When you come home from traveling, usually you just want to leave again. And so it is. For the next few months, we’ll be working hard behind the scenes to make this site better (and you will continue to see clandestine updates to my personal blog), but in the meantime, you can’t blame a man for fantasizing about the possibilities of the future. Some may ask, hasn’t he had enough of this? If you do, you clearly haven’t been watching our episodes or reading the blog. My life is rich. So without further ado, Here are my four 3-country circuit options, broken out by geographic region.

A brief ado: My ratings and scales are entirely subjective based on hunches and basic research on a scale of 1,600 in honor of the Brian Lio International Satisfaction Scale (or BLISS). Feasibility reflects employment and cost of living. Life-Enrichment is the degree to which doing this makes me a better person.

Option #1: Eastern Europe – (after a brief stopover in Istanbul..) Odessa, Ukraine; Riga, Latvia; and St. Petersburg, Russia.

Total transit cost: $900 (all planes – not kidding)
Feasibility rating (out of 1600): 1200
Fun points (also out of 1600): 1400
Life-Enrichment Rating: 500

Option #2: Middle East – Beirut, Lebanon; Jerusalem, Israel; and Cairo, Egypt

Total transit cost: $720 (wow, even cheaper – after Beirut, all taxis)
Feasibility: 800
Fun points: 900
LER: 1600

Option #3: Subcontinent – Yangon, Burma; Kathmandu, Nepal; and Goa, India

Total transit cost: $2,200 (that looks more reasonable – all planes)
Feasibility: 400 (*volunteering in Kathmandu)
Fun points: 1000
LER: 1400

Option #4: South America – Calí, Colombia; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; and Buenos Aires, Argentina

Total transit cost: $1700 (all planes)
Feasibility: 1100
Fun points: 1500
LER: 900

Istanbul will be the last stop for Brian, Nick and I.. for now. We passed the one-year mark last September, somewhat unceremoniously, after having lost Matt, Jed, a cast member that is never to be, and our two good friends, Kevin and Bryan, who were the legs beneath us behind the scenes.

All of these losses were due to factors like burnout, injury, and financial strain– simply the accumulation of our daily lives– and though we could see some of them coming, the losses were devastating. This is the secret behind the curtain, which we’ve struggled with silently for months, the reason behind the blips, errors, bugs and lack of episodes.

It’s been this way since in our last month in Seoul, Season 3, when Brian did what Brian does best– he had an idea. We’d been proud to bring Nick out, and despite his limited appearance in the episodes, he added a great deal the footage we have through the end of our time there. We were expecting Jen, and even a sixth cast member, so Brian’s proposal was to mostly pull out the layer of production overhead we grappled with daily, and allow them to tell their own stories, take their own videos and edit them afterwards. That’s what you’ve seen on this blog, unfolding over the past few months. You’ve also been introduced to three new faces: Kris, Serene, and Laurene.

So what about Brian, Nick and I?

Well this mode of storytelling is new to us, and so we need to pull ourselves out of the chaos, insanity, and instability that comes when you pack up all your stuff and leave home every 90 days. We’re still here, and we still plan to be out on the road again, but for now, we’re going home.

For each of us, home means something different, but for me, I will be traveling from Istanbul to Paris, Paris to Normandy, and then Normandy to Santa Fe, New Mexico. I will share a few stories of the trip over the week, but you will see me less and less, as we focus on developing our new content model, and building Jet Set Zero into a global network.

Don’t forget, you can always send me a note, ask me a question, or pose a suggestion, by emailing me at rob –at– jetsetzero.tv

Thanks, and you’ll see me again soon.