Hey there, so you found my blog, hello or Hallo as we say in German and willkommen/welcome to MyTraveliciousLife.com Initially I was going for something like TravelBugonTour (does my little icon), but while traveling is infectious, there are too many negative connotations associated with bug.
My name is Sandra and this blog may be new online, but has been a work in progress in my head for so many years already. Since there is never a right time, I decided to start today, but there will be many posts from my past being added in the future. Not sure how that will all work out, but why worry about that now.
On my instagram profile, I state: “I travel for a living and I live to travel.” That about sums it all up. But below is a bit more about how I got started and such.
My earliest travel memories are Sunday lunches and vacations in France (my Dad’s favorite country), weekends spent at the Belgian North Sea with grandma, winters in South Tyrol with the other grandparents… Plenty of material for Throwback Thursday there! My family loved to travel and they simply took me along. Now I have my own family, and I continue the tradition of making them come along – whenever possible. However, most of my journeys these days are work-related, wether it is scooping out a new destination, hotel, or restaurant, and what I love most about that is getting to know the people of the places I visit and start relationships for those who follow (via Incantato Concert Tours or Inside Europe, the two companies I am proud to call my own, together with Ted, my partner in life and work).
I have always loved to tell stories which is why I became a journalist and I strongly believe that just like with riding a bike, once you become a reporter, it just stays with you. My dream of becoming a foreign correspondent soon morphed into a travel reporter as politics and conflicts are best left for others to address, and while I technically remain a journalist with 10+ years of actively writing, editing mainly in Germany, but also during college in the US, being a travel reporter became a reality in a different way than what I imaged it originally, and who knows what life will bring next. So when I officially changed careers (after working as a tour director throughout colleague) and got hired into the US travel industry, I continued to “report” back about the places I got to experience and especially the wonderful people I got to meet and mostly great foods I got to eat. I credit the successful launch of our first tour company first of all to the many supporting friends who became clients and clients who became friends, but also social media as facebook, youtube, blogger and co allowed me to show that unlike so many others who “work” in travel, I actually do travel as part of my work and take great joy in discovering new places for myself and our travelers, but also to continously re-discover my favorite cities. I recently left the comfort zone of Europe (after a few adventures in Asia with friends or for work) to venture out to South Africa and a tiny part of Namibia/Botswana, and I am very much intrigued and cannot wait to go back soon – hopefully not alone that time as the most important realization I had when being in awe about the sheer beauty of African nature, was that I wish I could have shared this incredible experience with someone, preferably family and friends, but at least like-minded people. Since many of my friends and past clients continue to follow my journeys that I mostly document on facebook, and I have gotten the occassional nudge to start a blog, well, here it is. With my little girl and favorite travel buddy (next to her Dad) starting to read and getting more and more excited each and every day about her, our, my travels, it is about time to get this blog started. Los geht’s – and so it goes…