Remember those frustrating moments on a trip with your significant other or best friend, where everything seemed to spiral out of control? We've all been there. In our latest podcast episode, we divulge into some of our own travel mishaps, bickering and fights. But, those experiences, believe it or not, molded our relationships. From testing trust to challenging compromise, we delve into the profound impact travel has on various relationships.
Longing to travel but budget constraints pulling you back? Think again! We spill the beans on how to travel on a shoestring budget without compromising on quality. With our personal anecdotes of exciting day trips and luxury stays within budget, we hope to inspire you to pack your bags and hit the road. We also shed light on the hidden gems of locally owned lodgings and boutique hotels, sprinkling in some of our own experiences with Airbnb.
This episode also caters to the foodies out there, particularly vegans. We go gaga over soy-curls, a versatile and realistic vegan meat substitute, discussing some mouth-watering recipes. Wrapping up, we emphasize the importance of trusting your instincts and the value of stepping away from the daily grind to immerse yourself in new experiences. So tune in, as we journey through a variety of topics from budget travel to vegan food, showcasing the transformative power of travel on relationships.
Please email us at Gettoknowthedevil@gmail.com
Remember those frustrating moments on a trip with your significant other or best friend, where everything seemed to spiral out of control? We've all been there. In our latest podcast episode, we divulge into some of our own travel mishaps, bickering and fights. But, those experiences, believe it or not, molded our relationships. From testing trust to challenging compromise, we delve into the profound impact travel has on various relationships.
Longing to travel but budget constraints pulling you back? Think again! We spill the beans on how to travel on a shoestring budget without compromising on quality. With our personal anecdotes of exciting day trips and luxury stays within budget, we hope to inspire you to pack your bags and hit the road. We also shed light on the hidden gems of locally owned lodgings and boutique hotels, sprinkling in some of our own experiences with Airbnb.
This episode also caters to the foodies out there, particularly vegans. We go gaga over soy-curls, a versatile and realistic vegan meat substitute, discussing some mouth-watering recipes. Wrapping up, we emphasize the importance of trusting your instincts and the value of stepping away from the daily grind to immerse yourself in new experiences. So tune in, as we journey through a variety of topics from budget travel to vegan food, showcasing the transformative power of travel on relationships.
Please email us at Gettoknowthedevil@gmail.com
This is another episode of the Devil. You Don't Know, Lindsay, what are we going to be talking about today? Let's talk about travel. Oh, let's talk about travel. What are we when we thought about this episode? I know you kind of wanted to tell some funny stories, but what are the things that we're going to be talking about specifically today?
Speaker 2:I like traveling in relationships, even friendships. I'm traveling to make or break any relationship. But first, before we get into that, let's talk about something you ate this week.
Speaker 1:Something that I ate this week. That was good. I know we talked about it a little bit in the pre-show when we were thinking about it. It was that amazing taco salad that you made, that you made me this week. That was probably the best thing that I've eaten all week.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you said, it was really good.
Speaker 1:It's delicious. I put in it, by the way.
Speaker 2:I think it had lettuce, some roasted corn, caramelized onions, roasted peppers, some fresh tomatoes, black beans or some kind of bean I made from dry plant-boss taco meat. I think I gave you some cilantro bitchin' sauce.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, the bitchin' sauce is amazing. That's what it's really called. It's called bitchin' sauce.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a vegan sauce like a dip. I made that for you because I had had it for dinner one night, but you had clients and you were working late, so you had ate a quick sandwich. Because Cleve is the sandwich king. I am in my sandwich era. Yeah, he loves a sandwich.
Speaker 1:If you've been following the story so far, every week I talk about a meat sandwich.
Speaker 2:I made you sandwich for dinner last night. What was it?
Speaker 1:It was a buffalo soy-curl sandwich, yeah, and it was delicious. I'm going to do a little bit of a rant about soy-curl. Soy-curls are so versatile. I know when things were looking a little bit crazy a couple of years ago, during the height of the pandemic, I was like Lindsay, you got to jump on all the soy-curls. You can, lindsay, just real quick explain to folks what soy-curls are?
Speaker 2:Soy-curls are a meat substitute, but they're 100% soybean, so they're somehow pressed and processed and then dehydrated and so they look like when you get them. They're these long, snake-like looking pieces of dehydrated soy and you just rehydrate them with any flavor, and I have made you so many varieties over the years. I make you the soy-curl buffalo chicken sandwiches the soy-curl Italian beef, the soy-curl cheese steaks, oh, delicious, delicious. I think I've made you even a lemon pepper. Soy-curls with creamy pasta sauce.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of options for soy-curls For all you doomsday preppers out there, because there's a soy-curl for everything there is.
Speaker 2:And they're really good. They're very much. I've probably one of the most realistic meat substitutes right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, any challenges? Yeah, it is definitely one of the meat substitutes I'm thinking ahead. I'm already jumping over to the devil of the week or the devil of the day, but, yeah, it's a great meat substitute out of many Any challenges that you can think of, that you face this week, or anything that particularly frustrated you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Again. No, not two weeks in a row.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, I had to drive to the city on Friday and I hate the city and I had to go on rush hour. But I don't even want to bring that up right now because it still pisses me off.
Speaker 1:I think one of the challenges that we faced as parents this week was just trying to help the youngest one figure out college again, and I think you know it's just. I know we talked about it a couple of weeks ago, but you know, and I talked to a parent this week that was talking about the challenge of raising her child, and it's still.
Speaker 1:those are things that are always going to come up right, like you know, like you want one thing for your kids and another thing for yourself, and it's just that's always. I think about that in my relationship with the grown ones, with the, with the grown kids.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're gonna have to have a whole episode about emptiness syndrome. Oh, about how? Great it is, but you're gonna like love it. You're like, you're like emptiness syndrome. Who gets that? Who?
Speaker 1:gets that. But now on to the main topic, which is travel right and the way that I envisioned it. I wanted to break this up into a couple of segments and you tell me, live on air, we're gonna workshop this live, yeah.
Speaker 2:So first thing I want to say is I was reading in preparation for this episode and I read something that said in like intimate relationships, 47% of couples break up after they go on their first vacation together. Wow, why do you suppose that is? Well, it's probably a lot of reasons that we're gonna get into, but when you go away with someone, that's probably like the most intimate experience you have with them. When you're here at home, for example, you go about your daily business, you work, you do your errands, you do your chores right. Not everyone lives together right away in a relationship, but a lot of people travel together before they even live together. So, right, you get a whole glimpse into the other person's life and a lot of times there's a lot of surprises.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of surprises, I remember to go along with that statistic.
Speaker 1:I watched divorce court and I used to like the People's Court and it was amazing, I feel like both judges. Those shows have gone through several iterations. I don't want to attribute a quote to the wrong judge, but those judges also did agree that a lot, because a lot of times you would look at the People's Court and be a couple suing each other because they went on vacation and now that the vacation is over, what was a gift was now no. They were supposed to pay me back for that. So it does seem that it's common at folks break up on vacation and I think you have a story that you can share with us.
Speaker 2:We know a couple that went on.
Speaker 2:Well no, I'm not a couple anymore, but it was a friend of yours and we went to a wedding and he was there with his girlfriend at the time and we met them. So I became friendly with her and they went away to, I think, puerto Rico, julibra and she had just gotten her license. She was a city girl all her life and they went away and he refused to drive and she was driving around Miss Tiny Island by herself and he was with her, but it was really uncomfortable for her. She wasn't a comfortable driver. She worked for the airline, so they had gotten free airline tickets, but he was really cheap, it turned out, and he didn't want to pay for anything. He wanted to split the cost of things or split entrees when they went out for dinner and it did them in. They were going away home in the airplane, they were flying back to New York and she gave him his key back and they parted ways, went in separate taxis and never spoke again. Wow.
Speaker 1:Wow. But that's a really good thing to know, right? Because in the notes that I wrote down some of the things that a good vacation you should have after a good vacation of shared experiences, improved communication, learning about each other, teamwork and partnership.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we had a lot of vacations and I do want to say that when we started traveling together, I think we were dating for about five or six months and it was a big adjustment for us because here we didn't live together. We didn't live together for a long time after we dated, right, we bought our house what? Five years ago yeah, I'll be five years next week. Look at that. Yeah, look at that. But we didn't live together before we bought the house and we were dating for almost three years, right? So we had basically seen each other on weekends and then we went away and it was just all this time together and we were really excited about it. But we did actually bicker and fight, quit a bit that first couple of vacations we took together.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, we don't do that anymore. But that and this is a topic that I want to drill down into the right. I want to drill down into these two pieces so that we stay succinct learning about each other. Yeah, how does a vacation I can think of? I'll talk here for a second because I can think of how it helped me learn you better and how it helped you learn me better, because when we first started going on vacation, I was scared of absolutely everything.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it really brought you out here in Cumberton. And on the opposite, I was not. And I've traveled for years and years and I do think a part of it is that I was probably a little bit oblivious. I've never really visited places that are really unsafe. I do a lot of research and I book a lot of travel, so I have traveled. I've traveled on girls trips. I've actually traveled alone quite a bit when I was getting divorced and I was kind of trying to figure myself out, so to speak. Right, and I was on a journey, I would go away alone and I was never scared. I would rent a car, I would go everywhere. There was actually a time I shouldn't even tell you this that I went away with my friend, you know, kim, kim and Peter that was in Ohio.
Speaker 2:Kim and I went to Torto. We didn't rent a car, we hitchhiked everywhere.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's the common, but that's common out there, whenever we go, there's always folks like hitchhiked we hitchhiked.
Speaker 2:we didn't rent a car and we didn't want to pay for a taxi, so we would just stay on the road and be like drop us over the hill, we're going to dinner.
Speaker 1:Being from Bed-Stuy Brooklyn, I would not recommend that, but every time we go to Tortola that is seen to be the common way that folks get around.
Speaker 2:I do want to say also, there was a time that I did go to Tortola and I and Tortola, so Tortola is like my favorite place on earth. Right, I have to say I have visited most islands in the Caribbean and I absolutely love Tortola and I come back to it over and over again because it's not easy to get to. It's very small, there's no big airport that accommodates large jets, so you have to really make an effort to get there and it's a little bit of an expense and it's so. It's a tiny island, it's very safe and it's one of my favorite places to go. But still I do want to lock my door at night and that was one of the things when I had gone on another trip with friend. We got this place called the Mongoose Apartments and the woman was waiting for us. She owned the building and she was just like let us in the room and we're like where's the key? And she's like we don't lock up here and I was like bitch.
Speaker 2:I'm from the Bronx. We lock the door Like even if it's safe. There's just a certain feeling of safety when you lock your door and the craziest thing was it was this room. You know those double doors where, like the top opens separate from the bottom, like it's four pieces, do you? Know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2:And so she's like oh, I have to find the key.
Speaker 2:And she comes back like two hours later with this tiny padlock and a key Like you know, those miniature keys that you would like lock your suitcase with, like that and then you could only lock it when you're outside, because you had to put the thing and, like you know, like you'd have to like actually lock the lock, but it was only on the outside, so on the inside there was a flap of wood.
Speaker 2:So I remember that whole vacation just being a little scared every time I went to the bathroom and of course it was a girls trip. We were doing a lot of drinking, tons of and biving until like two, three I'm sure I called you drunk in the middle of the night, plenty. But we couldn't like lock it from the inside, just like fold the flap of wood, so the door would stay shut. And every time I woke up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, like I would think somebody from the bar was sitting in the living room and I put all the lights on in the whole condo and I'm like peeking around corners, yeah that. So yeah, like lock up, stay somewhere with like a lock on the door.
Speaker 2:That I would say, but anyway, let's get back to the topic. So what were you gonna ask me?
Speaker 1:What the team were. No, no, you. Actually, that memory piece that you brought really makes me think about two things that we can talk about from there, and how it impacts a relationship, or how it impacts folks that are traveling Cause in that particular instance, you were with a girlfriend, and so it makes me think that you guys had to work in tandem to stay safe, right, so it brings up the team.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I told you the things that we would do. You probably would be appalled, but we never really locked up. Well, we did lock up when we went out, but we were like young and skinny and we would wear these slinky dresses and there was nowhere to put the keys or anything. So we would just like drop the key and the bushes outside the room and then, when we'd come back at two or three in the morning, we'd like fish around for the key and let ourselves back in.
Speaker 1:I remember that you said that there was an older couple that was staying there. That was like watching out for you guys.
Speaker 2:Oh, that was when I went with Kim. Yeah, we stayed at this place called the Columbus Sunset Apartments and it was right in the beach and it was it reminded me of. Do you remember that show? Melrose Place, yes, when everyone would like know each other. So it was all these old, like retired couples who would come for the whole winter and then me and Kim and these people would see us out at night and they'd be like talking to us. They remembered us from the inn and then in the morning when they would see us, they'd be like we got back at midnight and you weren't back yet. When did you come in? And we were just like I don't know, but they knew us everywhere we went.
Speaker 1:But it benefited your friendship and it benefited in even thinking of us. So, even though you were doing stuff that was out of the ordinary and staying in an unfamiliar place with a lock on the door that didn't work, it gave you a break from the routine. And what advice would you give to folks about that, about you know, like how that can impact the couple's relationship or friends?
Speaker 2:Well, I think, when people don't feel safe, right and one person understands that and one doesn't I think you know, vacation can either like help you grow as a couple or impact you in a negative way, and I think those were two things we wanted to talk about.
Speaker 1:Yes, and like one of my notes here, as you talk about that, let's say, in an instance like that, you and Kim had to trust each other, right? There are times that you and I, for instance, we also went to Tortola and we went to and I'm not gonna just talk about Tortola, I'm gonna talk about Key West. We went to Key West and remember the guy drops off the bike and I'm like oh, I remember, I remember, and you thought that he was gonna break into our room in the middle of the night and rob us and I was like his job is to rent people bikes Like he does it every day.
Speaker 1:He's not gonna rob us at night, and then when we went to Tortola, we stayed at Sebastian's on the beach, and these are like early on. This is very early, this was very early in our relationship.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and we say that Key West and Key Largo was like five months in, and then it was about a year and a half when we went to Tortola and we stayed on the cliff that plays on the cliff and I was so excited because I booked us this beautiful place and this is where you get to know your partner.
Speaker 2:I thought, oh my gosh, this is gonna be so romantic. We have this. It was Sebastian Seaside Villa. They gave us the villa all the way at the end. It was this big, beautiful room. It was huge, the bathroom was half the size of the room and it was on a cliff and you can hear the ocean washing up on the rocks. And how you could sleep the whole week.
Speaker 1:And in hindsight it was beautiful, but at that point I was new to traveling and I didn't have a couple of key pieces that we have now. Right, I didn't trust you because I didn't really know you and I really didn't.
Speaker 2:You didn't trust me. A year and a half into the relationship you didn't have a problem. Why were you sticking around? Because I didn't. As I've read my notes, I realized I didn't trust you because I didn't trust your judgment, right.
Speaker 1:And so, traveling together and going through those two, you still are always trusting your judgment, oh, of course, but I trust your judgment a lot better now, right, and so one of the benefits of traveling, together.
Speaker 2:You thought someone was going to scale the cliff and come in the balcony door and I'm like first of all, would you look? It's literally a straight drop into the ocean.
Speaker 1:That was one too many James Bond movies, right. But to my point, to your point and why I trust you now, traveling together, especially in an unfamiliar environment, meant that you need to rely on each other, right? And in this case I was in tortola. I've never been. I think I had been out at that point in my life. I had only been out of the United States maybe, and that was to the Bahamas.
Speaker 2:To the Bahamas which ain't really really outside of the United States and it was on a cruise, I think, which ain't really outside of the United States, which was basically a whole bunch of Americans on a floating hotel.
Speaker 1:Yes, and so the way that those trips benefited our relationship, it made me trust you right, also made me learn how to compromise right, which we still work on on a daily basis. But, being in those situations, what our friends that broke up after Calabra and what made these vacations different, is we put aside our differences and, despite the fact that I was scared out of my mind in both of these places I remember not even being able to sleep in Key West and now I could go there you could probably give me a bottle of rum.
Speaker 2:You could probably sleep on Devol Street. Yeah, and sleep on Devol Street. And I'll be absolutely fine. Right, and let's talk about that a little bit, because now it's a couple years later. If you've been to tortola three times now, right, we're going for our fourth next year. Can't wait. And the last time we were there we were with the family and remember we were the only ones who paid for the extra cell service. Yes.
Speaker 2:So we were able to use our map on the car, the GPS. I remember my dad was like if I was on any other island when he got lost.
Speaker 2:I would felt really unsafe if I was driving down some alleyway where people were hanging out after dark. But no problem, they just told us how to get back. So I think it's also just having these experiences makes you feel more comfortable. So there is, yes, absolutely some compromise. You create a stronger bond with your partner, but on the other side of it, you get to know your partner really well when you travel together, because you kind of see the unseen. You get to know people's bathroom habits and their grooming habits all of these things that you might not get to know on a daily basis.
Speaker 1:We have to change this into a video podcast, because if you saw the look on my face when Lindsay said bathroom habits, it was just one of guilt. But in my same notes I do have that same notes, and my notes too is that going on vacation with someone, be it a platonic friend or a romantic partner, really helps you see that person in a new light and it makes you see if this is a person that you might have a romantic interest in. Oh you know, maybe I can spend the rest of my life with this person. If it's somebody, or maybe you'd be like nah, you know I can't do this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you see people's ability to adapt under pressure and in uncomfortable situations, right.
Speaker 1:And yep, yep, exactly and that's what I have in my notes too is like it helps somebody. When you see your partner or your friend overcome something that's a language barrier or cultural barrier, it really can help you appreciate or realize that that person is not compatible with you at that point in time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean we did. It was a big struggle for us in the beginning with the vacationing, but I think we learned a lot about each other and we've talked about this a lot in other episodes the compromise right and having your own individuality and we've both learned for you that you can go off and swim and snorkel and take a walk down the street and I'm okay under the umbrella right. So it's also about like that communication piece listening to your partner when I tell you I'm fine sitting here, you don't need to sit there with me, you can still go off and do what you want to do, even if it's not what I want to do.
Speaker 1:And not every vacation is an easy one, and I'll bring up New Orleans in this and that we went to New Orleans recently and even though we had some, we had, you know, a lot of good times.
Speaker 2:We went during a time of year we had good times when we were indoors.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but we went during a bad time of year for you, which was raining.
Speaker 2:Well it was cold and it was raining, which was unusual and you can never predict, and I hate rain, like you know. I know you love rain, but I don't mind rain when I'm sitting inside, but when I'm in a super walkable city, I'd like to be able to be outside, and so my and we also only went for a few days, so we didn't pack that much with us. My feet were soaking wet the whole time. My sneakers never dried out Right, so it's stuff like that too.
Speaker 1:So so I did learn a lot about you, right, and we are going to do that again, but we're going to make sure that we'll follow some of our own advice, which is to plan ahead, probably going to look at the weather and then just book a flight next week or something that's probably.
Speaker 1:oh, it's going to go, know the weather ahead of time and whatnot. I want to jump into into another piece of this of travel and why travel is important is how and it makes me think of myself and how I've changed. How does travel help you get out of your comfort zone? Period Eve, let's say, if you're a single person and you're not looking to get into a relationship, how will travel help that person?
Speaker 2:Well, you're like immersing yourself into a different culture, right, Even if it's not international. When you go to certain places in America, even right, there's very different political views and cultural views and different foods and different experiences. New Orleans is like that it's very different than New York. Nashville is very different than New York. So you're just immersing yourself and adapting in a different environment.
Speaker 1:One of the notes I wrote down for myself is how this can benefit someone who's just trying to grow, or maybe even a single person. And you made me think of it when you said New Orleans is appreciate what you have. So how long ago did the hurricane Katrina happen in New?
Speaker 2:Orleans oh my God, that was a long time ago.
Speaker 1:Early 2000s yeah, maybe almost 20 years ago, and it was amazing to have been down there. Just what was it? It was this time last year.
Speaker 2:I mean, this was so ignorant of me because I living in New York City, right when there's a big weather event or something happens, people come and scoop up real estate and they develop it right back right away. And so when we went to New Orleans, when we went to that lower ninth ward because we went to that wine bar, yeah, Baca now was down there Right.
Speaker 2:The. That whole area was still not rebuilt. The stores were still boarded up. I can't imagine what's like behind the boards, but I, I think and that's like my own ignorance, because I had no idea that there were places in America that were like that yeah, and one of the things that we suffer from in this country is not understanding that folks have it different or hard than us. Also too.
Speaker 1:Sometimes we just don't have an appreciation for what we have, and that's something that I wrote down in my notes, and that was something that was really important to me about going back to New Orleans, because New Orleans is one of my favorite places to go. We'll get you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, no, I will go back because I compromise with you and I know that you're going back to Tortola with me and you know you come to the Caribbean with me all the time and I know that beach vacations are not really your number one all the time, so they're getting there they're getting there.
Speaker 2:They're getting there, Right. But I I agree with you and I think that there is this get out of your comfort zone moment with most vacations and especially when it's somewhere new. And for me, New Orleans was like that. What didn't help me there also was everyone everywhere we went saying be safe out there. And I'm like, should I not be right? And we live like just you know, as Ryan, as an example, we live in one of the like lowest income places in America and obviously our neighborhood is not like that, right, but we're very close to those places, no-transcript. But it's different here and I work in terrible neighborhoods where there's a lot of poverty and a lot of crime, but I don't feel comfortable in them and I guess because it's known for me and it's what I know.
Speaker 2:But when I go to a place, for example New Orleans, it was scary for me, probably because I don't know it well, and then I think we went, because we went to New Orleans at Thanksgiving and then we went to see my folks in Naples, florida, at Christmas and I remember you saying to me well, you're not uncomfortable here. I'm like well, look around, you don't see the poverty and the homelessness. And Naples is not a good example because Naples is very wealthy, it's probably more wealthy than a lot of places up in the Northeast, but for me, there I felt really comfortable. So it's this feeling of what's going on around you and I think it's also an example for me. Just because there's poverty and homelessness, it doesn't always mean that something is going to happen to you when you go somewhere.
Speaker 1:But I do like that piece of travel right, because it was appreciation for what you have. And so, even though one of the things I remember going on vacation as a kid and my father would always say when we came back, is home, sweet home. Ever be so humble. And so sometimes, especially going to a place like New Orleans or traveling even when we went to Gatlinsburg and Pigeon Forge is seeing that not every place is as privileged or as modern as you think it is and it gives you an appreciation for what you have.
Speaker 2:You learned a lot about your culture, even American culture, right Gatlinsburg and Pigeon Forge, tennessee. I mean, that was like nothing I could have. Even If you told me it was going to be like that before I went there I couldn't even have pictured it or imagined it.
Speaker 1:Remember how ignorant I was with a lady where it was 4th of July and we're in Gatlinsburg and it's this tiny town, and the woman in the hotel we were staying at was like, don't take your car down there, you better off walking.
Speaker 2:No, she said, go the opposite direction. Go to the opposite direction For lunch or something.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was like go in the opposite direction. And I'm like not typical cleave because I'm arrogant. It was like, yeah, I'm going to just go down there. And then we I said I'm from New York, I know traffic, no that was traffic.
Speaker 2:And then we looked and they say they have 250,000 visitors a week or something A week.
Speaker 1:It's one of the most highly traveled.
Speaker 2:It's something like 12 million visitors a year. That's crazy. And let's also talk about another time that you didn't listen on vacation, when you took the hill instead of the flat road. I mean, people tell you things and you just do the opposite, and that's one of the most frustrating things in our relationship. But yet still, almost eight years later, here I am.
Speaker 1:Yeah, here you are, love it, I love you. Obviously, I'm learning right, but here's the thing Is this travel, it gives you learning and new skills development Right, but when someone tells you that lives in a place, which way to go you should? Listen to them. You should listen.
Speaker 2:And that's the thing.
Speaker 1:And I do now.
Speaker 2:I do now. Now, after you had a car accident in the Caribbean, you do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but that was like eight years ago, so I'll tell you guys that story. Right, and this goes back to improved communication skills and learning and development.
Speaker 2:Now, I've been to that island 20 times before you had ever been there.
Speaker 1:Yes, and one of the things that I had to grow and where I had to grow and where I still have room for growth is learning to trust other people and rely on others and realize that I'm not an expert in everything. There was an evening that we went out to dinner and it was raining and I had an option of two ways to go home. There was a more direct but more treacherous route that was back to the Cain Garden Bay. Shout out to Jimmy Buffett.
Speaker 2:May he rest in peace.
Speaker 1:May he rest in peace, because they always make. Whenever I say the Cain Garden Bay, it always makes me think of one of his lyrics.
Speaker 2:Well, that's what he said. Right, Things will get better. That's what they say as soon as you sail on the Cain.
Speaker 1:Garden Bay, get in the Cain Garden Bay. And so there was two ways back to the Cain Garden Bay, which we were staying, and by the way.
Speaker 2:I just want to interrupt you for a minute because that's actually how I found Tortola was. There was a whole piece in the daily news, oh my God, maybe in like 1999 or 2000, about Jimmy Buffett and his songs, and it was all about Tortola and all the places he sang about there and I was a huge Jimmy Buffett fan so I said I have to go there, so that's how I found Tortola, just so you know.
Speaker 1:But Jimmy is an example of all the things that we're talking about, and then I'll get back to the point about my personal growth, about Tortola. It's like when you listen to his songs and you listen to him sing about the Caribbean or about the South Pacific, he talks about how he learned skills, new skills and how all those trips to Key West and New Orleans because these are places that Jimmy has been how it increased his independence and confidence. Right, but just getting back to what happened to me, us in Tortola, because I was an ignorant American and I didn't listen to the locals, I was trusted.
Speaker 1:And didn't listen to your wife, didn't listen to my, to my wife, but I'm learning to listen. I decided to go. I decided to go a completely different way than what was recommended from anyone and basically what ended up happening is we get through the most treacherous parts of the Hills and then we get to the shore up a hill for like a half hour, yes, and then there's a garbage truck in front of us.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I remember, and I was terrified In the pouring lane. Terrified because when you stop going up one of these hills, this is not a normal hill, no, this is a hill through a Caribbean mountain right, and the garbage men are stopped like pretty much, was it like?
Speaker 1:vertical, almost vertical. I had to have my foot on the brake.
Speaker 2:On the hill and it's terrifying because when the road is wet, your wheels are spinning, you can't get any traction to go, you start to roll backwards until you get to a drier spot and you decide to go this way and I'm so scared the whole time. And then we get up near the top of the hill and the garbage men are here emptying the dumpster because there's no garbage pickup, only from dumpsters, so they have to empty this whole entire dumpster and there's like music playing and these guys are drinking beer from brown bags while they're emptying the garbage. That could never happen in America.
Speaker 1:Maybe the garbage men would be happier if they did drink.
Speaker 2:Probably because our garbage men are so much so here. But yeah, so it was like. And then I mean we were stuck behind that truck forever. So I was so upset with you for not listening to me and go ahead, carry on.
Speaker 1:So long story short, we finally see the lights of the Cain Garden Bay after. I probably could have just saved ourselves a lot of grief and just done what was recommended to me and probably saved yourself a huge fight with me, a huge fight Because you went to sleep that night afterward you were good.
Speaker 1:So we get down to the last hill and there was already two cars that had an accident and there was a sign at the top of the hill which was like put your car in the lowest gear, because this hill is steep and you'll probably fucking die.
Speaker 2:Well, that was your interpretation. But it just said put your car in the lowest gear, which I did, which was like coast down the hill, don't use gas.
Speaker 1:Yeah, which was close, which I did, and unfortunately because it was raining. We get to the bottom of the hill and my car just begins to fishtail out, and unfortunately it was somebody else.
Speaker 2:It was the longest car.
Speaker 1:I mean I haven't had many cars in my life, but it felt like 10 minutes, and so there was somebody approaching that didn't see my car fishtail out because, as he said later on after we exchanged information, he was already looking at the two cars that crashed. So he drives straight into me and is like it. Just as Lindsay said, it just felt like the longest, it was a side swipe, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. I get out. It's in the rain, it's dark, on a country road in the far. It's only the second day of me being there and I'm freaking out. I get out, my heart is racing. There's absolutely no damage to our car.
Speaker 2:None, none. His car was destroyed, yeah his car was destroyed.
Speaker 1:I don't know what it is on the Jeep Wrangler those rubber bumpers that really saved the car. So we waited around for the police. The police never showed up.
Speaker 2:We exchanged information and the guy from the island didn't want to wait.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he didn't want to wait he didn't want to wait. So we exchanged information. Whatever I get home, I do the right thing.
Speaker 2:I go right to see the R&B side villa where you were terrified I pass out. I'm like I'm ready for bed.
Speaker 1:And so the next day I call the rental place. And we rented it from a fella. His name was Deadman Deadman, so you could imagine my fear. Doing this, I call him up. Hello Deadman. This is Cleveland, from Brooklyn. I rented your vehicle. What you call him, if I'm on.
Speaker 3:I'm just calling you to let you know I had an accident in your vehicle and I just want to file a claim.
Speaker 1:You had an accident. Let me ask you a two question. Yes, sir, any damage to my vehicle. No, sir, no damage at all. Okay, that's good to know. Do you have a police support? No, sir, there's no police support. They didn't want to wait. The other fellow didn't want to wait.
Speaker 1:Oh, that man. No, no, no, no, no. Let me tell you no damage to my vehicle, no police support, no accident. Sir, you continue to enjoy the rest of your vacation. Anybody, come see Deadman Deadman handle it. Thank you, sir. That was amazing. I hung up the phone. None of that shit made me feel any better. As I told that friend to another friend of mine who is from the Caribbean, I was like, yeah man, no police report, no accident. You know where my mind went. He was like yeah, nobody, no homicide. He was like, exactly. But the whole point of that story is, if I would have just listened to the voice of, at that time, my fiance, things would have been more of the 100 Islanders in the bar.
Speaker 1:Or the 100 Islanders in the bar. That was like, hey, man, take the flat bridge. So it really did go back to what we're talking about. Here is an individual that helped me grow, because it really helped me realize that I need to not rely on myself as much as I did.
Speaker 2:And to have a lot less fear. You could rely on yourself, but you just sometimes need to listen to other people. Yes.
Speaker 2:Who know better than you because they live there. Yes, they know what the safest way is, but that's one of the things that you struggle with, anyway, in our relationship too, is that you like to do things your way. Sometimes my way is the best way. If I say I don't want you to do it, you still try to do it anyway. So you know, at that moment it was whatever it was. And now on vacation. If we go somewhere new that I don't know, I'm just like, all right, you could do your thing.
Speaker 1:But those are some of the benefits of going on vacation by yourself.
Speaker 2:And I think one of the big things too is a lot of people say they can't afford to go away. I know a lot of people who never travel and it is so important to go on vacation, even if you go somewhere on day trips, right, I mean, we do a lot of budget travel, which we'll get to, but go on a budget trip or take a couple of days and go somewhere.
Speaker 2:Because when people say they're on a staycation, what does that mean? You're cleaning your house for a week. Stay here On my days off, I look around and I'm laundry dishes, household projects. You can't just stay home and do nothing, unless, I guess, unless you have someone who comes and organizes and cleans your whole house so you can sit and do nothing, because it doesn't have to be.
Speaker 1:I know we talked about Tertola a whole time, but we've been to Maine. We were going to go to Rhode Island, we've been to Vermont, you know when you you can go to Lechorog, guadalupe, I think the official definition of what is considered long distance travel is anywhere that's 50 miles outside of your home. 50? Yeah 50. We do that for like a day trip every week, almost, yeah. But those are things that you can do, right. And so we've gone to even for the day we've gone to New Paltz, we've gone up to.
Speaker 1:Woodstock, so you don't have to take an extraordinary vacation, you can just do a day trip. What I do think is important, what I do think is important here is an accommodation choice right, and I want to talk about that real quick, and that's something that Lindsey is a master at.
Speaker 1:So we went to Barbados, which is called the Platinum Coast because everything there Well, we stayed on the Platinum Coast yeah, we stayed on and a lot of those rentals are like what was that when we were at RICO's on the beach, how much was that place that?
Speaker 2:I was like hey look that up 50,000 for a week. So which I?
Speaker 1:was like-.
Speaker 2:You can go on vacation and you can decide where you want to stay. There are times that we do go away and we splurge for sure, and then there's times that we go away and we go really cheap and budget travel and it really depends and I understand not everybody has the budget that we have, so we're really fortunate. I believe in quarterly vacation. I think it's important for my soul and we have a lot of trips coming up, so some are more expensive than others. So we go away and find locally owned lodging or boutique hotels or Airbnb and when we went to Barbados, that was a perfect example, because Barbados doesn't have a lot of American tourists. Where we stayed.
Speaker 2:All the American tourists go to Bridgetown which is the capital city In the sandals or any of those other all-inclusive hotels. I hate all-inclusive hotels. I don't go typically to islands where you need to stay in one, like Jamaica or Dominican or Mexico, because I want to go out and go off the property and explore. And so when we went to Barbados, we booked an Airbnb and we didn't even really know the lodging that was there until we were there. We saw, for example, that villa and then we had a couple of nice dinners at some of the hotels and resorts and we looked them up and everything is 1500 a night at most of those places.
Speaker 1:And I think we paid maybe 2000 and changed for 10 days. I'm going to do a plug at West Rockvillas.
Speaker 2:And it was beautiful and Barbados. I felt very safe the whole trip. I think you agree.
Speaker 1:Barbados is. I said look at these white people walking around with impunity Right and it was a very safe place.
Speaker 2:I never felt unsafe. I just felt unsafe with the driving there.
Speaker 1:That's a whole other story.
Speaker 2:So you can travel and Tortola is a perfect example of traveling on a budget, because there's no chain hotels in Tortola, everything is independently owned. Right when we stayed at Sebastian Seaside Villas, remember when we left they were adding everything up with an adding machine. Oh, I remember that.
Speaker 1:They didn't even have a computer. They didn't even rent one at a state of the art VHS tapes.
Speaker 2:Remember they had the list of VHS tapes available.
Speaker 1:They still use the VHS tapes. This is five years ago. We have the modern movies Home Alone, jaws.
Speaker 2:The Blair Witch Project. The Blair Witch, yes, remember that was so funny. So you can find these places if you look, and that's the thing. And you have to look and do your research. I happen to be very good at that. That's my thing.
Speaker 1:I probably was a travel agent in another life or something, and that's what I wanted to say is the first note that I have written on how to travel in the budget is to plan ahead. I know out of my own children I'm being from Brooklyn I know a lot of folks from Brooklyn who are like, oh, I can't afford to travel, this is beyond me to travel. But if you plan ahead and you're strategic about it, you can actually plan ahead and there's other places to go. If you can't afford to go to Caribbean, I can think of we've gone to Pensacola, which was oh, I love Pensacola.
Speaker 2:Pensacola was awesome we're.
Speaker 1:We've been to where we've been domestically. We went to.
Speaker 2:Nashville, gatlinburg, waynesville, north Carolina, a couple of times to see Timothy at school. We've been to the Finger Lakes, to Maine, New Hampshire, new Paltz. We've done a couple nights overnight there. Yeah, there's places that are close. There's great places to go. Personally, I am a beach vacation person and I believe it ain't blue, it ain't true. So I like to go to the Caribbean. But you can still go to the Caribbean and find these islands that are not so easy to get to, because that's really what makes Tortola such a hidden gem is that you can't just get there from the United States directly easily, and so that island is all. The islanders own the land, so they all have their own little spots and they're all competing with one another, so the prices are very low.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think about one of the notes that I put here is like how to save money is by traveling slowly. I think about a place like we went to, like Culebra, which is becoming more popular. But travel slowly means, hey, you only go to one or two places while you're there. You know, we've had friends that go to Italy and Greece. I don't know where to go to in. Culebra, except to the beach, except to the beach there's like three restaurants right. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we went to Culebra a couple of times, and that was really nice too. Remember when you became the taxi driver? Oh my God, we can share so many stories about our vacations. But Culebra, we stayed at that hilltop Casita for three weeks and that was just lovely. But I think you know you get bored. I like to go places where I could see no people, so I could see myself buying a property on Culebra and just buying enough groceries for a few weeks and never leaving.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's another thing that saved us money when we travel Even though we always do it and then we wind up because it's a vacation you don't always want to cook. No, I don't cook dinner on vacation.
Speaker 2:I cook dinner every night here.
Speaker 1:But we've had options when we've gone to Naples.
Speaker 2:There we've made sure, lots of different We've made sure to rent places.
Speaker 1:Even Culebra had a kitchenette. Pensacola had a little kitchenette. When we went to Nashville, no, we stayed in a hotel, and when we're going back to Nashville, we're also staying.
Speaker 2:I know best husband ever. He fought me those Kenny Chesney's and brown stadium tour tickets.
Speaker 1:It'll be two black people there. It'll be me and my shadow, and maybe yeah.
Speaker 2:No, there'll be other black folks out there?
Speaker 1:No, I can't wait.
Speaker 2:I can't wait, I'm super excited about that. No, but that's a little weekend trip. But when we go on an extended trip I do. My rule of thumb is I always make my own coffee in the room, and a lot of times I make breakfast in the room too, because there's no reason to go out and spend that money when you can just have the groceries delivered in and make your own breakfast.
Speaker 1:And then I want to move on. Yeah, that's really true, and I do think that that whole piece of doing your own coffee, making your own breakfast, those are important, because where you can save, you can save, and I do think that's the difference between doing an Airbnb or a VRBO with a hotel. There are certain places that I will not stay in. An Airbnb I'll never go. Remember we went to Binghamton, new York, and how scary it was. I will never, I'll never go to another college tour.
Speaker 1:That was scary. I'll never stay in an Airbnb New Orleans. I will never stay in an Airbnb Nashville I'll never stay.
Speaker 2:So there are certain places I would in Nashville, but we're only going to be there for a weekend.
Speaker 1:But do your research right, Do your research plan ahead.
Speaker 2:Yeah, do your research Definitely plan ahead and set a budget and then look within that budget Because you can really cut back on costs by. I mean, even JetBlue has Blue Basic where you just take your one little bag on the plane.
Speaker 1:And one thing that I've learned recently is and I'm going to do a plug to Klarna and to PayPal QuadPay is hey, if you keep your prices for your plane or your hotel down under a certain amount, you can do like, say, for instance, we bought airplane tickets to Barbados, I put them on the QuadPay.
Speaker 2:I know and I hate that because I love to just pay cash.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But QuadPay is the same difference.
Speaker 1:It's the same difference. It's coming out of your bank account, but you're just splitting it up into four equal payments. So instead of paying $2,000 all at once, you're paying $500 over a course every two weeks, Right two?
Speaker 2:weeks Right, so of course the week Right. But you can also budget travel right. Don't go during the busiest weeks, that's right.
Speaker 2:I mean we happen to because we have the balancing of the kids with the custody. We often have to travel during the busy travel times and for those times, what do we do? We book the flights the day that they're released. So we knew we were going to go to Barbados for spring break again this year, so we booked them the day they were released. Same thing for Florida. We're going back to Naples for Christmas to see my folks, so we booked the flights the same day that they came out. But the bottom line is is find the time to travel with your partner, because it will make or break the relationship. But it's also really important to spend time together and get out of your comfort zone together and to just experience different things together.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my youngest son just came back. So I have between, we have seven between us because we're insane and we love children, but we love them all we do. But my youngest, well, my youngest, which would be, I think, fourth in the line of succession and we're going to do succession, our version of succession, years from now he just came back from Miami with his girlfriend and he was like it was a wonderful time and it really brought them closer. It really brought them closer together. So it is something that if you can do successfully, hey, it's a wonderful thing. Even my, the oldest, who just turned 28, and I forgot his birthday so happy, belated. I'm so sorry for missing it. He was against traveling and he recently went to London on a budget trip and now he's going to try to come with us to Barbados. Realizes how important it is to travel.
Speaker 2:No, it is. It's important to travel. It's also it's important to get out of your own comfort zone, whether it be traveling, trying new places, new cuisines, things like that. I'm a big traveler. We go away a lot. I think I have four trips planned right Naples, barbados, tortola, we're going to go a couple of days to Anagata, we're going to Nashville, we're going back to the Finger Lakes. So five trips planned before Labor Day.
Speaker 1:And all under. I would say we're not spending over, let's say under, $8,000. Five for five trips.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, no, we budget travel, but also the differences that we work. I can work from home because I work for myself, so I sometimes still see my clients and still do things, so it's a little bit of a different situation. That's the other problem. A lot of people are stuck with their limited amount of vacation time.
Speaker 1:The last thing I want to touch on with the couple of minutes we have left is for somebody like me who was new to travel, like those years ago, what are some recommendations for staying safe?
Speaker 2:while you're traveling, Do your research ahead of time. Don't go to places that are really unsafe unless you're staying at an all-inclusive hotel, and so just be aware. I think just have a general level of awareness wherever you go. Now, I felt really unsafe in New Orleans, so I was definitely looking around over my shoulder the whole time. So you know, but just know where you're going.
Speaker 1:Yeah, one of the safety experts I listened to said if you were home and a stranger came up and talked to you, you would be like what are you talking to me for? And so the same thing when you are, the same thing when you're traveling is you want to be cautious? As Lindsay said, you really want to understand your surroundings. I always say I feel like what gets people in trouble when they go on vacations and you hear these horrible stories of things that happen to folks either be misadventure, like the family that died in Airbnb a couple of years ago from the carbon monoxide poisoning, or a couple that went missing in Belize is that they weren't really. They didn't really and we're not. I'm not victim blaming, but you really have to do your research and not and know where you're going and really get understand your surroundings. One of the first things that we do whenever we go to Airbnb. What do I always do, lindsay? What do I do?
Speaker 2:You check every single room in the house.
Speaker 1:I walk through every single room in the house, except for in Bingington, where you are, like Nabra, don't go in the basement. Don't go in the basement. Something happened.
Speaker 2:You remember how crazy that house was. Do you remember? The next morning, the first night, we stayed, we woke up and none of us slept because we were all so scared, all of us, all of us, and I had told you it was just so creepy. And then the next night, so we did the college tour, and then the second night we slept. Do you remember we woke up at four in the morning. Everybody was like everyone was packed, we're like let's get the fuck out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's get out of here. Which, which, which?
Speaker 2:which goes to-. So there's certain places where you need to stay in accommodations, such as a hotel, where there's a lobby and there's people working. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:That's Bingington, right, bingington, bingington. But that goes to the last point that I wrote about being safe, which is trust your instincts. My mom and dad had, and my, my sister, talia, had a similar experience where they went somewhere with my aunt, uncle David and Aunt Mary. I don't remember where it was, but all of them, all five of them, got into this place and they were like nah, this is weird, something's not right here, and and and unlike the folks in the horror movie, because these are like five black people, we're like, nah, we getting the fuck out of here. So, my mom, they, all five of them, they all had the same feeling as soon as they got in there and they, they checked out, they went someplace else. I don't know what it was that they felt.
Speaker 1:I don't know, but it is. It is good to trust your instincts. As Lindsey pointed out, If something doesn't feel right, don't do it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was us in Bingington. So yeah, that being said, I think it's important to travel. Vacation is important, taking time off is important. You learn to compromise in relationships, you adapt, you learn new cultures, you meet new people that are really interesting and you just learn a lot about each other.
Speaker 1:You only go around in this particular life, whatever, whatever you believe in, and you only go around in this place one time, once. And if you have the money or if you have the ability, we would both encourage you to travel, to travel, to travel, to travel, and you can't figure it out, so you just email us and I'll let you know how to do it in a budget.
Speaker 1:Yeah, email us and get to know the devil at gmailcom and we will help you plan that travel, that put that travel plan. Lindsey, what are we going to talk about next week?
Speaker 2:I think we're going to talk about having difficult conversations, because this is something that's come up with some of my clients Not no, don't worry, you're not an Oxy, but some of the stuff that's come up with my clients that I think you know that kind of sparked the idea for me for an episode was that people are in relationships for such a long time but they still can't have difficult conversations. And you know, we'll get into some of the reasons why.
Speaker 1:I'm looking forward to that. Yeah, this and this has been another episode of the devil, you don't know. Please rate and review us on whatever platform. You're listening to us and tell your friends. Let more people know about the good work, of the OK work that Lindsey and Clee were doing over here.