Schedules Out of Whack

Backpacking across Europe? Like, living out of a backpack? Traveling from place to place however you can get there? Cold showers and triple bunk beds? Are you for real?

Yes. We're for real. Some of you may be asking how we even got to where we are right now. Short story: Tyler's scholarship with Truman included a study abroad stipend. We looked for the cheapest study abroad option to get the most out of the stipend, and it turned out to be a three-week program in Bulgaria (July 22-August 10). That got us thinking and looking at how to make the most out of the rest of the stipend, and our trip to Europe was born. As recent graduates with a whole lot of wide open spaces in front of us, we're looking for any ways to save money that we can. For those of you who are under 25 and have a university email account, http://www.studentuniverse.com/ has significantly cheaper flights to and within Europe in an attempt to get students traveling. That got us started, and from there we planned a route. We want to see as much as we can without compromising quality time in any given location, but we are going to push ourselves to the limit. One of our goals with this trip is to really invest in people, rather than stay wrapped up in our own little world of tourism, and we definitely want to see what God is doing in other parts of the world. Another goal is to learn. Learn anything and everything we can, be it about a particular culture, piece of history, or language, or deeper things. We want to learn more about each other, about ourselves, and about God, and we are eager for a shift in perspective.

Long story short, here we are in Iceland, with sore shoulders, empty bellies, and schedules out of whack, but happy to be here nonetheless.We got in at 11:40 last night, Iceland time (6:40PM your time) and spent the night on the comfy couches at the airport. Today we are headed into town to start some exploring. Look for a post in the next few days about all our exciting travels. In the meantime, just to give you a little taste of our itinerary, hopefully you'll be seeing posts from England, France, Spain, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Slovenia, Italy, and Greece (in that order). We're so excited to get this trip underway! Thanks for all your prayers and support. If any of you want to contact us or have any tips or people you know in any of these places, feel free to shoot me an email at djack6367@gmail.com. Talk to you soon!