We are Angela and Paolo and we are the travellers behind BEYOND THE TRIP.
Our story begins December 2008, in a typical foggy night in the famous Italian Po Valley.
Paolo, a young employee with a strong passion for music, and Angela, next to graduation and with a job as sales assistant.
From that moment on, we understand that we have a common passion: travelling. So we collect our stuff and luggage and, less than a year after our first date, we leave for the first great adventure: moving to Edinburgh.
Soon we fall in love with the city and with Scotland, its traditions and its enchanted places, and when, after 2 years, we decide to return to Italy, we know that we left a piece of our heart among those loch and those castles.
We choose to live in Lecco, maybe because the lake and the mountains slightly remind us of Scotland.
We start a life that is “normal” for a couple of 25 and 28 years old: search for work, commuting to and from Milan, work contracts that last weeks then later become months, until the permanent contract!
With that piece of paper we can finally open a mortgage in order to buy our own house – “the house on the waterfall”: an apartment of 50 square meters that in a short time we furnish with IKEA furniture, many maps and guides of places we’ve been!
The salary also allows us to make a few trips. With our backpacks, we leave as soon as we’ve the chance: weekends in European Capitals, 2 weeks in August trying to avoid crowded places, and 2 weeks in December in order to escape the bad weather.
Our love grows with the passion for travelling, so we decide that it’s time to have a great party to celebrate…why not? And so, on April 29, 2017, we get married. Paolo, who wears his kilt, and Angela in a pink dress… but at home our backpacks are ready, shortly we’ll leave for our one-month long honeymoon between Ecuador and Peru.
And it’s during that month that we have time to think about us, our lives and what we’re doing… we realize that what we’ve been chasing for years wasn’t really what we were looking for.
Work and day-by-day routine were making our life boring, and, looking at ourselves from the outside, we saw each other really sad. Our dream had always been to travel, but we had relegated it to weekends and to summer and winter forced breaks.
Up to the altitude sickness, or up to the coca-leaves or maybe up to the Pisco sour… we realize that we really need to change something: life is only one, (we have repeated it to ourselves several times…) Are we sure that we want to waste it just because we lack the courage to pursue our dream?
And that’s how our project BEYOND THE TRIP – FULL TIME TRAVEL was born.
Leaving and doing what we love in order to find out which is OUR path..
We are very lucky, because we are two soul mates with the same dream and together we believe that we can achieve it.
Travelling has always been an important part of my life… When I was 3, I moved from Calabria to Bergamo (ok, let’s say I didn’t took this decision on my own!) and when I was 26 I moved to Scotland with Angela (the “other side” of this blog). The Scottish cliffs, the wild nature and the highland cows let me discover a new way of travelling. The “DIY travel”: just book a flight, prepare a backpack and start exploring a culture and its customs.
Why do I like travelling?
Because it gives me the chance to talk with people…I’m the one who’s always asking locals for information (even when I don’t really need them!) because I like seeing the passion in their eyes when describing the place where they live.
In Bergamo for generations, I’m proud of dozens of holidays in Liguria and a couple also in Romagna.
My passion for travelling “exploded” when I met Paolo in 2008.
Two amazing years in Scotland made me realize that travelling is so much easier than you could think… for a long trip, all you need can easily fit in a 40 litres backpack.
In the couple, I’m the one who usually organizes… this means only that I read the guide book the day before we are visiting a certain place!
While travelling, all the “tags” disappears: there are no secretaries or managers, no married or singles, no graduated or not… you are just a normal person among other normal people.
South Africa, Thailand, Georgia, Perù, Ecuador, Sri Lanka… those are only a little part of the countries we visited and where we met some special people.
We are really looking forward to our greatest adventure starting next January!
One way ticket to Asia.
2 full time employees will become 2 full time travellers!
This is the journey that will change our life and we are looking forward to telling our story!
Traffic in Vietnam: is it so crazy?
Angela & Paolo - BEYOND THE TRIP - The 2 of us travelling full-time!