STA Explorers
As an STA Explorer the heavy weight of the expectations of the internet world bare down us every day. Well not quite! Especially when there’s (mostly) no blinkin’ internet in most of the world! Possibly the first time I’ve used the word ’old’ to describe myself, but I’m old enough to remember the world before broadband, even, at 33, old enough to remember not having anything on the other end of that little wire to the world except some distant voice. They were still trying to sell us something though. Come to think of it, I’m old enough to remember getting our first computer, and black and white mobile phones and only having 24 pictures in a camera and…
The fact is we’re still getting there, still on our way to a connected world. Not quite there yet and in some places definitely miles away. Some might say that’s a good thing. I saw an article about an experiment. Someone wanted to go back to the electronically disconnected world. Live without an internet connection for a month. I actually can’t remember anything more about it except the gist of the title so pretty pointless to bring it up here except to say that the mere title must imply that for a connected person, it is near impossible\madness to live disconnected. Couple this with the average connected person’s desire to share every intimate\interesting\dull moment with anyone who cares to care and quite possibly one of the few times when the average person has anything interesting to share ie when travelling and you’ve got a problem.
Some people go away on holiday to get away from it all. But what if there’s nothing really horrible to get away from? That’s kind of how I feel. I’ve grown very fond of the world I have and although there’s so so much more I want to see and do, and will see and do, there’s nothing much I want to leave behind. I want to bring it all along with me for the ride!
Sure you can be an STA Explorer, a roving explorer testing the limits of social media while travelling the world in loads of places. Loads of places have the technology and if you have a massive budget even not having the technology shouldn’t be boundary. I’m told you can get a mobile signal at Everest base camp for example. I wasn’t quite willing to shell out for 8 months of the mobile data packages available right now though (about £400! If they work at all). The final and most important thing I think is; you may not be travelling alone! And the other person may not be too impressed with their partner spending ages tapping away on a keyboard or snapping away with a camera when they want to be enjoying the world with you! There’s definitely is a balance to be struck there and it can take a bit of time to sort out.
Is the world set up for this kind of exploring yet? Is the technology ready for it? I think the answers are “not really” and “no” at least when it comes to anything big like an around the world trip. Most countries have vast numbers of internet cafes or hotspots in Starbucks etc, Some have pretty much none though, like Cuba (possibly Tibet too??). The main reason though is the time involved, time in internet cafes when you should be out and about taking in the place you’re in, and time involved in getting the technology to work eg this GPS thingy I have – is fine if you’re connected to the internet full time on you own computer with the software loaded but of course you can’t do that in most internet cafes. If you’re not connected there’s not a lot you can do and try connecting a load of trips or days together to show a big trip and it’s been impossible so far. I’ve spent ages playing with the raw data, much longer than someone sane or travelling should! Hopefully I’ve fixed the problem but only after writing an Excel spreadsheet with formulas and other gubbins to convert it to the right format for Google maps! What was that about striking the right balance between this and experiencing travelling the world?
To do this properly around the world I think you’d still need things that don’t exist or are too expensive right now. Until cameras, GPS devices, and mobile phones come with fast world wide internet connectivity at the press of a button you’ll need a lot more time than you ever thought you’d need to actually create a full on day to day internet travel blog as you go.
Having said all this, I’m still as determined as ever to make this work, it’s just taken a while to figure out what is and isn’t possible right now, and what limitations the places we have been and are going place on this kind of thing.
Things should get easier after Cuba and in hindsight Mexico was so easy (just didn’t have anything to write back then)! I’d imagine week or longer breaks will be normal just because we’re really here to experience the trip rather then the inside of an internet café and Starbucks are still not that common some places!
So… hope someone is reading this, and virtually see you soon!
