Welcome to The Introduction to our blog about our traveling lifestyle

    We spent a gorgeous fall in Vail--the aspens were putting on a great yellow and gold show this year. Our Festive Season voyage this year was in in Panamá, after skiing Vail's opening few days.
    For July and August 2024, we traveled to the Middle East (yes, while there was a war on). We stayed at 6 different Four Seasons Hotels and were truly indulged! It's been nearly 30 years since we were in Turkey or in Egypt. We started in Istanbul at the Four Seasons Sultanahmet property. From Istanbul, we flew to Cairo and stayed at the Nile Plaza property. After Cairo, we flew to Sharm El Sheikh and stayed at that FS property. Next, we went to the Alexandria Four Seasons and Dimitri’s birthplace (not the FS, Alexandria). Click here to read about all of the things we checked off Dimitri's wish list. We returned to Cairo by car and stayed at the FS First Residence. After a month in Egypt, we returned to Istanbul and stayed at the gorgeous FS Bosphorus. 
     Wow! We've come a long way since we started traveling on a budget in 1995--both in travel expenses and in our ages! When we are traveling these days, people offer to help us. We start chatting and invariably we are asked our ages. We tell them 83 and 78. They say "you mean you are still traveling?!" They can't imagine their grandparents or even their parents traveling (or skiing) as we do.
    We have always aspired to inspire.
      
Audre + Dimitri biking (and looking young) at the iconic rock-Uluru or Ayers Rock, Australia

It all started in 1993 when Audre got a contract for a World Bank project in Indonesia - that was the beginning of our Odyssey or worldwide traveling or vagabond globetrotting... call it what you will (Dimitri likes "global meandering" the best). A year and a half later, Dimitri planned a
9-month trip from Jakarta to Istanbul. It was supposed to be just an interlude between contracts. However, six months into that trip, while meditating on top of Mount Sinai, Audre saw the light! (A couple of weeks earlier, Dimitri had calculated that we could most probably live on just the appreciation on our mutual funds (without our touching our capital) and had proposed retirement to Audre's initial shock and dismay.) So, on Mount Sinai, Audre got the message from above that it is perfectly okay to retire and go traveling throughout the world at 49 (Audre) and 54 (Dimitri). We retired in 1995 and global meandered from 1995 (somehow surviving the financial meltdowns) until 2014 when we settled down in Vail, CO and bought a condo. See our tab above "About our traveling lifestyle" to read more about how we do/did what we do/did.


This blog site was started in 2006 during our 2½ years of South American Explorations (to begin reading at the beginning of our blogging in Santiago click here) and continue by clicking on Older Post at the end of each one. 

Consequently, the travelogues about our first 9-month trip from Jakarta to Istanbul, our nine months in Turkey, our six years in the rest of Europe, our three months in India, our nine months in Singapore, our three months in Phuket, our one year in Australia (although the picture above is of us at Uluru and you can click here to see the summary of our 26,000 km Australia Road Trip in 2004-05), our one year in New Zealand and our three months in Tahiti, will be posted when Audre writes them.

On the right margin is a Table of Contents that lists each place we have lived since 1995. The descriptions of our travels begin with our posts in South America in 2006 (when we started this blog). Before that, you will notice most are still "to come." To start reading at the beginning of our travelogues, click here and click on Older Post at the end of each post.

If you are epicureans of food, like we are, then have a look at the list of "Restaurants Reviewed by ALEDM Organized by Country and City" in the banner at the top if this page. If you click on a city, you will be linked to the blog posting of our restaurant reviews for that city. It's been so long since we've been to some of those places, we fear that the restaurants we reviewed may no longer be in business (send us an e-mail about your experiences)!

And, if you want to do a search for a specific place, topic, or for a person, use the Search Blog feature that is a box in the upper left-hand corner of the screen (from here on your laptop click "Control - Home" on your keyboard to get to the top of your screen).


While we were in Beijing in the fall of 2010, the China Daily (the largest newspaper in English in China) published an article about our Global Meandering Lifestyle. Our picture is on the front page of the newspaper in the upper right-hand corner and click here for the article itself.





55 comments:

  1. Good blog:)
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  2. What an amazing life you have chosen for yourselves! My/our travels are more touch and go -- a week in once place being a luxury, a month unheard of. The summer after my junior year in college, a friend and I went to Europe for three months. Since then, the longest I have EVER been away was five weeks between jobs back in the '70s and three weeks in England, on the Isle of Man, in Lisbon and in Madrid just last month. I read your South American adventures and am inspired!

    Claire @ http://travel-babel.blogspot.com

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  3. I should have added: What a decision you made and how gloriously you are living out your dream. A National Public Radio call-in program today discussed what it means to be "rich," "middle class" or "poor" in the US. Some people defined these classifications by income or net worth. One caller defined them as "If you're rich, you can afford to waste food. If you're middle class, you can feed your family. If you're poor, it's sometimes hard to feed your family." Others defined "rich" as a high quality of life. By that definition, one that I agree with, you are among the riches people I know of. Thank you for sharing your wealth via this blog.

    Claire @ http://travel-babel.blogspot.com

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  4. Hello. This post is likeable, and your blog is very interesting, congratulations :-). I will add in my blogroll =). If possible gives a last there on my blog, it is about the Aluguel de Computadores, I hope you enjoy. The address is http://aluguel-de-computadores.blogspot.com. A hug.

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  5. Great story! I find it really inspiring to see that in a moment such an understanding can alter one's life completely

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  6. The link for el comercio no longer works. Would have enjoyed reading it. Found your blog through your review of lima restaurants. Will be in Lima for the next couple of years trying to become a chef at LCB. Sorry to hear about what happened in Bolivia. Keep your spirits up and the adventure going. Best wishes

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  7. Isaac, thank you very much for telling us that the link to the El Commercio article no longer works. We've fixed the problem! We created a link to the pdf version of the article. So enjoy reading the article now! Have you found the www.livinginperu.com site? It is great! And Alejandro's blog: http://perufood.blogspot.comis another wonderful resource. Good luck with your studies!

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  8. You are a travel inspiration!

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  9. What an amazing story. My husband and I are not nearly retired but we absolutely love to travel. This summer we traveled around western europe and next summer we are planning a 3 month journey around eastern europe. I just found a cool new travel site, baraaza.com
    . Since you are such big travelers I think you will like it.

    Melissa

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  10. Beautiful area Posted by Pakistan travel to Audre & Dimitri's Traveling Love Affair at December 25, 2008 6:30 AM

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  11. Hi,

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  12. Hola and Hello

    My name is Marcela, I'm Colombian and came across your blog because I just started writing mine about my travels.

    I love your approach to life and I love how you share it in your blog, but what I loved the most was your article on El Comercio. It really touched my heart because my story is very similar to yours. To make a long story short, I'm now living between Bogota and Buenos Aires writing my blog and folowing my heart.

    I noticed that you haven't been to colombia yet(I hope) and I would love you to have a look at my Colombia travel blog and fall in love with my country.

    Hope to hear from you soon!

    Abrazos

    Marcela - Colombia Travel Blog

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  13. hi your blog is awesome i too own a travel blog... can you extend your support to my blog by linking me

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  14. Feels like joining you two on your amazing trips!!
    Happy travelling!

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  15. really i'm very happy to read your Article story and you done very amazing work.

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  17. NICE!!!

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    I realized that even if you were completely stuck in the doldrums of blogger’s block, you could always pick another blog to say something nice about. It’s like an instant post formula! We sometimes need a change of pace, a refreshing alternative, new inspiration from literary exploration and admiration of great authors will do the trick!

    Has your mother ever told you that if you couldn’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all? Well, this is the same idea, but flipped on its side: if you can’t say anything at all, then say something nice! Not only is this a sure-fire method to come up with an idea for a blog post, you will also make somebody’s day...I'm starting with you...

    You are great and talented, i really enjoyed reading your posts. You really gave me something to think about. You have a book inside of you. I hope you can read my posts and be inspired to write, as i have become, viewing your blog. Take care of yourself, God bless you and your family.

    -Clarence

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  18. Amazing. That's what I want to be doing when I retire!! Come to Scotland and try the West Highland Way, or the Southern Upland Way :)

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  19. Nice blog about tourism.I got many informations from this site for our holiday tour. Happy journey...Thanks...

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  20. I admire what you guys have done; and are doing. I love how you decided to retire because you could. It sounds so simple and logical - but most fear this step. Did you not have any serious commitments?

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  22. Wow! This is so impressive. I would like to travel like this too. Really inspiring. What's your next destination?

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  23. Wow! This is so impressive. I would like to travel like this too. Really inspiring. What's your next destination?
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  24. I really like your lifestyle and I really like how you discuss it in your website, but what I liked the most was your content on El Comercio. It really moved my center because my tale is very just like yours. To create a lengthy tale brief, I'm now residing between Bogota and Buenos Aires composing my weblog and folowing my center to find travel agents the best.

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  25. I think it is really great that you travel, global meander, so much and are able to take on all of these interesting adventures. Thank you for sharing them with us. I love skiing, and hopefully the mountains were great. Thank you for all of the restaurant reviews as well, it would be a great companion when travelling.


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  33. Have you had any income other than that from your investment (mutual funds) during your travel years? Any income from publications, blogs, interviews. etc.?

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  34. Wow.. Amazing. That's what I want to be do in future. Hope you share more like this



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  35. Hello Audre and Dimitri,
    I love your blogs. Kudos to both of you for traveling to so many countries. Just had a thought why don't you use these memories and create something unique. Digital oil painting from photos is a new concept. You can check some other options of creative things to do with old photos

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