Month: July 2018

We have decided it is time to move on. Living in Portugal has been a great chapter in our journey, but we always knew this is an unsustainable endeavor (at least the way we have been living).

Now it is time to enter the “real” world again. Yes, this means we need to start making money again.

Part of our Portugal experience included reading books that inspire us. Here is the list of books we have been working through on this trip: https://www.golaunch.net/books/. My favorite so far is Start With Why by Simon Sinek, Leslie’s favorite is A Million Miles In A Thousand Years by Donald Miller.

Favorite to us means they have made the largest impact on our life today. For me, Start with why has been a game changer. I am an aspiring business man with dreams and ideas galore. So many, in fact, that I have regularly (constantly) been stalled out because I don’t know which one is the right choice to get started with. Ultimately, it comes down to not having a good way to gauge the quality of each idea.

Start with why clearly lays out how it is not the quality of the idea that matters, but how that idea resonates with your own desires for progress. As I think back through all of the stories I have read of entrepreneurs I think are successful, they all built companies with a mission that made sense. In Simon Sinek’s terminology, they had a clear sense of why they were doing it. Check out the link to Sinek’s book above to really understand what I am trying to say.

For me, thinking about why I want to do things gives me a filter for my choices (money doesn’t count in the end, it is just a desired byproduct). When I apply a why to each business idea my excitement wither goes up or down. When the why resonates with my passions and future visions of the world I start seeing an idea as an adventure with exciting challenges. When it doesn’t, I feel the oppression of all of the tasks that need accomplishment prior to launch.

That was a bit of a tangent, but it leads into our next adventure. We have a new quest: to build a sustainable life that fulfills our spirits. We are moving back to the States in a few weeks. After a couple weeks of visiting friends and family (and a bit of work), we are heading to Bend, OR.

We chose Bend because it has a lifestyle that is appealing. Bend is active and outdoorsy, it has great skiing at Mt. Bachelor (we haven’t been on skis in a couple years), and the sun shines a good share of the year!

Our intention is to settle in as quickly as possible and launch into starting businesses. My leading business idea (using my new “why” filter!) will mean traveling to coastal cities and towns, our living location is not particularly important. Leslie is planning to start a business as well. Her business idea is the consumer product type and, again, not location specific. This is great because we can live somewhere for lifestyle rather than work, hence Bend.

Living the retired life in Portugal has given us some interesting perspective on fulfilling our spirits. We are both missing a mission in life. In the past, work has fulfilled this to some degree. For me, work became sort of a self perpetuating downward spiral. The more I worked, the more I felt I needed to work, and, in the end, the house, the car, the stuff didn’t really make me feel accomplished. Work covered up the mission with limited time and providing for my family.

Leslie and I both have desires to help the world. For me, it is about advancing the world. The world is where it is at, but there are opportunities everywhere to improve things. My personal realization came from exploring real estate investing. I am a dreamer, and as I dream bigger and bigger, I realized that real estate investing is limited to the economic development of a community. Real estate investment can improve the quality of life a bit, but real growth comes in the form of business and industry growth.

Leveraging new technologies or new ideas to improve the world is what excites me. This has become my filter as I work through my different business ideas. I am going to launch a business along these lines. The first project will help communities with tourism from an infrastructure development angle. It will be accomplished by modifying a relatively new technology for a totally new application. Using technology and new ideas to improve a community… perfect!

There are some major hurtles, but I am starting with a passion for the project, not just the technology or the money. The first challenge that will be particularly difficult for me will be contacting and building relationships with the communities and organizations necessary to make these infrastructure projects happen. My wife says I always want everything perfect before I get started and never end up starting. She is right; I tend to be slower than I should be to get started. I am also not the gregarious, type A personality that picks up the phone at the drop of a hat. Knowing this, a) it is something for me to work on, and b) I am going to keep my eyes open for a possible business partner that has connections, fills some of my personality and business voids, and shares my excitement for the improving world.

I am excited to see where this goes!

Portugal has been a great experience. There have been challenges all over the place, particularly with a baby. It has cost us more than originally expected (and intended). In hindsight we would have done a few things differently. But, there is no way I would take any of it back. As Master Card would say: the experience has been “priceless”.

Living abroad has taught me, more than anything, what I want to do. The unexpected ways that new experiences challenged us really opened our eyes.

I thought much of this trip was going to be about living in a less developed country and learning that we need less. Learning to live with less stuff has happened a bit (mostly through the need to move often), but the real take home has been more internal than external.

The dreamy life of being retired at 40 sounds good, but the reality is a bit different. We really found a desire for progressive goals. Something to work on. Another beautiful day wandering didn’t give us quite as much motivation to get up in the morning as we thought. Now we are excited to get up in the morning and work on our businesses!

This is not to say we never want this lifestyle again, next time will just be different. We will have something to work on and, hopefully, be living a sustainable lifestyle (watching the savings slowly drain away adds a surprising amount of stress for us!).

If you have dreamed of moving abroad, or challenging the status quo of your life, I absolutely recommend going for it! If your experience is anything like mine, you will learn and grow a little in the way you intended, and will learn more than you can imagine in some unexpected way. Just step outside of your comfort zone and see what happens!

Even though we are moving on, this is not the end for my blog. First, there is more I want to post about Portugal and traveling. Second, I plan to give some details about how our move back to the States goes (moving back from New Zealand was a huge culture shock!). And, third, I intend to blog about how our business experiences go after all of this inspiration. Stay tuned!

For those just here to keep up with Theo’s antics, here is some fun:

I have been planning to write a blog post about driving in Portugal for quite some time now. I have driven in a few places around the globe and, as always, this place has its character.

Driving in Portugal can be an exciting adventure. We have been here almost 5 months. Other than a few train trips into Lisbon, we have traveled mostly with rental cars. Renting alone has been a varied experience.

Car Rentals

Planning this trip initially, we rented a car from Sixt. It was the least expensive option I found at the time. If I take Hertz Gold, skipping the rental counter (in the US) as my baseline, the Sixt service left something to be desired. But it wasn’t bad.

We rented the car for 5 weeks (the time we spent in Lagos). The real challenge was, if you remember from my initial posts, our luggage did not make the re-directed flights with us. Theo’s car seat was somewhere in Toronto. To add a child’s seat was almost €4 per day. And, the only option was to add it to the entire reservation.

Luckily, I have a persistent wife. She wrote Air Canada and TAP Portugal about our challenges and they cut us a check for the full cost of the car seat add-on!

Anyway, the check in was at the airport and they asked the standard questions and pushed the insurance policy as usual. I have insurance through my credit card, so I always decline. Most rental companies put a security hold on your card in Portugal. With the lower cost companies this can be quite high. I believe the highest I have seen so far is €2000.

We went on to rent with Interrent, Centauro, and Europcar. Being more of a mainstream supplier, I expected Europcar to have the least fees and add-ons, but it was not the case. The desk experience seemed better organized, but all of the add-ons seemed to cost a bit more. Also, with the cheap suppliers, we seem to be more likely to get a better car than we book. With Interrent, Centauro, and even Sixt, we ended up with diesel cars. (Much better fuel economy and better power for driving in Portugal). For reference, we have been booking Peugeot 208 or equivalent most of the time.

OK, where should you rent from? First, you should understand the difference between at the airport and near the airport. Lisbon airport is like airports used to be in the US. Walk from baggage claim to the rental desk and on to pick up your car. This is for the top tier rental agencies. Alamo, Hertz, Sixt, etc. Centauro, Interrent, and a few other cheap rental companies have a “convenient” shuttle to their office. Pay attention to the small print on where to find your car rental agent. Centauro, for example, is outside of baggage claim near the Vodafone booth. He will have a clipboard that says Centauro on it. If your name is on his list he will organize you on a Centauro shuttle (first come, first serve). From my experience shuttles tend to be about every 20 minutes. The ride is about 10 minutes. Please don’t be in a rush if you plan to use one of the off-site (cheap) rental companies. I have rented from Centauro 3 times. The shortest wait time queued up for check in was about 15 minutes. This was mid-week, odd hours. The longest queue was 2 hours 15 minutes to get to the counter. The first picture is just getting into the garage. The Second is about half way through the garage. If you notice, the check in desk is in a glass walled office way up ahead.

Interrent has similar difficulties expediting people through. They are advanced though… they have a pull-a-number machine and a reader board saying “now serving…”. All of these people are waiting just to talk to the desk agent.

I found the advertising a bit of a joke, particularly on this day. I spent a couple hours extending my reservation when it is supposed to be “fast pick up 👍, easy return 🔁, smart choice 😉”. The wink at the end felt more like “sucker!”.

What it really comes down to is how much time delay you are willing to put up with and how much that is worth to you. We typically rent for long periods of time so half of a day at the rental agency is not too bad for the hundreds saved.

The other noteworthy difference between rental companies is the age of the vehicles. With the cheap companies we received everything from a Nissan with 150,000 km that rattled and had the most annoying backup alarm (I think the backup proximity sensor was broken) to a Fiat with under 3,000 km. The top rental companies tend to have newer cars all across the board.

Side note on road tolls:

If you intend to spend much time driving around, I recommend getting the automatic toll collection, called Via Verde. All of the cars have it, they just charge you to use the service (I think it is a per day rate). Some friends chose not to get it. They didn’t have too much difficulty as they always had someone in the passenger seat and a bag of change. I hear there are unmanned toll booths that require you to stop at one of the service stations to pay the toll. Either way, we just slow down to 60 km/h and pass through the Via Verde line and we are on our way. Easily worth the money we paid up front (I think turning on the automatic collection has always been less than €20 for the entire rental period).

Tolls tend to be relatively cheap, but can add up on the longer transits. The tolls on all of the local roads are in the €0.75 to €2.50 range. Going between Lisbon and the Algarve or Porto are in the €18 to €20 range each way. I think 5 weeks in the Algarve with a couple of trips to Lisbon added up to about €120. (The ~€17 we paid for Via Verde was totally worth not stopping at 30 or 40 toll booths).

Driving

On to Driving. Portugal is a relatively easy country to drive in, but does have a few difficulties. The first you will experience as you leave the airport. Roundabouts can lead to nightmares here. The roundabout on the way out of the airport is a doozy. It has 6 lanes, 6 off-ramps, 4 on-ramps, 4 traffic lights, a gas station, and a freeway overhead. Here is a Google maps image:

Other roundabouts can definitely challenge as well. Here is one with a road through it, one with a road under it, and one not really round at all.

The Google view is interesting, but when you approach one of these intersections it can be difficult to understand where to go! This is a view from the street of the roundabout with a road through it:

It is good to have a co-pilot with strong navigation skills. No offense to my wife, but this is one area that she has always struggled. Practice does help though! She has managed to get me through some odd and difficult streets in Lisbon!

The roundabouts do come with a benefit though: u-turns are available! Or just go around again!

Navigating the roundabout:

Driving is on the right side of the street in Portugal, so look left to enter the roundabout. Street lights are an odd twist, but it just gives opportunities for different groups of cars to enter. Just think of them as a pause in the roundabout flow.

The flow is like this: move to the center to keep going around, and move to the outside just before you exit. Use your turn signal as you cross lanes, but realize that the Portuguese will not necessarily use turn signals or lanes. They just have the flow down.

Portuguese Drivers

Have you seen the animated movie Zootopia? There is a sloth named Flash that works at the DMV. He is painfully slow getting things done at work, but it turns out he is a street racer. Portugal definitely has a feeling of this. When you are waiting in line it feels like an eternity can pass before you are even helped. Then the process (e.g. checking out at the grocery store) is… um… well… I just want to reach across and check out myself! Then, heading down the motorway at 120 km/h with a car riding your bumper and another blowing your doors off. The road is the only place with a real sense of urgency.

But it is not with everyone. There are also people happy to cruise at 70 km/h in the right lane. In fact, often there are minimum speed limits for each lane (that is what the blue speed signs are). And, even though many Portuguese have a need for speed, they only get upset if you are driving like an American.

One of my true dislikes about driving in the United States is the propensity of Americans to set cruise control and camp in the fast lane. Get over! In Portugal, like other European places, driving is done in the right lane or second to right lane (larger roads: where the right lane is for merging). Lanes to the left are for passing. And when you pass, do it close to the car you are passing. Get over, pass, and get back in your driving lane quickly. If you want to pass another car in a moment, do it then. Don’t camp in the passing lane. You will get honked at.

And, like the roundabouts, use your turn indicators. The locals don’t much, but it is something they pay attention to. Safety trumps fitting in!

Rest Stops

On the major motorways there are rest/service stops. In the states, rest stops are dirty places you don’t want your kid to touch anything, and they may have a picnic table outside. In Portugal, on the other hand, people actually meet up at the stops. They include a fuel station, mini-mart, and, usually, a nice café. Nice and clean. Gardens. Kids toys. Check it out:

The only drawback: no coffee to-go. Actually, being from the Seattle area, that is one of our biggest frustrations about the country. We are just so used to walking around and exploring with a cup of joe in our hand.

Parking

Another uniquely Portuguese thing is parking. First, parking in designated places is fairly straight forward. Just look below the P on the sign to see if there any restrictions. For example, if there is a motorcycle, it is parking for motorcycles only.

These spaces, however, fill up quickly. Other than places where there are no-parking signs, it seems to be a free world. I have seen people parked in the most random places. I have even been held up in traffic because someone parked in the street (they just turned their hazard lights on). I don’t recommend that, but parking on sidewalks, etc. is normal, as long as there is not a no-parking sign.

During our walk this morning I snapped a couple of pictures of parked cars. The first re-defines the idea of parallel parking. I think the only properly parked car is the silver one in the middle.

The area in front of the garbage collection happens to be the preferred parking location for our local bakery:

Other fun tidbits:

Most Portugal cities and towns date from long before the US was even born. This leaves (extremely) narrow roads in the city centers. Most of these cobbled streets are primarily walking paths and only used as vehicle roads for local access. It makes for a quaint feel and beautiful images.

I have shown this image in past posts, but it is worth repeating. Some of the Portuguese still live in a time long past. This is regularly accepted and even the Portuguese street racers are content to wait for a donkey cart (as long as they obey the correct flow of traffic).

As you drive around the countryside, striking images abound. The for how densely populated the towns and cities are, the countryside is amazingly pristine.

Empty Motorway

Cobbled road next to golf course

Strikingly green in contrast with the white buildings

Cork trees in the Alentejo region

And for those car enthusiasts: Cascais (the town we currently live in) has an amazing array of cars passing through. This was a McLaren rally that passed us on our morning walk. (Sorry for the Renault in the way; I was slow in getting my phone and only caught the last few cars going by).

Other transportation

We have used the trains between Lisbon and Cascais, the metro in Lisbon, and Uber. All work well here.

In hindsight, I would have chosen to take the train to Porto. It turns out the drive is longer than the train ride. Also, we did not use the car while we were in Porto. It was parked in a paid lot for the 3 days we were there! The only downside to the train is you can’t explore the small coastal towns on the way. If you have time, driving through little towns in Portugal is worth it.

Uber also works well, and is relatively inexpensive. We spend €30-€35 to get from our place (the other side of Cascais) to the airport, a half-hour drive without traffic.

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This post is a bit on the long side; I guess there are quite a few details about driving in Portugal. If you have any questions, feel free to send me a message. Good luck and enjoy!

Travel is an interesting thing. There is this romantic idea of anywhere you want to go. Paris is the perfect example; you picture sitting in a café with your croissant and espresso listening to someone play the accordion, overlooking the Eiffel Tower. Then you go. You find pieces of the dream, but the guy next to you is smoking, and there is a security wall with armed guards around the Eiffel Tower, etc., etc.

The unexpected becomes the most memorable. This past trip to Paris was all about the unexpected. Most of my favorite travel memories come from locals.

In a past blog I described the Pena Palace. It is the iconic palace to see near Lisbon. It is worth a visit, but did not hold the romanticism I had built up from the brochures. Hanging out with some friends (locals), we asked about where to hike. Two different friends said to go to the same place.

It took us a while to find time, but we finally went to Santuário da Peninha. It is not far from Cascais or Pena Palace. In fact, you can just see the Palace from Peninha. Although mostly unknown to tourists, it is a popular hiking spot for locals. The buildings aren’t special, but the views are the best we have found in Portugal. By far! I’m not sure the pictures do it justice, but here they are:

There is a forest to the north of the buildings that is full of hiking trails. We hope to go back soon to explore more!

If I expect, allow, and look for variation in travel plans, something unique and memorable always comes out. As I think back, all of my favorite travel stories involve either some knowledge locally acquired or planning mishap. I am not great at meeting random strangers to find the good stuff, but, luckily, my wife is great at it!

At a café here in Cascais, she met someone that retired in Portugal from Seattle. This lead to lunch with her and her husband, who manages a “beer with the boys” gathering for expats. I have been a few times (a lot of fun!). And from that: tomorrow I am going out sailboat racing. I haven’t raced in a lot of years, but I am excited!

My Portuguese (romantic) vision never included racing sailboats. Another great divergence of travel!

We picked up a book before this trip that really does a good job of describing these opportunities and experiences. “Vagabonding” as the author calls it is not for everyone, but I think the great opportunities possible with flexible travel will benefit anyone willing. Here is a link to the book:

P.S. I go through my pictures before each blog post to see what we have done that is interesting. One thing I have noticed is the prevalence of purple flowers in Portugal. I would guess that about half of the flowers (wild and not) are purple. Most of the trees even bloom purple. I thought I had more pictures, but here are a few; check it out: