How Ralph Velasco Turned Travel into a Purpose-Driven Career

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How you doing today, Ralph, man?

I'm great. Thanks for having me, CJ.

Like I say, man, I appreciate you coming on, man, taking the time out your busy continental schedule, man. Hey, ladies and gentlemen, we just don't have a guy that go from state to state. My man Ralph is continental, man. Hey, so that's a big thing. So Ralph, man, let's jump right into this, man. Let me ask you a question. Origins of a world traveler, the spark. What inspired your passion to travel and do photographs?

Well, I've been very lucky to have been a traveler since in high school. I studied in Spain for a summer, and the next summer I was a volunteer in Venezuela. The next summer I volunteered in Peru, and the next summer I studied in Mexico City to learn Spanish. So from a fairly early age, I've always been a traveler. I've always enjoyed photography, and this was well before the dawn of digital photography. But I think like a lot of other people, digital photography really allowed us to dive headfirst into this realm of photography, and it was so much simpler and cheaper. In most cases, it was a new trend. And back early in 2001, 2002, I kind of saw this coming, this dawn of digital photography. And I thought that there might be a market for someone like me to teach people how to use their new digital cameras. And so that's what I did. And it started as a slow burn, but here I am. 17 years later, full-time, still doing this and going pretty strong.

Let me ask you, Ralph, man. So like doing digital photography and things of that nature, what do you actually photograph? What is the main thing that you photograph?

Yeah, well, as a travel photographer, I organize and lead tours around the world and have been doing this for about 17 years. And so first of all, I started out just sitting across the kitchen table from someone one-on-one. Teaching them how to use their new 1-megapixel camera. But then that gradually turned into half-day tours and then full days and weekends. And I was living in Southern California at the time, somewhere where I could do this full-time, year-round. And even during the winter, we were, you know, going all over Southern California, which is a beautiful place to photograph. But eventually I started bringing groups back to Chicago, my hometown, And then I started doing international tours. So, you know, what got me started with the travel part though is having started doing it from a very young age, being just totally enamored with international cultures and people and learning about different cultures and places. And I just haven't stopped having that curiosity since.

Man, first LA. I never been to LA. Big Laker fan. Been a Laker fan since 1980. I know people get tired of me saying that, but it's true. I'm not ashamed of. So Southern California, I heard that it never rains in Southern California. So I know that that's a beautiful place to take pictures. But one thing that I do admire, man, that you said that in this journey that you were doing, you came back and started teaching this and doing it in Chicago, in your hometown, man. And that's cool where you built everything at, man, to come back and bring others along the way, you know what I'm saying, from your community, man. I think that's cool. So let me ask you, Ralph, man, the brand. How did the Continental Drifter name and platform come to life?

Yeah, it's, it's kind of funny. I started out with my business being all about me. It was, so it was RalphVelasco.com and it was Ralph Velasco Photo Tours. And, and so early on I realized that if I made the company all about me, if I ever wanted to bring other tour leaders or I want to sell the business, it might be difficult to do that. So I changed the company name to Photo Enrichment Adventures, and then I created a second brand called A La Compaña Experiences right before COVID And this was a different type of trip. So the Photo Enrichment Adventures were more photography focused and more let's see a little bit of a lot in a region or country, where A La Compaña Experiences were more about doing a deep dive into a place. So staying a week maybe in one, maybe two locations where we do a deep dive, pack and unpack once. So to make a long story longer, I was confusing my customers even more 'cause if you recall, I had three brands, Photo Enrichment Adventures, Alla Campagna Experiences, and then I started thinking about Continental Drifter because I was going to start actually hosting a TV show, and I thought, what a great name for a TV show, The Continental Drifter. And so I trademarked the name and registered it. And so now everything folded underneath the Continental Drifter umbrella. And so Photo Enrichment Adventures, a la compañía experiences, are behind me, and we're all Continental Drifter at this point.

Man, I like that. I like that. You know, I've been working on my umbrella to the CJ Moneyway Entertainment. And like you say, everything else just falls under that umbrella, man. And it takes a while to come up with that concept and think about things, you know, and things of that nature. Like you say, we be all over, you know what I'm saying? You got so many ideas. But one thing I've learned from somebody once before, man, he said this, Ralph. He said that you got to have pockets. And what I mean by pockets is like we got so many ideas. And so you got to have pockets for all these different type of ideas because if not, then we can put all these ideas together that don't go together. And so if I got an idea here, I got an idea here, and I can come back, I say, you know what, this may go with that, you know what I'm saying? Or this may go with this. Because as creators and things of that nature, man, we have so many things that's built up, we gotta make first thing first, because we could be working on a lot of different things and then try to do multiple things at one time. But I talked to a young lady When I first started, she said, make the first thing first, you know what I'm saying? And then you keep everything else on the side and then work on that as you go along. So yeah, man, that's cool.

I could have called my business Chase the Shiny Objects Incorporated, you know, because every time you get an idea, you just want to go after it. I know what you mean.

You do, man. I love that name, man. Continental Drifters, you know what I'm saying? Like I say, Hey, y'all, we're not working with somebody— I'm not talking to somebody that's just a worldwide man or just local. This man is a continental advocate, man. My man, Ralph. So, Ralph, man, let me ask you, man, building a dream career around travel, living location-free, what has it been like living without a permanent home for 12+ years?

Yeah, it's a great question and it is an ideal life. But like anything else, there are pros and cons to it. So, you know, I'll tell you when I chose to become what's come to be called location independent or digital nomad, about 12, 13 years ago now, I was in Toledo, Spain, and I was walking through the town dragging my bigger suitcase and I had my little backpack on and I'd been on the road for about 2.5 months at that point. And I'm thinking to myself, you know, I've survived 2.5 months with just these 2 bags. More do I really need?

You know?

And so I started thinking about all this stuff that I have, you know, CDs and books and things that I don't need. So I really started getting into this minimalist idea of getting rid of stuff and starting to accumulate experiences. And that's just been a change in my life. That was definitely a turning point when I started thinking about accumulating experiences and memories instead of things. And so that was a big deal.

I like that. Experience memories instead of things. You know, that's a whole nother subject right there. You know what I'm saying? Because we do, you know, it's not about the things that a man obtains. You know what I'm saying? Oh, the wealth that you get, that ain't what get us there, man. It's other things in life. Like you say, memories is one of them, man. So let me ask you, Ralph, man, getting paid to travel. Now this is the good part. You've created and led over 120 international tours. How did you turn that into a business model?

Yeah, as I mentioned earlier, it was a slow burn. So starting out just sitting across the kitchen table from someone going over their camera from top to bottom. Teaching them all the dials and buttons and settings, you know, especially 20, 25 years ago when digital photography was just sort of being born really. And no one knew anything about these devices. So I had to learn pretty quickly to be able to teach it. One thing maybe your listeners can benefit from, one thing I did was I started teaching at, I was living in Southern California at the time, city where they might have adult education programs and, you know, yoga and photography and who knows what. But that's a great way to test your business idea if it's something that you can put into, say, an adult education class. So I decided back then to create a course that was about teaching people how to see. Not just using the camera, but what to point it at, what makes a good photograph, composition, lighting, things like that. So I really enjoyed teaching the creative part of it, not the buttons and dial stuff. So that was a great way to validate my idea, was to learn how to market where people gonna sign up, which is kind of funny to say. Uh, but, uh, these are places that you don't need any kind of teaching degree.. So anyone can create a course, and if it's accepted, you can teach it, test your idea, start to build a following. I was able to practice, you know, learning how to teach this subject. And as you teach, you learn, of course. So that was a great way to go about it for me.

Man, I like that. Get a teaching course and go out there and just test it and see where it go. Let me ask you, Ralph, man, on that course creation, Can you tell us more about your tour organizer training and how others can break into this space?

Yeah, so the tour organizer training is an online course that I created. It's, uh, 7 modules and 27 lessons within that. But I started getting asked by a lot of people, how can I do what you do? You seem to live the ultimate life traveling around the world. Getting paid to travel. So I created a course called a tour organizer training, get paid to travel. So this is available, it's on my website at continentaldrifter.co. But I wanted to show people from soup to nuts what it takes to organize and lead a tour. And one of the first tips was that you should create your trips around a special interest. And mine was initially photography. Now it's sort of morphed into some photography, but more about food and wine and culture and learning about the locals and things like that. So that's kind of how it's progressed. And now the trips are, you know, like I said, just kind of one, maybe two locations instead of moving around a whole region or country.

Well, man, you're in town, 125 international courses, man. Of course you could just go to a couple of them nowadays, you know, two at a time. You're You put in the hard work, but you say you laid the foundation, man, and that's the most important part. So let me ask you, man, before I get into this next section, we talked about this offline. Tell us a little bit about Bitcoin, man, and how did you get into that?

Yeah, so Bitcoin, I started this company and the idea for it was when I was here in Chicago and I owned a restaurant and I decided that I couldn't probably run that type of an outdoor business in Chicago all year round because of the weather.

Mm-hmm.

So I decided to move to Southern California. So to do that, I needed some kind of an income. So I became a financial advisor and I was working for a friend of mine who had a firm out in Southern California. So I worked for him. So I got my licenses. So I love investments, things like that. But when Bitcoin came on my radar, actually about, 8, 9 years ago. I was trying to figure out how to create a wallet, how to buy it. Uh, it was very difficult back then, so I gave up. And it was at $4,000 a coin back then. Now it's over $90,000 a coin.

Hmm.

Now I did get in 4 years ago, but still I missed out on that huge run-up from $4,000 to $90,000. But I'm doing okay. Bitcoin is just an incredibly hard and safe form of money. It's like a digital gold, so it's less of a currency than it is a store of value.

Hmm.

And it's taken a little bit of a hit over the past couple months, and it was kind of in the low $80,000s per coin. And you don't have to buy a whole coin. And don't let anyone ever sell you an actual coin because of course this is all digital money. Mm-hmm. You see these videos where it looks like there's a Bitcoin, you know, an actual coin, but don't ever let anyone sell you a coin and, and charge you $90,000. But the thing I was gonna mention is that you can buy any fraction of that. So you don't have to come up with $90,000 to buy a full coin. You could buy $10, $100 worth, dollar cost average into it. So, you know, put $100 a week, $100 a month, whatever, and just slowly get into it. But I absolutely think it's where it's going.

Mm-hmm.

Governments are starting to hold Bitcoin. I just heard that Russia was paying China for something in Bitcoin. Now we've got a pro-Bitcoin president and government. So everything's heading in the right direction for this to go from $90,000 a coin to a million or more over the next 5 to 10 years. Now, this isn't an overnight get-rich-quick scheme at all. It's a get-rich-slowly type of thing. But I would recommend that people especially look up a gentleman named Michael Saylor. S-A-Y-L-O-R. If you look up any videos of his on YouTube, he is the absolute guru, incredible at explaining what's involved. It's really incredible movement.

You know, you told me more about Bitcoin than I've learned about it, especially with the value, $10, $100 here and there. But when Bitcoin came to my mind is when the football player He was playing for the Rams at the time, the receiver Odell Beckham. He wanted his salary, his whole salary, we talking millions of dollars, his whole salary to be paid to him in Bitcoin. And everybody thought that he was crazy and stupid at the time for doing something like that, but he was the one laughing all the way to the bank, man.

He said, I bet he's at least doubled his money. That was brilliant. That was brilliant.

I think, you know, at that time, what, maybe $12, $15 million, and you know going to Bitcoin. And you say what, it's $90,000 a coin or something? And maybe it was a little cheaper to buy in, you know, by the time he did it, probably about 4 or 5 years ago when the Rams won the Super Bowl. So yeah, man, big shout out to you, Odell, man. You was ahead of a lot of us, man. So thanks for that explanation, Ralph, man. So let me ask you, Ralph, man, behind the lenses, what are your best tips for travel photography, even for beginners?

Yeah, so I've got some tips that anyone can use with any kind of camera, smartphone, anything. And as I mentioned earlier, I was very interested in teaching people what to point the camera at, how to frame a shot. It's, it's just as important what's in the frame as what's outside of the frame, what you cut out. So to me, one of the most important things is being aware of your backgrounds.

Mm-hmm.

And right now I'm not in the most ideal background. So you could see that this frame is coming through my head here behind me. That's just the way that the basement studio is set up here. Can't get it any higher. But normally I would want to be something like this, right? Where it's more framed instead of this thing coming through my head here. And so if you're watching the video, you'll see that there's this map behind me, but the frame's coming through my head. So always be aware of what's happening behind and in front of your subject. Is that proverbial telephone pole sticking out of the person's head? Is something happening in front of them that's distracting? So sometimes we get focused so much on the person or the subject, we forget what's happening in front or behind them. The other thing is being aware of the quality and direction of light falling on your subject. You know, is the light coming from behind and their face is all in shadow? Or are there harsh shadows underneath the nose and the chin? So being aware of those things, you know, just looking deeper into the scene and how you might be able to correct that. Can you turn the person so they're now facing towards the sun? Can you take them out of the sun and put them into the shade where the light is more even? Things like that that we don't—

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Often think about, but that are easily fixed right then and there. It's not even really a camera setting, it's just moving around or moving your subject. So those are two really easy tips that anyone could do with any kind of camera.

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Hey, G. Smith, Donovan, I know you guys doing your thing, man, but Ralph got some tips for you, man. Ralph got some tips. I got a couple partners that do this, you know, and have took some professional photos of me myself in some aspects. But man, it's always good to learn from a pro who in Continental, man, you know what I'm saying? I, I get the map, I get the map. I see you, Ralph, I see you, man. That's Continental right there, continental living brick by brick on the Money Way Show. So, Ralph, man, let me ask you, man, mindful travel. You've written books on travel affirmations and gratitude. How does mindfulness evaluate the travel experience?

Yeah, you know, this is something that since I was on that trip to Peru back when I was 16 years old, and one of our teachers on the trip We were 16-year-old boys. We were kind of complaining a little bit about missing our mother's food and our beds and our friends and family back home because we were literally on the other side of the world in Peru and South America at 16 years old. And, one of the professors said, "Guys, be here now. You have the most incredible opportunity to be literally on the other side of the world to learn from these people." to get their perspectives, see how they live, learn from them, be here now, appreciate the moment. And so that always stuck with me. But as a young person, we are all about trying to see and do and experience as much as possible. And that's wonderful. And that's one of the great things about youth. But as we get older, or as I get older, I should say, I am much more appreciative about slowing down, about slow travel and not trying to just tick items off of a bucket list. To me, it's about experiences again and doing a deep dive into a place as opposed to seeing a little bit of a lot. I'm much more interested in seeing a lot of a little. And an example of that is just sitting in a cafe watching the world go by somewhere. And this can be in your own hometown. You don't have to be halfway around the world, but sitting on a bar stool in Great Britain, and that bar stool's older than the United States of America, and I'm sitting there talking to some old-timer having a beer and chatting them up. So something like that, that's just experiences and being more about enjoying where we are. You know, these digital devices, smartphones are fantastic and, you know, I love mine. Don't take it away from me, but they're made to take us away from where we are. They're great for that. You know, you're watching a TV show, you want to look up some actor or you know, where the scene was made, the information is in your pocket, but it immediately takes you away from where you are. So I wrote a book. My first book I wrote was subtitled 101 Tips for Developing Your Photographic Eye and More. And the last tip in the book is put the camera down. And I thought that that should maybe be the first tip in the book. Because as a photographer, I'm one of the worst because I tend to go through these trips. I realized about midway through my career as a travel photographer, international tour organizer, that I was going through these trips with my eye to the viewfinder and I was getting some great shots, but I was there physically. I've got the passport stamps, I've got the receipts, the pictures and video, but was I there mentally? And so I'm really big on this idea of putting the phone down, turning it off, or set a timer for every hour or two, whether you're traveling or not, for it to remind you to just stop, look, listen, feel, touch, taste your surroundings. And again, that doesn't have to be halfway around the world. It could be in your own backyard. Just, it's about appreciation, gratitude. So that's why I wrote the books, was to get that across. The books are, one is 60 Affirmations for Travel. So it's got some adult coloring pages in there, lined pages for notes that you can write for yourself. It's sort of a journal. I wrote a travel activity book for adults that does have more things like crossword puzzles, word searches, all having to do with travel, but also inspirational quotes, mandalas, which are adult coloring pages, things like that. And then recently I wrote something called How to Be a Mindful and Intentional Traveler, or How to Be a Mindful Traveler. And this is deepening your travel experiences through the 5+ senses. And I just mentioned that. So taking these places in through the 5 senses, And doing that intentionally, it's very important, the intentionality, because if you're multitasking while you're doing it, you're probably not doing anything well. I'm good. I'm great at multitasking. Yeah. You know, I could watch TV and eat and be on my phone at the same time, listen to a podcast, you know, but I'm not doing any of them well. And that's the key.

Yeah, I like that. I could do that too. I, for one, I can't eat without reading. You know, I'm just not comfortable without reading. I have to read while I'm eating. Yeah, so sometimes that's why I can't eat when we go out in different places, or, you know, may go to a party here and there, because I just like to be comfortable in my own spot. But you said something about the 5 senses, and I want people to listen to this, especially those who drive a lot. Put the phone down while you're driving, man. Pay attention to, as Ralph said to your surroundings. I think that has become an issue with drivers on the highway, wherever, man. Just everybody just want to be on their phones. Like you say, these phones, you know, it's a good thing and it's a bad thing. But man, people on these phones and they driving, they're not paying attention to the road. Pay attention to your surroundings, man. For real, for real. So let me ask you, Ralph, man, You mentioned this earlier, from being a restaurant owner to global storyteller, food and travel as a third-generation restaurateur. How do you blend this into your tours?

Yeah, so obviously we all eat, and hopefully 3 meals a day. I know I do. I'm very lucky in that sense. But when we're traveling, especially with my background from, you know, being a third-generation restaurateur, food's been very important in my life. I don't know if I call myself a foodie, but I enjoy food and I love to try anything. I, I'll try anything twice. I say, you know, when it comes to food, I've eaten tarantulas in Cambodia and water bugs and putrefied shark and just crazy stuff. I'm still here, but I think food is such an important part of travel because number one, I go to some of the world's great countries with amazing cuisines like Turkey, Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, Mexico. I mean, every country has its, you know, plate dishes and certain ways of cooking, but I love to bring my groups to market walks. So wet markets, the food markets, produce, see all the new and exotic fruits and vegetables that we've never seen before. Let's try 'em. Let's taste them. Gosh, you know, I love to turn people onto different things that they've never tried before, and they almost always fall in love with it. So food is such a universal thing, and it's such a great way to explore a place that I love to incorporate it into my trips. And there's also food and wine tastings. Let's see how they make the local cheese, walnut oil, olive oil. We go caviar tasting. It's not expensive. And we go to the caviar farm in southwestern France where they actually grow the sturgeon to make the caviar. It's phenomenal. So those kinds of things are the experiences that I just love to share with my clients That's what I really get off on, is going to these places, learning about them, doing these things, and then bringing my groups back to see it through their eyes and through their experience.

Now, I will say this, Ralph. You know, the most exotic food I've had— I have tried alligator. Me and my wife just went to New Orleans for our anniversary in December. First time trying fried oysters. It was pretty good. Yeah, but one thing I don't think I'm gonna try, Ralph, as you just said, I don't think I'm gonna try no water bugs, man. I just, I don't think I could.

Tarantulas are okay.

I don't know, man, you got an exquisite taste there, Ralph. But see, I ain't never been to France or Britain either, you know what I'm saying? So I don't know. You know what, I have been to Jamaica. All right, and I tell you what, you eat goat meat in Jamaica, and you eating goat in Jamaica, it's so good you don't even know that you eating goat, you know what I'm saying, or whatever. So, so it was pretty good. And so when we came home, you know, at home, and I was working at the casino, and we have potlucks sometimes or whatever, and so people bring in different variety of stuff, and they bring in some goat meat and things of that nature. Now, like I said, I ate goat meat in Jamaica, but now we in America. Now you bring some goat meat up. Yeah, I don't know, man. So, so, uh, just got one more question for you, Ralph, man, that I want to do a quickfire round. And my quickfire round, I've been doing this since the beginning of the year, and, you know, I think the guest and the audience has been enjoying this part of the segment. Sure, I'm gonna ask you 5 questions and tell me the first thing that comes to your mind. So, but before I get there, let me ask you, man, the Storyteller, how does your podcast Travel Thoughts from a Continental Drifter help deepen the common, uh, the connection with your audience?

Well, with that podcast, it's been about sort of travel tips, talking about money and electronics and things like that. And so that's a podcast that I haven't put out in a while, but typically on other people's podcasts. I've had podcasts in the past of my own, but I'm all about helping people to travel easier, more safely, and less expensively. So that's what I try to get across in almost everything I do.

Well, I want to holla at you because I definitely want to learn how to travel less. Expensively. You best to believe that. Hey, so Ralph, man, so you ready for this quickfire round, man?

Let's do it.

Let's do it, man. Here we go. Favorite destination you've ever visited?

If I had to choose one, I would say Spain.

Spain.

Spain is absolutely fabulous, and, uh, I just feel at home there. I have some Spanish roots, but I love the food, the people, the culture. Just everything about it is wonderful. I'm going in about 2 weeks and I cannot wait.

How did I know that you were going to say something about you love the food there? I thought maybe you would say soccer because I heard that that's real big there with Messi and all that. He said the food, the— what did you— the tarantula. Ah, anyway, must-have item on your carry-on?

You know, just off the top of my head, I would say earphones. So like your AirPods or something like that. 'Cause I fly and, you know, I'm on buses and transportation a lot. So I do like to put in EarPods and just either listen to music or podcasts or zone out or white noise. One thing I'll recommend is, 'cause I'm all over the world, I'm on different time zones, I'm constantly jet lagged, I'm awake in the middle of the night, I'm trying to sleep during the middle of the day. And so using a white noise app, which if you're not familiar with it, it's just a sound like, you know, like a fan. A lot of people like to sleep with a fan. And so I like to put that on either in my EarPods or, you know, just sitting on the side of the night table. And that drowns out most of the noises that would wake me up. It kind of evens out the noises. So that's AirPods and a white noise app I highly recommend.

Oh, I like AirPods, white noise app. Get that. The one book you recommend to travelers?

Ooh, well, two of my favorite books are Cosmos by Carl Sagan. That's about space. That's space travel. But also another one is Guns, Germs, and Steel. By Jared Diamond, and that's about how guns, germs, and steel transformed our world, especially in South America. Like when the Spanish conquistadors went down there and ravaged everything, but with their guns, the germs that they brought, and the steel of their swords, something like 80 men conquered the Incan civilization. And so it's just super fascinating stuff. So I love that stuff. It's somewhat related to travel, but those are two of my favorite books.

So let me ask you, Ralph, man, before we go any farther, you said travel in space. You were talking about the one book, Cosmo. So are you thinking about getting on SpaceX or something one day, man? You want to take that ride like that?

I don't think so. I mean, I have my pilot's license, but very, very different to going into space. But yeah, no, I'm super claustrophobic. I can't imagine just sitting on the launch pad in some little seat like this and like getting ready to blast off with 50,000 megatons of power behind you. Yeah, that— I don't know if I would do that.

Now, you said you don't know if you would do that. I know for a fact. No, right?

I mean, you're with me, right?

I know for a fact. I'm not doing that. You know what I'm saying? I don't care how much money I got, I don't want to go to space that bad. No, I'm not doing that and be stuck up there like them astronauts was for 9 months. No way, Jose.

I like it down here.

Hey, keep me where I'm at, man. I like ground level. I work in an industrial industry. I don't even like going up to cranes and stuff like that. I don't like the heights like that. So your boy going to Mars, not gonna happen. Most unforgettable travel memory.

Uh, one story that I often bring up, I'll try to tell it very quickly, is I got to Georgia, the Republic of Georgia. It's a country in the Caucasus near Russia, Turkey, Armenia. And I just landed there and my local guide was picking me up at the airport. First time I'd ever been there. Young woman in her 30s, and I could tell she was driving sort of very cautiously and trepidatious and, you know, maybe hadn't driven too much. And so, uh, maybe she could see me holding onto the, the seat or something, but she said, hey Ralph, don't worry about it. Tomorrow my dad's gonna drive us around. 'Cause I was there scouting and she was gonna show me around the area, what things we could put on the tour.

Mm-hmm.

And I'm thinking to myself, oh, thank God. You know, so, uh, then her father comes and drives, and he's worse than she is. Oh my God, it's hard to explain, but have you ever seen someone who slows down to pass someone and speeds up when someone tries to pass them?

Man, picture that.

So it was like that, and I was just, you know, so we were supposed to go 2 full days with him and I made an excuse for the next day. I couldn't handle it. I was afraid for my life. And so I made an excuse to get out of the next day anyway. Make a long story even longer, they were driving me at the end of the trip to the border of Armenia where I was going to meet my Armenian guide to go there. And so they drove me to the border, they dropped me off. They say, uh, we'll wait out here 10, 15 minutes for you to get through the passport control. If anything goes wrong, we'll still be here. So I get up to passport control, I slide the man my passport, and he says, do you have a visa for travel to Azerbaijan? I said, I'm going to Armenia. He says, this is the Azerbaijan border. So they took me to the wrong border crossing.

Wow.

So here I am thinking, oh my God, I'm out of this car, I'm done with this man.

Wow.

And I had to go another 45 minutes with them to the Armenian border. And go across there. So it was just a kind of a funny story where these things just kept happening one after the other, but I did finally get out of there.

Man, I know what you mean. I mean, I said I've been to Jamaica and ate goat meat. We went to Negril, so you think probably like 2, 3 hours away from when you, you know, get off by Montego Bay. Uh-huh. Now if I ever go again, I'm going to Montego Bay. Because that bus ride to wherever we took— the grill, like you say, man, that was the scariest bus ride I've ever had in my life. He was getting whiplash back there, man. I mean, like you say, they going, you know, because they drive on the other side of the street. Oh, that's right. So they passing cars up, going around curves, and they flying. And you know, like, how do you know something not coming? Oh man, it was the scariest thing ever, man. Nothing against Nothing against Jamaica, but if I ever go again, I'm going to Montego Bay where I don't have to travel. All you gotta do, get out of the airport and you right there. They got Kentucky Fried Chicken, they got Burger King and everything right there. That's a good tip. That's one to grow on. Hey, so my last one, Ralph, man. Word or mantra you live by on the road?

I would say be here now. I would bring that back up. I'm constantly trying to bring myself back to now. The past is behind us. We can't do anything about it. The future's in front of us. It never really gets here. Someday never comes. All we have is now. So how are we going to make the best of now?

I like that. How are we going to make the best of now, Ralph? Thank you, man, for taking us on an unforgettable journey today, from your global adventure to your wisdom about mindfulness, photography, and entrepreneurship. You've given us so much to reflect on. To our listeners, if you ever dream of getting paid to travel or want to experience the world with more purpose and presence, go follow Ralph at continentaldrifter.co. And check out his podcast that he haven't released in a while, but he throw out some good nuggets, and his books. And don't forget, this is more than just a podcast, it's a movement. From the CJ Moneyway Show to G Outta State's Capital, when Planting Seeds with CJ, we're building a platform for success, creativity, and impact. Until next time, stay curious, stay intentional. Wait a minute, I forgot. Ralph, tell us again, man, what can we find you at on social media, man?

Yeah, look for me @RalphVelasco, and you can find my website continentaldrifter.co where everything is there. And I also organize trips for people that are looking to travel on their own dates. So if you want a custom tour, I can do that as well.

Now I can close it. Until next time, stay curious, stay intentional, and remember, you're just one decision away from your next big adventure. Now, if you gonna eat tarantula, that's on you, but your boy CJ Moneyway ain't eating no tarantula. Hey, yo, this is your boy CJ and Ralph. We out of here. Peace.

You've been listening to the CJ Moneyway Show with real stories, real lessons, yeah, and real perspective come together. Remember, move with patience, move with purpose.

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