I found myself taking some of the final steps I needed to take for my upcoming trip today. After being rained out of work on this gloomy Wednesday I headed straight to the passport office, right in the heart of the downtown area of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Getting my passport is the last of 3 steps I need to take:

1. Get my Passport 2. Travel Insurance 3. Buying my ticket to Dublin.

Throwback to an early summer spent in Victoria as a child

I never had the need to get my passport before this; everywhere I had ever traveled to would have always been in the country. I really have been traveling since I can remember. My mother moved to Vancouver Island when I was 8 and I proceeded to fly 5864 km twice a year, every year for the next 7 years. This doesn’t even include the hundreds of trips I made as child/teen to many places around Atlantic Canada or even other flights I would make with other family members. So the thought of me not having a passport seems really strange to myself. (Got side tracked, sorry haha.)

Now that I only have the 2 other things left on my list, (If you didn't get it already I got my Passport today.) before I can say I am without question ready, I find myself to be very anxious and overwhelmed with the fact in less than 2.5 months I will have Irish soil beneath my feet. That soon I will be thousands of kilometers from any of my friends or family. With this starting as a small idea and something I’d always push off growing up, its’ been hard to believe it would ever happen. Now to see it blossoming into a well thought out and fully planned trip (well sorta) is a unique and indescribable feeling. It is truly insane how fast things can change, especially when you take the time to help those changes happen. How, with a small sliver of belief, you can actually pursue what you want.

“If you don’t build your dream someone will hire you to help build theirs.”

— Tony Gaskins

Even now, 2.5 months out of the trip I am already starting to open my eyes to ideas I should’ve always been aware of. That I should always be doing what I want to do, to not let myself come up with excuses why I can’t do something. A lot of people I talk to about this trip, and how I am going about doing this trip, end up with a look of pure envy, topped with a hint of disappointment in their own current situation. To quit my comfy managerial job and actively pursue my passion in photography, not to mention travel Eastern Europe alone, seems asinine to most people. Even though deep down they would do the same if they felt they could. Almost 9/10 times they will say to me “ I wish I could just go travel for a little while, I always wanted to see Insert desired travel destination.” I was the same way, but now that I am taking the steps towards going on this trip, without sounding to preachy, I find myself questioning them.

Why can’t you go? What is REALLY stopping you? Could you make it happen if you really wanted to? With only the most pure of intentions, the same ones Simon Carrière had with me, to hopefully spark a small fire inside them. To have them ask those questions to themselves. To rationalize why they should go to that desired destination or quit their unfulfilling job, instead of give themselves reasons they shouldn’t. I want to help people discover, that any given time, they can pursue what ever it is they are most passionate about. To show them that they shouldn’t let anything stop them from doing so. If I am able to be an example to even only one person, then I will feel accomplished.

With my ever-shrinking to-do-list becoming increasingly smaller by each passing day, I am extremely excited to start on my travels already. That if this is how I am thinking now, how could 3 months, 6 months or even a year abroad change my thought process. That I will be traveling hopefully more going forward, than I have ever done in the past. To soon have the opportunity to be using my gear daily!? To meet people I would have otherwise never have met in my day-to-day life. It is going to be a crazy up and down trip, but I cant help but look forward to it.

- Bernie