It’s that time of the year when I write my year end reviews as per the Indian new year that will happen on 29th October this year. I love this activity as it lets me spend these Diwali holidays in a very reflective way where I look back and see how the year panned out. A macro view adds lot of value to life, don’t you think?

Travel Year in review: Vikram Samvat 2075 & Veer Samvat 2545 (approx Nov 2018 – Nov 2019)

Days on the road: About 3 months. 2 months in Thailand on a cycling trip. One month split into small trips of few days to Surat, Ahmedabad, Coimbatore (Isha Yoga Center) and Bangalore.

Posts published on this blog: 24 (a new metric I thought of checking)

This year I am reviewing the events in reverse – starting from the most recent that happened at the end of the year and then to the ones that happened earlier on in the year.

Shifted To Coimbatore

The biggest “travel” move happened at the end of the year, so I am covering that first. I shifted my home base to Coimbatore. Being a digital nomad I could always work from anywhere in the world. And that’s how I spent 7 months of last year out of Mumbai. Mumbai being the home base then. Now I have shifted the house base to Coimbatore.

It has now been a month in Coimbatore since I shifted here. It is not exactly “travelling” but it has been a deep exploration of the city as a new citizen. 🙂

Lots of reasons why – blogged about them here. Will be sharing more details on this soon, quite a few people have shown interest.

Two points:

• this is a trial attempt
• my Mumbai house is still there (my parents stay there)

1000 kms of cycling in Thailand

Earlier, in Jan-March 2019, I went for a couple of months to Thailand on a solo cycle tour. Ended the trip in Cambodia. I actually planned to go to Vietnam too but by the time I reached Phnom Penh, the Cambodian capital, I wasn’t inclined to continue further. Vegetarian food difficulties – one of the main reasons.

This trip got really intense. And typically the idea is that once I finish this trip I get back and start working asap. But in this case it was impossible. I found myself in a very different state of mind. Once I returned, I needed at least a month of cool down period before which I could really get back to anything at all.

Quite a few blog posts have been written about this trip, read the summary.

Surat

beautiful tile work and structure of this Jain temple in Surat

My maternal uncle shifted to Surat along with my Grandmother and so a couple of trips to this city happened. It was my first proper exploration of Surat. The Jain culture amazed me. I hadn’t seen such an active Jain community until now. My uncle has shifted here from Kolkata. And we all could appreciate the benefits of staying in a tier 2 town like Surat as opposed to a metro city. This probably also warmed me up further to the idea of moving to Coimbatore – a quieter and more value for money lifestyle.

Isha Yoga Center

clicked this when I stayed for the entire night at the Adiyogi on Sharad Poornima, 2018

I stayed for about 10-15 days in the Isha Yoga Center this year. Not at one stretch but split into a few days now and then. I wanted to stay longer but there are many rules and restrictions. So I finally considered shifting to Coimbatore, a major reason being that I could visit the ashram a lot often this way. And also be part of some of their activities. And soon with Guru’s grace the move happened. Coimbatore, here I am! 🙂

In Other News,

I got a few travel articles published this year. Top of mind are the Temples of Chiang Mai in Open Magazine, Oriental cycle tour in New Indian express and Making of the Adiyogi in Swayajya mag.

I also have been spending some time on my Youtube channel starting with a loooong monologue about why I shifted out of Mumbai as a first. 😀

That’s about it from me.

How has your travel year shaped up?