Living my life: 2016 trips

Trips in the past year

It has been almost a years since I got behind my computer and started writing about my life and trips more importantly. As many of you know I moved from Slovenia to USA in February, 2016. So it has almost been 1 year since I have been living here. So far so good, I can't actually complain. I have an OK job, but will start working for a much better position very soon. Just got offered a position in Cargill as a food safety and quality assurance chemist. A very good position with a much more reputable company. New year has started great so far. Getting back to the main topic... Life is good and I am much more focused on my long term goal as I ever was before. That does hurt my social life much more and I didn't go out to party even once since I have been here, nor do I feel the need to do it. I am very happy with work, study after work and cooking routine day in and day out that I don't feel like changing it. Mostly I study the markets and trading techniques, which is something I want to do in the future, I also study Spanish and Chinese. Luckily I have an amazing Chinese roommate and my best friends here who helps me with Chinese and staying on track with my goals. Mora about that in the Christmas letter I wrote (next post).

This year I took quite a lot of trips considering that I am full-time employee and regarding the really small amount of vacation days I have. My main trips were to Denver/Boulder Colorado, Chicago, Kansas city (family), Minneapolis/Duluth/Apostle islands Minnesota & Peru, Bolivia & Panama trip for 3 weeks.

Denver/Boulder, Colorado

All the trips that I have done in the past year were together with my best friend/roommate Min Liu from China. Surprisingly he adopted my way of traveling pretty fast and found himself liking my style. What is my style? Budget traveling, spending more money on the experiences and food while being as cheap as possible on accommodation. Therefore, most of these places we spend the nights either AirBnB (which we rent out here in Omaha as well), couchsurfing or hostels. We always try doing couchsurfing first and see if we get lucky and then AirBnB and hostels only if we feel like socializing and partying. The prices are usually around 10-25$ of night depending on the location and type of room we choose, but we prefer not spending more than 20$ unless we feel fancy.

Denver/Boulder was a 3 day trip by car from Omaha which is around 8h drive. Every time there was a holiday on Monday we would take the advantage and get away ASAP so we could have 3 complete days of traveling. We decided to visit Rocky mountain park for two days and one day spent going around Denver and Boulder downtown area just to get a touch for the places. Rocky mountains were actually pretty amazing and we camped somewhere in the middle of the park on top of a mountain. The view in the morning was simply stunning and it was really worth doing that!! Let's get to the more interesting part, the pictures!

On the way into Rocky Mountains

1-day hiking trip to Sky Pond

Min & I

Denver

I especially loved hiking to one of the most beautiful mountain in Rocky Mountains, Sky pond. It actually took us around 5h hiking to get to the top, but the path wasn't marked at all. We had a printed description how to get there, but since there was snow nothing was like it is supposed to be. Everyone we talked to while going to the top they all said it is impossible to get to the top because it is too dangerous. Luckily Min and I didn't want to give up and found an alternative way. We were there only 2h and only one other person made it there. I have to thank Min for not giving up and together finding a way!! On the way back we slid down on the snow, it was soooo much fun. I loved it. It was one of my better trips in 2016. I LOVED IT, will be back for sure!

Chicago

I was there when I arrived in the states. It was really cold and windy but that didn't stop me wondering around and try to see as much as possible. I also did try the deep dish pizza which was good but I couldn't even eat that small little thing, I was surprised. But at the end, it's just a city, nothing much...

The Bean

Deep Dish Pizza

Minneapolis, Duluth, Apostle Island Minnesota

Another three day trip up north of Omaha, NE. We decided to go there mostly because there is a lot of nature and the pictures online of the islands looked really amazing. We ended up Couchsurfing the first night in Minneapolis with a couple that really nice and kind. Wondered around the next day around the city and headed to Duluth where we tried some local food and enjoyed the scenery of the city. We headed to Apostle islands at night and camped in some camping site close to where the ferry to the islands was. The little town from where the boats were going was completely renovated and all the buildings architecture was older looking but yet very interesting. We took the ferry to the island where we rented bikes to go around. Some of the island we could only do on foot and we found a place where you could jump from the cliffs and some really nice beaches where we swam. It was a really nice place to see. We came back to the same camping ground and spent the night there again. The last day we already had to go back and were driving for more than 10h to get to Omaha on time!

Minnesota is a beautiful place to visit with all the natural treasures it has, that is why it is called the stated of 10000 lakes!

One of the lakes in Minneapolis

A sign on our camping ground

Apostle island

Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures of Duluth with my phone, I will have to get them from Min and then I can post them. Duluth is a really beautiful place and definitely needs to be shown here!

Here are some other moments of my year in pictures. The three-week trip and the Christmas letter i will post separately!