Top Ten Travel Tips:

     Basically Few parameters are also required

 I moved around a lot. These are all places I spent at least two weeks in.

• Valladolid (Spain)
• Lisbon (Portugal)
• Coimbra (Portugal)
• Sevilla (Spain)
• Pamplona (Spain)
• Ronda (Spain)
• Valencia (Spain)
• Tarifa (Spain)
• Koh Samui (Thailand)
• Chiang Mai (Thailand)
• Siem Reap (Cambodia)
• Essaouira (Morocco)
• Brno (Czech Republic)
• Shkoder (Albania)
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I’m probably forgetting some, but here’s my top three (in no particular order), and an explanation of why.

Seville

I spent August 2015 in Seville, and it was the hottest month of my life, peaking at 48 centigrade! Despite the heat, I completely loved the city, how alive it was day and night, how beautiful the people and the buildings were, how green the parks were and how succulent the food. I found great company in my Airbnb roommate, and we explored the city together. This city is so liveable, and I plan to live here again in a few years time, perhaps even buy a place!

Essaouira

This is the first place that I went back to to live for a second time. The cost of living is incredibly cheap, I had a two storey penthouse with sea views, an office, three living rooms, two terraces and a gorgeous kitchen all for £240 a month. The people are super friendly and welcoming, and they taught me a lot about Muslim and Moroccan culture, food and music. I learned to surf here, so it will always be in my heart.

Brno

This is where I live now, I’ve been here since September. I found a place in Brno that offers me the opportunity for well-paying local clients, low cost of living, great quality of life, beautiful women everywhere, fair tax agreement, amazing public transport and small local airport which incredibly flies direct to the local airport from my hometown for about 10 euros each way! The city is full of young people, music, culture, art and life. It’s cold as hell, and that’s the biggest drawback, as well as the language, which is alien to me.

I would quite happily spend four months a year in each of these places

on rotation, but that’s not how I travel :)

Bonus:

Beautiful Brno Cathedral!

 

Sure, but only if you do certain things. The easiest way to do this is:

• To get a job
• Get good at it for 5–10 + years
• Then ask your boss if you can be a digital nomad. If you have shown you are self-motivated by working from home before, they might accept
• Or start your own business. You just don’t have a permanent address.
• Also have investments for a second source of income.

As wifi is good in most countries now, you can become wealthy living such a lifestyle.

What’s the difference, in fact, between getting wealthy living at home, overseas and `on the road`.

The same business and investing principles apply. You have just got to make sure that you:

• Keep costs down
• Don’t become unmotivated. So many people say `I would love to work remotely`. Then they can’t motivate themselves to work from work. They can’t focus.

Also, making money from purely being a digital nomad is much harder.

So many people are trying to blog about being a digital nomad. Or write a book or make articles.

That may make you hundreds, or even $1,000+, of passive income a month, if you promote it.

It is a competitive field though, and much harder than monetizing something you are already qualified in.

Alternatively, millions of people already have home-based online businesses which have been going for years.

For those people, all they need to do is work remotely.

It can Be defined as:-
My path to digital nomadism grew organically from world events. Working for myself was born out of a necessity caused by the big crash of 2008. When no one was hiring, I made my own work by producing content for blogs, online publications and publicity agencies.

I started early at 7am at one of my favorite coffee shops on Larchmont Blvd in central Hollywood where I researched my subject, created the content and shared it on social media. I read everything I could get my hands on about upcoming Los Angeles events and I pitched constantly for interviews with photography.

It wasn’t long before I was getting paid for the content I produced and being invited to cover bigger events with bigger talent. In addition, I gained experience working on film sets and for independent production companies. I observed the different aspects of film production from development to publicity.

I wanted to be boss.

I founded the blog Inside Hollywood Examiner which covered film and festival reviews and interviews. I reviewed the Oscars and Golden Globes and wrote about women in film. Media and publicity agencies would pitch me to review and interview their clients in Hollywood and I learned that I was a natural interviewer with a passion for the personal.

I wanted to have my own clients.

I founded the boutique PR and social media agency Ginger Media & Entertainment and I worked with a variety of international clients from independent films to international fashion brands. As the business shifted between entertainment and e-commerce and tech startups, I managed PR, social media and paid social, SEO, content marketing and strategy, copy and editing, blogger outreach and media relations. I was getting so much work that I hired and managed my own team of freelancers.

Life happens.

When my mother was diagnosed with dementia I knew I had to design a work life which made me independent of location. I set out to work half of the year in Los Angeles and the other half in England so that I could be with her.

I continued to work with entertainment and business clients for Ginger Media & Entertainment, I produced and edited entertainment feature interviews and reviews for my entertainment blog and I ran a portrait studio from my apartment and photographed Hollywood performers. In addition, I photographed weekly burlesque shows and entertainment and art events.

Whenever I was in England caring for my mother, I produced and edited content every day and worked with clients in London. I pitched my unique business and management experience working between Los Angeles and London and helped numerous international clients gain coverage in both cities.

Is the digital nomad life for you?

First move: Turn your passion into work.

It makes no sense working to leave your day job if its a job you hate. Use the skills you’ve learned for good. For some of us, its easy to transfer skills and job roles in related fields. But for others it may take some brain storming and trial and error to see what pricks your passion. What you find out about yourself may surprise you.

Ask yourself these questions before you jump ship from your steady job:

What am I good at?

What am I passionate about?

Do I like working alone or with others?

Am I creative or into numbers?

Am I super organized and want to be the boss of everything?

Do I need direction?

Can I be my own boss and be responsible for finding work and chasing fees?

Second move: Make necessity work for you.

My necessity was finding a way to earn a living working for myself and to be with my mother. Think of new mothers who find they are no better off financially if they return to their day job and have to find expensive child care. Many start an online business at home and work in their own time while caring for their children and make necessity work for them.

I got what I wanted out of necessity. I knew that I could no longer live in Los Angeles all year long when my mother needed me. And I also knew that I could not live in England all year when my sanity needed me so I worked and traveled and made a life for myself.

Third move: Constantly work on developing your skills and expertise.

If you’re not challenging yourself then the digital nomadic lifestyle is not for you. While the elements of PR and marketing have remained the same for decades, it is technology which has changed its area of execution.

Research your competitors and find out how they do business, who they work with and the software they use. Take a look at job descriptions in the area of your expertise and read up and learn the skills you’re missing.

Don’t fake it. Your niche will separate you from the crowd so try not to spread yours skill set so wide that customers get confused.

It’s not an easy life being a digital nomad.

The digital nomad life is not for everyone. The freedom to live and work anywhere is an attractive proposition but it can feel unstable and the constant fight for the next gig can get tedious.

Having said that, I would never change this life because I get to pick and choose who I work with and when, plus I get to work around the world on exciting and innovative projects which aim to enrich and challenge me.

The experience and intuition I have gained is invaluable to the businesses and talent I work with. I’ve always told it how it is. I make realistic propositions and work around what’s doable for each client and each budget. I enjoy sharing my energy in workshops or in one-to-one consultations to businesses, talent and wannabe influencers.

Make life and necessity work for you. Seek out new challenges which take you out of your comfort zone. Understand who you are and what you’re passionate about because it will make you stand out from the crowd. It will make you fearless.

Ginger Liu. MFA. is a digital nomad writer, photographer and filmmaker. She is the founder of Ginger Media & Entertainment and Ginger Liu Photography.

 We love being digital nomads, but sometimes, the things that you see online are just bullshit.

Okay, maybe a lot of the time, it’s bullshit. Especially with us digital nomads. Especially those of us who call anywhere our office.

When you see pictures of us “working” from breathtaking places around the world, it’s not always as it seems. Some of us are tired. Dead tired. Others are struggling for work. Hell, some out there might actually be faking those photos altogether.

But hey, whatever gets those likes on Instagram, right?

Here’s a picture of our Airstream at sunset in the Nevada desert:

Make no mistake about it, there is a lot to love about this lifestyle. For example, we get to see a LOT of the country. Change our backyard whenever we darn well please. We get to actually be in nature

and fully embrace everything there is about our environment.

However, this isn’t some endless thrill ride either. It’s more like a roller coaster. There are both ups and downs. It’s not always great.

Why?

Why being a digital nomad isn’t always as great as Instagram photos

My wife and I are digital nomads and we travel full-time in our Airstream Classic travel trailer
with our two dogs. Though we are financially independent, we also need to stay connected to run this blog, our YouTube Channel and develop our course

And even then, it may not be completely stress-free.

. We aren’t just sitting in our rocking chairs sipping ice tea watching the clouds go by.

Here are the four biggest reasons why being a digital nomad isn’t always as great as what you might see on Instagram.

1. Sometimes, staying connected is tough

An amazing amount of square footage of our globe is connected, and if you include satellite into the mix, nearly every spot is connected.

Unfortunately, there still remains a remarkably big dead zone where connectivity through a cell network, much less a WiFi signal, is downright impossible. If staying connected is a part of who you are, you won’t be able to go just anywhere. At least for long.

After traveling full-time throughout the United States for a couple years, I learned three primary things (the hard way!) about the “connectedness” of our country:

    There are so many dead zones out there, especially around the most beautiful areas of our nation (like National Parks)
    Even when there is a signal, it may not be enough, and
    Less sophisticated areas of the country are easily susceptible to cell tower overload during peak hours

It’s frustrating, but still very much a first world problem. But, sometimes I feel like punching a hole in the wall whenever my Verizon MiFi device “sees” cell signal, but I can’t seem to do anything online.

Or, if I’m able to do a few things, but most websites just crawwwwwl. It takes 5 minutes to load my own blog even though the damn MiFi thing says it has 3 bars of 4G LTE.

Damn you, cell technology!

Another common problem: Especially in smaller cities, the speed of the Internet slows considerably during the daylight hours when everybody and their brother is using the network, then speeds up on weekends and shortly before you go to bed because, well, everybody else is hopping off the network and going to bed too.

In other words, network load can bring cell towers down to a standstill in smaller or less sophisticated areas of the country.

I’ve had to pick and choose the time I do heavier data tasks in the past based on how congested the cell towers were in my area. That’s not something I enjoy doing.

If you’re a digital nomad, this can greatly affect productivity.

2. It’s hard to truly integrate into community

Most digital nomads move around the country (and world) quite a bit, and a constant mobile lifestyle makes it tough to integrate into a community. When we’re on the move so often, we don’t have the opportunity to develop relationships with people in the community like we would if we lived there full-time. Naturally, it won’t be the same.

A lot of us are okay making this sacrifice, but for many of us, we lose a sense of community that we never realized was so important to us until it was no longer there.

My wife is a prime example. The longer we travel, the more she misses the community that she felt before we left. She wants the ability to call her girlfriends and get together, socialize with people and nurture long-lasting friendships. While we have pleeeeenty of friends in this lifestyle, we can’t say that many of them are “best” friends or deep friends.

Not because they aren’t good people. It’s because we aren’t around each other long enough to make those relationships more meaningful.

3. We’re constantly re-learning

Everywhere we travel, we start at the beginning and re-learn how to go about life in that new area. We’re learning the streets. The businesses. Where to go (and where not to go). The weather.

But, we’re also beginning to make new friends again.

Well, sorta. We know that these “friends” probably won’t be lifelong friends because we live on the road. Perhaps they are just “acquaintances”? And, we tend to treat them as such. We look at social engagements purely as having a little fun rather than building true friendships.

Nevertheless, we meet people we’ve never met before and start from ground zero each and every place we go.

This process is relentless.

I like seeing new things, but other times, I just want to mindlessly meander my way through town like it’s old hat, say hi to people I know, and instinctively understand exactly what I’m doing every step of the way. I know the route. I know the traffic.

For example:

I know that I wouldn’t be caught dead on that street corner at night or I’m taking my life into my own hands. I don’t even have to think about it. It’s subconscious.

These are things that digital nomads are forced to learn and re-learn every single time we move to a new place.

4. We believe travel makes our grass greener

Let’s face it: A lot of digital nomads began their life of travel with the hope that they’ll be happier after the transition. The stress of the 9 to 5 will suddenly melt away and we’ll get to sit on a beach or on a hotel balcony with huge views of the Alps and plow through some remote work that keeps the money rollin’ in and the smile on our face.

Because, well, that’s what the photos show.

Here’s the problem: The grass is never greener with almost any change of lifestyle (yes, even early retirement

). Instead, it’s just another shade of brown. Life won’t ever be a vacation unless you’re actually on one.

And even then, it may not be completely stress-free.

Being a digital nomad is still life. If you’re running a business, you still need to square that against life’s demands. Build relationships. Sell. Provide customer service. Of course, product development.

Nothing about the art of making money suddenly changes or gets easier just because you’re living a life on the road.

Even with websites like Fivrr and Upwork, which are services specifically designed for remote work, most of those jobs don’t pay nearly enough to live a lifestyle as we see on Instagram.

They provide income, but that might only enable us to live in our cars or vans and eat ramen.

We probably won’t be staying in hotels and eating gourmet meals every night designing 150px by 150px logos for small businesses.

Note: Before you reach out to me with examples of how people are doing this, let me respond – I know that there are exceptions. There are exceptions for every rule, but those exceptions don’t disprove the reality for most digital nomads.

Full-time travel can be tremendously rewarding, but it’s also hard work. Especially if you aren’t already financially independent.

Don’t believe the grass is truly green over here.

5. We never get to spread out

When we live a traditional life in a house, we have our own space.

Different rooms have different purposes. While many of us have huge homes

, even those of us with more modest estates still get to spread our wings a bit. Enjoy our little piece of property.

Think garages. Front and backyards. Family rooms and kitchens. Bedrooms that don’t share space with said kitchen.

Digital nomads don’t really get to do this. Ever. Their space is defined by the environment around them. Whether it’s a hotel or a tent, or even a van, full-time travelers don’t have the luxury of space (and, that’s part of the appeal for many travelers!).

Even if you’re camping, you can set up your grill for use while you’re there, but when it comes time to leave, you’re packing all that stuff up, throwing it in your car or RV, and setting sail – only to unpack it once again.

Our space isn’t consistent. Our stuff’s current location is only temporary.

In the end: We love our lifestyle. We love the pictures we get and those we post on Instagram, Twitter and even on this blog. But, understand that while there are so many cool things about this lifestyle, it’s also not always roses. It’s still real life.

Being a digital nomad is not always a walk in the park.

Here’s the bottom line about being a digital nomad:

    It’s still real life
    It’s not for everyone, and not everybody will be able to do this
    Social platforms highlight the GOOD in being a digital nomad but often ignore the not-so-good
    Sometimes, travel just sucks
    But, it is an exciting and super unique way to live your life