie, in a sudden tragedy, his grief was a black hole that consumed everything. But amid the quiet wreckage of loss, something unexpected stirred: the call to move, to reconnect, and to live fully again.
What began as a reluctant return to the road became an audacious mission to visit all 193 countries on Earth-not to escape his pain but to transform it. Along the way, Barry discovered a world with far more depth and complexity than headlines suggest-one full of unexpected joy, even amid hardship and struggle. From war zones to mountaintops, refugee camps to ancient ruins, he found people whose kindness and openness brought him back to life.
Belonging to the World is a deeply felt memoir of healing from grief, finding resilience, and forging human connection across the globe
Belonging to the World
Belonging to the World follows Barry Hoffner’s journey from the sudden loss of his wife, Jackie, to an unexpected path of healing as he travels to every country on earth. The book opens with the shattering grief of Jackie’s death and the dark, disorienting months that follow, then widens into a story about connection, curiosity, and the raw power of human kindness. Hoffner moves through deserts in Oman, chaos and beauty in Afghanistan, warmth in Syria, wonder in Bhutan, and countless small moments of humanity that tell him he still belongs to the world, even when he feels unmoored from it. It is both a memoir of loss and a chronicle of awe, written with honesty and a clear desire to understand people wherever he goes.
As I read, I felt pulled into his emotional rhythm. Sometimes he writes with a quiet weight, almost like he is whispering because the grief is still too close. Other times, he throws himself into a scene with bright energy, like he is hungry to feel alive again. I found that mix moving. It mirrors how grief actually behaves. It hits hard, then softens, then surprises you all over again. The travel stories aren’t just pretty postcard moments. They are the places where he bumps into his own pain and also where he finds these tiny sparks of connection. I loved how often strangers show up at the perfect time. It made me think about how people everywhere have this instinct to reach toward someone who hurts.
I also appreciated the simplicity of the writing. He doesn’t try to sound wise or polished, and I liked that. It feels like someone telling you the truth as they live it. The chapters unfold quickly, each country arriving like a new test or a new chance. I sometimes wished he lingered longer, especially in the places that clearly changed him. But the pace also reflects his state of mind. After loss, standing still can feel dangerous. Moving forward feels like survival. And the way he carries Jackie with him in every experience made me ache. It never felt sentimental. It felt real.
By the end, I had this sense that the world he traveled through became less a map and more a mirror. Every landscape, every border crossing, every shared meal made him a little braver and a little softer. I didn’t finish the book thinking about travel as a checklist. I finished it thinking about how connection works. How people can stitch you back together without even knowing they’re doing it. How a life can shift from broken to open if you let yourself keep going, one unfamiliar place at a time.
I would recommend Belonging to the World to anyone traveling through grief, anyone who loves travel stories with heart, and anyone who wants to see the world as more generous than the headlines make it seem. It’s especially good for readers who don’t need tidy lessons and who are comfortable walking beside someone still figuring it all out. The book feels like a companion for anyone trying to rebuild after life comes apart.
Pages: 405 | ASIN : B0FZNNDF5L
Get Me to Costa Rica!: A one year plan to leave the Rat Race
Get Me to Costa Rica! is a step-by-step guide for anyone feeling boxed in by work, routine, expectations, and wants a clear path to living abroad. The book lays out a twelve-month timeline that blends mindset shifts, decluttering, money planning, relationships, and logistics, all anchored in the idea that Costa Rica is not just a destination but a symbol of a calmer and more intentional life. It moves steadily from asking big personal questions to offering practical actions that make the dream feel reachable rather than abstract.
What I liked most was the tone of the guide. It feels like a long, honest talk with someone who has already gone through the fear and doubt and come out the other side. The writing is direct and encouraging, sometimes almost preachy, but in a way that feels earned. I found myself nodding along, especially during the parts about burnout, endless schedules, and the quiet grief of putting dreams on hold. The author clearly believes in what he is saying, and that belief carries emotional weight. At times, it felt a bit repetitive, yet that repetition also felt intentional, like a coach reminding you again and again that you really can do this if you commit.
The ideas themselves are not wild or revolutionary, but they are grounded and practical. Declutter your life. Set a date. Know your numbers. Build income that travels with you. None of this is flashy, and that is the point. I appreciated how the book did not pretend the move would be easy or magical. There is fear, guilt, and stress woven into the plan, and the author names those feelings without sugarcoating them. I felt both excited and a little exposed while reading, which is usually a sign that a book is poking at something real. It made me reflect on my own excuses and timelines, and that was uncomfortable in a good way.
I recommend Get Me to Costa Rica! to people who feel stuck and tired of talking about change without acting on it. It is especially good for readers who want structure, reassurance, and a push to stop waiting for the perfect moment. If you are dreaming about living abroad, or even just craving a major life reset, this book offers a clear map and a steady voice saying you are not crazy for wanting more.
Pages: 241 | ASIN : B0FPD3Z8Y4
